The Latter Day Lens
Welcome to The Latter Day Lens, a weekly faith-based podcast where we explore the intersection of Mormonism, global news, and political science. Hosted by Shawn Record and Matthew Miles, a professor of political science, this is your home for an authentic and nuanced LDS perspective on the world’s toughest topics.
Each episode provides thoughtful Latter-day Saint commentary on current events, ranging from Christianity and politics to social identity and economic policy. Whether you are an active LDS member seeking a deeper religious podcast experience or a listener interested in Mormon studies, we apply a "gospel lens" to move beyond the headlines.
Join us every Wednesday for LDS perspectives that are faith-promoting, intellectually honest, and designed to help you navigate your faith in the modern world. From Come Follow Me 2026 insights to deep dives into LDS history and doctrine, we tackle the conversations most people avoid.
The Latter Day Lens
When Church Leaders Tell You How to Vote (Ep. 186)
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
What should a faithful Latter-day Saint do when Church leaders take a political position—and you aren't sure you agree?
That question drives one of our most candid conversations yet.
The United Nations, Ezra Taft Benson, and Prophetic Counsel
We begin with the United Nations. New Gallup polling across 137 countries finds that 50% of adults worldwide approve of the UN's performance, compared with 26% who disapprove.
But Latter-day Saints have an interesting history with the organization. During the 1960s, Ezra Taft Benson was a fierce critic of the United Nations, warning about communism, threats to national sovereignty, and what he saw as parallels with the Book of Mormon's warnings about secret combinations.
Today, the Church works with and supports UN organizations.
So what changed? And how should Latter-day Saints understand political counsel from Church leaders decades later? Are some prophetic teachings intended for a particular time and circumstance?
When Church Leaders Tell You How to Vote
Then the question gets much more personal.
Idaho's Proposition 1 would overturn the state's strict abortion ban. Supporters are making an unusual argument: Idaho's abortion law has contributed to an exodus of obstetricians and reduced access to healthcare for women. Opponents dispute that interpretation and argue that the state's abortion restrictions protect unborn life.
Then Church leaders entered the debate.
Does an Area Presidency speak for the Church?
And what should a faithful Latter-day Saint do if personal study, prayer, and conscience seem to point in another direction?
Matt and Shawn revisit the experiences of Latter-day Saints during California's Proposition 8 campaign and discuss Harry Reid's disagreement with then-Apostle Russell M. Nelson over a proposed constitutional amendment defining marriage.
What does it actually mean to sustain Church leaders? Is obedience always the same thing as agreement? Where does personal revelation fit? And is there a faithful way to disagree?
Should We Put Weapons in Space?
Then the conversation moves from the ballot box to outer space.
The U.S. military has acknowledged possessing operational weapons in orbit, raising new questions about an arms race beyond Earth's atmosphere.
The potential consequences go far beyond military competition. Destroying satellites can create fast-moving orbital debris, potentially producing cascading collisions—the dreaded "Kessler Effect"—that could threaten the satellites modern life increasingly depends upon.
Matt argues that the scriptural command to "renounce war and proclaim peace" should make Latter-day Saints deeply skeptical of expanding warfare into another arena.
Shawn isn't convinced.
If potential adversaries develop these capabilities, does a nation have a moral obligation to prepare to defend itself? Does Captain Moroni provide a model for military preparedness—or is there a point at which preparing for war actually makes war more likely?
The Big Question: Is Language Divine?
Finally, things get unexpectedly philosophical.
A study involving 228 languages found little evidence that some languages are inherently more beautiful than others. Listeners' preferences appeared to be influenced much more by things like the speaker's voice and familiarity with a language.
That raises a very Latter-day Lens question.
President Dieter F. Uchtdorf has jokingly praised German as a heavenly language, and most of us probably have languages we find particularly beautiful.
But is there actually something divine about language?
If we could hear Adam and Eve speaking the pure Adamic language, would something about it sound familiar—or even beautiful—to everyone? Or would we still prefer the languages we already know?
The discussion eventually expands into music, art, the golden ratio, resurrection, and an even bigger question: Are beauty, language, and music merely human creations, or are they expressions of eternal principles?
Chapters
00:00 — Mailbag, Key & Peele, and Political Outrage
05:10 — Do We Need Political Enemies?
08:28 — Ezra Taft Benson vs. the United Nations
10:55 — Can Prophetic Political Counsel Expire?
13:23 — When Church Leaders Misunderstand an Issue
15:20 — Study It Out, Decide, and Pray
17:40 — When Church Leaders Tell You How to Vote
19:28 — Does an Area Presidency Speak for the Church?
21:41 — Prop 8, Steve Young & Political Disagreement
22:49 — Harry Reid vs. Russell M. Nelson
23:33 — Does Sustaining Mean Obeying?
26:33 — Personal Revelation vs. Church Counsel
29:57 — Can You Criticize a Church Political Position?
31:16 — Do Church Leaders Learn Too?
33:56 — Should America Put Weapons in Space?
37:09 — "Renounce War" vs. National Defense
41:15 — What Would Captain Moroni Do?
44:06 — Are Some Languages More Beautiful?
46:10 — Is Beauty Objective?
48:57 — Was the Adamic Language Divine?
51:29 — Is Music Eternal?
53:09 — Shawn's Case for Eternal Beauty
55:21 — Final Thoughts
Join the Conversation
Here's the question we especially want to hear your answer to:
If Church leaders publicly ask members to support or oppose a political measure, what does sustaining those leaders require?
Does it mean voting as requested? Does it mean taking their counsel seriously while still seeking your own answer through study and prayer? And what should a faithful Latter-day Saint do if those two things appear to lead in different directions?
Send us your thoughts at LatterDayLens.com. We may discuss your response on a future episode.
The Latter Day Lens explores the questions Latter-day Saints argue about privately—but rarely discuss publicly. Faithful, intellectually honest, and no requirement that Matt and Shawn agree.
Visit our website to join the conversation: Latter-day Lens
Matt (00:00.845)
Hey everybody, welcome to the Latter Day Lens. It is so good to have you with us this week. I'm your host, Matt, and with me as always is Sean. And we are excited to dig into these topics this week. It's going to be super, super fun. So we'll open the mailbag. The first listener wrote in and said, such a great episode. Thank you for being wise and vulnerable and informative and even inspiring.
shawn (00:26.784)
Now read that again, Matt, and I'm gonna comment who they're talking about for each of those adjectives. Sean.
Matt (00:32.471)
Wise vulnerable.
shawn (00:36.204)
Matt Sean Sean
Matt (00:37.561)
Informative. Inspiring. I agree with your assessment on all of those. I'm more vulnerable than Sean is, but he's wiser and more informative and much more inspiring for sure. Hey, this is a like it's fine if you don't want to talk about this on the podcast, but I just thought of this, Sean. I saw this like I was driving through Jackson, Wyoming, and I saw a business that does some kind of like llama fur called Koto Paxi. Do you work?
shawn (00:44.777)
Ha ha ha.
shawn (00:49.134)
Yeah.
shawn (00:53.303)
Nice.
shawn (01:06.334)
yeah. No, no, it's a company actually out of Logan that has so they've they've it Kotopaxi is a long standing company. This one owns the only Vicunya herd in all of America and they're local to Logan, Utah. Was it you say you were driving through Utah or Logan? no
Matt (01:06.937)
Do you work with them? okay.
