Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Latter Day Saint movement

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Mbatman72 (talk | contribs) at 04:20, 11 July 2007. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Revision as of 04:20, 11 July 2007 by Mbatman72 (talk | contribs)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)

Infobox Standard?

I was wondering if this wikiproject has a standard infobox for temples. I've looked at some of them and stuff like "cafeteria, floor area, location, phone number," etc., it is just irrelevant and should either be worked into the article or taken off of the infobox.-Mbatman 72 04:20, 11 July 2007 (UTC)

Baby Blessing

I have created the article requested on baby blessings. Please read, edit, feast, enjoy, rip apart, check for NPOV, change, or otherwise change or dismember the article to make it better. I make no claim to its perfection and welcome any input. Thanks. --Pahoran513 22:13, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

The main problem I see is that no references have been cited. The Gospel Library may contain some sources we can use though. --Lethargy 21:14, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

New lds theology article

There has been some discussion of where to put Animals in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I was thinking that a theology article would be a good place to start as their are quite a few articles to draw from Category:Latter Day Saint doctrines, beliefs, and practices and a good summarization of this material would be good, and articles like Animals could then be broken off into minor theology articles, or individually as needed. Thoughts?? --Trödel 20:10, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Portrayals of Mormons in popular media

is on the main page, and I didn't see anybody I know in the history, so I thought I'd post it here just to make you all aware of it. :) cooki e caper (talk / contribs) 02:57, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Key articles for Misplaced Pages 1.0

Hello! We at the Work via WikiProjects team for Misplaced Pages 1.0 would like you to identify the "key articles" from your project that should be included in a small CD release due to their importance, regardless of quality. We will use that information to assess which articles should be nominated for Version 0.5 and later versions. Hopefully it will help you identify which articles are the most important for the project to work on. As well, please add to the WikiProject Latter Day Saint movement article table any articles of high quality. If you are interested in developing a worklist such as this one for your WikiProject, or having a bot generate a worklist like this one automatically for you, please contact us. Please feel free to post your suggestions right here. Thanks! Walkerma 04:27, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Woo-hoo! The Mormons get in version 1.0! That table is currently empty. I nominate Joseph Smith, The Book of Mormon, the Golden Plates, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Latter Day Saint movement (initially) as articles for it—just for starters. Anyone else? — Frecklefoot | Talk 14:28, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Early life of Joseph Smith, Jr. should be there also since it is a featured article. --Trödel 16:08, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

LDS Standard Works

I say that Joseph Smith, Jr. (and all of its subarticles about Joseph Smith), Latter Day Saint movement, all of the denominations listed on that page, History of the Latter Day Saint movement, The Book of Mormon, Golden Plates, and everything in the LDS template. Are we limited based on number of articles or space occupied? Val42 01:19, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Who added the table to the right? How about all the articles in the table for this one? — Frecklefoot | Talk 14:01, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks a lot! I shall put these into the table when I get a chance. I suggest listing the articles specifically mentioned in the above postings as "Top-importance" and others found in the template on the right go in as "High importance." Does all that sound OK? Is the early life featured article one of the top importance ones, or just high importance (i.e. ignoring the article quality aspect altogether)? Thanks, Walkerma 20:50, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Endowment

I added some proposed content to Talk:Endowment (Mormonism). I would appreciate knowing if any of it might be acceptable. Thanks. Agape bright 00:00, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

p.s. I have personally invited User:Alai and User:John Hamer to offer their support if they happen to see anything worthwhile in my proposal. I invited them personally because I understand they are not affiliated with the LDS Church, and I have a feeling I may need a little support. I sincerely hope in the spirit of my user name that there is something useful in my proposal, and that my motivation is in reality and perception 100% loving. And I beg standing Wikipedians please to not reject my proposal out of hand if at all possible. Agape bright 00:12, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Wives

Hi, is there any reason that there are 2 sentence stubs for all of Brigham Young's wives, see Category:Wives of Brigham Young. Misplaced Pages is not a genealogical database, these articles would be more easy to access and far more useful as a list (and they are all in his article anyway).--Peta 10:35, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

U.S. state article POV: Mormonism and Christianity

How do we address POV problems in state articles which place a Mormon category outside of Christianity? For instance, Arizona has a section with percentage of Christians, and places Mormons in a separate section, "Other religions", even outside of the "Other Christianity" section already there. (They also had a link to freemasonry labeled as Mormon.)

The Pennsylvania article avoids the issue by never using the word "Christian". We need to have some sort of standard about how to avoid POV problems in demographics sections, possibly by avoiding clumping things into a Christianity section, and instead simply state church names and percentages.

Any thoughts? --Lethargy 17:08, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't have any problem with the PA article. I revised the AZ page to include Mormon under Christian. Somebody can check later and see what happens to that edit. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 17:27, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I double checked the AZ article, and the percentage of Mormons was included in the Christianity totals, but the Mormon entry was under "Other religions". Perhaps someone recently vandalized this page, which would explain the link to freemasonry. --Lethargy 17:35, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

You are correct. An anon moved Mormonism from Christianity to Other and changed it to freemasonry. The same person (or IP address, at least) vandalized Newspeak as well, which I fixed. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 18:08, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

HELP: Major merger proposal

Without commenting on the merits of the proposed merge - I just wanted to notify project members that a proposal to merge a number of articles has been made.

This shows a complete misunderstanding of a movement versus a denomination - I would summarily delete them all as being impossible to pass under the snowball rule, but last time I did that I got bit.

The articles in question:

I am sure there will soon be others since the user stated: "there are nine (9) pages on Momonism as of today (maybe more are hiding)"

What is the best way to put a stop to this nonsense? --Trödel 16:13, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Not realizing it was a mass effort, I simply deleted the merge proposal from Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints since there was nothing on the talk page discussing the merge. The merge request isn't there since I removed it, so maybe it will blow away.

