Nature’s God

16 July 2008, 3:44 pm by Giggles
Categories: Gospel, Happy Things

The last weekend in June I went on a camping trip with my ward. I blogged a bit about it on the first of July. The weather was great. The water was warm. I had fun out riding on the boat. It was a real good trip on the whole.

But I think my favorite part of all was getting there at night, setting up my tent, and then getting in and laying down. The whole top of my tent was open because I’d left the rain guard off to get more ventilation. I had the whole Milky Way open to me as I laid there in awe at God’s creations.

The stars are used many times in the scriptures as symbols of light, truth, guidance, stability, and posterity. As I stared up at them, I couldn’t help but be amazed at what a perfect symbol they are.

President Hinckley often used the stars, and specifically the Polar Star as a symbol of faith, the atonement, and testimony.

Faith? There can be no doubt about it. When doubts arose, when tragedies struck, the quiet voice of faith was heard in the stillness of the night as certain and reassuring as was the place of the polar star in the heavens above (“The Miracle of Faith,” Ensign, May 2001).

Regardless of what may come, may faith, immovable and constant, shine above us as the polar star (“Till We Meet Again,” Ensign, Nov. 2001).

We know not what lies ahead of us. We know not what the coming days will bring. We live in a world of uncertainty… But one thing we do know. Like the polar star in the heavens, regardless of what the future holds, there stands the Redeemer of the world, the Son of God, certain and sure as the anchor of our immortal lives. He is the rock of our salvation, our strength, our comfort, the very focus of our faith (“We Look to Christ,” Ensign, May 2002).

Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ must be a beacon light before you, a polar star in your sky (“Stay on the High Road,” Ensign, May 2004).

The stars, with their light that stretches in all directions and times, is a wonderful testament to the power of the God of all Nature. All things testify of Him. Lying on my back looking at the stars that night, I was so grateful to know my place in the vast universe, and who I am among all of it.

Not only the stars testify of God, but all of creation does. I love how Elder Robert R. Steuer stated it in this last General Conference:

Our testimonies are strengthened as we reverently observe the great universe God has created for us. The Lord declared to Enoch, “All things are created and made to bear record of me” (Moses 6:63). Alma bore a similar testimony to Korihor, the anti-Christ: “All things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator” (Alma 30:44) (“The Power of Light and Truth,” Ensign, May 2008).

What a wonderful world we live in. While I was in Brasil and saw all the of the beautiful creation that was there, I often felt that maybe God took the seventh day for rest so that he could spend time simply enjoying this world.

All things testify of God. The stars in their places in the sky giving guidance to us here on earth, filling our hearts and minds with wonder and awe. The beauty of a sunset. The life that is found in all animals and plants. The love that people share. It was a loving God who gave us all of this. There is a God. He lives.

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Laws of Nature

15 July 2008, 9:43 pm by Giggles
Categories: Life

I love to learn. I love finding out new ideas. I will never be an expert in many of the things I study. But that does not stop me from learning. I really enjoy learning more about science. Oddly, quantum physics and string theory have really captured my attention of late. I blame Nova on PBS. It is just such an amazing show. Well really, I could probably blame all of PBS if I wanted to. They have some real good programs.

What is fun is when I can take the little I do know and use it in a conversation. These theories are just so fascinating, and I like sharing them with people. I’ve had conversations over dinner about quantum physics, string theory, and recently Shröedinger’s cat as well.42D

I know that science is still looking for one grand unifying theory that will combine all of the theories of nature they have so far into one. But it must be possible if I can talk about what they have already in just about any conversation.

It’s all just very fascinating. I want to learn more.

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Equal

14 July 2008, 8:26 pm by Giggles
Categories: Education, Exercise, Family, Gospel, Happy Things, Health, Learn Something, Relationships

People sometimes say “all things being equal…” The only problem is, all things aren’t equal. There are a lot of things in life that don’t have an equal. Just as a short list of some things

  • love
  • family
  • a gorgeous sunset
  • the best of friends
  • a good night’s sleep
  • a good nap
  • some good chocolate
  • a good run
  • eating at Tucanos with people I care about
  • the stars
  • that sense of accomplishment when you do something difficult
  • doing something that makes someone you care about happy, something only you could do
  • learning something new
  • being healthy
  • life

If you can find anything that you could put an equal sign between any of those and something else, let me know. If you can think of anything else that has no equal, add it to the list in the comments.