Matt (01:29.105)
Jackson, Wyoming, yeah. But to me that yeah, it it r it reminded me of like Logan, Utah.
shawn (01:34.914)
W llamas are abundant. Llamas can be anywhere. What these guys have is a vacunya, which is normally native to Peru. And it is
Matt (01:37.753)
Okay. say c so Codopaxi is like a long s standing I don't know any of these brands, like okay.
shawn (01:51.874)
You do. You know brand, Matt. You know good fashion brands. Don't pretend like you know. What t shirt are you wearing right now?
Matt (01:57.035)
It is a plain white t shirt. There's nothing on it.
shawn (01:59.118)
Usually there's a fashionable t shirt you're wearing, including today's plain white tee. Yeah.
Matt (02:06.04)
Cause I love that band so much. Is there a band called Plain White T-shirts? Yeah. Okay, I like them. Do they sing this song? Here's the story of a girl who cried a river and drowned the whole world. man, if it wasn't for Sean, I would be lost with pop culture references.
shawn (02:09.429)
There go. There's no point right Ts, yeah.
shawn (02:22.327)
Ha ha ha ha.
shawn (02:31.297)
That's not true, man. Like you could sit down right now with a guitar in a room full of girls that, you know, are your age at BYU and you could sing s what is this, seventy four, seventy five? Yeah. Everyone knows that reference. What do you mean?
Matt (02:38.513)
Ha ha ha
Matt (02:44.214)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Or air supply. I'm all out of love. In primary today, we were did we did like guys versus girls singing a song. And the boys were like, we're totally gonna win because Michael Jackson is on our side. And then the girls are like, No way. We've got Taylor Swift and Olivia Rodrigo and then I was like, but
shawn (03:10.996)
they were saying Michael Jackson's a boy and they're boys, so he's on their side. That's awesome.
Matt (03:14.012)
So we're gonna win. Yeah. Like I I don't know if you guys know. None of those people are here singing today. It's just us and them. All right. Another listener wrote in and shared the classic Yeah, go ahead.
shawn (03:19.915)
Ha ha
shawn (03:25.813)
Well, pause. We joked around this about this comment, but let's let's at least address the kindness and the the maybe the nudge that Matt Miles should not quit this podcast, right? The the man who is who is wise and informative and inspiring people, which is why I do it. I like learning from you, man. But that's a very kind comment.
Matt (03:38.348)
Mm-hmm.
Matt (03:45.049)
You you're the wise, informative, and inspiring person. I'm the vulnerable one. So Sean can continue without me, and you'll just lose a little bit of vulnerability. But yeah, listener, thanks for saying that. Another one wrote in and said, there's this key and peel sketch. I watched it because the listener sent it to me. Otherwise, I don't even know who they are or but in this sketch, a telemarketer hangs up on a guy. Should I know who Key and Peel are? I mean, I saw them in the sketch.
shawn (03:50.027)
Ha ha ha.
shawn (03:54.338)
Boy.
shawn (04:07.554)
What?
shawn (04:11.009)
You know who they are. They're
Matt (04:14.738)
shawn (04:16.375)
Gosh, man, don't turn your court TV off for three seconds and learn who Key and Peel are, man. They are fantastic.
Matt (04:25.56)
So the one guy looked like there are these horror movies that I've seen sometimes. Yeah, okay. So one of them I'm like, he's in a horror movie. And then the other guy, I saw this thing with Obama back in the day, and this guy was like, he looks like he's the Obama angry translator. So Okay, so that's what I know about those two people. One of them was in some horror movies and one of them was in
shawn (04:30.369)
Yeah, I think he's in the house.
shawn (04:42.795)
Yeah, that's right.
shawn (04:46.681)
man. Okay, I'm gonna send you some I'm gonna send you some clips after this episode, man.
Matt (04:51.434)
Yeah, okay. Well apparently this is another one of their things. So there's a telemarketer, he calls a guy and then hangs up on him. And the guy gets so mad that he calls back repeatedly and ends up buying a vape vacation package out of spite. And so th the listener sent this clip and asked this question Looking at effective identity politics today, how much of our political behavior is like that customer? Have we reached a point where Americans care less about policy outcomes and more about protecting our right to feel aggrieved?
shawn (05:22.059)
I like the like when when listeners ask questions. So if I understand it, this is this is basically our listeners urging us to talk about Saul Alinsky and the book Rules for Radicals, it sounds like. 'Cause one of right, 'cause one of Saul Alinsky's principles was what you need to do is rally your people for the cause that you believe in. And one way to do that is you pick an imaginary or a real enemy.
Matt (05:32.546)
that's true.
shawn (05:50.338)
And you focus on that enemy so that you can build ire and anger and angst against that enemy. Because once you do that, you gather you rally people around your cause. Your your cause needs an enemy to focus on. I I think that's what this is talking about, right?
Matt (06:00.269)
Mm-hmm.
Matt (06:05.696)
Yeah. Yeah, that seems well and I think like we could definitely say that that's how Trump is, right? That's Trump's brand of politics. to find an enemy and to make people angry and to and and that sort of thing. And I think there are probably people on the left that are that way, but I don't think that that really describes America. Like most Americans that I talk to, even about really contentious issues, they're really not just about getting mad and like
Teaching a person a lesson, like most people are just good people. So I don't know. I think some politicians might use that. I think even if I were to say, okay, who were the people I know that voted for Donald Trump in 2024? They weren't really doing it because they agreed with him about the anger and all of the enemies, right? They didn't vote for Trump because they were so mad at Democrats. Most of them. Most of them voted up for Trump because they saw Trump, they saw Kamala Harris, and they didn't like
What Kamala Harris more than they didn't like Trump, right? They had two choices that they didn't really like either of the choices, and they just picked the lesser of two evils. I think that actually describes most Americans.
shawn (07:05.089)
Yeah, yeah.
shawn (07:10.69)
Yeah.
Dude, the mo one of the more angsty t guys that I've heard online, public guys, is Bill Burr. Matt, do you know who Bill Burr is?
Matt (07:19.016)
yeah. I saw my son sends me Bill Burr clips. Yeah. He's kinda like an angry guy, right?
shawn (07:23.103)
Okay. Okay. Yeah, he's got an angry guy, but he said something really wise to basically repeating what you said. this past weekend someone has talked to him to him about Trump and he's like, you know, as I travel the the United States, I bet he says about eighty five to ninety percent of people th they don't they're not on that side or that side. They're not. They're good people. They just want normal things. It's these fringe guys that bring rile everyone up, you know, like Solinsky.
Matt (07:49.26)
Yep. Yeah. Yeah.
shawn (07:50.027)
Like Sololinsky, who decides that's a shout out to our friend Levi.
Matt (07:53.954)
Does Levi like Sololinsky?
shawn (07:56.024)
Leva, you'll have to answer that. I don't know if you like him or not, but we've talked about him before.
Matt (07:58.689)
I I can't imagine anybody really likes Sol Olinsky.
shawn (08:02.463)
Really? no, well Hillary Clinton loves Solansky 'cause she Yeah.
Matt (08:04.236)
Well well, she wrote a a thesis about him, right? That's like being I mean, I wrote I wrote papers about like Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. I've I wrote a paper about Karl Marx. That doesn't mean I love him. I just I do not. I do not love Karl Marx. All right, here's our first topic this week. So according to global surveys conducted by Gallup across 137 countries, more people around the world approve of the United Nations than disapprove.
shawn (08:13.377)
but based on the evidence of our podcast, you love him.
Matt (08:34.178)
So 50% of adults around the world think the UN is doing a good job. Only 26% disapprove. Support is strongest in Southeast Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, but the Middle East and North Africa really don't like the UN very much. So leading into the question, in the 1960s, Ezraf Benson publicly condemned the United Nations as a communist dominant dominated body that aimed to create an all-powerful world government.
