The Divine Role of Mother

This photo by Dorothy Lange is so expressive, and makes one question why life should be so difficult. Being a mother I have come to understand a little better the role of my Heavenly Father in allowing these difficulties. As a child, a teenager especially, and sometimes as an adult it is easy to ask questions like:

Why do we need to have rules?

Why do I have to do hard things?

Why can’t I be given an allowance instead of working for it?

Why should I serve others? What about me?

Now as a mother I understand His role in my life better, and why these things must be so. I have learned that children are actually empowered by rules. They know what is expected of them, and gain confidence when they follow those rules. I think it’s also true with adults. We like to know what God expects of us, and feel good when we make good choices.

When we stick through a hard task, the sense of accomplishment we feel can help us discover our true potential and give us the motivation to try more new things and better ourselves. The struggles we face will show us our strengths, and help us strengthen our weaknesses.

It’s true that when you work for something, you value it more than if it is given to you because of the feeling of accomplishment you get from the process. I remember starting to buy my own clothes by age ten and learning the value of work. If the Lord gave us everything we would not be as grateful for the blessings we have.

As much as we hear about the importance of knowing yourself, it is even more important to be able to put the needs of others before your own sometimes. Showing compassion for others helps you appreciate your own circumstances, and learn to see the world through another’s eyes. Empathy is a virtue that can be overlooked, but there is a peace that comes from seeing another perspective and being able to appreciate it even if you don’t agree with it.

It’s hard to watch your children struggle, and even harder when they resent you for letting them struggle, but I’m grateful that there is a purpose to it all, and that in the end, my children will be better for it.

May Photos

Happy Mother’s Day! Check out the latest pictures of your grandkids, cousins, and friends!

Habeas Schmabeas and Guantanamo Bay

I recently finished listening to an episode of This American Life from NPR. It’s essentially a documentary series on the radio. This episode, called “Habeas Schmabeas,” was a look at the prison at Guantanamo Bay. It was fascinating and I would love for any of you guys to listen to it too and tell me what you think about it. You can get it by either subscribing to the free podcast through iTunes or other program like it, or just click here to listen to it online.

The people that created this show said their idea for this episode came from the realization that, while it’s known that there have been several hundred former detainees that have been released from guantanamo over the years, no one they knew of had ever heard an interview by any of these former prisoners. So, these guys tracked down some former detainees and talked to them. They also talked with some U.S. attorneys that had been assigned to represent prisoners at guantanamo about what it is like to represent a detainee.

One thing I found very interesting is that guantanamo was built to house high-profile terrorists—the worst of the worst—like Bin Laden and others like him. It’s essentially a supermax prison. However, one of the complaints that has come out from the military commanders in charge of the prison is that they’ve never received those high-level prisoners, they’re all kept in “black sites” run by the CIA. Instead, guantanamo ended up being used to house mainly lower-level, fringe players that provided very little valuable information, or very often, people that weren’t even terrorists to begin with. You’ll need to listen to the interviews to find out why it is that guantanamo received so many detainees that, upon review, got re-classified as NLEC’s (No Longer Enemy Combatants) and what the consequences have been.

The title of the episode “Habeas Schmabeas” refers to habeas corpus. A petition for habeas corpus is what’s known as a collateral attack against criminal charges. It doesn’t address the actual charges against you, it is a way of saying to the government, “before I answer anything else, you need to show me first that you had the right to arrest me and charge me with this crime, because I believe you didn’t follow the rules.” It requires the government to justify their actions and show that they behaved properly. This right first popped up in the Magna Charta in 1215 (Wow! politics, legal terms and now history. Could this post get any better?!) and is in Article I of the U.S. Constitution—it was such a fundamental, non-controversial right that it didn’t even need to wait until later to go into the bill of rights.

This concept of habeas corpus comes into play with the detainees at guantanamo because the current administration (we’re not naming any names here) has made a very interesting claim concerning the legal rights of the detainees. On the one hand they claim that U.S. legal rights, chief among them habeas corpus, don’t apply to the detainees because they’re prisoners of war. On the other hand they claim that the rights of the Geneva Convention don’t apply to the detainees because they’re not really prisoners of war. A little crazy, huh?

So, if I haven’t totally turned you off of it (and put you to sleep just a little), go listen to it and let me know what you think.

