Zane K's Response to "What I Now Believe"

I agree with the author on many points. Too often we put so much focus on what our grade will be, and we lose sight of the eternal, spiritual perspective of education. We worry so much about doing well that we don’t get much of anything from the experiences we have. I do think the author made grades sound too unimportant. They do have importance; that scholarship is important, and that career is important, but we cannot let those divert our attention from what is truly important. As the author said, we will not be asked to show our transcript when we are judged, but we may be asked how we served the Lord.

One of the other points that the author made is the “classroom King” hierarchy. Most of the time, I do not think of my teachers this way, though I can’t say I have never had a teacher like that. If anything, I think of them as wiser and in charge, but rarely do I find them tyrannical. Usually they are nice, and, well, a teacher. We tend to be afraid of our teachers. We don’t ask them questions, we try to suck up to them for extra credit, and we do all we can to avoid their bad side. I find it interesting how normal and how human teachers can be if you just have a friendly chat with them. Some of the best discussions I have had in High School were with my teachers. There is rarely a real reason to be afraid of a teacher.

Matt L's Response to "What I Now Believe"

Oh the irony.  I love how I get to respond to this big, grand finale type RFIW article all about how to make the best of our BYU educations and be the best students we can be when I, the grandsire of all procrastination and goof-offery, am scrambling to write this blog response the night before and with a fully lackluster attitude.   I just can’t defeat the thought that none of you could give a crap what I’m writing and will only be reading this response because you’re required to.  Frankly, I don’t care either, and I’m kinda playing the same game as you folks.  In fact, I intend to use this blog post as a kind of experiment more than anything. See, I’m hypothesizing that people leave the most comments on the responses that are the shortest/ most skimmable because none of us really care about any of these articles or our peer’s responses and once a week we just go online and choose the path of least resistance.  So I apologize: even though this article would persuade me to do otherwise, I’m going to try to keep this brief in the name of science. And also in the name of my unfinished Great Works responses.

            So as revealed before, I am no one to expound on Richard’s words here.  I would be such a dirty hypocrite, and I can’t afford to be defamed like that or have you lovely people hate me, oh no no. So instead, I thought I would write about ways you and I fail at making the best of our stays at BYU, because I’m definitely a credible source when it comes to failure.

Ready? Follow

                        Meeee

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Richard’s first belief: We should view our education in an “eternal context” in order to make the best of our mortal and post-mortal lives.  This means we work with goals and have a sense of mission and spirituality within our learning.

A Failure’s interpretation:  Psych!  To be honest, I pretty much work assignment to assignment and think of nothing but finishing so I can sleep.  I am the natural man if there ever was one, and although I like learning stuff, I don’t exactly view my homework as any kind of channel for learning.  Everything just seems like busy work to me.  Things like this, for example, I’m doing just because I have to.  And I know I’m not alone in this.  We all have an imperfect perspective of learning because it’s far easier to jump through hoops than to actually stand back and refine our knowledge.  To paraphrase Richards, “Knock it off, Matt”

Belief # 2:  Our professors are there to help us.  They’re in the same boat as we are, just trying to perfect themselves and others and share their knowledge with us to promote our eternal well being.

Failure says:  Our professors are our friends? LIARS!  They are the enemy, just waiting to trap me with some kind of knowledgeable trickery and expose all my well disguised dumbness.  I try to look at my professors as friends, but in certain cases they seem more like crazy people than anyone I want to look to for help, which holds me back in a big way from getting the most out of my education.  I need to stop competing with them, figuratively, and practice learning for a change. 

The Final Belief:      Richards finally suggests that we “consecrate [our time at BYU] unto Him” (21) and, somewhat reiterating his first belief, never let the world’s standards replace or supersede the higher standards of a “consecrated” people. 

I’m Special:  Finally! One area where I don’t completely suck.  Personally, and I think about everyone is with me here, I manage to keep my standards in place at BYU.  You’ve pretty much got to try to commit any major sin here, and because we live as students live apart from the carnal influences outside of this place, we can grow and progress in ways that seemed miles away a couple months ago.  It’s so much easier here to get in a spiritual zone, and from there it gets a lot easier to lace spirituality in with your academics.  While I do suffer from “academic bulimia” (20) as I’m sure many of you my fellow peers/adoring fans do, I still do learn a lot, sometimes against my will.  Richards did an excellent job of picking me up and brushing the dust off of me in this section after those guilt trips in the first two sections.  After coming to BYU I feel like I stand for something, and I have a reputation and a mission larger than myself to uphold by studying here.  I expect more of myself, and so does the world, and I do feel like I’m learning how to be the best representative of Christ as I can.  In a world that belittles Christ repeatedly, it feels good to know that I’m at least preparing myself to do what is right in a secular world, and let my secular side complement my religious one at the same time.

And that’s all I can really say about this article.  Dang good speaking is what it is.  I wish I could have been at the devotional for this one.  I need a good kick in the pants every once in a while, and this article caught me off guard.  Good for you, Richards.  Hopefully I’ll catch on before it’s too late.      

Miriam J's Response to "What I Now Believe"

     It was in high school that I first began to enjoy learning. I realized, what I was learning was actually kind of interesting. That was one thing that I loved about A.P. classes; the students actually cared about what they were learning. They cared overly much about their grades, too, but at least they weren’t too cool to discuss what they were learning about. However, I still cared more about my grades than anything else, and I didn’t bother to remember anything I had learned after the A.P. test was over. I suppose laziness won out over sounding smart.

    

   Now that I’m in college, I’m still having a hard time caring more about what I’m learning than about my grades. But reading what A. LeGrand Richards had to say about education helped to put things into perspective for me. He talks about how a lot of students view school as a game, as something to get through with as little effort possible. But school isn’t about getting good grades; it’s about learning. And not just learning for a career, but learning so that we can fulfill our mission in this life, whatever that may be. The more learning we have, the more we will be able to serve the Lord wherever we are. Any type of learning can be helpful – music, languages, business, even car repair. We should be excited and eager to learn. 

      

 There really is a lot to learn in this world; no matter how hard we try, we’ll never be able to learn it all in this life. We all know how important serving is; that alone should be incentive to learn more. Anything we learn can be used to serve others, even if we can’t see how right now. For example, if I have never stuck with piano for 13 years, I wouldn’t be able to serve as the sacrament meeting accompanist right now. If we just have a good attitude about learning and are actually interested in what our professors – and anyone else, for that matter – has to teach us, it will make our lives so much more fulfilling.

Holly H's Respose to "What I Now Believe"

Haha. Funny I should be assigned to read this article. I really struggled with my decision to come to BYU. When I visited campus the summer before I applied, I remember the admission counselor I spoke with talked at length about the unique learning environment available at BYU, particularly the opportunities for spiritual growth. When I returned home, my dad repeated much of what he said verbatim, emphasizing the wonderful spiritual experiences I would have here (all the while telling me I could go wherever I wanted, no pressure). It was only half-heartedly that I finally sent in my acceptance of admission to BYU, after weeks of putting off the action that would commit me to spending four years of my life in Provo. I was not excited. I took a very cynical approach to the whole idea of church-school integration. I did not want to hear about our divine American heritage; I wanted to learn the “real” version of history. I didn’t want to have the overlay of some psycho religious professor’s personal reflections imposed onto every subject I studied.

In this article (transcript of a devotional address, really), Richards puts this concept differently. He says that what we practice here is “learning the temporal in the context of the eternal.” Well, that’s an idea I can deal with a little bit better.

As it turns out, for the most part, I’ve enjoyed any religious connections my teachers have cared to make to their subjects. In Astronomy, for instance, Dr. Hintz often shares scriptures about the heavens and stars, etc. Far from offending my sense of academic legitimacy, these additions have elevated my studies this semester. I’ve been able to ponder my life from an eternal point of view more than I ever have, and I know that that is due, at least in part, to the spiritual environment I am in pretty much 24/7. My religion class, which I’d been dreading most, has miraculously turned out to be my favorite class. This is possible to some extent because I’ve been able to separate it from the “game of school” and focus on learning all that I can from the scriptures.

As your typical perfectionist/over-achiever student, I’m definitely acquainted with the “game of school” that Richards talks about. Over the past couple of years, I’ve gotten a lot better at recognizing what is important and what doesn’t matter, but the tendency to give undue importance to grades and prizes is still something I wrestle with. Richard’s message here is to set aside the competitive, prideful attitudes we have toward school and instead focus our energy on learning as children of God trying to better themselves. One quote I really liked was his response to “But we have to play the game to survive!” people. He said, “The reality is, however, that you are not on this earth to maintain a scholarship, enter prestigious graduate schools, or beat someone else in the marketplace. You have a much higher standard.” That lends some great perspective to the subject.