Not sure what would be the official way to diffuse the effort, but it seems pretty silly to me. A single article would be entirely too big and not much use. I guess I should check to see if they are also trying to merge all the Final Fantasy articles into one. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 16:56, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Checking the Talk page for the new user, I would assume that it is a misunderstanding, and we can simply remove the merge requests. If they get re-inserted, then we should look into how to resolve the issue. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 18:27, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

thanks User:COGDEN --Trödel 19:12, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Categories to rename

Category:Apostles of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Category:Presidents of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints need to be renamed to have a capital "The", and pages using those categories also need to be fixed, if anyone is willing to do this. --Lethargy 18:46, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

I put these up at Misplaced Pages:Categories for discussion/Speedy. --Lethargy 21:16, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

New format for list of temples

List of temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints recently underwent a review for Featured List status. The former "Status" column was seen as redundant since the chronological organization structure makes clear what the status of each temple is. The addition of the Notes column to hold information about currently closed temples or temples under construction is blank for most of the temples. Thus, there are two proposals for organizing the list to eliminate this mostly blank column.

Please review and comment. Thx in adv --Trödel 14:36, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Temple Square

I have submitted Temple Square for the Mormon collaboration, but even if it doesn't pass, I wonder if anyone is knowledgeable/bored enough to help me expand this article? I would also like to expand the articles about the buildings in and around Temple Square, such as the Salt Lake Temple, Salt Lake Assembly Hall, Salt Lake Tabernacle, LDS Conference Center, etc. but I am unfamiliar with much of the history of these. The Salt Lake Temple is the most famous temple and has become a symbol of the LDS Church, so it should be a high priority article.

Currently all of these articles are unreferenced, so we'll need to find references we can use. --Lethargy 01:59, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

LDS Temples WikiProject

If there is interest in such a thing, I would like to start a WikiProject specifically for temples, which aims to improve and maintain these articles: List of temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Is this worth creating? --Lethargy 01:59, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

I would think so. Pahoran513 01:17, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

I've been thinking about this since the query was posted, my first thought was - we can hardly get people (myself included) to participate regularly in the COTM, we don't really need a another project and its overhead.

However, reviewing the subprojects of other projects, I could see this as being useful. And provide a place for documenting how the articles relate to each other, and how the templates work, etc. Thus I would support such a project. I would like, however, to get the List of temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints up to featured status first. Then I'd be happy to help provide documentation, etc. --Trödel 01:43, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

I'll hold off on creating it until you (and others) have more time to help out. I haven't started a project page or anything yet, so I'll start thinking of how it should look. It would also be a good idea to wait until that list is featured, so we start off with an article we can point to as an example. --Lethargy 02:43, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

I struggle with how it will be percieved politically on wikipedia - especially with the lapse of effort in the current project. I'd rather see this project focus on that subject for a time to bring it up to good or featured status - then focus the next topic, whatever it be, but create a portal-like categorical structure for temples would be more beneficial, imho. We tried and were partially successful with the "series on Joseph Smith" infobox and related articles, but I think that a similar grouping for temples would be great rather than a wikiproject. hope this makes sense. Just my thoughts... -Visorstuff 16:15, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Similar grouping or portal-type series could include the follownig:

Series on Mormon Temples
Series on Joseph Smith
Series on The Book of Mormon
Series on Mormonism controversies (exmormon, anti-mormon, mormonism and christianity, etc.)
Series on Mormon doctrines
Series on Latter Day Saint history
Series on Mormonims and Pop culture (including exmormons, etc in pop culture)
Series on Latter Day Saint leaders
Series on Latter Day Saint denominations

Thoughts about these groupings as series? -Visorstuff 16:23, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Mormon pioneers featured for Pioneer Day 2007

I brought this up at Talk:Mormon pioneers, but I'll alert this project as a whole: We (mostly BRMo) managed to get Mormon handcart pioneers featured in time for the 150th anniversary this October. Let's see if we can pull that off again with the Mormon pioneers article, aiming to have it on Misplaced Pages's front page for Pioneer Day (July 24) 2007, which will be the 160th anniversary of the pioneers' entry into the Salt Lake Valley. Since it takes awhile for an article to be approved for the front page, I'm guessing we should aim to have this featured a few months before July.

I have nominated this for the Mormon COTM, if you are able to help out with this, add your comments or votes there. Hopefully it isn't inappropriate to mention the vote here, if it is I will remove this. --Lethargy 00:45, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Mormonism and Judaism

Hello all. Take a look at Mormonism and Judaism and my proposed split, see also Talk:Mormonism and Judaism. Kaisershatner 18:57, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Template revisions and future directions

User:COGDEN has been making several changes to the general template about the LDS movment. While I think these are being done in good faith, I think it is wise to begin a discussion about what real limits ought to be place into this general template and perhaps some new directions as well.

Certainly the catagory system of Misplaced Pages works out well to do some searches, but it is also reasonable to use a template as a sort of quick navigation link for related topics as well, as it only takes one click to move to related articls as opposed to two clicks going through category pages. As has been pointed out by this user, the template was getting overloaded simply due to the very large number of LDS-related articles in Misplaced Pages now and it needed to be cleaned up. My main objection was that the cleanup happened without discussion, so I'm starting the thread here.

I would also like to propose themed templates that would cover a much more narrow focus that could be included or substituted for the general LDS navigation template. This could be something like Template:LDS Leaders, Template:LDS Historical Locations, Template:LDS Canon, etc. Perhaps these more narrow focused topics could also be integrated into the more general LDS template but with some sub-section that would change based on the general category, with the more specific topical areas changing based on general categorization of the article.

Certainly this is something that needs some wider participation than a discussion on an obscure template talk page. --Robert Horning 18:20, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Book of Mormon Pictures

I´m not a official member of this project but I need your help.I created the Portal:Latter-day Saints and I need some pictures of Book of Mormon storys. For example some paintings of Arnold Friberg. DAde 20:25, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Friberg's paintings have to be used under Fair Use copyright rules, and I'm not sure you could easily do that in the portal. It's possible, but you have to know what you are doing, and be familiar with U.S. copyright law. Roughly, you'd want to use it for commentary on the painting itself, rather than as an illustration of the painting's content. (No legal advice intended.) COGDEN 20:47, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Can someone ask Arnold Friberg if he wants to licence his Book of Mormon pictures for wikipedia?DAde 21:06, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

I would put the liklyhood of this to practically nothing. The Friberg pictures have been (and are still) commercially reproduced and an attempt to provide a GFDL-compatable version would be contrary to the business interests that are involved.

On the other hand, there is a book about the Book of Mormon with a 1925 (approximately) copyright date that has some interesting pictures of Book of Mormon events that my wife's grandmother has. I've been trying to steal (or beg, borrow, grovel) to get access to that book where the images are very likely in the public domain due to copyright expiration. Either that or try and get some Wikipedian to help out and donate some original artwork about this subject.

The Friberg pictures, for good or ill, are what most current LDS think about Book of Mormon events, however. They would be difficult to replace, particularly as the LDS Church seems to have adopted those pictures as the "official portraits" of several people mentioned in the Book of Mormon, giving these images iconic qualities. --Robert Horning 19:26, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Any idea what the title of that book is? COGDEN 20:20, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

The most important picture is a Christ visits the Americas picture.We need a picture which shows Jesus in the Americas. This are the most powerfull images of the Book of Mormon.84.146.233.136 15:08, 5 November 2006 (UTC)

External links in temple articles

Is it a good idea to have the exact same links (lds.org, Mormon.org, and a few about temples in general) on every temple article? That just seems like spam to me, and these links would be more appropriate at Temple (Latter Day Saints) or The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Of course links that contain information about the specific temple in the article are completely appropriate, but this is ridiculous.

Perhaps we should collect a list of these links and request a bot to remove them. Comments? --Lethargy 05:09, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

I checked out a few articles and I see what you mean. I agree with your assessment, but I don't think that we need a bot to remove the extraneous links. But I think that we should have at least one more person agree before we go and do it. Val42 16:33, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

FamilySearch

FamilySearch has been nominated for AfD. Anyone care to weigh in on this? One of the reasons given for the AfD is that the article is "mormoncruft". -- 63.224.136.62 03:50, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

religioustolerance dot org

I came across over 700 links to this organization, Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance. The site has a ton of ads but on the other hand, it has content (and a Misplaced Pages article).

Normally, such an ad-intensive site with so many links gets attention at WikiProject Spam for further investigation. Even if it's not spam, many links may often get deleted as not meeting the external links guideline. I've left a note at WikiProject Spam asking others to look at some of these and see what they think.

Even some non-profit organizations will add dozens of links to Misplaced Pages since links in Misplaced Pages are heavily weighted in Google's page ranking systems. (If interested, see the article on Spamdexing for more on this).

You can see all the links by going to this this "Search web links" page. I encourage you to look at Misplaced Pages's external links guideline then look at the links in the articles you normally watch. Also, if you don't mind, please also weigh in at WikiProject Spam with your opinions. If you see links to pages that you don't think add additional value beyond the content already in an article, feel free to delete them, but please don't go mindlessly deleting dozens of links. (Per WP:EL, links that don't add additional value should be deleted but that doesn't necessarily mean they're "spam").

Thanks for your help and for providing some second opinions. --A. B. 17:04, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Category:Anti-Mormonism & subcategories

I recently created the Category:Anti-Mormonism, and in an effort to clean up and more clearly define the category, less that 24 hours ago I created the following subcategories:

At that time I also modified a number of the articles that had previously been under Category:Anti-Mormonism so that they were under one of those sub-categories. While I think that there is most definitely lots of room to debate if a particular entry really falls under this category or one of the subcategories, I think the categories themselves have a solid basis for their existence. However, at this time, there is a CfD on Category:Material related to anti-Mormonism. If this category has been already nominated this quickly, I though that it made sense to ask the participants of this WikiProject for their thoughts on all of these Categories. Do you think that the categories themselves should exist as is, should be modified, &/or deleted? Are the entries in each category appropriate? Are there any articles missing in the categories? -- FishUtah 15:11, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

After looking at this further it appears that the CfD nominator (Dev920 (talk · contribs)) may disagreed with my inclusion of Latter Days (of which the user is a frequent editor) into the "Category:Material related to anti-Mormonism", and instead of removing the category from the article, they are question the value of the category itself. After considering this, I removed the category from that article; just because the film deals with the controversial topic of homosexuality and Mormonism doesn't necessarily mean it is anti-Mormon. Am I off base on this? The film is still included in Category:Portrayals of Mormons in popular media where it is a solid fit, and "Category:Material related to anti-Mormonism" has a see also to that category. -- FishUtah 16:51, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Please also see the discussion on at Category talk:Cults#Category:Anti-Mormonism label applied to anti cult orgs -- FishUtah 17:27, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Fish, I am confused about the subcat. Material related to Anti-Mormonism. That seems like a catch all type of category. What are examples of articles to which this category would apply? Places related to Anti-Mormonism; would this category apply to the early history of the church or does it apply across time? For example, Hannegraff's group is in Petaluma, CA (I think); would the whole city be labeled with this? This may also be a category that may not be appropriate. If it is really for historical sites, then dropping the term Anti-Mormonism would seem a better approach. The Law and People categories would be very helpful. Storm Rider 18:03, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

If I had felt that the category was OK, just that its addition to Latter Days was wrong, I would have simply removed it. However, I nominated because I felt it was subjective, too broad, and POV. And as it turns out, the guys at CfD agree with me, so I would not leap to the conclusion that I'm being vindictive over a pet article, Fish. Dev920 (Please peer review here.) 21:59, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

If I made any unfounded assumptions, I'm sorry. You are also making assumptions that I thought that somehow changing the article would make the CfD go away, and that was not my intent. The CfD made me rethink what was in the categories, and I realized I made a mistake with that article (and probably others too), and so I fixed the mistake I could identify and consulted with a wider audience of more experienced editors with an interest in the subject. You certainly are entitled to your opinion that the category doesn't belong, & I'd be happy to discuss this further. However using language like "Mr Utah now appears to be trying to cover his back" and describing the WikiProject Latter Day Saint movement as a "WikiProject full of biased editors" doesn't help with having a discussion. I though I had been above board, honest, and open about what I was doing; any mistakes that I made are my own, and not a responsibility of anyone else. -- FishUtah 22:41, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

A WikiProject on religion is always full of biased editors - it's a sad, but true, fact. I don't really want to have a discussion about the CfD: I nominated it, and now I don't really care what happens to it. Don't give up on Mormon articles because of this experience, just be a bit more careful next time about your actions. Read up on WP:AGF and I'm sure you'll get along fine. Dev920 23:01, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Fish, I saw you removed your name from the LDS community group; that is unfortunate. It is true that article topics founded in relgion are quarrelsome; LDS/Mormon related articles are particularly so. However, to be successful you can not take things personally. I know that we have a gadflys (read obnoxious anti-Mormons with no objective in producing excellent articles, but only in grinding down their pathetic little axes), if I had my way editors of that ilk would be allowed to work with a coach for a period of time and then their case reviewed. If they continued in their POV editorializing, they would then be banned forever. They serve no purpose and produce nothing positive. It is one of the significant downfalls of producing a public encyclopedia; one must just accept it comes with the territory. Take a breather, reconsider your decision and then come back. I hope you will find the wisdom in doing so. Peace. Storm Rider 04:57, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

