family

Unfreezing Our Hearts: Choosing to See the Beauty in Disney’s Frozen

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Anna and Elsa embrace at the end of Frozen.

Anna and Elsa embrace at the end of Frozen.

This is a guest post by Raven Haymond, my dear wife.

This life, we are taught, is all about choices. Ultimately, this existence can be framed by the choices made in three gardens. It almost reads like a fairy tale.

Once upon a time, there was a garden, blooming with all the beauty this world could hold. In this garden lived a prince and a princess who spent their days in the light of the sun, in the shade of the tree, and in the company of Gods. One day, a jealous serpent whispered into the princess’s ear, hissing truths encased in mischief. After listening to the serpent’s words, and after considering the beauty of her present life, the princess made the choice to disobey one of the rules of life in this garden and eat the fruit that would cause her and her children to know the bad with the good, the sorrow with the joy, the toil with the happiness. When her prince found out what she had done, he, too, ate that heavy fruit, for he knew that a life without her was not really a life at all. When their choice was found out, the prince and the princess were cast out of their beautiful garden, into a world of isolation and strife. However, this choice to leave perfect beauty allowed them to know the miracles of family, faith, and repentance. [Read more…]

Homeward Bound: Interpretations of Marta Keen Thompson’s Music

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homeward bound

Cover of album “Homeward Bound” by Deutsche Grammophon

This past Sunday afternoon I came across a piece of music that moved me to tears.  I don’t get emotional often, so I was struck by the overwhelming power this song has, which I believe is the result of an exquisitely crafted resonance of lyric, melody, arrangement, and vocal talent combined in perfect harmony.  It’s one of those songs that seems to reach down into the deepest parts of my experience and speak to me on a level usually untapped.  I immediately took a closer look at the song, trying to unpack its meaning, and why it moves me so.  I hope to share some of the beauty that I found.

The song’s title is “Homeward Bound.”  No, not that one, by Simon & Garfunkel.  While a good song, it’s not that kind of song.  Rather, the song I heard is by the composer Marta Keen Thompson, who currently lives in Las Vegas.  She wrote the lyrics and music to this song, and this seems to be her most well-known composition.  Marta wrote some about her song, and who has performed it, on a Facebook page dedicated to the song: [Read more…]

Hugh Nibley’s on Twitter! And has a Blog

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Hugh Nibley [off the record]

Hugh Nibley [off the record]

Well, not really.  But it sure seems so!  

Nibley’s family organization Hugh Nibley & Associates has organized a Twitter feed and a new blog, HughNibley.net, dedicated to Hugh Nibley’s work.  The Twitter feed includes quotes from Hugh at least once every day, as if he were tweeting, which I’m sure he would scoff at, but is fun nonetheless.  What would Nibley write in a 140-character sound bite?  You’d be surprised some of the concise, off-beat, meaningful, spot on, quirky, poignant, strange, and humorous things that have already been posted.

The HughNibley.net blog is meant to publish more of Hugh Nibley’s work, including ebooks, and new materials.  They explain:

[Read more…]

Radically different views of Death

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A couple months ago I received an email from someone who stumbled onto TempleStudy.com.  It read in part,

[The Bible] is purely a creation of man to placate the ego’s fear of death and nothing more. All religion was invented to buffer the ego against the fear of death.

That’s certainly one way to think of death.  Another way to think of it is that religion gives meaning to life and death.  Hugh Nibley often quoted a poem by A.E. Housman about man’s preoccupation with death:

. . . men at whiles are sober
And think by fits and starts,
And if they think, they fasten
Their hands upon their hearts. ((Qtd. in Nibley, “Prophets and Glad Tidings,” The World and the Prophets, 259-67,http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/bookschapter.php?bookid=54&chapid=515))

The prominent literary scholar Harold Bloom once said,

What is the essence of religion? … Religion rises inevitably from our apprehension of our own death. To give meaning to meaninglessness is the endless quest of all religion. ((http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/commentary/what-is-this-thing-that-men-call-death))

I recently came upon two vastly different modes of thinking about death.  The juxtaposition of these two starkly different views is very interesting.   [Read more…]

The Promises Made to the Fathers

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Elijah Appearing In The Kirtland Temple, by Dan Lewis.

Elijah Appearing In The Kirtland Temple, by Dan Lewis.

My father is on the High Council in the Riverton Utah Stake, and this past Sunday he was asked to speak in a ward about the temple and family history work.  He sent me his talk, and I thought it was good and thought provoking.  I thought you might like it too.  -Bryce

By Mark Haymond
November 15, 2009
Riverton 11th Ward

At the first of October, just last month, I had the privilege of traveling with other members of our stake and even President and Sister Higbee back to the important sites in early Church history. We visited the birthplace of Joseph in Sharon, Vermont. We visited Harmony, Pennsylvania, where the Prophet Joseph and Emma first lived after they were married. In the home in Harmony most of the Book of Mormon was translated and revelations were received. Just behind that home, not fifty yards, are the banks of the Susquehanna River where John the Baptist laid his hands on Joseph and Oliver’s heads and the authority of the Aaronic Priesthood was bestowed upon them. While Joseph and Emma lived in Harmony, the Apostles Peter, James and John came to the earth and laid their hands on the heads of Joseph and Oliver and bestowed upon them the Melchizedek Priesthood and the holy Apostleship.  [Read more…]