membership

Are Church Leaders Accountable to the Membership?

Accountability

Accountability

I received an email today which highlights a serious error which I believe runs rampant among some members of the Church, especially those I encounter online. Here are some excerpts from the email which demonstrate the issue:

… You should allow this point to be made.  You can always oppose that point, but to suppress it altogether points to a lack of honesty, and integrity in the debate…

Being a fan of Nibley, you should recognize that all is not well in Zion, and it’s up to the inhabitants of Zion to make corrections.  … We have a duty to put pressure on our leaders …   [Read more…]

Using Google Wave in the LDS Church

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Google Wave

Google Wave

Anyone who has been following this blog for some time knows that I love new technologies, and most particularly how those new technologies might be used to benefit the Church and the work of the kingdom of God on the earth.  Last week I received a nomination to the “preview” of the new Google Wave service from a friend on Twitter (thank you!).  Last night I finally received my invitation to join the service and test it out.  I quickly hopped on board and began exploring.

I’ve only used the tool for a few hours, and its only available in a very limited preview release at the moment, but I’m already wondering how this cool new technology could be used in the Church to help the work roll on.  For those who are not familiar with the service, it is being touted as the ultimate collaboration tool, an amalgam of email, instant messaging, wikis, social networking, document collaboration, picture/video sharing, and much more.  Many are still not sure what exactly its potential is, or if it will even catch on.  But from my limited encounter so far, it does seem like a powerful tool for working on things together, and I think it will be of use to many.

So the question that’s been rolling around in my head then is, how can we use Google Wave in the Church?  How could it facilitate those things we already do in the Church to make them better?  How can we harness its power to help the threefold mission of the Church accomplish its ends in a quicker, easier, or simpler way?  [Read more…]

Two More Temples

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In case you missed it, President Monson yesterday announced plans to build two more temples, both in Arizona. One will be in Gila Valley, and the other in Gilbert. The LDS Newsroom notes that this will bring the number of temples operating, and in planning or construction, to 139. These are also the first temples that have been announced by President Monson since becoming the prophet and president of the Church. President Monson is dedicated to continuing the legacy of temple building that his predecessor, President Hinckley, instituted:

It is my personal priority to make sure members of the Church have access to the blessings of the temple. It is here where members learn of their divine origin and destiny, where they are strengthened spiritually as individuals and as families. Temples are sanctuaries from the storms of life.

Here is a graph of the growth of the numbers of temples and membership since the organization of the Church in 1830. You can see that there is roughly one temple per every 100,000 members of the Church: