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Are You Aware? Wildfires
This is part IV in our “Concerning Climate” Awareness Wednesday series. Read the other posts in the series here. Wildfires have been a part of the American landscape for centuries. Fire is a part of nature. Grasslands have historically burned every 15 to 30 years, and many forests have burned every 60 to 150 years. Burning is known to maintain forage and open woodlands, creating important wildlife habitats. Plants, such as the ponderosa pine tree with its thick bark, can survive low-intensity fires, and the seeds germinate in the fertile, recently burned soil. Thousands of acres have burned every year, often with few consequences but occasionally with tragic outcomes. During the hot dry…
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Are You Aware? Love for Africa
This is part III in our “Concerning Climate” Awareness Wednesday series. Read the other posts in the series here. Africa accounts for only two to three percent of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions from energy and industrial sources. According to the World Resources Institute, Africa’s per capita emissions of carbon dioxide in the year 2000 were 0.8 metric tons per person, compared with a global figure of 3.9 tons per person. The U.S. per capita emissions are 16.2 tons per person. In the fight against climate change, Africa’s contribution is negligible. Of course, Africa is not a monolith. African countries have varying levels of development and utilization of energy sources. The…
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Are You Aware? Water Is Critical
This is part II in our “Concerning Climate” Awareness Wednesday series. Read the other posts in the series here. Water is critical to the sustenance of life. Creating and maintaining life is impossible without this vital resource. Throughout the history of the world, people and civilizations have followed the water. Any threat to our water sources is a threat to life itself. While the western U.S. has always had periods of drought, many are now experiencing historic drought levels. Drought typically starts with less than normal rainfall. But temperatures also impact this. Since the industrial era began, our earth has warmed by about 1.2 degrees Celsius (about 2 degrees Fahrenheit). While…
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Sabbath Devotional :: Advocate
As I stood to exit a meeting at the school, the teacher said, “Your daughter is lucky to have you as her advocate.” Advocate. The word caught my attention. In that situation, I was teaming up with teachers and administrators whose purpose was to help my daughter be successful. Her success was a shared goal. But without my advocacy, they wouldn’t have known how to help. As I drove home, I dwelt on the word advocate. One of Christ’s titles is Advocate. This title makes me feel especially loved by him. In the Doctrine and Covenants, Christ says, “Lift up your hearts and be glad, for I am in your midst,…
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Are You Aware? Taking Our Temperature
This is part I in our “Concerning Climate” Awareness Wednesday series. Read the other posts in the series here. The night of Tuesday, November 8, 2016, I couldn’t sleep. I tried distracting myself to calm my nerves but to no avail. The few moments I did sleep were fitful and short lived. Anxiety for the future had replaced disbelief and was my companion all night. My number one concern was climate change, and I knew the president-elect didn’t share my concerns and, in fact, held policy positions in opposition to my concerns. You may not have experienced this same apprehension or felt it to the same extent. If that’s the case,…
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Sabbath Devotional :: Belonging and Believing
Something I catch myself thinking a lot is, “How can anyone believe _____??!!” And especially, “How can any of my family, my friends believe ______??!!” I see the inverse on social media sometimes: “If you believe ___, unfriend/unfollow me because I don’t want to know you.” It is so satisfying and so tempting to think there is a set of righteous beliefs and we should only associate with others who have them. Unfortunately, I do not believe Christians or Latter-day Saints can afford to indulge in this kind of ideological purity testing for the people to whom we are willing to extend love. It’s true that there are abhorrent beliefs,…
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Sabbath Devotional :: And Above All Things, Charity
True confession: I don’t love reading the scriptures. Well, I don’t love reading them all the time. I don’t read them all the time. I know I should, but I don’t. I have struggled my entire life being a daily scripture reader. I have always had dreams of being a great scriptorian (and an Olympic gymnast), but I am not. I struggle to establish any good, daily habit (unless you count snacking on chocolate chips, because I do that every day). When it comes to the scriptures, I struggle to understand what I am reading, especially when it’s written in King James-era English. I struggle when I see what I…
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9 Ways You Can Help Afghan Refugees Today
I believe with all my heart that even though our situations and talents and experiences are different, we can still find ways to help others — no matter where we are physically, emotionally, mentally, and financially. Here are nine ways any of us can come to the aid of our Afghan sisters and brothers. 1. Pray Pray for those who are suffering in Afghanistan. Pray for those across the world with relatives in Afghanistan who are worrying about their family members’ safety. Pray that as many people as possible can get to safety. Pray for those unable to get out. Pray for our government and governments across the world to…
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Sabbath Devotional :: “More Love”
There is a lot of talk lately about polarization and tribalism. The danger of fracture and schism feels immediate and frightening. Yeats’ oft-cited lines ricochet in my head almost daily. “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.” But it turns out that Yeats’ poem, published in 1920, was voicing a timeless sentiment. Another of my favorite poems, John Donne’s Anatomy of the World voiced a similar lament in 1619: And new philosophy calls all in doubt,The element of fire is quite put out,The sun is lost, and th’earth, and no man’s witCan well direct him where to look for it.And freely men confess that this world’s spent,When in the planets…
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Sabbath Devotional :: “Don’t let Perfect be the Enemy of Good” and Unwritten Stories
“Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good.” It’s not exactly what Voltaire said, but it is how it’s known in common parlance. What don’t we do because we think we need to do it perfectly? What don’t we do because we think it won’t be enough, won’t matter, won’t make a big enough difference, won’t be important enough? What don’t we do because we think somebody else could do it better? What don’t we do because somebody may criticize us, or shake their heads, or rebuke us? What good things aren’t we doing? I fight this fight more often than I’d like to admit. I’m not satisfied unless I…