I've proposed renaming Category:Law related to Anti-Mormonism as Category:Law related to Mormonism. The laws shown in the category are all ones that deal with Mormonism, rather than Anti-Mormonism, and I think it would be more neutral to avoid the "Anti-" label. You can comment on the proposal here: CfR on Category:Law related to Anti-Mormonism. -- BRMo 07:40, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Standards for Temple Data

I setup a page to outline the standards for the data going into the temple here: Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Latter Day Saint movement/Temples

This will allow the data to be in one location and make it easier to keep it up-to-date.
A new template will need to be created, templates will need to be moved

Please comment on the standardization WikiProject talk page, and please edit the proposed standars where appropriate. --Trödel 00:14, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Notice

The standards that are at Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Latter Day Saint movement/Temples have been implemented for the first 10 temples and the new templates are used on the other list pages List of temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and Comparison of temples of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

The are also used for the Infoboxes on the individual article pages for the first 10 temples (see Salt Lake Temple for example). Please register any bugs/concerns on the talk page. Thank you --Trödel 06:25, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

Category:Religious leaders

The current organization there is abit muddled, and needs some discussing how to deal with. A general proposal for cleaning it up is posted at Category talk:Religious leaders#Organization proposal, and more input would be great. It doesn't address the issue of Religious leaders/religious workers/religious figures, but that is another issue that exists. Badbilltucker 22:03, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Nauvoo temple as symbol for Latter Day Saint movement

Why was the Nauvoo temple picture chosen? I would think that an image of the First Vision (like the Joseph Smith first vision stained glass.jpg on the mormonism page) would be more appropriate.

I realize that Joseph Smith was martyred during the Nauvoo era, leading to the major schisms in the Latter Day Saint movement, but some groups split off long before then, and other groups that didn't organize until later believe that Joseph Smith was a fallen prophet by the time of the Nauvoo era, accepting earlier revelations but rejecting his later teachings such as plural marriage, nature of God, etc. that came during the Nauvoo era. 74s181 01:00, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages Day Awards

Hello, all. It was initially my hope to try to have this done as part of Esperanza's proposal for an appreciation week to end on Misplaced Pages Day, January 15. However, several people have once again proposed the entirety of Esperanza for deletion, so that might not work. It was the intention of the Appreciation Week proposal to set aside a given time when the various individuals who have made significant, valuable contributions to the encyclopedia would be recognized and honored. I believe that, with some effort, this could still be done. My proposal is to, with luck, try to organize the various WikiProjects and other entities of wikipedia to take part in a larger celebrartion of its contributors to take place in January, probably beginning January 15, 2007. I have created yet another new subpage for myself (a weakness of mine, I'm afraid) at User talk:Badbilltucker/Appreciation Week where I would greatly appreciate any indications from the members of this project as to whether and how they might be willing and/or able to assist in recognizing the contributions of our editors. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 18:25, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

Can I upload this pictures?

I found great pictures at http://www.lds.org/hf/art/0,16812,4218-1-3,00.html Can I upload this pictures to wikipedia without copyright problems? I do not know. So please help me.Daniel3 16:24, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

See my detailed response on Daniel's talk page. --Trödel 22:04, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Religion

The group indicated above was recently revitalized for, among other things, the purpose of working on those articles whose content is such that the article does not fall within the scope of any particular denomination. To most effectively do this, however, we would benefit greatly if there were at least one member from this Project working on those articles. On that basis, I would encourage and welcome any member of this Project willing to work on those articles to join the Religion WikiProject. Thank you. Badbilltucker 22:45, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

Jesus nominated for Article Improvement Drive

I recently found that our article on Jesus is the first page that appears when anyone does a Google search of the subject. It is currently, regrettably, only at GA status. On that basis, I would request any individuals who might be interested in helping to bring this article up to FA status to indicate their support for the article being chosen as the AID article at Misplaced Pages:Article Creation and Improvement Drive#Jesus. Thank you for your attention. Badbilltucker 18:03, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Image:Themartyrdomoftheprophet.jpg

Image:Themartyrdomoftheprophet.jpg is lacking source information. If it does not have the appropriate information within 7 days, it will be deleted. I assume that the licensing information is correct (PD), but without a source, we can't be sure. If anyone can research this image to prevent it from being deleted... go right ahead :). ~MDD 46 96 21:06, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Mormon pioneers

This is the current collaboration of the month. I would like to add the non-commercial LDS movies, Legacy: A Mormon Journey to the external Links section.I think to upload this movie on http://video.google.com/ would not be a problem because LDS movies like The Restoration (Google Video) are also on http://video.google.com/ .But I can not upload this movie because I do not have it and I´m from Europe and I´m not a mormon. So please, is there someone out there who can upload this movie on http://video.google.com/ and share it with us?Daniel3 17:07, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Archibald Gardner

I asked for help on Trödel's talk page, but I didn't know about the RfC and the signs that he's busy in real life. Could anyone take a look at this (details on Trödel's talk page)? Help would be appreciated. -- 63.224.137.164 03:19, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Did some reorganizing and minor editing, and established headings, on this article. But, even though I am aware of this Mormon pioneer, the article needs lots of work. It may be a family project, as the primary author is using a Gardner name. I suspect some copyright issues as well. I would encourage other editors, familiar with the pioneer period, to take a look. Perhaps we should contact the primary editor about the LDS project and guidelines? Best to all. WBardwin 07:44, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Since Milogardner and myself can't seem to communicate effectively regarding Archibald Gardner I posted a Request for Comment directing people to Talk:Archibald Gardner#Request for Comment for further comments. --Trödel 17:04, 7 May 2007 (UTC)

Wikiproject userbox

I say we create a userbox which says something like This user is member of wiki-project Latter Day Saint Movement. Anybody agree? --TomasBat (@)(Sign) 18:13, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

I do! --Austinsimcox 15:40, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, here is the userbox:

This user is a member of the Latter Day Saint movement wikiproject.

