Constitutional government, as designed by the framers, will survive only with a righteous people.

Ezra Taft Benson
April 1976 General Conference
(May 1976 Ensign)

Popularity: 15% [?]

Lord, bless me with more tolerance for those who sin differently than I do.

User on LDSGlo.com

Popularity: 17% [?]

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has finished and released the new “Meeting House Locator” called LDS Maps.  It’s a really neat website that will show you the closest meeting houses as well as the assigned Wards for an address entered, including things like YSA and language wards.

Check it out at http://Maps.LDS.org

Popularity: 17% [?]

“A secret combination that seeks to overthrow the freedom of all land, nations, and countries is increasing in its evil influence and control over America and the entire World”.

Ezra Taft Benson
LDS General Conference, October 1988

Popularity: 16% [?]

Every month, when I go home teaching, I take Mikey with me.  I do this for several reasons, among which are;

• I’m trying to set a good example for him
• I want him to become friends with others in our ward.
• I want him to love Church service.

Today, with my Home Teaching companion, Mikey & I went home teaching to a family in our ward.  They have a threeish year old.  He and Mikey played together pretty well.  When we were on our way home, Mikey told me “Daddy, I love home teaching.”  It made me happy to hear that.

I also like to make some kind of dessert to take with us when we go home teaching.  Today, I made brownies.  My home teaching companion made a handout, and used some cutesy scissors to decorate its border.  Later in the evening, Amanda told me that my companion and I are more like “Visiting Teaching companions” than Home Teaching companions.  Silly wifey.

Popularity: 14% [?]

The Chuch of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has recently released a new 6-page document entitled The Divine Institution of Marriage.  Per the Church:

“The Church has a single, undeviating standard of sexual morality: intimate relations are proper only between a husband and a wife united in the bonds of matrimony.  

The Church’s opposition to same-sex marriage neither constitutes nor condones any kind of hostility towards homosexual men and women. Protecting marriage between a man and a woman does not affect Church members’ Christian obligations of love, kindness and humanity toward all people.

As Church members decide their own appropriate level of involvement in protecting marriage between a man and a woman, they should approach this issue with respect for others, understanding, honesty, and civility.

Intending to reduce misunderstanding and ill will, the Church has produced the following document, “The Divine Institution of Marriage,” and provided the accompanying links to other materials, to explain its reasons for defending marriage between a man and a woman as an issue of moral imperative. “

To read The Divine Institution of Marriage, visit http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/commentary/the-divine-institution-of-marriage

Often times, when talking about why the Church is against gay marriage, people will ask “What’s the harm?” or “They’re not bothering you.”  To those who believe that, read NPR’s When Gay Rights and Religious Liberties Clash.

What do you think?  Is this a cause the Church and its members should be fighting for?

Popularity: 23% [?]

“…Are we reading the Constitution and pondering it? …Are we abiding by these principles and teaching them to others? …Can we recognize when a law is constitutionally unsound? …We must become involved in civic affairs to see that we are properly represented…”

Ezra Taft Benson
October 1987 General Conference
Ensign, November 1987

Popularity: 21% [?]

In regards to the question of whether to vote for the “Whig” candidate or the “Democratic” candidate in the election of 1844, and his unwillingness to vote for either, the Prophet Joseph Smith stated:

“….we shall have the satisfaction of knowing that we have acted conscientiously, and have used our best judgement. And if we have to throw away our votes, we had better do so upon a worthy rather than an unworthy individual who might make use of the weapon we put in his hand to destroy us.”

 Times and Seasons, Nauvoo, IV, 441.
Cited also in Roberts, Comprehensive History, II, 208-209.

Popularity: 22% [?]

We engage in the election the same as in any other principle: you are to vote for good men, and if you do not do this it is a sin: to vote for wicked men, it would be a sin. Choose the good and refuse the evil. Men of false principles have preyed upon us like wolves upon helpless lambs. Damn the rod of tyranny; curse it. Let every man use his liberties according to the Constitution. Don’t fear man or devil; electioneer with all people, male and female, and exhort them to do the thing that is right. We want a President of the U.S., not a party President, but a President of the whole people; for a party President disfranchises the opposite party Have a President who will maintain every man in his rights.

Hyrum Smith
(History of the Church, Vol. 6, Chapter 15, page 323).

Popularity: 23% [?]

The United States will spend her strength and means warring in foreign lands until other nations will say, “Let’s divide up the lands of the United States”.

Joseph Smith, Jr

Prophecy by Joseph Smith, Mosiah Hancock Journal, pp. 19-20

(note: this statement, attributed to Joseph Smith, was written down about 50-years
after when it was supposedly said, and, as a result, should be taken with a grain of salt)

Popularity: 22% [?]