At the expense of individual freedom and national sovereignty. He connected these political views to faith-based warnings drawing parallels to the concept of secret combinations found in the Book of Mormon. So here's the question: Is the United Nations something church members ought to support?
shawn (09:18.177)
Matt, Matt, you're a freaking genius, man. These questions all tied together in such a cognitively dissonant way, like th I think what you're asking here is and in the rest of the questions is when a prophet or the church comes out and says something.
Matt (09:20.983)
No.
shawn (09:36.033)
Are we supposed to obey it letter of the law through and through? A hundred percent? Like all the way? 'Cause
Matt (09:39.008)
Mm-hmm. Right.
Well, because nobody else knows the rest of the topics. But yes, it does sort of feel that way in this question, right? There it's not just Ezra Taf Benson. You can go David O. McKay. all of the church leaders from the nineteen sixties to nineteen seventies, you can find negative things they said about the United Nations.
shawn (09:58.094)
Okay, so if you're to parse that out though, like it you can't okay, one take, Matt. The United Nations is like a political party, an organization made up of humans that change their mind. And when you get different leaders in different situations, they can change their policies or their behaviors or their actions. So if in the 80s or whenever President Benson made that or yeah, when he made this company.
Matt (10:19.959)
Mm-hmm.
Matt (10:23.628)
Yeah. I he made it in the sixties. The nineteen sixties is when he was most anti UN.
shawn (10:29.023)
Okay, so was he commenting and guiding the church? Well, he wasn't prophet at that time, was he? Yeah. Case okay, so he was an apostle. So that's one, right? You have to kind of consider that. But okay, I can maybe go in the sixties, if an apostle says that in the sixties the UN is not on the right track and we shouldn't support him, then maybe I can get behind that. What about the UN of the seventies or the eighties or the nineties or the t or today?
Matt (10:33.173)
No, he was in the quorum of the twelve.
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Matt (10:51.202)
Mm-hmm.
Matt (10:55.168)
Well, details Christopherson I didn't put this in the thing. Elder Christopherson said recently that the church look likes the UN, the church supports the United Nations. The church regularly gives money to the United Nations right now.
shawn (10:57.933)
Okay, let's hear it.
shawn (11:07.277)
So this would then this would then support that idea that a prophet is a prophet when the prophet is on the earth, when the prophet is over his time, he's called to give us the direction that the Lord wants us at that time. Which is what which is a pretty amazing comment for the next couple of topics we're gonna go over.
Matt (11:18.839)
Mm-hmm.
Matt (11:24.728)
So you're saying we should support the United Nations because President Benson, what he said in the sixties, may or may was probably good counsel for the church in the sixties, but it doesn't mean it applies to us today.
shawn (11:38.443)
I'm actually gonna say something that in English doesn't sound quite good because it's a Russian phrase that's gonna give my opinion on this. I I apologize behalf of Matt for liking this little phrase and how it sounds in English. But the answer is Kamuka.
Matt (11:47.82)
To all of our listeners who don't speak.
Matt (11:56.003)
To whom how? How to to each his own. That's what it means in English. To each his own.
shawn (11:57.326)
To home to home how.
Yeah, there's no way, there's no way you can find okay, sure. If you can find an apostle's opinion, I I don't think it's an official opinion, right? This is a human individual's opinion about something. Regardless, if you're an apostle, I'm gonna listen. But th you're not gonna find him in an official way, and looking in scripture, you're not gonna find any support for what does are we supposed to support the
Matt (12:12.32)
Yeah. Yeah. He's
shawn (12:27.735)
twenty twenty six UN's stance on X, Y, and Z. You know, you're not gonna find it. The latter day lens there doesn't exist. So that's why I say it's okay to have different opinions on things. No?
Matt (12:30.31)
Yeah.
Matt (12:37.942)
Mm-hmm. So no, I agree with so when I was again back in the day when I was studying Marxism and I was reading I was taking a class on Marxism, reading everything Karl Marx wrote, I would read Yeah, go ahead.
shawn (12:47.543)
Be before b before you were simply just a fan, you studied it and were a fan. Now you don't study it, you're just a fan. I got it.
Matt (12:54.1)
I wasn't a fan. I I was I was doing a master's in Russian and East European studies. And so as part of that, they're like, you can't understand the things that happen in the Soviet Union if you don't understand Marxism, right? Because there's so much and er anyhow, so I had to I had to take a class in Marxism so that I understood Marxism. And I remember in that class I would read what what David O. McKay was saying about Marxism, what Ezra Taft Benson was saying about Marxism.
shawn (13:01.941)
Okay. Good content.
shawn (13:09.165)
Good con.
Matt (13:23.542)
John Taylor had some strong words about Marxism, communism. And I would think I was thinking to myself, these guys, the way they're talking about communism isn't consistent with what Karl Marx said. Like they fundamentally misunderstood what Karl Marx was saying. And so I thought to myself, I should put something together to like explain to people what Karl Marx actually said versus the way he was portrayed by church leaders. And I remember as I was doing that, I felt strongly that no.
You weren't alive in the 1960s. You don't know what those people were inspired to be talking about in the 1960s. So, and and you don't know what John Taylor was inspired to tell the church members in the late 1800s when he was prophet. And so it's similar to what you're saying, Sean. It's like prophets speak for a sp for a particular time and place. Some things that they say are timeless, right? Like,
shawn (13:59.968)
Wow.
Matt (14:20.316)
so when they talk about the atonement of Jesus Christ or when they talk about eternal principles that don't change, those are timeless. But President Oaks has said that there are temporary commandments, commandments that you're given for a time, and then you're not given those commandments anymore. And and no prophet at the time says, Hey, by the way, this teaching is just for today, or this teaching is just for the next couple of weeks. They just teach you what they feel inspired to teach you. And then in time we learn, okay, maybe that was for that particular time and place. And so
I feel something similar about the United Nations and the things they're saying in the United Nations. I wasn't alive at that time. I wasn't in that situation. But but for somebody to come to me and say, well, here's what President Benson said about the United Nations 60 years ago, and it's relevant to us today, I would say, I don't know. I'm going to look to living prophets today. I'm going to look to other sources of guidance for today to understand what I should do. And if the church is giving millions of dollars to the United Nations today, I'm going to say there's probably some good there that I should support.
shawn (15:20.141)
So I do love that story of yours. I've always loved that story. And I love it. And listeners, when Matt says something like, you know, I was going to do something and then I was praying and I felt something, I know Matt. I don't know you. And I know that that means the Holy Ghost was involved in your decision making and you're faithful to that. So I love that story because you're you are doing the most latter day lens thing when approaching that subject, which is I'm going to study it. I'm going to make up my mind on it.
And then I'm going to take it to the Lord and the Lord will guide me. And when the Lord guides you, that gives you direction what to think and what to believe in. So I think that's the most important answer is if you really want to know the Lord's will regarding the 2026 UN, study it, make a decision on it, go pray about it.
