Dave's Mormon Inquiry

Reflections on Hollywood

Meridian Magazine posted Kieth Merrill's short commencement address to the graduates of the BYU College of Fine Arts and Communications. It's a nice point of departure to ruminate a bit on Hollywood and the movies. If video killed the radio star, what killed the movie star? Hollywood, maybe.

Who Are These Guys?

That seems to be a popular question for magazines and newspapers looking at "the Mormons" these days. The latest entry: A modern prophet goes global, in the Economist (and thanks to a reader who sent me the link). The accompanying pic shows a blond missionary in white shirt and tie walking past a third-world hovel. Understandably, the piece highlights events in England: "Also dear to Mormon hearts are parts of northern and central England where, soon after Smith had his visions, the faith won many converts." After touching on 19th-century emigration to Utah, it notes that now "the Mormons want their converts to stay put and use their spanking new meeting-house and temple; and their keen young missionaries are as likely to be British or Danish (even, in one case, from Greenland) as American."