Check your Privilege: Count your Blessings
When people talk about "privilege" -- as in "white privilege" or "male privilege" or "straight privilege" -- it can be easy for some people to tune out. Here's another social justice warrior telling me I should feel bad for something I have no control over, or telling...
Are We Not All Beggars?
I can't see anything about immigration or refugees in the news without thinking of my friends and my family. People I consider my blood. Some people are my blood. My wife is Guatemalan. My daughter is half Guatemalan. My two oldest brothers are also half Guatemalan....
Back to School Gratitude
My kids go back to school next week. HALLELUJAH, Y’ALL, WE MADE IT THROUGH THE SUMMER!! I have one child entering 7th grade, one in preschool through her daycare, and THREE kindergartners this year, as my 5 year old son just missed the deadline for starting...
An Open Letter to the General Primary Presidency
Dear Sisters, My wife and I are the parents of a ten year old daughter. We were excited and saddened to learn about this past Sunday's lesson in Primary about modesty. The lesson was entitled,Dressing Modestly Shows Respect for Heavenly Father and Myself. (for those...
DONALD TRUMP HATES MUSLIMS… AND MAYBE MORMONS?
Most of you are familiar with Donald Trump's anti-Muslim proposal from December 2015: "Donald J. Trump is calling for a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country's representatives can figure out what is going on. According to...
It’s Probably Hard to Be a Lesbian Mom
Two family studies researchers have been lionized by defenders of heterosexual, two-parent families, and demonized by proponents of same-sex marriage in recent years. Their studies showing poor outcomes for children of parents in same-sex relationships compared to...
Scoring Points or Saving Lives?
According to a story in the Salt Lake Tribune on August 8th, “Brigham Young University's intolerance of homosexual behavior should keep the private school out of the Big 12, a group of national LGBT advocacy groups says in a letter addressed to Big 12 commissioner Bob...
No, My 8 Year Old is Not Getting Baptized
My oldest child turns 8 in December. I know what this means for my cultural traditions. He has been getting invited to baptisms all year long as the rest of his primary class moves through this coming-of-age hallmark. But I can't do it. I can't allow it. Let me be...
Zion. Really.
If Joseph Smith had an authentic experience with the Divine (which I think he did), and if his experience was prophetic rather than strictly personal (which I think it was), his emerging vision of Zion was pretty much inevitable. To put it another way: The most...
Landing Instructions: How to Navigate (or Help Someone Navigating) a Faith Crisis
Many years ago, I took a flight from Baltimore to New York on a turboprop airplane. I love to fly and I had never experienced a turboprop, so I was thrilled to get on the plane. But what started out as an adventure ended up a nerve-wracking experience when we ran into...
God Sees Us: Talking To Youth About Race and the Priesthood
The following essay was written for a group of Laurels and Priests in Highland, Utah. It was created in regards to a discussion about the Priesthood and Temple restrictions set for black Latter-day Saints, racism and how to have a conversation about the restrictions...
Faith and Doubt in Contemporary American Mormonism: A Quantitative Empirical Perspective
Last week I presented at the 2016 Salt Lake Sunstone Symposium. The title of the presentation was "Faith and Doubt in Contemporary American Mormonism: A Quantitative Empirical Perspective." Here is the abstract as it appeared in the program: Much has recently been...
Intellectual is not a 4-letter word
We live in an information age. The access we have to information is unparalleled in the history of the world. The internet has democratized information. It is no longer simply kept in the hands of a select few. It seems this is leading to the end of the age of the...
102: Ask a Mormon Sex Therapist Part 15
Here in the 14th installment of the “Ask a Mormon Sex Therapist” series I discuss a fascinating research article about sexual arousal with Dr. Jennifer Finlayson-Fife (title and abstract below) and Jennifer fields a question about the frustration a couple is...
ZEALOT – A BOOK REVIEW
Aslan, Reza. Zealot. The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth. Random House, 2013. Reviewed by Sheldon Greaves, Ph.D. Zealot first came to my attention when I was teaching classes on the New Testament early Christianity at Stanford University the year the book was...
Grief
On my mind tonight: Grief. After an emotionally difficult day at work today, my mind turned to loss and grief as I drove home. I thought about the grief I have experienced personally in losing our twin sons at 20 weeks. My mind drifted to my friends who have also lost...
LGBTQ Mormon Crisis
Two Printable handout for bishops and stake presidents that talks empirically about LGBTQ suicides:
The LGBTQ Mormon Crisis: Responding to the Empirical Research on Suicide
Youth Suicide Rates and Mormon Religious Context: An Additional Empirical Analysis
The Barker Brothers’ Projects
These videos were created for Latter-day Saint parents and allies to voice their love for their LGBT brothers and sisters, sons and daughters. They want to give a message of comfort and support to other parents who are navigating the difficult conflicts that can arise in families around this issue.
“Cogito!” (“I think!”) follows the intellectual adventures of a recovering academic outside the walls of academia.
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