Matt (16:03.914)
Is it possi I love that by the way, Sean? I'll give you the points for that. Cause but is it possible there is no latter day lens on the United Nations? Because, like you said, it's an organization with many different parts, some of which are good, some of which are bad. And so your opinion about the United Nations really has nothing to do. The church or your faith really has nothing to do with what you should think about the United Nations.
shawn (16:30.129)
I I'll answer that and go out on a limb and say, look, I've had this long-standing belief, and I preach a little bit, that the way we can determine what the church has a long-standing belief on is a combination of do prophets preach it? Then is it found in scripture? Because I I'll preach that if it becomes canonized, we can absolutely believe in it as a doctrine or at least a guidance or teaching. And so
Can we find anything in scripture canonized that talks about the UN? Sure, there's lots of things that talk about government and how we should treat governments and that type of thing, but obviously not specifically about the 2026 UN. So yeah, yeah, I d I again, kamukak. To who how? Like whoever, whoever I think, I think in this state. Now, this may differ in the next two questions that we're gonna talk about. Or maybe the same. But yeah, I think you're right. There's probably
Matt (17:21.782)
Not. It doesn't matter.
shawn (17:22.813)
No, but but I could easily study. Now again, back to your anecdote, which is the true answer, I if I really in my heart want to do the right thing, I can go study everything that the UN is doing in twenty twenty six and I can make decisions and pray about it. And I'm sure, Matt, there's gonna be ten things that are unprincipled and there's gonna be ten things that may be principled.
Matt (17:40.087)
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. You get the point, Sean. Okay, here's the next topic. In Idaho, supporters of a ballot measure called Proposition One are trying to overturn the state's strict abortion ban by focusing on a severe shortage of doctors rather than on abortion itself. Since Idaho made performing abortion a felony, about thirty-five percent of the state's practicing obstetricians have left, causing longer wait times.
Higher medical costs and less basic healthcare access for women across the state. While organizers argue that passing Proposition 1 is necessary to bring doctors back and protect rights to reproductive health care, conservative opponents maintain that the ban successfully protects unborn life and argue that physician shortages are part of a nationwide rural trend rather than a direct result of state laws. In a letter to congregations, the area presidency in Idaho urged church members
To vote against the proposition. So here's the question. By the way, they read the letter twice. They read it last week and then they read it again today, because they were told to. Here's the question: Does the area presidency speak for the church? Because in the letter they say the church opposes this ballot measure. So does the area presidency speak for the church? And what should church members in Idaho who support proposition one do about this?
shawn (18:59.629)
Okay, I was gonna ask for clarity. Are we talking about abortion or are we talking about the church's the line of authority and who has authority? But I guess we're talking about both, aren't we?
Matt (19:08.416)
Yeah. Well yes in the letter, the first the area presidency said the church opposes Proposition One in Idaho. And then it says because we don't we don't get involved in politics, but when there's moral issues, we speak out. And here's where you find the church's statement on abortion. And so we urge everybody to oppose this measure.
shawn (19:28.715)
I mean anecdotally, my experience with with Area Authority seventies has been that the the almost a hundred percent of the time those people are called because they are straight arrow, letter of the law and spirit of the law, hopefully, but more letter of the law, like follow the rules that have been handed down to them. They are loyal soldiers. I've never met an Area Authority seventy who was kind of this rogue opinionated, like I'm off and I'm gonna
Matt (19:57.089)
Like me. Yeah. no, I have to be honest. You're right in your description of not just area authority seventies, even general authority seventies are very, very obedient. Very, very you tell me what to do, and I'll do exactly what you tell me to do. Now, they might disagree personally, like in private, right? I've met a couple of general authorities that don't necessarily agree with everything that they preach over the pulpit. but
shawn (19:58.486)
Right? Like like have you?
shawn (20:13.239)
Right.
Matt (20:26.272)
What do they say and what do they do? It's always straight arrow right down the line.
shawn (20:30.379)
Which in a lay leadership church says something about their faith, obviously. right, there's no motive other than I I gotta trust in prophets or in the church. So that's the first piece of evidence that I would argue that says that yeah, the area authorities speak for the church. That's your first question. The second piece of evidence would be there's no way that if an area authority had state presidents all throughout Utah Idaho.
Matt (20:37.154)
Mm-hmm.
shawn (20:59.807)
announce something that was against the will of the church, there's no way that the machine of the church wouldn't squash that immediately.
Matt (21:02.968)
Yeah, they had to get approval probably, right? Yeah.
shawn (21:08.819)
They had to have. Like there's no and the and if they didn't and they made this announcement, the church would be aware and they'd be on top of it very, very, very quickly. The same in in California twenty years ago on prop was it prop eight? Prop yeah, prop eight. Yeah, we were same sex marriage. We were like it was we were
Matt (21:18.324)
On prop eight, right? Prop eight, yeah. The same sex marriage.
Did they tell you how to vote?
shawn (21:28.353)
They said to go on the streets and hold up signs and go knock on doors for weeks and weeks and weeks to educate people and to persuade them to vote in a certain way. Yeah. I mean it
Matt (21:41.333)
Mm-hmm. And I remember at the time Steve Young did not do the thing the church said to do. And people were like, heretic, how dare you not follow your church leaders? But he was like, Well, I feel differently on this issue. And and Harry Reed was Senate majority leader and President Nelson. He was he was quorum of the twelve apostles, goes to Harry Reid and tells him to support.
Support an amendment defining marriage between a man and a woman. And Harry Reid's like, Yeah, I'm not going to do that, Elder Nelson. We disagree. Like, I don't think that's the right thing to do.
shawn (22:18.381)
Is that is that documented? Is that like primary source documented?
Matt (22:21.334)
Yeah, that's documented. Yeah. Mm-hmm. A hundred percent that happened. Harry Reid never backed down from it. He never denied it, never said it. He's just like, I I told him that he he was wrong. Harry Reid said this. Well, he's like, I told President Nelson he was wrong and on that issue, and that he was making a mistake asking members of Congress to vote in a certain way on that bill, on that amendment. So that's
shawn (22:46.485)
That's yeah, that's a f fascinating story. Like like
Matt (22:49.844)
And and whether President Nelson was wrong or not, right? Like you can l so this is like the question of what should church members do. So I'm gonna just say I agree with you that I I believe that they speak for the church in in Idaho, right? Like, like I agree with you that if the church didn't want them saying the church is opposed to this ballot initiative, then it wouldn't be read in every congregation one Sunday and then the next Sunday, the exact same thing. At some point, somebody above them in the church would have said,
they're rogue, they're going rogue, they weren't told to do this, they weren't allowed to do this. So I okay, I'll say that yeah, they speak for the church on that. But then the question of what should you do, I mean, there's stories of people who go along, and then there's stories of people who don't go along.
shawn (23:33.39)
Okay, so how about this Latterday lens? Okay. You know, 20 years ago I found myself sitting in a sacrament meeting and I was sitting there and I was thinking, here's the thoughts. This is a vivid memory for me. And I'm thinking, you know, I'm doing pretty well, man. Like, like I've worked real hard, my family's doing well, my kids are doing well, financially I'm doing well, like the job is going well. I sat there in sacrament meeting and then the sacrament starts. And my mindset was I'm doing pretty well for myself.
And I remember Matt going, then the sacrament stars. And I viewed the table, which represents the altar and the savior's body and blood. And in a moment I realized, why am I sitting here in the sacrament meeting, think like praising myself, thinking of myself? And I realized, Matt, whoa, I need to I need to check myself. Am I sufficiently humble as the scriptures teach? Am I caught in pride?
And am I repenting enough? And am I like all these thoughts? And it kind of got me on this path of like really more consistent praying and repenting and all that kind of stuff. But it reminds me of the prayer that says, Matt, it says, we cut recovenant every week that we will remember him always, we will keep his commandments, and we will take upon ourselves his name. that's not true. That's not true. It doesn't say that we does it. Do we promise every week that we will remember him, keep his commandments, and take upon ourselves his name every week?