So, though BYU’s religious nature has its quirks, there really is a rich environment here, all geared towards enabling us to expand our minds and grow in the Gospel. Yep, that’s right, I’m pretty much repeating what the admissions officer told me, and what my dad told me, and what my grandparents and all those other adults told me about BYU. So do I feel silly for my antics in the spring? A little. But there’s nothing like knowing something for yourself, and now that I have a better grip on the advantages of a religion-oriented education, I can appreciate and begin to make the most of the opportunities BYU offers me.

Sean K's Response to "What I Now Believe"

Brother Richards spoke at a BYU devotional back in 97. He talked about his personal experiences with devotionals back when he attended, I find that we have a similar outlook on devotional attendance; I find that when I attend devotionals I get blessings, sometimes they come subtly through the speaker but oftentimes, just being in such a spiritual setting just helps me through the day. A friend once told me he planned to attend all the devotionals because he needed the blessings that come from attending them. I feel the same way now.

Brother Richards highlighted three beliefs of retrospective prominence for him. First off he said, "I wish I had placed my education in its eternal context." I don't think its really helpful for me to be re-telling the material so I'll just tell you another story. I have  a friend who likes to talk about "deep stuff". He literally called me thap one day and asked if he could talk about deep stuff with me because he was scared he might scare off his new friends by being so forward about deep subjects. So on a particular night we started talking about our futures. We both aspire to be medical professionals so he went off on his big plans he made for every year of his life for about the next fifteen years. His eternal perspective on this situation was through the parable of the talents. Basically, he believes that if we slack off, that is a waste of our educational capacity, therefore we'll be punished at the last day. My life hasn't quite been planned as well as his was. My perspective contrasted his because I believe that even if we aren't constantly learning in an academic sense, most everything else we do with our time, we are gaining experience in some way. Which to me means that I'm still learning something even if I take it easy and take longer getting to the career field, I can still be learning things and still be progressing. Just food for thought.

His second belief was that: "I wish I had believed that m professors were nothing more and nothing less than my brothers and sisters." I triple dog dare (oOoOOO) someone to address SWILUA as her royal highness. (although, I suppose If we constantly addressed her as She Who Is Like Unto Aphrodite, we'd get a similar response anyways). I just find this example so stunningly true. Back in high school, I had the system down. I knew how to make teachers like me, I knew what would press their buttons and what would make them believe I was worthy of their concern. Many times I felt as if they were tyrants and I was playing the game trying to please them and stay out of their angry tantrums. Brother Richard's belief is really insightful, I think too many students separate their church and school-life; so people in their wards might be brothers and sisters, but teachers in school suddenly become absolute, power-hungry tyrants.  I don't mean to preach, but I think its important to remember that every person is a brother or a sister, some just have more experience than others and it is the opportunity for the less-experienced to learn from the more-experienced people.

The final retrospective wish was that: "I wish that I had believed that the standards of the worlds were not sufficient for a consecrated people." When I asked one of my cousins from out of state, why they wanted to come to BYU, they said, "I just don't want to deal with any of the worldly things that are on every other campus than this one." And although I haven't had much experience outside this "Provo Bubble" I still do feel blessed to be going to such a campus where I can keep my standards with people around me who have similar standards.

I can't say it any better than the way he put it. "The reality is, however, that you are not on this earth to maintain a scholarship, enter prestigious graduate schools, or beat someone else in the marketplace. You have a much higher standard. You need to please the Lord God Omnipotent. I promise you that if you please him, with an eye single to his glory, your life will not be without GREAT OPPORTUNITIES" (emphasis added)

Jason R's Response to "Zeal Without Knowledge"

“What are you thinking?” People ask me this question sometimes, or a variation on it, and I usually discount it as an an unimportant filler question, just a way to begin a conversation. However, Nibley holds that there is no more important question. What we think about is vital, not just very very important but vital to our salvation.

This raises an important question. What should we think about? And are there things we should not think about?

The answer to the second question is most definitely yes. Prophets in every age have counseled us against thinking about certain things, things that are morally degrading and defiling—the prophet Jacob condemned the Nephites not just for their actions but for their thoughts. I won't go into what these thoughts are, I'm sure you are as familiar with the list as I am.

We have also been commanded, time and time again, not to think about riches, wealth, the honor and praise of men, the things of the world. It is our natural tendency—or perhaps not a natural tendency but a structure drilled into us by the society we live in—to aim to be rich, powerful, influential, comfortable. However, riches and worldly power are not God's priority nor His wish for us, and it is important for us to remember this.