♠TomasBat (@)(Contribs)(Sign!) 03:05, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

I altered this userbox slightly (changed the picture to match the one of Joseph Smith used for the project template) and created a template for it. To add yourself as a member of this WikiProject and include this userbox in your profile, please use {{User WPLDSmov}}. I hope you like it. Chiros Sunrider 21:48, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the transclusion! Yes, looks good. ♠Tom @s Bat 22:43, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Praise

The LDS portion of "Praise" need some serious attention. It looks like it's just someones personal opinions, mixed with scripture passages and very un-LDS like vocabulary; the bibilical passages in the "LDS" paragraph aren't even KJV. -- FishUtah 03:58, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

I removed the entire section. I have no idea where the original editor got some of those ideas, and I agree they probably weren't LDS. IMHO, the LDS treatment of Praise isn't much different than any other Christian religion. Of course, anyone can go back and add something more meaningful if they don't agree with me. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 04:37, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Garden of Eden

Garden of Eden#Latter Day Saints' geography for Eden needs some help. It seems to have more faith promoting speculativism & personal interpretation than actual documented teachings from published sources. -- 63.224.137.164 04:02, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

LDS 'Saints'

I have read elsewhere that the city St. George, Utah is named in honor of George Albert Smith. Assuming that this is true, then there is presumably some sort of at least irregular canonization process in the LDS churches. Are there any other instances in which Mormons have been similarly officially given the title "Saint"? John Carter 19:38, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

There are two theories as to how St. George got it's name, one being from a man named Philip St. George Cooke and the other being George Albert Smith, who became known as "The Potato Saint." The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints does not have anything similar to the canonization process used in Catholic and Protestant churches where a person is canonized and given the title of "Saint." The term "Saint" in the LDS Church (and other Latter Day Saint movements as well) is more of a generic term for a follower of Christ, not a canonized or exalted person. --JonRidinger 21:39, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

The city St. George, Utah is named in honor of George A. Smith (Was confused with George Albert Smith, which is not the same person). submitted in material above by anon 76.23.6.23 09:22, 6 June 2007

OK, so the statement I read is not universally accepted, which is good to know. Just for clarification, however, does the church employ any other terminology for the same purpose? I realize the answer is probably "no," but want to make sure. I may soon try to rename some of the non-Christian "saints" categories so that they use the term actually used by the specific religion (avatar, tzaddik, wali, etc.), and would probably want to make sure that any such Mormon grouping would use the correct name as well. Thanks again for the information. John Carter 15:20, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

You are correct in assuming there is no terminiology nor process in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints comparable to the use of "Saint" in Catholic or Protestant traditions. If any title is used in reference to past church leaders (like Joseph Smith or Brigham Young), the title they held while alive is sometimes used, like President Brigham Young or Joseph Smith the prophet for example. While great members of the Church are revered, remembered, and respected, there is no canonization or elevation to sainthood process in the Mormon tradition like you would find in a Catholic or Protestant church, nor a posthumous title given. Hope this helps and best of luck! --JonRidinger 21:30, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

Boy this misses the mark widely. The term "saint" in the LDS tradition refers to a baptized member of the religion, after which you are called a "saint". Even now, when talking about the body of the church as a whole, it is very common to talk about the "saints". It is part of the very name of the church, and the "S" in LDS. I've seen this terminology also used by more than one group in the LDS movement as well... although talking about their own unique brand of Mormonism as being the "true" body of "saints".

If there is an equivalent in LDS theology of what is known as "sainthood" with Catholicism, it would be considered a "calling and election" or "second endowment". This is a very obscure ordinance, but is also not part of the reference to St. George. Many practicing members of the LDS Church have not even heard about this ceremony.

As far as "urban ledgends" within Utah are concerned about the naming of St. George, Utah, it was done as a sort of parody on the concept that other cities in the USA had names that started with "Saint" like St. Louis, St. Paul, St. Augustine, and others. George A. Smith, the grandfather of George Albert Smith and the LDS apostle who served in authority over southern Utah during the initial settlements of the region was honored by having the city named after him. It seemed silly to have a city simply named "George" or "Smith" so they decided to give the city a more dignified name of "St. George", since he certainly was a "saint" by LDS standards. The term "saint" here had no other significant distinction, and was not an honorific. I can try to find some better references if this is an issue to settle an edit war. --Robert Horning 21:37, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Just to clarify, which statement are you saying "missed the mark badly"? The Second Anointing or Calling and Election is a process Latter-day Saints believe is chosen by God through revelation, not by a vote of cardinals or lay members, like in elevating a person to sainthood in the Catholic Church. While it would be considered an equal level, Latter-day Saints do not refer to people who have supposedly gone through this ceremony by a different name or title, nor is it something that is done posthumously, both of which are true about sainthood in the Catholic church. Also, those that have had this "second endowment" are VERY few and far in between, hence the lack of information and knowledge of it at all. As you said, most members aren't even aware of it. As far as St. George is concerned your reasoning sounds right, although the info I supplied on the origin of its name is from the city of St. George's own website. I've always considered it a parody on "saint" more than anything. On a side note, St. James Township, Michigan was named after James Strang, who was the leader of the Strangite movement (he named it after himself). I would imagine his use of "saint" was not meant to be a parody.=) --JonRidinger 03:29, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Latter Day Saint movement

In recent edits to Latter Day Saint movement, Jukilum (talk · contribs) appears to be intentionally injecting a Latter-day Saint centric POV into the article, so that the article now reads that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is unequivocally the successor/continuation of the Church of Christ. I tried reverting this, but this user consequently undid the revert and additionally converted the lists of denominations into tables that also display POV issues. -- 12.106.111.10 21:32, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Nation of Deseret

The article, Nation of Deseret, is truly a non-encyclopedic article. If someone would like to salvage something out of it for another article in this project, please let me know. If not I will Afd it in a few days. As it appears to be WP:OR and has no references I was tempted to Speedy it but I have no familiarity with the topic and there may be something useful in it. I don't think merge or redirect would work here. Thnx --killing sparrows 03:51, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

About the only thing useful there that I can see is some of the material about the Deseret alphabet, which could be moved to that article. -- 63.224.137.164 03:37, 1 April 2007 (UTC)