Matt (24:57.258)
Isn't that in the prayer, the sacrament prayer? I mean
shawn (24:59.897)
Is that how it's how how it's worded? Is that how it's we're urged? Are we urg are we promising, promising that we will be perfectly obedient, perfectly remembering, and perfect
Matt (25:06.904)
It says that they they witness that they will what witness unto thee that yeah, I don't I don't know. You have to tell me, Sean.
shawn (25:13.037)
Close. Close. This is
There's a word in there. I love that. That was listeners. This is Matt being vulnerable and me helping him be humble and vulnerable. And me inspiring. So it says that we are not. We don't say I promise to do these things. This is I promise that I'm willing to do these things. I will try my heart, I want to, despite the fact that I can't and recognize that I need the savior. I will try to be.
Matt (25:23.768)
Being inspiring.
Matt (25:34.558)
okay, willing to do okay.
shawn (25:44.884)
Obedient to all these commandments. So I think my answer to this, Matt, is I've got this dilemma. I'm trying to be obedient to the every authority who is the church or the prophet in in in Harry Reid's case, right? To an apostle. But you're also trying to be obedient to God or what your conscious says. And there's lots of scriptures that say mankind needs freedom to exercise their f their conscious, right? Their freedom to choose. So
Matt (26:10.156)
And if they weren't enticed by one side or the other, then they're not truly free. Right. In order to exercise agency, you have to be enticed by two sides.
shawn (26:14.187)
Yeah, yeah.
S so I have to believe that Harry Reid was willing to obey God and was trying his hardest to make the right decision. I I don't know, unless you think no, he was just putting politics over faith.
Matt (26:33.686)
Well, I mean, depends on how you want to look at it, right? But you could definitely make the argument that Prop eight hurt the church, that the support of those same-sex marriage amendments made things harder for the church. but this is what I this is my take on this. The church teaches general principles, right? The church teaches sometimes very specific principles, but they're general. So, like for example, when my wife and I first got married, there was a lot of talk in the church about the importance of having children, not delaying having children, but
Try as we might, we couldn't have children. So, how do you obey a commandment when you physically can't obey that commandment? Right. And so we had to pray about it and ponder it and consider like what does that mean for us in our lives, the these this instruction we've been given. And I think that that proposition one is no different. Like there are many, many reasons why the church would tell people to vote a certain way or to support a support certain cause. And I don't believe that that means that for every single church member.
They have to do what seems the obvious thing. Right. So so in my case, I say, well, in the last Ward Conference, I was asked to sustain the area presidency. And so I raised my hand two or three weeks ago to sustain the area presidency. And the area presidency never really tells me anything to do. But in this particular case, they've told me specifically what they want me to do. So to me, it's easy to be like, well, I can sustain them by supporting Prop One in Idaho. But
For my wife, when she heard the letter, she decided to do research on the issue and look into like various claims that different people are making. And so maybe for her the letter was just to motivate her to become informed about the issue when she hadn't been before. But I do know that there are active members of our church in Idaho who've put a lot of time and effort into getting prop one on the ballot. And I can see a scenario in which they would say, just like Harry Reid said, look,
You're wrong about this. And I feel strongly this way. And I believe that a person could pray and seek guidance, and Heavenly Father could say to them, continue doing the thing you started doing, and you're going to be just fine. So I really think like the the church teaches us that blind obedience is wrong, right? I can't find any context where blind obedience is okay. So no matter what you do in the end about Prop One, you should seek guidance from God.
shawn (28:51.976)
Absolutely.
Matt (29:00.182)
And try to f work this out in your mind and say, no matter where you stand on prop one or no matter where you did before, you should take this as an opportunity to say, here's where I was before. Here's the counsel I'm getting from church leaders. What am I going to do with that? And I believe that everybody who does that will find the inspired course of action that they should take. Doesn't that seem like the latter day lens?
shawn (29:20.461)
See, I told, see, man, I told a story about v being vulnerable one time in my sacrament meeting. And you just told an inspiring story. No, really, that was good. I yeah, it points to you. That is the only answer. As we strive, commit to strive to be we are we're representing the Lord, we are willing to obey. I want to do the right thing. I'm I'm here, my heart is there. I want to do the right thing.
Matt (29:30.008)
Ha yeah.
Matt (29:35.704)
Yeah.
shawn (29:45.801)
And you're right. Scriptures overwhelmingly and prophets overwhelmingly teach us the way you do the right thing is you study it out and you pray and you get the spirit telling you what to do and how to do it. Yeah, I'll go with that.
Matt (29:57.017)
But I think what do you think about this? Is it fair for us to say that we should not criticize the church for taking a position on this issue? Would that can I say that that's always bad? Like if the church leaders decide to do something and then I decide to come out and say, You're wrong, you're wrong, you shouldn't have done that. Like, is that is that wrong?
shawn (30:05.196)
I think
shawn (30:15.083)
I'm gonna I'm gonna all week this week, I'm gonna think about your comment that the church's primary goal is to teach us about the gospel of Jesus Christ or true principles. And that I can look at prop eight, or in this case, prop one, and go, their goal here is to teach us something. We learned something extremely true and valuable in California in prop eight. We learned what the Lord's stance is when it comes to marriage. Right? Here here.
Matt (30:38.88)
Yeah. I mean, you did. I wasn't there, so I don't know. I wasn't a part of that. I didn't have the ex I'm just saying I didn't have the experience you had, so I don't know. I'm gonna take your word for it.
shawn (30:44.491)
Okay, you can
shawn (30:48.641)
Right. Right. And you now are having the prop one experience. And so if what you're saying is the Lord is teaching you something, and it doesn't matter necessarily say I we're trying to force you, take away your agency and cause you to vote in a certain way, he's trying to teach you something. That's what I'm gonna think about all all all week. Is is it true that that's what these actions are for? Is to teach us true principles, not necessarily make us feel guilty for not supporting their guidance. Is that
Matt (30:56.504)
Mm-hmm.
Matt (31:16.664)
How about this, Sean? Yeah, 100%. I think that that's what I'm saying. But I also think this the church is trying to teach church lead, God is trying to teach church leaders true principles, right? And so there's this unrighteous dominion idea, right? This idea that when you are given authority, there's this temptation to exercise unrighteous dominion. And and in in leadership positions, individuals need to learn, like when do I exercise authority? When do I not exercise authority?
How do I exercise that authority? What is a moral issue? What is not a moral issue? And I think that just as we as individuals learn through these, so do church leaders learn through these experiences. And regardless of what the outcome might have been with President Nelson and Harry Reid, I think President Nelson learned something about church leadership in going to the US Senate and asking them to support an amendment. And I think Harry Reid learned something about secular leadership.
in having a member of the quorum of the twelve ask him to do something and and wrestling with that. I so I think that all of the things are designed to teach people true principles and it's on us whether or not we learn what we're supposed to learn from that or not.
shawn (32:25.485)
I guess we'll never know what Harry Reid's true motivation was. Was it to be obedient to what he thought God was telling him to do or to be obedient to what he thought the church was telling him to do and did he obey or disobey?
Matt (32:33.976)
He he talked about it. he he believed that what he was doing was the thing that God wanted him to do. So he would never come out and say President Nelson wasn't inspired, but he would say, President Nelson asked me to do something. I pondered it. I considered it and I prayed about it. He does say he prayed about it. And he felt like he he was being asked to he was being asked to use his power in a way inconsistent with how he ought to exercise his power as
spe Senate majority leader.
shawn (33:04.321)
That's a really fascinating case study. Really, really fascinating. Well.
