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Recent Posts
- Grondahl 62
- 64 Psaltery & Lyre: James A. Clark, “The Captain”
- Ride to the Genesis Group’s Commemoration of the Priesthood Revelation
- Our Favorite Mormons: Freda Lucretia Magee
- 63 Psaltery & Lyre: Annaliese Wagner, “There are Volcanoes in Iceland”
- Ride to Lakewood Church
- Grondahl Restored 61
- June: A Tough Pull
- Nerd Version of “Dance Moms”
- 62 Psaltery & Lyre: Theric Jepson, “Rifflection: ‘To His Mistress Going to Bed’ by John Donne”
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The Sanctuary Archive
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Battle Hymn of My Mormon Mother
First thing: It is somewhat appropriate that my tribute to my mom is showing up after Mother’s Day proper. My card and gift also showed up after Mother’s Day proper.... -
3 Little Gurus
“The greatest advantage of not having children must be that you can go on believing that you are a nice person. Once you have children, you realize how wars start.”... -
A Street-Legal Version of the Beatitudes
I am reading The Street-Legal Version of Mormon’s Book by BYU music professor Michael Hicks (and recently did a Mormon Stories Book Club podcast with him . . . stay... -
The Pharisee Within
Today, I gave a talk in church about the last week of Jesus’ life. In the course of my talk prep, I was struck by the multiple warnings and chidings... -
Thanks (but no thanks) for the Sabbath School
I’m halfhearted about Sunday School. Okay, less than half. I feel like a boy who’s been held back in, say, fourth grade. A year goes by, then two, then three,... -
Rain or Shine
When my then six year old son was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes six years ago, I heard someone close to me asking the question, “Why him? Why us? Why... -
What We Talk About When We Talk About Culturally Constructed Holidays
Five out of six dentists agree that five out of the last six Valentine’s Days I’ve lived through have mostly sucked. The one in the middle was swell, though, since... -
‘Tis Sweet to Sing the Matchless Love
-Submitted by Michael Hicks I got choked up when I played that sacrament song today. It takes awhile to explain why. But please stay with me as I try. Our... -
One Word
I am a recovering perfectionist wannabe. Sometimes when I think about who I used to be, I marvel that I could have gotten so flustered about so many things, but... -
Parenthood Juggle: From SAHM to Single Parent
I couldn’t quite believe my bishop had confidence in my ability to be in charge. “Are you sure about this?” I asked him. “My life is falling apart right now.” -
The Years of Magical Thinking
“I know the truth about Santa Claus, Mom. I know the answers now, the real answers,” my twelve year old son said to me solemnly last week, waving a Christmas card featuring the red-cheeked... -
Words, Words, Words
Earlier this week, someone I didn’t know, someone I’ve never met, just a woman in pain, mistakenly thought I had taken something of hers, or rather, someone of hers. In... -
What Teaching Argument Taught Me About Talking Politics
Although I fancy myself an amateur city planner with dreams of working in the professional back-up dancer field, I actually spend ten months of each year teaching writing for a... -
My Own Personal Canon: Desdemona’s Honeymoon from Hell
There are a few things I know really well in this world. I know how to make a delicious marinara sauce, I know the second soprano part of “Boogie Woogie... -
What to Do with Regret
I believe that as we spend quality time with love ones, stretch ourselves to live up to our potential, and allow ourselves to be happier, we may not have zero... -
Mutual Improvement Associations: Singing Together
One week ago, I had just sat down on the piano bench in the Primary room and started to play some wiggle songs while the junior primary children galloped in,... -
Christ Within
Today’s guest post comes to us from Bill. On a recent business trip to San Francisco, while on a walk with some coworkers to find food, out of the corner... -
Mutual Improvement Associations: Pinewood Derby
Here is an example of just how swell my post-divorce home teachers were. During one Sunday afternoon visit, they asked for and each ate a large bowl of spaghetti and... -
A Whole Lot of Craziness
It’s funny how one story can take on different meanings, reveal different themes, and speak to us in new ways depending on who we are during the time of reading.... -
Starfish Beyond Mountains
Everyone knows the parable of the starfish. Some of us even have a framed print of the parable, maybe a shadow box with an actual dried starfish, hanging in the... -
My Own Personal Canon: Yeah, Yeah, Yeah
A little more than a year ago, I was on my way home from a ten-day vipassana meditation course. I had spent twelve days in total at the center, ten... -
Mutual Improvement Associations: Tools, Tents, and Radiant Hope
Today’s powerful and inspiring Mutual Improvement Associations comes from our guest blogger, Mark. Let’s begin in typical LDS-sacrament-meeting-talk fashion and define the meaning of some words. Mutual Improvement Association. What does... -
PROUD
Part 1 – Setting the Stage Earlier this week I sat and thought about the weekend. Should I march in the Pride Parade? Do I belong there – as a... -
Good Grief
But in that moment, I acknowledge the reality that it’s nearly impossible for me to go back, for my faith to be sufficient, for me to KNOW that there is... -
Mutual Improvement Associations: Wednesday Nights
My son is a bit of a puppy dog, though more bounding Great Dane than docile lap dog. He is tall with shaggy-ish hair and size nearly-9 feet and a... -
Mutual Improvement Associations: Moving Day
This is the first of at least four pieces in a Sanctuary series — Mutual Improvement Associations — wherein I try to describe the bonds that exist between members of... -
My Own Personal Canon: The Learn’d Astronomer
Lately, I have been spending a portion of nearly every evening stargazing in my backyard. There is a beautiful quality of light that graces the Texas sky come 8 p.m.... -
It is just a matter of semantics?
