Here is my Back to School gift for you to share with your kids (or parents) in Family Home Evening. Hopefully it adds some fun to the old Primary Plan of Salvation Diagram. I’ve provided links to documents you can download or print out yourselves, as posters or as figures to cut out and lay out on your living room floor as you tell the story of eternity. Enjoy.
- An openclipart collection containing nearly all of the images used in this poster.
- Google Drive folder containing high resolution .svg (Inkscape), .xcf (GIMP), .jpg, .pdf, and .png files.
The first two are free, open source software formats that will allow different kinds of editing of the documents. The later files should allow poster printing, although the small fonts used require either larger size posters or high resolution printing services. (The standard 15o dpi resolution won’t work for anything smaller than 24×36″, but I think it is ok at that size. Check the previews before ordering. I think I found a high resolution print service for an 18×24″ poster, but I haven’t had one printed yet, myself.) Also in this folder are standard, 8.5 x 11″ pdf documents with pieces that can be printed out and used for a floor or flannel board type presentation of the Plan of Salvation. (Edit: I replaced Ubuntu fonts with Lucida fonts. It should work without difficulty for most people, and not cause problems with printers. I can supply the previous versions upon request.) You may need to install Ubuntu fonts for some of the text to be formatted correctly, or you are welcome to reformat anything.
I’ve explained my reasoning on parts of the poster in previous posts (Starting here and continuing here). Other aspects I will justify further in future posts. If anyone wants to contribute to future versions of this poster, I’d love collaborations or suggestions. For example, while it works, I’m not in love with “outer darkness”. I’d like to convey that it is “outside” and that it is “dark”. I don’t want to use a black hole, because those may be sources of new universes and new life. I modeled this image on dye bleeding on wet fabric, which was fun, but it doesn’t quite convey what I would like.
Another example would be the words or quotes used in explanations. If you can think of better quotes or clearer words to explain any of the concepts, I would welcome them. Maybe we can make a web based, hyperlinked version of the Plan of Salvation where people can click or float their cursor over different parts to find scriptural references, quotes, or links to more substantial discussions of the topic.
A third example is that Christ’s role is nearly absent in this presentation. Maybe a quote or reference by “Resurrection” is in order.
Once again, I hope you enjoy it. Let me know what you think, and feel free to help me make it better.
Jonathan Cannon
Jonathan lives in rural Georgia with his wife and three boys, teaching Chemistry and enjoying the good people of his community. He studied Molecular Biology at Brigham Young University, and Biophysics at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. Jonathan is passionate about fatherhood, teaching and learning, Mormonism, and dance (he's much better at the first three), and dabbles in home repairs, various crafts, poetry, music, gardening, and Transhumanism. He has enjoyed many years working in Primary, with Young Adults and Ward Missions in various capacities. He currently enjoys serving in his ward and community however he is able. He posts on whatever interests him at the moment at http://jonathan.metacannon.net/
All posts by Jonathan Cannon
Jonathan,
So, how do I do a poster-size printing of this? Do I send one of the files to Kinko’s or something like that?
You can. Most sites will have a preview, so you can see if it will be clear or blurry once it is printed. I’m going to try to fix (switch) the fonts so that there aren’t crowding issues in a couple of places on the jpg (or pdf depending on whether your pdf reader renders the ubuntu fonts correctly). I’ll switch to a more common set of fonts. If you can wait a month for me to get around to it, it will be better for printing, then.
Fonts are changed. You should be able to download the jpg from the GoogleDrive folder and submit it for printing. Make sure you look closely at the digital proofs, first. Most places only do 150 dpi for posters, so you have to see if your shop does more or you have to make it big enough.
I really liked this. I love the idea that the cosmos is more infinite than even God’s infinite knowledge. Gives me hope that eternity won’t be boring. 🙂 What is your opinion on how human evolution squares with the Gospel narrative? It is one of my biggest pet peeves that so many Church members dismiss such basic (and obvious) facts of evolution.
Here are my thoughts at this time, some of them fairly tentative.
As far as Evolution is true and real, we will ultimately have to conform our understanding of the gospel to those truths. Evolution is a fundamental reality for life on this earth, so my gospel narrative squares with that just fine.
Speculatively, any God within Nature–which I believe Mormon Gods are–is likely to be governed by some evolutionary principles. Those principles may not be much like the ones we experience, but it is fun for me to think about what God would be like if he were shaped by evolution. I think he comes out looking pretty good, and very interesting.
I like the mapping. Nice job.
I like the side bar showing the degrees of glory as applied to stages of the plan!
This is awesome! Thank you. I have been contemplating and studying the plan of salvation these past few months. I feel like there’s so much more to the story than the simplified version I taught as a missionary. Its exciting. What’s your email? I’ll work on typing up some notes of my thoughts. I don’t have new answers but just new ways of looking at the ones we have in scripture. Thanks again.
t h e y o g r e@ g ma i l. co m
I’d love to hear your thoughts.
Logically complete cosmological concept. /due to lack of knowledge of the English language was not able to correct the translation Implemented by Google/
In order to present the unlimited space originally:
1. homogeneous – enough to postulate the presence in it of two elements with Simple and Complex /closed systematically/
2. heterogeneous – enough to postulate the presence in it of one more element – the Most High and Almighty God – with open systematically.
It is easy to assume that even at the lowest possible deployment of the intangible component of the essence of God – the Spirit of God – for the level of the original downwardly directed the permanent deployment of the material component of the essence of God, there is a curtailment of Simple and Complex /i.e.. It is their decay due to blocking of origin upwardly directed constantly deploy intangible components of the entity / as much as possible heterogeneous to God's essence minimum possible number of cell uniformity (1H), and God on the basis of the material components of the 1H deploys the minimum possible heterogeneous to its essence as possible numerically elemental homogeneity (2H). Coagulation process will begin in 2H known God start time since the completion of its deployment. curtailment of the Spirit of God to the level of initial deployment again unfolds 1H – God potential for transformation 1H into 2H and 1H into 2H limitless!