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Separate

13 July 2008, 11:46 pm by Giggles
Categories: Education, Gospel, Life

Many people must separate religious and scientific ideas in their minds. All they can see between the two is a lot of conflict. The two can never come together, never agree on anything, contradict each other, and so on and so forth. The two are so opposite that they can never come together. The origins of life on earth is one of the latest points of controversy. Last month NPR and the New York Times both ran stories about “God vs. Science: Keeping Creationism Out of School” and “Opponents of Evolution Adopting a New Strategy.” But is it really necessary to separate the two? Are God and Science really at odds with each other? The Desert News ran a column about the topic: “Real Faith, Science Unafraid” that looked at the other side.

I suggest that those who believe the two to be in opposition and separate do not understand either one.

A simple way of explaining how I look at both is that they both look at the same object, only from different perspectives. While they might each see something different about the object, it does not make one of their views wrong and the other right. If they were looking at a tree and one saw the trunk and said a tree is brown while the other saw the leaves and said a tree is green – would one of them be wrong? Nope. They would just have different views on the same subject. That’s a simplified version. Science is a distinct way of knowing, but it is not the only way.

Back in April I went to see the film “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed.” It’s touted as a documentary, but um, no, sorry, it’s not. It’s a biased look at how some people view science as trying to destroy religion. Sure, there are probably those scientists who feel that way. And there was that whole thing with that whole problem between Galileo Galilei and the Catholic Church about a heliocentric solar system. But again, those who see a conflict do not fully understand religion or science.42D

Both are seeking truth. They just both go about it in different ways. Last October Elder Richard G. Scott gave a talk at General Conference entitled Truth: The Foundation of Correct Decisions. And then just this past April Conference Elder Dallin H. Oaks gave a talk entitled Testimony. Both apostles spoke of methods for finding scientific and revealed truths. Both seek truth, but they take different routes to arrive at it.

The year before I left on my mission was when I did the majority of my education classes at BYU. As I was preparing to leave someone asked me if it was going to be weird teaching about the gospel now instead of school stuff. I replied that it wouldn’t. Truth is truth, no matter where it is found. The Holy Ghost can testify to the truth of the water cycle just as much as he can testify to the truth of the scriptures.

There is nothing about my faith that says that science is wrong. Science is meant to be questioned. And there is nothing about my faith that I cannot question it either. Looking back through the annals of time, revealed truth often came as the result of questions. If the prophets of old could ask questions, why can’t I?

For one of my Masters classes, the Nature of Science, we discussed the apparent separation between science and religion with regards to the origins of life on the earth. One of the articles we read was by Martin Mahner and Mario Bunge: Is Religious Education Compatible with Science Education? (Science and Education 5:101-123, 1996). Part of my written response to the article said thus:

Mahner and Bunge started by breaking down science and religion to their basic components. Science, they say, is made up of nine parts – a community, a domain of facts, a general outlook or world view, a formal background of logical and mathematical theories, a set of problematics, a body of knowledge, an aim and purpose to the research, and a collection of methods. Oddly enough, they say that religion has all of those things as well. Except religion includes two more components, a body of factual knowledge admitted by the believers of a religion and a value system and value judgments. With so many similarities, how can religion and science be at such odds all the time?

While science and religion both have similar components, they describe very different things. They are two different ways to look at the world. They come from different backgrounds. And as long as they are looking at different things, they are fine. But when they start looking at the same thing, they run into problems. Looking at things like quantum physics, immunizations, and electro magnets, there is no conflict. Yet when they both try to look at things for which they both have an explanation, such as the origins of the earth and man, conflicts of ideas arise. Mahner and Bunge say that these conflicts result in instability within the person who tries to hold on to both views of the world.

While I’m sure there are people who might question my mental stability, I do not feel that looking at the world through both science and religion has created any inner conflict. The two do not need to be separate. Together they can both strengthen each other.

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Powers of the Earth

12 July 2008, 8:48 pm by Giggles
Categories: Life

Thursday was six months since I’ve moved to Tucson. It seems like it hasn’t been that long. It’s time for the storms now. And Friday morning the storm moved into my kitchen. But the maintenance guys say that cleaning out the gutter drain outside my kitchen should take care of that. Let’s keep our fingers crossed on that one.

I love desert summer storms. They are fast, furious, powerful. You can sit and listen to the thunder roll in from far away. The lightning dances across the sky. And the rains come down hard and quick. The other day I was getting ready to go shopping when it started to rain. So I fixed myself a bowl of ice cream. And by the time the ice cream was gone, so was the rain. All that was left was a light drizzle that feels absolutely wonderful, and that smell of rain. Rain in the desert smells like clean dirt, if you can figure that one out.