Auxiliary Organizations

Unless I'm mistaken, we do not yet have articles on LDS Sunday School and LDS Young Men/Young Women organizations and functions. Both have a long history! Should we create these articles independently or develop a generic LDS Auxiliary article with summaries of all auxiliaries? WBardwin 22:51, 31 March 2007 (UTC)

Space Opera in Latter-day Saints theology

Someone might want to look at this "interesting" article. -- 12.106.111.10 19:41, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Title and Value of the article: Rotten title for this article (see Space opera) as it is constitued -- and the information is questionable at best. Opinions on the article's value and changes needed? WBardwin 03:49, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

If no one objects, I plan to nominate it for deletion. Seems to be original research under a mocking title that doesn't actually refer to any heretofore known scholarship. Article therefore fails WP:OR and WP:N. Cool Hand Luke 05:38, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

It is worse than WP:OR, it is highly POV. I support a speedy delete if possible. --Storm Rider 20:46, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Ok, the prod should be fine. What I'm getting at is that POV is not normally a criteria for deletion (stock reply is to fix the page). The content is POV, but even if it weren't, it would need to be deleted because it's OR and an invented concept. Cool Hand Luke 22:15, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Cool, would you take a shot at correcting the reasons or should I? --Storm Rider 23:36, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Too late, I went in and deleted the NPOV violation. Thank you for pointing that out. Anything else I should do? --Storm Rider 23:39, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Nope, we just wait. Assuming no one finds reliable sources to back up the existence and notability of this subject, we delete it in less than a week. I don't think such sources exist, so it's just a formality, but it's one we have to go through when an article doesn't neatly qualify for a speedy. Cool Hand Luke 23:47, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Prod was removed by an anon, so I just nominated it for deletion. Cool Hand Luke 01:07, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Category:Bigamists

In the recent past there have been several CfD's for "polygamists" categories (1, 2, 3, 4) which removed them all, and also a related CfD on Category:Bigamists. The consensus for leaving Category:Bigamists revolved around categorizing "convicted criminals" instead of pointing out polygamists.

I'd like to point out that a recent effort is being made to add into Category:Bigamists to a group of biographical articles (predominantly LDS related), which appears to have been done irrespective of criminal prosecution for bigamy of the subject of the article. This has the effect of recreating the deleted "polygamists" categories, and does not seem meet the criteria for inclusion in Category:Bigamists.

I made some suggestions to User:Dr. Submillimeter (the person who submitted the CfD on Category:Bigamists) on his talk page but his reply he seemed to indicate he did not feel that these suggestions would work long term. I'd like to solicit some suggestions from members of WP:LDS on what they feel might be done. Should the inclusion criteria mentioned on the top of the Category:Bigamists be modified to better explain what the category is meant for, and if so how? How should Category:Bigamists be cleaned up to only include the relevant articles? How likely is it that this cleanup process would be sustainable over time? -- 12.106.111.10 21:52, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

I have removed most of the names of those individuals that were not convicted of Bigamy. I would like to see the category deleted, but I suspect that because there are those who are convicted of bigamy exist it stays. First, we should explain the purpose of the category and second, it will take monitoring to ensure the category does not bleed into other areas. --Storm Rider 03:24, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Category:Mormonism-related controversies

Well, how about this emerging category?? LDS articles are being, in my opinion, quite casually placed here. It seems to me that such a category would generate a list of articles for potential edit disagreement. Quite polarizing. Is that its intent? What other purpose would such a category have? Opinions? WBardwin 05:38, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

I could see the potential for such a category, but at present there is no definition / criteria and seems to be assigned to a wide range of articles, some of which are clearly controversial, but others where the controversy seems to be that others don't believe it. The category has been nominated for deletion, BTW. There is a discussion going on there. wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 12:16, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Category:Anti-Christianity & Category:Anti-Mormonism

Anyone interested in weighing in (for or against) this and this CfD? It would seem that the issues on both may be intertwined. -- 12.106.111.10 23:28, 18 April 2007 (UTC)

Template and portal usage

I noticed some additions yesterday which got me to wondering and so I made comment on the Template:LDS talk page. I got an 'against' opinion that sounded reasonable. Then what I had wondered at happened today. Someone has added the portal to the Template:LDS. I know nothing pertaining to this, but Wikignomes know religious 'stuff' can be controversial, and so I'd like to get the discussion going before feelings.

Is it a 'good' or 'bad' thing to have mention of the Latter-day Saints Portal in the template? Please discuss over at the template talk page (link above) Shenme 20:10, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Talk:The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints/Sandbox

What is Talk:The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints/Sandbox for? Can this/should this be deleted at this time? -- 12.106.111.10 20:21, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

The Church of Jesus Christ

In pointing out Misplaced Pages:Manual of Style (Latter Day Saints)#Avoid use of "Mormonisms" to another editor earlier today I noticed one thing that currently seems to be an issue. In that section the current wording is (bolding mine to highlight issue):

Never use terms like "The Church" or "The Church of Jesus Christ" to refer to any specific church, in spite of the LDS Church's style guide recommending it. "The church" is acceptable when the word "church" is an uncapitalized common noun, but capitalized "Church" should only be used when it is part of a longer reference to a specific church.

Currently the naming used on the article The Church of Jesus Christ (as well as collateral references to that subject in other locations on Misplaced Pages such as on Template:Mormon denomination tree), seem to contradict this statement. Likewise the church list in Misplaced Pages:Naming conventions (Latter Day Saints) remains silent on this denomination. Would a rewording/reworking of these guidelines be in order? -- 12.106.111.10 21:02, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm raising this on those talk pages. The guidelines should be revised, as it is the official name of the Bickertonite church. Vassyana 21:32, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Usefull pictures for wikipedia

Look at http://www.hopeofzion.com/stuff/map.jpg and at http://www.lightplanet.com/mormons/images/Basic_BOM_Plates_2.jpg Daniel3 20:41, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Mormon Denomination Tree

There has been some discussion on usage of the Template:Mormon denomination tree scattered throughout several pages. I decided to start the thread here to centeralize the discussion and any decisions resulting from it. (See Talk:The Church of Jesus_Christ#Tree Link (revisit) for one such discussion). Based on other discussions, I am proposing that the usage of this tree be limited to the Latter Day Saint movement page and any other page that references the movement on a similarly high-level. (Perhaps like Succession crisis (Latter Day Saints), etc.) Putting it on every page, particularly every different denomination's page, in my opinion just amounts to a bunch of clutter. It seems to be overused, and frankly I think the whole project would look better without this glaring at the reader at the bottom of every page, although it does have value on high-level pages discussing the entire movement. Thoughts? Stekun 21:35, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