Today’s guest post comes to us from Andrew. I’ve spent the past several weeks euphemizing, dodging, and altering the narrative of the long out-of-print Book of Mormon Reader as I... -
A Preview of Things to Come?
My son is the only boy in his Primary class, which makes him the only soon-to-be Young Man in the Valiant 11 group. He will be turning twelve this spring,... -
Onward and Upward
My son made a basket during the final game of his fifth grade basketball season yesterday! It was a beautiful shot, let me tell you. I was holding my breath... -
Where the Rubber Meets the Road
In the space of just four weeks during the most recent holiday season, I had to purchase three new tires for my Mormon mommy minivan. That seems like a lot,... -
On Thin Places
I’ve been chewing my way through The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith by Marcus Borg, a professor of religion and culture at Oregon State University. Borg’s is... -
My Own Personal Canon: Letter from Birmingham Jail
Dr. Martin Luther King’s famous April 1963 letter, written to his fellow southern clergymen, was not known to me, sadly, until I was a college student, some thirty plus years... -
My Own Personal Canon: Bootless Cries
Today I am thinking about a profound lesson I learned as a student at Ricks College. I am thinking about the sacred text that prompted this lesson, its lines inspired,... -
Reboots: Comic Book Heroes, Origin Stories and Mormon Myth
As a kid I read a lot of comic books. I enjoyed studying the intricate character storylines consisting of their origin stories, their many adventures and their overlapping histories with other... -
Ring Out, Wild Bells!
Is your ward like mine — that first Sunday of January brings another round of Sacrament Meeting talks on setting goals? For the record, I love those talks. I’m actually... -
Lighting the Way
When I moved to Texas several decades ago as a naive, hopelessly midwestern college student, adjustments had to be made. I had to get used to the way people here... -
My Own Personal Canon: Southern-fried Love
In Paul’s 2nd epistle to Timothy, chapter 3, verses 14-17, we read this ringing endorsement of inspired writings: But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and has been... -
Kitten Energy
I hope you’ve been enjoying our discussions of animal love (and non-love) this week here at Doves & Serpents. Considering that our blog’s title names two animals, it’s a wonder we... -
Going to the Dogs
The following piece is a guest submission by Claudia Ruptier Ron liked dogs. He just didn’t want one—even after he’d been diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment with likely progression... -
Rotten to the Core
The Sanctuary may seem like an unusual place to discuss Facebook status post trends, but recently, I was so disturbed by a word art image being shared and “liked” on... -
Do You Realize?
Two powerful iconic men — Steve Jobs, technology visionary, and Fred Shuttlesworth, Civil Rights movement activist — died this week. While Shuttlesworth’s death was certainly mourned and reported on, it... -
The Go-To Goddess
“What does God look like?” I asked my little girl as I tucked her into bed. “Well, he is old, and he has a beard, and wears a….a white dress,”... -
Meditation Station
If you were to open your green hymnbook emblazoned with that nifty gold Tabernacle organ icon to page hymn #144, you’d find this ode to solitude, a song about the... -
Schooled
The kids and I began this school year with everything organized and ready. Clothes, backpacks, lunches – all ready to go. I summoned my inner “Tiger Mom” and set up... -
Doubting Thomas & Me
“Faith is like a little seed. If planted it will grow,” sing the Primary children. The Book of Alma extends the metaphor of faith as a seed beautifully. While I’m... -
Fast (?) Sunday
It is the first Sunday of the month. In many Mormon families that means one thing: no breakfast! Well, that’s a bit of an oversimplification, I’ll admit, but fasting (for... -
10 Seconds with Tinkerbell
This week I found myself in that place Tinkerbell is so fond of – the place between asleep and awake. I opened my eyes from an awkward catnap on the... -
O Pioneers!
One year we had a brown horse in the church parking lot. Bonnet-wearing girls and cowboy-hatted boys took turns “riding” him around the building. Another year, I helped organize a... -
Great Expectations
In 2006, Elder Nelson spoke of his first wife saying, “When people have asked her how she managed with ten children with so little time available from her husband, she...