Matt (33:06.528)
Yeah. Yeah. But don't you think we all have things like that in our lives, right? Like I'm I would imagine the people in Idaho who are active members of the church who fought to get proposition one on the ballot, prayed about it, felt like it was the right thing to do, and now they're at this moment is like, okay, I felt like I should do that then. Should I continue in it or should I not? And I think that it'll be a learning experience for them, but also for everybody else who takes the opportunity to to ask the question What should I do?
shawn (33:34.335)
I sincerely like like humbly hope that that's the case, that each of us would spend the time to to in yeah, engage with God and get the spirit to know what the right thing to do is. No, you got the points. No, you you points always go to who ins those who inspire, not those who are vulnerable.
Matt (33:46.56)
Yeah. Okay. Points to you, Sean. Okay. Points points to me. Okay.
Matt (33:56.429)
okay. All right, here's the last thought provoker. the US military has openly confirmed for the first time that it possesses operational weapons in Earth orbit capable of defending American forces against enemy actions. Although the nineteen sixty seven Outer Space Treaty was designed to prevent the weaponization of space, major powers like the US, China, and Russia have actively tested anti satellite capabilities for decades.
With the US recently accelerating programs like the multi-billion dollar Golden Dome Defense Initiative. The biggest danger of placing weapons in space is the creation of fast moving orbital debris if satellites are blown up. Even a tiny piece of metal traveling at high speeds can destroy critical spacecraft, potentially triggering the Kessler effect, which is a disastrous chain reaction where collisions create more debris and wipe out entire orbits of essential satellites. So here's a question.
Should the US be putting weapons in outer space?
shawn (34:59.231)
I hate you and love you for making me discuss this. I'm so torn on the one hand I'm like, just shut up. We're not talking about it. On the other hand, I'm like, actually that's really fascinating. We should talk about that.
Matt (35:01.762)
Ha ha ha
I know. It's so for listeners who are like physics dumb the way that I'm physics dumb, my daughter studies physics, and so does her husband. And they told me, you get people probably already know this. In outer space, there's no friction, right? So if you blow something up in outer space and it creates some momentum, that object, there's nothing to make it ever stop moving unless it hits into another object. So, like blowing something up on Earth, the debris goes only so far.
But in space, the debris could continue on forever and ever and ever, right? In a certain direction. You could have somebody like light years away from Earth that suddenly like some little piece of satellite like penetrates their skin and kills them. Like, what happened? I don't know, there was an explosion on Earth like 450 years ago. And now that piece of debris is like killing you today. Like, doesn't that seem immoral that we would create a weapon or use a weapon that could like kill people?
Thousands and millions of miles away because we're being stupid.
shawn (36:09.837)
Does it all right? I'm gonna ask you even more stupid questions. Okay, have you seen all the online videos of the progress of robotics, like humanoid robotics and what they can do now? Like watch videos from four years ago of these like goofy robots barely walking. Now, literally, I watched this video yesterday of this robot standing there and everyone's watching it. And it just crouches down and it jumps in the air probably 20 feet and floats for a minute and then does like a spin flip.
Matt (36:18.934)
Yes. Yeah.
Matt (36:35.254)
Wow.
shawn (36:38.177)
And then lands right back on its feet and just like walks around. Like like literally like a superhuman. And and then there was like reports. I don't know if these were real reports or not, but there's like exoskeletons being worn by Ukrainians on the front that allow them to do these crazy amazing. So I guess you're talking about space, man. Let's talk about more sci-fi. Are those things moral? An army of these really capable robots that can jump and flip and like super futurist futuristic stuff?
Matt (36:39.895)
Wow.
Matt (36:54.615)
Yeah.
Matt (36:58.06)
Well and and doesn't
shawn (37:06.817)
Going and attacking humans, is that moral?
Matt (37:09.034)
No, not moral. It's all immoral. It should all be stopped. We need to stop spending money on weapons. Like to me, this is a no brainer. We need to s like I feel like when I was a kid, people were so scared of nuclear weapons and all of that stuff. And I was like, stop it. God's gonna protect the world. We're not gonna destroy ourselves with nuclear weapons. But it just seems like it's getting worse and worse and worse and worse. And there's no there doesn't seem to be any real momentum. Like this story gets no attention at all in the news. The fact that we could s like
By the way, once all those satellites are destroyed, like everything stops working on Earth. Your phone doesn't work anymore. Like things stop working. Like what are we doing?
shawn (37:48.557)
Okay, but why is there why is there a moral right to protect the phone your phone from working? Why is that moral that we gotta make sure your phone keeps working, Matt?
Matt (37:52.898)
There's
Matt (37:56.247)
The moral question is renounce war, proclaim peace. So you cannot proclaim peace by building weapons of war in new arenas, new robots, outer space.
shawn (38:02.253)
Okay. So what's your
shawn (38:08.203)
I think I think I think Moreau I think Moreau and I would disagree with you that you have to pronounce
Matt (38:13.142)
Moroni was attacked. Moroni was attacked by the Lamanites.
shawn (38:17.343)
And was prepared and was prepared to defend themselves against the Lamanites. So is it not yeah, no.
Matt (38:22.498)
First he first he was attacked. He didn't they didn't he didn't build up the defenses until after they had already been attacked one time.
shawn (38:29.121)
Have we not been attacked? We've been attacked. So America has been attacked. In general, they've attacked. So if if look, if Moroni could innovate a banner of fabric with you know, you know what I mean? That just because it hadn't been done before, he innovated this thing that rallied up the people. Well, that's a bad example. But what I'm saying is what's your favorite movie, Matt? That one about the Christians in was it China, Communist China that yeah.
Matt (38:31.38)
Who's attacking us in outer space?
my goodness.
Matt (38:43.733)
Yeah.
Matt (38:47.745)
Yeah.
Matt (38:54.592)
Yeah. Yeah, silence, right? Or yeah, it's Japan. Yeah. Mm-hmm.
shawn (38:58.871)
Japan. You love that story because there's these Christians there and the Japanese are saying you we're either gonna kill you or you can denounce Christianity and you're we're gonna let you live. And they chose to die. they did? I thought it was yeah, I thought actually there's some that did the did A and some that did B.
Matt (39:08.663)
Yes.
Matt (39:12.662)
Denounce Christianity. Yeah, they denounced Christianity.
Matt (39:21.056)
What they did was they found that the priests would rather die than denounce Christianity. And so what they started doing is torturing their congregants in front of them and saying, How long are you gonna watch these people suffer before you denounce Christianity?
shawn (39:26.507)
Okay, so is the
Yeah.
shawn (39:34.612)
So that's the scenario, Matt, that I would say why I'm surprised that you wouldn't say, No, unfortunately, unfortunately, we have to weaponize anything we can possibly weaponize because some other person will c some other country will start coming attacking us and we have to be willing to defend ourselves instead of just rolling over and saying, Hey, just because China will have weapons in space, we're peacemakers, and then China kills us, then we're dead.
I would
Matt (40:05.506)
They're not gonna kill us. China's not gonna we just don't live in that world anymore. Yeah, but whoever, whoever and by the way, if they kill us, like what's the worst thing that happens? What's the worst thing that happens if they use their space weapon to destroy our military or whatever?
shawn (40:08.461)
I'm not saying ch I don't mean China specifically.
shawn (40:15.095)
Matt, you Matt, you spend eighty percent of your life watching court T V. You don't see you see every day that there are humans on this earth who choose evil or choose a lifestyle that leads them to mental illness that causes them to choose evil. You know that the forces of evil exist.
Matt (40:23.478)
Yeah.
Matt (40:30.338)
Mm-hmm.