It is a great visual for the Latter Day Saint movement, but I agree that it is not needed on the denomination pages. We already have a Latter Day Saint movement Template. It has links to major things within the movement. This template should be on general sites within the movement, but specific denominations seems a very cluttered.Jcg5029 23:17, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

I would also recommend that the colors be muted somewhat. I find the current version quit jarring. A more subtle color scheme might make the results look more professional. (I have always been color challenged, which is probably why I noticed it. ;^) wrp103 (Bill Pringle) 15:00, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm with you on the colors as well. It should be cleaned up a little, included on relavent high-level LDS movement pages, and cleaned up from the other random ones that it pops up on. This will make the whole project appear much more professional and easy to follow. Stekun 16:57, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with both of you. It has good info but jumps at you pretty hard.Jcg5029 21:55, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

An aside - New LDS.org links

Does anyone else besides me think the Church's webmasters are complete idiots for using unfriendly and unnecessarily long URL's in the "new and improved" website design. I mean seriously - what were they thinking --Trödel 01:55, 28 April 2007 (UTC)

Lol. I have always thought that those employed to implement the LDS Church's forays into technology did funny things. I used to think it was a result of the difficulty of implementing technology changes in thousands of church units around the world, but now that I've seen how the lds websites have progressed (a prime example being the issue you cited), I'm starting to think there is a deeper problem there. Maybe the wages aren't great. -SESmith 01:35, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

I had actually given them feedback on getting shorter links when the new site first appeared. Maybe if more people mention it they will change it?Joshuajohanson 02:04, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

It's probably because the websites are run by 80-year-old volunteers who want to serve an easy mission. COGDEN 08:15, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

I fell off my chair reading these comments; spot on critique. Surprisingly, the Church has recently begun to pay for top notch talent. Recently they have done some head hunting of senior managers at Microsoft and the individuals have felt comfortable that their pay was not going to be harmed by working for the Church; that would have been unheard of just a few years ago. Maybe things will improve in that area with the new talent.

As a long-term investment manager I would never have thought of working for the Church simply because they did not pay even close to industry standards. Their old way of thinking is that working for the Church was supposed to be such a blessing that wages were should be a secondary issue. It may be a blessing, but pay for talent is still the best way to obtain the best talent for non ecclesiastical positions. --Storm Rider 08:42, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Is it perhaps that they are trying to make it difficult to deep-link? Intellectual Reserve v. Utah Lighthouse Ministry comes to mind... -- 70.59.251.173 05:16, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

Actually the church is encourages deep-linking - the ULM case was about linking to a copyright violation (regardless of whether it is a deep link or a front page). Which, btw, is also not within Misplaced Pages policy. I.e. wikipedia external links and references should not link to material that violates another's copyright. --Trödel 20:59, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Hm—I suppose it could have been done on purpose—but why would they object to anyone deep-linking to anything found on lds.org? I think the church (IRI) owns the copyright to anything found there and if they don't want something linked to, wouldn't they just choose to not put it up in the first place? -SESmith 05:25, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

If you want to ask someone at the top of the food-chain (IT wise), try asking Joel Dehlin (the CIO for the Church) on his personal (non-Church approved) blog at ldscio.org - his current blog article just happens to be about the mormon.org Beta. -- 65.101.29.133 19:11, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

BTW, I wrote the church about this issue back in January.

... I know that it is frowned upon by webdesigners for others to do what is called "Deep linking" into their website, but the church's website is the perfect example of why deep linking is useful and good web designers should plan for it:

It allows those who know how to use the site and are more computer literate to pass on direct information to those who aren't

...Any design such as the current URL structure creates difficulties where emailed links don't work because they are too long. The current structure even suggest that links to a specific chapter could change from session to session.
This, in my opinion, hurts ... real world usability because I can't tell someone who is having trouble to type http://www.lds.org/library and it will get them where they need to go. Or pass them a direct link to the chapter they are doing their lesson ...
Additionally the failure to use the words of the topic in the URL like:
http://beta.lds.org/protal/site/LDSOrg/library.Spencer_W_Kimball/Lesson_1/To_Live_with_Him_Someday.htm mean that search engines will not rank the page well when they type "Spencer Kimball lesson 1" ...(I know this can be overcome with metadata - but still easy URLs are better).

Finally, I am worried that pre-existing deep links to specific chapters or pages of books will no longer work once the beta site is active.

The response I received from the Director of the Internet and Project Coordination Division said:

Thanks for submitted these great suggestions. We are making plans to do all the things you mention below. In a few months, our URLs will become shorter and more meaningful. We will also have shortcut subdomains like ensign.lds.org that you can use to send to friends. We are also addressing the search engine optimization suggestions you provided below to increase our visibility with search engines.
Thanks for taking the time to submit the suggestions. You should see them all in place over the next few months.

So there is some hope. Unfortunately, the beta site was implemented and the old URLs are beginning not to work, especially in the newsroom area which contained press releases etc that were often used as source material. However, after writing the note above I wrote a quick note asking when how long before the changes he mentioned would be implemented. Still no response :( +

If you would like to add your email to mine, email me and I'll forward you his email address. --Trödel 20:31, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I have a list of about 130 wikipedia pages were the links are bad going toward the LDS.org site. Before i post the list, is tehre a willingness to help clean up the wikipedia links from the group? or should we wait for "deep links?" Incidentally Trodel, I've asked a contact of mine at Church public affairs about deep linking. I'm sure i'll hear something soon, and perhaps faster than if you go through the typical channels. -Visorstuff 21:34, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

I would be willing to help with link cleanup. If you post the list soon let me know. Chiros Sunrider 21:52, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

Templates on LDS pages

NThurston has been moving the LDS navigation template from the beginning of articles to the end. I prefered it at the top. Also, there is another navigation template at the bottom of each article, so they overlap. Rather than just change things back, I'd like to get a consensus: Do others have this same problem with the templates overlapping? Do others prefer the navigation box at the top? Val42 18:06, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

