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Liveblog: 178th Semiannual General Conference

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LDS Conference Center

LDS Conference Center in Salt Lake City, Utah

In my most ambitious liveblogging yet, I’m going to attempt to liveblog General Conference.  I must admit, this will probably be more of a notetaking project for me than anything else, but it might turn into something interesting and fun if we start getting other people participating online here (like you!).  You will be able to enter your name, and your comments, all live and in real-time.

Clearly, I will not be rewriting everything that is being said.  The Church’s English video stream will be embedded alongside the liveblog, so you can watch and listen while participating in a discussion and commentary about what is being said at the same time.  If you visit TempleStudy.com over the next two days the homepage will display the video and liveblog and nothing else to distract.

I am looking forward to learning at the feet of the Lord’s prophets and apostles over the next two days.  How blessed we are to live at this time, and to be instructed by prophets, seers, and revelators!

Update 10/5/08: The liveblog notes from Conference are below. Click on the circular replay button in the center below to read them.

San Salvador El Salvador Temple Groundbreaking

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San Salvador El Salvador Temple. © 2008, Intellectual Reserve. All rights reserved. (click for larger view)

San Salvador El Salvador Temple. © 2008, Intellectual Reserve. All rights reserved. (click for larger view)

The announcement of the building of the San Salvador, El Salvador, temple was particularly moving for me since that is where I served my mission (’00-’02).  The closest temple for members in the country when I served there was the Guatemala City Guatemala Temple.  Making the trip to Guatemala typically took members years of saving, a week long trip in a bus, and usually only happened once in a lifetime.  This temple will be a great blessing for them.

LDSChurchTemples.com reports that the temple groundbreaking ceremony took place just a few days ago on September 20, 2008.  Elder Don R. Clarke from the Quorum of the Seventy, and president of the Central America area, presided at the meeting.  Photos of the ceremony can be seen here.  The temple will be dedicated in 2010 or 2011.

See the approximate location of this temple.  If you know more precisely where it will be going, please let me know.

New Mormon.org Website

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New Mormon.org Homepage

New Mormon.org Homepage

Check out the new Mormon.org website that was launched today.  It is very clean and well designed, a big improvement over the former website.  A great new feature of the site that I’m sure will be used a lot is that visitors from anywhere in the world will be able to chat live with missionaries online at any time of the day.

www.Mormon.org

[via NorthTemple.com]

The Seal of Melchizedek – Part 3

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Seal of Melchizedek turned into LDS cufflinks, tie bars/clips, tie tacs

Seal of Melchizedek turned into LDS cufflinks, tie bars/clips, tie tacs

(Continued from Part 2)

Having found the mosaics from Ravenna, Italy, that displayed this symbol in connection with Melchizedek, I wanted to do some more research to see if I could find the symbol mentioned anywhere else.  And, of course, I went to the best tool for online research – Google.  The difficulty with using Google is that you can usually find someone saying something about pretty much anything.  So it’s not only a task of finding the correct information, but of determining its credibility.

One of the first results you come to is a blog called “Ernest Goes to Iraq” with a blog post “The Sign of Melchizedek.”  Ernest explains:

I heard directly from one of the architect team partners that designed the San Diego Temple, he explained that the designer saw this symbol in a dream and based the floor plan and décor of the temple on this design; namely two offset, intersecting squares. Much like the 6-point Star of David but with 8 points instead.  [Read more…]

New Site – MormonConferences.org

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One of our readers, Kent White, has built a new website at MormonConferences.org which gives announcements of upcoming conferences and papers which have to do with the Church and Mormonism.  As Kent describes it:

This site’s purpose is to provide those who have an interest in Mormon Studies the ability to easily find all of the conferences where presentations are made on Mormonism’s theology, history, culture, and people. I have particularly tried to make this a resource for scholars of Mormonism and those who enjoy academics, including the most comprehensive list of Calls for Papers on Mormon Studies (even if the papers aren’t presented at a conference).

I haven’t been too involved in the various conferences in the past, but I plan to change all of that.  These conferences/symposiums are an excellent way to stay current on all the latest scholarship in the Church, and to learn a great deal.  I appreciate the work that Kent has done on this website, and I have subscribed to his feeds.  Kent gave me the opportunity to design his site’s logo too, so that was fun.

Check out MormonConferences.org!