And the sunsets after the rains are full of powerful colors in the sky. The orange that lights up everything from the light reflected off the clouds is an odd wonder. I love it.

The storms are also powerful though. There are three or four storm warnings a week. It does not even have to be raining in the city for an advisory, especially of the flash flood variety. These are rains that are so hard you can’t see through. And when it rains in the mountains, all of that water has to go somewhere. The roads are covered with drifts of dirt now where the washes have run through them and flooded them. Flash floods come just as fast and hard as the rains do.

Just look what wind, rain, and time have created! I live in the state that boasts the Grand Canyon. (it’s about 6 hours away so I haven’t been yet). That’s power. I used to live in the state that boasts Arches National Park. I have been there.

I need to start carrying around my camera so I can get some pictures of the storms here.

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Assume

11 July 2008, 11:26 pm by Giggles
Categories: Family, Gospel, Relationships

It always seems interesting to me when people assume they know what I am thinking or feeling, and they really have absolutely no idea what they are talking about when it all comes down to it.

A while back, someone I know made an interesting statement about marriage.

If polygamy were really about adults who agree, you wouldn’t have children being forced (or spiritually blackmailed) to marry that way and you wouldn’t have entire communities of polygamous families….

Of course I feel the same way about religions that require all of their people to marry heterosexually and produce children. No one should be told how to marry, whom to marry or whether they should marry at all. Being told you have to marry heterosexually in order to obtain eternal salvation…. Every one of these use spiritual threats that tell people who they should love and spend their life with.

Apparently I’m being blackmailed. And I had no idea either. I do not feel blackmailed in the least. I do not feel the weight of eternity on my shoulders when I go on a date on a Friday night, feeling that if I don’t manage to convince some guy to marry me and have children with me soon that not only will I end up a lonely old maid who can’t even have cats because she’s allergic so I’ll have to knit sweaters for my plants, (How would you get a sweater on a cactus? That would take some work. I imagine the snags would be insane. My cactus still needs a name, by the way.) but I’ll also be in danger of being cast out of heaven for being single and childless.

Do I want to get married? Yup. I do. The trouble I had opening a simple water bottle tonight was a funny reminder that I can’t do it all on my own. Oh sure I’ve done great so far with my life. I’ve done amazing actually. But I would like to share it with someone. I would like to have someone who is always there for both the good and the bad days. Plus, that would mean there would be someone else in the house who could kill the moths. That one tonight was big. EEgghgh! *shudder*42D

Do I feel pressure from heaven to get married? Nope. I don’t. So assuming I do, well, it just doesn’t work. Do I feel pressure from other people? On occasion, but not often. And when they try I just ignore them.

It’s actually quite funny the different things people assume about me. Maybe I’ll post about other ones later. But don’t assume I’m being blackmailed under penalty of not going to heaven if I don’t get married.

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Connected them with another

10 July 2008, 3:30 pm by Giggles
Categories: Folks, Science & Tech

A few weeks ago NPR did a series of stories about e-mail – The E-Mail Age, how it helps to keep us connected, but also how it can be abused. Since I often tell people that the best way to get a hold of me is through e-mail, and since my family often communicates through e-mail over other forms of communication, I thought they were interesting.

Here are a few of the stories they did, and one that ran about the same time in the New York Times.

E-mail certainly has connected us more to each other in many ways. But at what expense? I admit that there are times where I find myself extremely addicted to checking my e-mail and I have a hard time tearing myself away. The logical side of me knows that everything I miss will be there when I get back and I can leave the computer and step away and not miss anything of great importance. But the illogical side of me has to be there and check it right when it arrives.

E-mail has a very valuable place in our lives now, but it isn’t the only way to stay connected. There is still a lot to be said about actually talking to a person on the phone. And I love a handwritten note sent through the mail. Not everything needs to be said instantly. I’ve mentioned previously that you can actually send a message by snail now.

I prefer that the e-mail I receive have a purpose as well and not just be a forward that is sent on to everyone in an address book. Forwards have never been that big with me. I won’t send them along. I might not even read them. Even though you can do cultural folklore studies by looking at what is passed around, I’d rather not have that land in my box. E-mail me with what you are doing. Tell me what you are thinking. Engage me in a discussion.

We have used technology to become a very connected society. But there is nothing more connecting than that of the human touch.

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