They overlap on my browser and are hard to read. And, frankly, are just plain ugly. WBardwin 20:28, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

a) Can you give some specific examples of the overlapping? That can be fixed easily. b) The template {{LDS}} was redirect to the Latter Day Saint movement template. A discussion of the changes has been occurring on the {{Latter Day Saint movement}} template's talk page. As a result of conflict and resolution, there are now two separate navigational templates - one for the movement, and one for articles about the LDS Church. {{LDS}} incorporates both templates at the same time and is used for articles that related to both this denomination and the movement. Navigational templates are more appropriately included at the bottom of the article, in or near the "See also" section, or at the very end. Infoboxes are not generally good substitutes for navigational templates, but rather as summaries of key facts about the article in question. Since almost all of the discussion is already there, I suggest continuing any dialog on Template talk:Latter Day Saint movement. I am glad to see interest in this and hopefully more discussion will result in improvements.--NThurston 16:08, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Here is an example of where they overlap from the Succession crisis article:

The portal navigation pane has been changed since I first reported the problem, but you can still see the overlap. I'm using Firefox 1.5.0.10, which admittedly isn't the latest, but it isn't very old either. Val42 02:53, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

The overlap has been fixed and verified in Firefox. If anybody sees any other overlaps please fix or report them so I can fix them. --NThurston 13:41, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm curious about what other people think of this template. I also think it is ugly, and I preferred the sidebar over the bottom navigation link. So much so that I would like to "fork" the older version of this template to another name and restore the sidebar in some of the articles that I'm actively working on. I understand that this is needless duplication of effort, but it is a change to the status quo and the current user who is actively making changes to this template is also engaging in a minor edit war to force this current format. --Robert Horning 00:35, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

I also prefer the previous template. Where is this discussion taking place about the templates? Val42 19:42, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

Template talk:Latter Day Saint movement, previously Template talk:LDS, is the page you are looking for. The current attitude is that since a "majority" working on this template think this change is reasonable, there is a modest edit war (a couple of full reversions) over the future of this template. Other editors interested in this certainly should join in the discussion. --Robert Horning 21:37, 18 May 2007 (UTC)

C. Terry Warner

Anyone have any info that could help the stub on C. Terry Warner, BYU professor? It is carrying a notability tag. WBardwin 20:53, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

Sounds pretty random, why is his site notable at all?Jcg5029 05:15, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

Archive remaining 2006 discussions?

Is it time to archive the remaining discussions from 2006? I have not noticed any comments on those items for some time now. -- 12.106.111.10 15:30, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

New project proposal

There is a new WikiProject task force proposal at Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Council/Proposals#Inter-religious content that is being proposed to deal specifically with articles whose content relates to several religious traditions. Any editors interested in joining such a group would be more than welcome to indicate their interest there. John Carter 15:09, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

AfD Debate - Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Transgression (Latter Day Saints)

I thought i'd bring this AfD to the attention of the project, as being raised LDS the basis and content of this article doesn't sound right to me. If you have some time to take a look at the article and make some positive contributions to the AfD discussion it would no doubt be appreciated. Thewinchester 07:01, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Mormon Teachings About Extraterrestrial Life

A recently created article by Jeffrey Vernon Merkey (talk · contribs) named Mormon Teachings About Extraterrestrial Life might use some attention. It's basically a extensive series quotes, with very little encyclopedic explanation or context about the included statements. -- 71.35.46.20 02:59, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Needed Articles

One of the needed articles, Second Coming (Mormonism) has been created. It was made by TheInfinityZero. Useight 17:57, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Source Quality

Generally for most Misplaced Pages articles, you can simply shut up most fringe theories or psuedo science pushers, especially with major POV concerns, by simply asking them to show source for their point of view. The marginal theories about cosmology, for instance that the universe is on the back of a giant turtle, will have poor sources compared to thinking by Einstein or Hawking. Or more to the point, it is very easy to evaluate sources and be able to suggest who is credible and what is simply an off the wall, perhaps even self-generated source.

I am strongly concerned about the quality of many of the Mormonism related articles (ok.... Latter Day Saint movement) with what I perceived is a huge problem with trying to evaluate what can be considered reliable sources and what are simply crazy kooks that have some wild theory about Joseph Smith howling at the moon goddess in his red pajamas. In other words something that is so far from a reliable source that you might as well consider it to be fiction, even though it seems to have a basis somehow in reality.

I have seen a huge number of POV fights also show up on several articles where you can pretty much document your entire POV and disprove the opposing POV through incredibly extensive bibliographies. I could name several articles here that would fall under this general umbrella, of having this problem, but it is an ongoing and persistent problem within nearly every article related to Joseph Smith, his religious teachings, and the religious movement that followed after him. Being a contemporary figure, or at least somebody with clear historical records in a country relatively free from foreign invasion, documentable and even contradictory records exist about the early events of the LDS movement. Even within "official" records, both government as well as church records.

What I'm asking for here is a frank and honest discussion about what kinds of sources ought to be considered "reliable" within Misplaced Pages articles, and what kinds of sources really are "un-encyclopedic" and don't really deserve to be considered a primary source of material. Particularly in reference to articles related to the LDS movement. I know that not everybody here will even agree on a common defintion, and even citing cannonized scripture is likely to cause huge disagreement as to if it may even be considered a reliable source. But for the sake of trying to improve the NPOV of many of the related articles, it would be worth while to at least consider that many of the source cited in these articles are really worthy of being cited in an encyclopedia setting of what should be quality NPOV articles about these topics.

Perhaps I'm opening a can of worms that is better left alone, but I perceive this as a huge problem that needs to be addressed by this Wikiproject. --Robert Horning 19:02, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, that's probably a big can of worms, but I agree, some sort of list of sources considered "reliable", "unbiased", etc, would be good. Useight 19:16, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Pictures

I recently went on vacation and visited many church sites. I have quite a few pictures in case there are any pages needing a free-use picture. If you can think of any needed pictures, feel free to ask me on my talk page. Useight 20:37, 18 June 2007 (UTC)

Will you assist in passing a Good Article review?

No Man Knows My History: The Life of Joseph Smith is being reviewed for Good Article status. The reviewer has some minor issues with the article, some of which I have tended to, other points are a bit beyond my abilities, so I am asking if someone here would care to look at the article and see if they can assist in having the article pass the GA review. __meco 10:24, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Archives