All Stories from Juvenile Instructor
There are currently 21 stories from Juvenile Instructor.
"Top Five" Mormon books in the Wall Street Journal
Mormon Life says: Interesting choices. Which book(s) would you like to have seen make the list?
In Saturday’s Wall Street Journal, Samuel Brown, professor of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at the University of Utah, friend of the JI, and author of the recently-released In Heaven as It Is...
Call for Applicants: BYU’s Church History and Doctrine Department Seeks Two New Hires
The Church History and Doctrine Department at BYU’s School of Religious Education seeks applicants for two new faculty positions.
Brandon Flowers, Arthur Kane, and the Mormon Rock Star Image
Mormon Life says: I didn't realize that Brandon Flowers' song "Only the Young" had such Mormon overtones . . .
While pundits and theologians continue the seemingly endless debate over whether or not Mormonism is Christian/Mormons are Christians/a Mormon can be a Christian, over at Slate, browbeat writer...
Overlooked and Under-appreciated Books in Mormon History
For a book project I am currently working on, I recently revisited Ron Walker’s Wayward Saints: The Godbeites and Brigham Young (which you can download for free here). I had glanced through the book years ago, but it never really made that big of an impression. However, this time through it struck...
Q&A with Terryl Givens and Matthew Grow on Parley P. Pratt
Mormon Life says: Q&A about a new book on this figure of Church history. Some interesting insights from the authors . . .
1. First, let’s start with the book’s subtitle: “The Apostle Paul of Mormonism.” One of the reasons for this descriptor, you write in the introduction, was that Pratt helped systematize and...
Plato on Deification and Eternal Marriage
Mormon Life says: Who knew Plato had some similar ideas to the gospel?
Clement of Alexandria asserted that Plato was an important precursor to the coming of Christ. [1] The quotes I post from Plato here suggest that Mormons could sympathize with Clement’s point of...
Resources on Blacks and the Priesthood
Mormon Life says: Resources both for teaching and for understanding some of the history of the Church and those of African descent.
There has been a lot of excellent discussion recently at BCC on the issue of blacks and the priesthood. I highly recommend readers to the three part series Margaret Young has put together on...
Pioneer Day, The Sweetwater Rescue, and the Role of History in Mormonism
Mormon Life says: In light of our somewhat recent Mormon myths article, as well as Pioneer Day, this article was interesting.
While I generally like to challenge–if not completely burst–historical myths, both in and outside the classroom, I sincerely hesitated to write and publish this post on Pioneer Day. I don’t like...
Call for Applicants: Write for the Church History Department
Job Title: Web Content Strategy Manager Job Description: The Web Content Strategy Manager will hold a leadership position responsible for developing, planning and delivering all aspects of the written and visual content for the Church History Department website (history.lds.org). The website is a...
First Edition of the Book of Mormon, British Library
The British Library at St Pancras, London has a first edition Book of Mormon available for view in its rare book reading room. I initially discovered this as a BYU London Centre study abroad student in 2007. As I looked up sources on Sir Robert Walpole for British Politics research at the BL, I...
Mormons and Mosques, and now Harry Reid
After hearing this morning that Harry Reid has now entered into this vitriolic debate about the right to build a mosque (or the responsibility not to do so) where shadows of the Twin Towers once fell, my curiosity about how Mormons, both scholars and non, feel about this controversy, has bubbled...
The Saints of San Antonio: A Video History in Their Own Words
A friend alerted me not too long ago to an effort by a local in San Antonio, Texas to document the history of the LDS Church in his city. The site is called, The Saints of San Antonio: A Video History in Their Own Words. He has conducted filmed interviews of some senior residents to document...
Adoption
Mormon Life says: Like this concept of choosing "family".
I knew something was up when my wife’s high-school Spanish teacher came by. “I feel like I’m losing a daughter.” We were in my wife’s hometown of Sonora, California, one week before our wedding....
A Small Tribute to Truman G. Madsen
I meant to do this back in May for the year anniversary of Madsen’s passing (May 28, 2009), but late is better than never. I grew up with long family vacations, often these were to historical sites related to the Church, and without fail, a staple of those trips were Truman G. Madsen’s lectures on...
Laurel Thatcher Ulrich on Mormon Women, Quilts, and Identity in 1857
For those of you who don’t subscribe to American Historical Review, you missed out on a wonderful treat in their first issue of this year. Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, pulitzer-prize winning historian and professor at Harvard University, published some of the earliest fruits from her recent work on...



