Monthly Archives: August 2018

MIConversations #4—Thomas F. Rogers with Terryl Givens, “Risk-taking discipleship”



Maxwell Institute Conversations are special videocast episodes of the Maxwell Institute Podcast, hosted by Terryl Givens and created in collaboration with Faith Matters Foundation.

In this episode Terryl Givens sits down with Thomas F. Rogers to talk about the risks of discipleship, and worshiping God with all one’s heart, might, mind, and strength.

About the Guest

Thomas F. Rogers is a noted playwright, essayist, and scholar who taught Russian at Brigham Young University from 1969 to 2000. He also served as director of the BYU Honors Program in the 1970s. From 1993 to 1996, he was president of the LDS Church’s Russia St. Petersburg Mission, the subject of his memoir A Call to Russia: Glimpses of Missionary Life (Provo, UT: BYU Studies, 1999). Subsequently, he and his wife, Merriam, served in the Stockholm Sweden Temple. From 2007 until his release in 2014, Rogers was a traveling LDS patriarch assigned to the LDS Church’s Europe East Area. He is author of Let Your Hearts and Minds Expand: Reflections on Faith, Reason, Charity, and Beauty (Neal A. Maxwell Institute, 2016). Tom and Merriam currently live in Bountiful, Utah, where he spends time painting and visiting their seven children and forty grandchildren.

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Christianity and American politics, with Matthew Bowman [MIPodcast #82]



What comes to mind when you hear the term “American Christians”? Most people today think of the so-called Religious Right, a loosely knit group of conservative Christians who oppose legal abortion, favor gun rights, and hail Ronald Reagan as one like unto Moses. Matthew Bowman’s latest book is a wake-up call, reminding us that there’s no such thing as American Christianity. There are Christianities, ranging from conservative to liberal, all over the political spectrum.

In this episode we’ll complicate the simple story and try to find out who gets to decide what counts as Christian in the United States. Matthew Bowman talks about his latest book, Christian: The Politics of a Word in America.

About the Guest

Matthew Bowman is Associate Professor of History at Henderson State University. He is the author of The Mormon People, and a new book called Christian: The Politics of a Word in America from Harvard University Press.

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