Instead, we should use our precious, priceless time to think about the things of eternity. This leads to a very important question: “What exactly are the 'things of eternity'?” Though I could list a few—and you probably could, too—I will leave this question open ended for, as Nibley says, this is the first question we must ask, and its answer will be our next step.

Jessica N's Response to "Zeal Without Knowledge"

Wow. This article was exactly what I needed to hear. As I read the closing line of “May God help us all in the days of our probation to seek the knowledge he wants us to seek,” a lot of the things I’ve been thinking about fell into place. Mostly the fact that I have no idea what I want to choose as a major and that thought has been bothering me lately. To get somewhere I need to have a goal, and being without a major sometimes feels like I’m working hard…but to what end? What is it I am trying to accomplish in this life, why was I sent here at this time to BYU, what do I want to gain from my time here? I could go on and on about the questions I have, but instead I will say what this article answered for me.

First off that I am here to gain knowledge for the eternities. Not for a job, not for money, but for the eternities. What is a job for money compared to knowledge for the rest of eternity? As Hugh Nibley says “If you’re so zealous in such matters [things of the world], why can’t you take your eternal future seriously?” Of course, being a college student money gets tight and I want a profession that will pay the bills- but is that what will most benefit me? While reading I understood that if I have the faith to choose a profession that will help me grow the most eternally, then things will then work out temporally. That may mean choosing a career that won’t be glamorous or pay in the sight of the world. The short time of probation on this earth is a time of learning and growth, and in the eternal scheme of things as long as I choose what I feel will most benefit me and others in this world and the world to come, I will be making the right decision.

Secondly, I was hit hard by the section stating that how I spend every moment of my short probation on earth is a test of my character. What am I doing with my time? Am I spending it in the best way possible? When I look back on my short time of probation, will I say I spent it after worthwhile things? I’ve come to realize the important things, what really matters, are not always what I spend time on. Those few minutes on facebook, watching youtube, television, all those things that take up my time that are not necessarily “bad” are taking away from my potential. I can be so much more: I just have to put the time and effort into becoming so. The friendships I make, the knowledge I gain, the spiritual growth: those are the things that matter. Everything else is well and good, but not necessarily imperative to my eternal progression. There is so much knowledge out there, knowledge that I thirst after, and that is what I should be spending my time on.

The last thought from this reading that answered some of my questions was when Hugh Nibley stated: “If we try to settle for a milder program at lower stakes and safer risks, we are immediately slapped and buffeted by a power that will not let us rest.” I’ve lately felt that need to push myself, to do more and accomplish more. I think when I hit a plateau of learning that is the only way to go: upwards. As I push through a difficult time and make it through, my options are to stay where I am or keep pushing onward. And there’s the part of me that wants to keep pushing onward, to become better and do all I possibly can in my time here on earth. I think that is the zealous portion of learning. The knowledge part? The knowledge part I think is accomplished by actively seeking after learning.
Learning is a lifelong process; it’s not something that we will be finished with after college. Learning is a part of our entire lives. We are potential Gods, and staying on a safe level is not characteristic of a potential God. We are continually tested because we have so much potential. We have to earnestly seek after knowledge, and as we do so, we will be given it. As we learn new knowledge, we will be able to learn more knowledge that was before unavailable to us because of our lack of knowledge. As we gain more knowledge, we are able to learn more, and more, until we learn things we didn’t think ourselves capable of when we first began learning. I compare it to the knowledge I had as a child to the knowledge I have now, and compare it to the knowledge I have now to the knowledge I will someday have. I could not comprehend as a child what I know now, and I can’t comprehend now what I will one day know in the future.

The more I learn, the more I realize how little I know. As I learn, I realize how much there is to learn. And how much human beings don’t know. There is so much to learn out there and as both zeal and knowledge is applied, we can progress onward to gain even more knowledge in this life, which will help us in the next.

Ariel P's Response to "Zeal Without Knowledge"

Knowledge can be seen as something that is critical, or necessary to obtain in order to progress in this life time. There are many different types of knowledge; however, only true knowledge is worth knowing. Being members of the church we have access to the truth. It’s extremely hard to tell someone that what they know is not correct, but the fact is they just do not have the full truth. Nibly discusses the importance of knowledge because it is really the only thing we take with us to the next life. He tells us that zeal and knowledge should work together. Knowledge can be useless if you don’t apply it in some way. I enjoy learning because there is always something new to know, but that is when zeal comes in and drives us to desire to learn and expand our knowledge.