Matt (40:34.849)
Yes.
Yes. So what does the latter-day lens teach us about how to protect ourselves from evil? What do I learn in the scriptures about how to protect myself to make sure that bad things never happen to me? Nothing. There's nothing you can do to protect yourself from bad things happening to you. The promise, the promise of the gospel is that bad things will happen to you. And when they do, God will be there for you, right? God will be there to protect you.
shawn (40:52.026)
What?
Matt (41:07.234)
God will be there to help you heal, but God doesn't prevent bad things from happening. And we shouldn't we shouldn't try to prevent bad things from happening.
shawn (41:11.22)
Okay, counter.
shawn (41:15.501)
Counter-argument, maybe scriptural counter-argument. So you have, so we're all the parents, and we've decided we have done so many bad things, we choose to rather die than to fight against our enemy. So we will take our weapons and we will bury them in the ground. That's a choice we make because of what you just said, right? It's peace above all, and we will follow the Lord. And then the children and grandchildren of those people said, We can't just let everyone die. We have to.
Matt (41:18.029)
Mm-hmm.
Matt (41:28.619)
Yeah.
Right.
Matt (41:35.607)
Mm-hmm.
shawn (41:44.757)
Make our weapons, and we have to go out. Now, did the Lord bless the one and not the other? The Lord blessed both of those choices. Both of them.
Matt (41:51.701)
Mm-hmm. But yeah, but this is what I'm going to say. I think the message of the Old Testament is God will fight your battles for you. The children of Israel were enslaved by the Egyptians. There was no way for them to get free. It wasn't he didn't give them some superpower weapons. He freed them, right? And he gave the children of Israel power to defeat their enemies. No.
shawn (42:08.247)
Well, right.
Hold on. Parting the Red Sea wasn't a superpowered w weapon? The plagues, the plagues weren't a superpowered weapon? yeah, but he gave them, he gave it to the you know what I mean? He like enabled Moses. He enabled the leaders of the church to to do these crazy things to s to defend and escape.
Matt (42:17.152)
It wasn't a weapon. It was faith. That's God doing that. Like
Matt (42:26.572)
So
Matt (42:31.104)
So it's in n Nephi says, Woe unto him who putteth his trust in man or maketh flesh his arm, right? And God's telling us, don't think that as humans, you can do anything to protect yourselves. That's not your job. Because no matter how powerful your military is, no matter how mighty you are, God can destroy it all within a day if need be. So you shouldn't you put your trust in God.
shawn (42:50.699)
I don't
shawn (42:58.103)
Well yeah. But
Matt (43:00.8)
And if you're gonna spend billions of dollars, let's say as a government, we've got a surplus of billions of dollars, which I don't think we have, and we say, should I put a weapon in space or should I, I don't know, build a hospital in a rural community? Build the hospital in the rural community, because that's way more helpful to mankind.
shawn (43:16.237)
W but but if but if you but if you don't build the army that protects those who will come and destroy the hospital, then you have no hospital in your community.
Matt (43:28.096)
Okay, Canada has no weapons in space. Is Canada worried that someone's gonna
shawn (43:32.693)
Is Cannibal v is Canada vulnerable to any w if they were ever to be attacked, how would they fare?
Matt (43:36.156)
Sure. They've they've been vulnerable for like decades and decades and decades. And they're gonna be okay. Mexico, Ecuador, okay, Uc Ukraine, right? Like and they're fine, by the way, right? Nobody stepped up to help Ukraine. And they're doing fine because God's on their side helping them to fight off the pesky Russia.
shawn (43:41.077)
Right. Right. Okay w Ukraine Ukraine
shawn (43:54.722)
Well that's not true. That's not true. Plenty of us have ha stepped up to help Ukraine defend themselves with technology, by the way, all of which is enabled by space, weapons in space.
Matt (44:00.161)
Okay.
Matt (44:06.392)
Okay, well, I disagree with you, Sean, but I'm gonna give you the points because you made some very good points. All right. Here's the big question. If Sean thought outer space weapons was a weird topic, wait till you hear this one. A study of 228 languages found that none are naturally more beautiful than others, with 820 listeners rating nearly all of them almost identically. Preferences were driven by speaker tone.
shawn (44:13.463)
Ha ha
shawn (44:20.279)
Ha ha.
Matt (44:35.714)
Female voices and cultural familiarity rather than any built-in phonetic beauty. President Ukdorf famously praised German as a heavenly language, and many would probably say the same thing about their own native language. So here's the question: Is there something divine about language? If we were to hear something spoken in the pure, undefiled Adamic language, would it appeal to all of us, or would we still have a preference for our own native language?
shawn (45:03.213)
How many years has this question been rolling around in your brain, Matt?
Matt (45:08.448)
Ha ha.
I actually hadn't thought about it before. I remember when I would study Russian and I would speak Russian. I hated the way I sounded, but when I would hear somebody else who's a native speaker speak Russian, it sounded so beautiful to me. And then when I would hear a St. Petersburg accent, I'd be like, my goodness, like there's a thing of beauty in listening to that person speak, which I don't think I would have appreciated if I hadn't studied the language, right? So I think there's something about familiarity with a language that makes it sound more beautiful to you. But
shawn (45:41.002)
Or y Yeah, so bias, right? Like I do think that w I don't know if this is what the study concludes, but I think nine out of ten times our own bias will inform us to what language, right, is most beautiful. If I speak it, if I've studied it, if I yeah. But but I'm gonna argue so since I'm you know, my profession is and my expertise is design, I will argue that there are objective standards.
Matt (45:41.108)
I haven't really thought about it for very long.
Matt (46:06.551)
Yeah.
shawn (46:10.391)
to things like visual beauty, to that's not to say that we all can't have this is we all can't have our opinions or have our yeah our opinions on things. But there is a truth that many of us have bad taste in certain areas. I mean
Matt (46:26.52)
In music. So wait, when you say objective standards, are you saying that there's like a design shape that no matter what country, no matter where I'm at, what time and place, everybody will say, Yeah, that's that's good.
shawn (46:43.231)
Not that everyone will say it, because they can be wrong, but in principle, it is good. You can disagree with it, but it is good. For example, have you heard of the the Fibonacci sequence or the golden ratio? So the gol
Matt (46:55.008)
Yeah. Yeah. The golden ratio they show that in the temple video, by the way. Yeah. I've seen it. Yeah.
shawn (47:00.267)
Yeah, that's right. So that's a shape. You just brought up the example of a shape. The golden ratio is kind of a shape. Probably people disagree with that, but there is a shape or a combination of shapes that many will argue is objectively the most beautiful. In fact, nature proves it because you can find it abundantly throughout nature, this golden ratio. All all throughout. And then they'll praise architects who follow the golden ratio or or fashion designers who follow the golden ratio.
Matt (47:09.944)
Mm-hmm.
Matt (47:22.476)
Okay.
shawn (47:30.359)
Graphic designers. And so this teaches us that there are some, I guess, objective universal and absolute principles. Now, again, like I may in my journey be at a space a state where I I I just have bad taste. And so I don't recognize the principled and the and the beautiful.
Matt (47:37.395)
Universal things?
Matt (47:50.563)
So so when I went to the Sistine Chapel, I sat there with my family and we all looked at the Sistine Chapel and I was like, I don't get it. I don't understand. And same thing when we went to Venice and same thing as we were looking at other works of art in the Vatican Museum, I was like, I don't get it. And my entire family is the same. They're like, we don't get it. Like we look at the great works of art and we don't get it. What you're saying is we're wrong.
shawn (48:17.953)
No, I'm not saying those apply the objective, universal and absolute standards of artistic or architectural beauty. I'm not saying that. I'm saying they could.