New Design for WhiteBinder.org

I just finished putting together a new site design for WhiteBinder.org. The prompting for the change came because I recently got involved in putting a site together for a friend of mine back in LA (which I may or may not tell you about depending on how it turns out when it’s all done). Anyway, the more I was working on that other site, the more I was unhappy with how WhiteBinder looked. It just seemed too monochromatic and jammed together. I’m really happy with how this new design has turned out. It’s not just a new look, there are also some new features that will enhance the experience for you, the website visitor (yes, you!). Here are the highlights:

1. You can resize the font on any page by clicking the “A” graphics in the top bar.
2. You can change the width of the site from “narrow” to “wide” to “auto width” by clicking those little line and arrow graphics in the top bar.
3. You can set the color scheme of the site to blue, green or orange to match almost any decor. No longer will my site clash with your drapes.
4. I figured out how to get the “create pdf” button to work that appears in the top right of every article. Before, all the text in the pdf would be all jumbled together. The way I got it to work, for those that are interested (ok, just Marky… ok, probably not even Marky), is to pull all the css code out of the paragraph tags (even any class designations) and put everything into the separate style sheet. I’ve only had time to do this for a few of the more popular articles so far so it doesn’t yet work for all of them.
5. The main menu on the top left is set up as a transmenu. Move your mouse over the menu and you’ll see it in action (ooh, high tech!)

You may also notice some familiar faces in the scrolling graphic on the main page. I’ll be updating those images from time to time so check back often, you never know who will make an appearance on the soon-to-be-world-famous WhiteBinder scrolling graphic of destiny^®!

So anyway, it’s still a bit of a work in progress and I could use your help polishing it up. Please take a look around and let me know if you come across anything that doesn’t work or doesn’t seem to be formatted correctly, or just let me know how completely awesome the site is in all ways, I’m cool with either.

Here It Goes Again… and Again… and Again

In order to fully appreciate this post, you must watch these videos in order. First is the song by OK Go “Here It Goes Again.” How did they come up with this? Who would think to choreograph a video with treadmills!

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pv5zWaTEVkI

Now watch these high school guys do the song for their school talent show. They must have practiced a million times!:

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gq7r3F1SoX0

And finally, a side by side comparison of the two videos. Pretty impressive!

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6STO7TCFik

Beliefs

At church today our Sunday School teacher told about a church near where he works that’s title is “Ex-Mormon Church of …”. I thought this was fascinating, and started wondering why people would put “Ex-Mormon” in the name for their church. What was even more interesting to me was that 95% of the membership never had been members of the Mormon church at all. They just thought that the idea of being against the Mormons was appealing. Our teacher talked with one such member and asked him what their church believes to which the man answered something like,

“Joseph Smith was not…”

-No, what do you believe?-

“The Book of Mormon is not…”

–What do you believe?-

The man could not seem to answer my friend’s question because of his focus on what he didn’t believe. I am so grateful that I know what I believe in: We are children of a loving Heavenly Father, who wants us to be happy. One of my favorite quotes is by Joseph Smith and he said, “Happiness is the object and design of our existence; and will be the end thereof, if we pursue the path that leads to it; and this path is virtue, uprightness, faithfulness, holiness, and keeping all the commandments of God.” I truly believe that and believe that the gospel of Jesus Christ is the source of true happiness. Our purpose is not to create a Utopia, but a Zion. Zion is any place where there are the pure in heart. Not the perfect, but those with a sincere love of God and of their fellow beings.

For me it all boils down to a scripture from the Bible in Luke 6:43-44: “For a good tree bringeth not forth corrupt fruit; neither doth a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. For every tree is known by his own fruit. For of thorns men do not gather figs, nor of a bramble bush gather they grapes.” In a church that currently has almost 13 million members each with their own ideas and personalities, I think we have an incredible track record for doing good. This is comforting to me when I hear criticism of individuals within the church because I know that the gospel is still true in spite of the imperfections of the people within it, and that it is a force for good.

Russel M Nelson gave an example of this in 2004 that I really like:

“Our religion is known by the fruit of its branches. Recently I met with government officials from a land far from here who were deeply impressed with the Church and its efforts throughout the world. They liked our teachings about the family and wanted copies of our proclamation to the world and guidebooks for family home evening. They wanted to know more about our welfare program and humanitarian help. We complied as we could and then shifted attention from what we do to why we do it. I explained with an analogy to a tree. “You are attracted by various fruits of our faith,” I said. “They are plentiful and powerful. But you cannot savor this fruit unless you know the tree that produces it. And you cannot understand the tree unless you comprehend its roots. With our religion, you cannot have the fruits without the roots.”