Having zeal is important and can act as the motivation or drive to learn but we need to be aware that there is false information out there. I agree with Nibly that there is so much information out there it can be hard to know what the real truth is and what isn’t. It’s harder to find solid truth that is unwavering and therefore it’s important to control your drive for knowledge. I think of the media and all of the false advertisements. They will pretty much tell you anything you want to hear if it means they will be making money.

I had never really thought about everything that constitutes sin. Sin does not always mean doing something bad and doesn’t have to be big. Not doing anything at all makes up sin as well and Nibly really described that well. I know I definitely sit around way more than I should and should be more focused on being as productive as I can with the limited amount of time that I have. If we do that then we should never feel bored. Knowing the importance of knowledge makes me want to learn the most I can but also make sure I am learning truth and not false information.

Matthew G's Response to "Zeal Without Knowledge"

I think that there were valid statements and principles in this article, but I also feel that Hugh Nibley was a little bit extreme. Yeah, people do tend to take the path of least resistance, which can often include things like denial of truth and self-delusion, but I don’t think that most people are mad men gallivanting about without brains in their heads.

Most members tend to know what is in the scriptures, but they lack the faith and the determination (zeal?) to study it and find out what they need to do to use it in their own lives. I don’t think that we have too much zeal, I think we just tend to use it in the wrong ways. As he said, people focus way too much on the things of the world. They set their hearts on the things of men and fail to give up their vain desires to learn how to become truly Godlike (no one is exempt, I include myself). We put so much effort into learning what we need to know to make a great career for ourselves so we can have 3 cars and a garage full of junk and really live “the American dream.” If we were humble, meek, and submissive as to the things of the world, but had the zeal to go forth and seek the words of God and testify of their truthfulness with much boldness, maybe this world would be in better shape.

I also think that this ties in with the idea of getting a C for the experience of it. We focus so much on doing exactly what we have to do to get an A that we really let the knowledge we could glean from the course slip past us. We
sacrifice opportunities for growth in order to obtain gold stars and sleepless nights full of stress and anxiety. The lessons we learn best are the ones that we learn not because we are enticed, but because we either want to learn and we seek it out, or God eventually drops it in our laps with some huge crisis that makes us panic and fret because we’ve lost the “control” over our lives that we thought we had. Maybe if we just sat down and listened to see what God has to say, we wouldn’t end up stuck in the ridiculous situations we find ourselves in so often.

I think zeal is a great thing. It has led men to do heroic things that they would never have been able to do without it. The key is channeling that zeal like Nibley says, so that is causes us to seek more knowledge, which will then give us greater zeal. Our zeal should flow in this cycle. If we interrupt this cycle, we damn ourselves with a sinful, prideful zeal instead of a zeal that gives us determination to bring light into the world.

Nibley said that universities are nothing more or less than a place for people to show off, which I think is also rather extreme. This is only true when people are filled with the prideful zeal. Universities can be filled with people whose greatest desire is to learn and enrich their lives. People learn how to be wiser, hard working, and knowledgeable people when they use their zeal appropriately in the university setting. We should embrace our zeal, but make sure that we don’t create a zealous culture that does nothing to move society forward, but squanders itself in pride and boasting.

Lindsay C's Response to "A Crime of Compassion"

I do not believe Barbara Huttmann to be a murderer in any way. What she did was what the patient wanted—who had the right to deny him his release from suffering? If a man before you is writhing in agony, wasted away into a skeleton, lost the strength to move or eat, and is asking to die, what makes you want to keep him alive? I find the TV audience who accuses Huttmann of murder for her ‘crime’ of compassion to be absolutely wrong. No man or woman should have to live in that state.

The audience says, “What gives you the right to play God?” I say, what gives them to keep a dying man pleading for death alive? I agree with the author, do we not have the right to die?

Reading this article pulls at my heartstrings—I would be willing to lose my job just to save this man from the agony of lung cancer that has eaten away at his body and life. It’s an act of such compassion, such selflessness that I view as Christ-like.

Where do we draw the line in keeping someone alive as right or wrong? Many do not see a line—keep a person alive at all costs, the TV audience in the article seems to say. I see the line exists where the patient wishes to be let go—where ‘saving’ the patient means letting him die. Death is not always a horrible thing—‘saving’ a man, in this case, means giving him over to death. If the author had not released the man from his agony, then she would just be condemning him to a longer life of nothing but suffering at the hands of lung cancer.

This woman did the right thing. No matter what the media may say about her, she is protector, not a murderer. She saved that man by letting him die while his heart failed him. She did not take that man’s life—she set it free to be at peace.