Matt (48:26.744)
But if I look at the golden ratio and I'm like, I actually kinda like a triangle a little bit more. I wish this was a little more cubist in the way that this looked, then I would be wrong.
shawn (48:32.237)
Yeah, I mean it's an interesting di what is it, Vin Diger? It's an interesting cross section of there's there's I mean there's there are absolute and universal truths and then there are also relative truths d at certain things, right? So
Matt (48:41.739)
Yeah.
Matt (48:45.098)
Lots of shapes.
Matt (48:57.25)
But language, is language universal? If you were to hear the Adamic language spoken, would there be something familiar to you about it that you'd be like, okay.
shawn (49:04.407)
We We don't know. Right, we don't know what it is and where it comes from and did God teach it to them. I mean we no we know that God taught it to them, right?
Matt (49:14.188)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. The Adamic language is the language everybody spoke before the Tower of Babel.
shawn (49:20.341)
Yeah, that's really fascinating. And God taught it. D is there scripture that says that God taught Adam and Eve the Adamic language? I mean, they I mean, but yeah, I agree. I doubt they invented it. And did God teach them as immortals or mortals, right? Isn't it is it an immortal language? You know what I mean? Like so
Matt (49:24.033)
Mm, I don't know. I don't know. But I doubt that they invented it, right?
Matt (49:39.816)
I don't know. But maybe there's something maybe all languages sound beautiful because they all derived from that one pure language and
shawn (49:47.221)
And it applies the the true universal absolute principles, maybe, yeah.
Matt (49:51.063)
Mm-hmm. I actually think that's not true. Yeah. I think there's the did you see the show in there's a show that came out before Interstellar. It's got Amy Adams in it, and it's like about linguistics. They like make such a big deal about language in that movie. And I'm like, please, this is all a bunch of garbage. That's what I think about language. It's all a bunch of garbage. The reason it all sounds the same is because it's all just gibberish, right? Unless you know a language once you know a language.
shawn (49:53.747)
Okay.
shawn (50:03.649)
Yeah. Contact.
shawn (50:11.22)
Ha ha ha.
What?
Matt (50:19.746)
Then you can see a lot of beauty in the language. But unless you've studied it enough to appreciate it, then it all just sounds the same, not beautiful. It's all identical because it's all just gibberish. Because language is just a tool that people create to communicate with themselves. And there's nothing truly eternal. When God speaks to us, he speaks to us in our language that we can understand. He doesn't try to teach us some better language. He just says, This is what you use, this is what you know.
And that's why I say there's nothing divine about language. It's all just gibberish garbage.
shawn (50:50.797)
No, I'll take the opposite stance. I'm I'm I'm I'm trying to think of an analogy to to to destroy your opinion. No, no I won't. No. No. what's a good example, man? I'm failing to find a good analogy that would counter your argument. Dang it.
Matt (50:59.978)
Use contact, use contact. Like a God is like the aliens from space.
Matt (51:12.664)
Tolstoy speaks Russian in a way that is so beautiful. Like if I could speak, if you gave me an opportunity for fifteen minutes to speak like Tolstoy in Russian, I would give so much just to have fifteen minutes where I could speak like Tolstoy. He is such a master of the Russian language. Well that's just a it's still just a tool. It's not
shawn (51:29.205)
But it's still Okay, do you apply the same to music? Here's my analogy. Do you apply the same ideas to music? Is music just man-made?
Matt (51:36.596)
Yeah, music is Ed Sheeran said yeah, it's what did Ed Sheeran say? It's four chords. Music is all four chords.
shawn (51:43.981)
Did you really just quote Ed Sheeran to establish the universal or non-universal truths of music?
Matt (51:51.339)
I watched a movie where Ed Sheeran was like the greatest songwriter the world has ever known. Yesterday in that movie, they taught me that Ed Sheeran's the greatest songwriter ever. And then I saw him on YouTube say, All music is four chords, and I'm like, Okay, well, music is supersome.
shawn (51:55.563)
Ha ha ha.
shawn (52:05.685)
He's saying it all po he's saying that all popular music is four chords. And he's trying to teach us that the McDonald's of music is what the masses listen to. He's saying in order to make money at music, you make radio pop and it's all just four chords. He's not saying that the objective standards of really good music are just four chords.
Matt (52:10.24)
Matt (52:17.036)
Yeah.
Matt (52:27.168)
All I listen to is radio pop. Like that is my world. Radio pop and then handles Messiah. Like that's it.
shawn (52:35.169)
But do you think the same thing? Music is just a man-made it's just it's just the notes and the melodies and and and and the way you harmonize with those melodies, it's just gobbledygook man. It's just like man-made garbage. It does nothing eternal or sacred about it. Why will there be trumpets? Why will there be angels with trumpets?
Matt (52:40.288)
Mm.
Matt (52:50.306)
So just like I can take words in a language
Just like I can take words and turn them into a prayer, which becomes something divine, or I can take language and turn it into scripture, which becomes something divine, I can do the same with music. But music in and of itself is just like me pounding on a piano.
shawn (53:09.185)
Here's where I think your thing f everything falls apart. Here's where I think a good latter day lens might come in. If it wasn't for the eternal nature of both our spirits and the flesh, then I I I would I would have to I have to disagree with you. Because when you're resurrected, Matt, that is that is the right, I love the scripture that says in your spirit you can have joy, and in the flesh you can have joy, but unless they are inseparably connected, you can never have a fullness of joy.
Matt (53:38.732)
Mm-hmm.
shawn (53:38.923)
So separably connected the way we are now, we'll never be able to reach a fullness of joy. Only after resurrection, when the spirit is the lifeblood of the the the elements, can we have a fullness of joy? Well, once our spirits and this element are combined, then voice, language, music, these things play a part in your eternal existence, do they not?
Matt (54:01.88)
Sean, that's beautiful. That's awesome. No, I'm serious. I hadn't thought about it though. This is because you're an artistic person and I'm not at all an artistic person. I mean, I think of myself that way, but no, like for you, art, music, it's like the core of who you are. You couldn't ex if I said just like I would love to speak like Tolstoy, if I were to say to Sean, I'm gonna take all music away from you. You can only get it for fifteen minutes one time the rest of your life. Like that would be awful for you, right? That would be like prison terrible. Yeah.
shawn (54:30.157)
It would be, yeah. It would be. Yeah, it would be.
Matt (54:32.416)
Yeah. Yeah, this is why you get this on a level that I don't understand it. I mean I like music, right? But I'm just as happy to like whistle some like Disney whistle while you work song or whatever. I don't need any
shawn (54:44.407)
But that's because you know why? Do you know why? That's because there are absolute universal principles that speak to everyone. And the basic principles were applied to what was the song you're whistling? Whistle while you work. And so it it becomes a part of your whole being. It's not because by chance and by random luck, this random human on earth just in mortality just happened to meet a number of, you know, notes that he kind of liked.
Matt (54:55.734)
Whistle while you work? Ba bum.
shawn (55:12.459)
No, it's 'cause they're based on true principles.
Matt (55:15.106)
Wow. Okay, Sean. Well done.
shawn (55:16.833)
So so so languages too, like certain languages are too. And Russian is that perfect language.
Matt (55:21.657)
I'm gonna go back to what this listener said. Sean, thank you for being wise, not vulnerable, informative, and even inspiring. That was awesome. Thanks, Sean. Hey listeners, thanks for joining us. Talk to you again next week.
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