I cannot believe that only 10% of Americans base their view of government assistance on religion. On what else would you base that opinion – no matter one’s view?

If you are LDS and one of the 90% of Americans who’s opinion on government assitance is not based on religion then I recommend reading some of the statements of Neal A. Maxwell, Ezra Taft Benson, Marion G. Romney, Spencer W. Kimball, Heber J. Grant, and J. Reuben Clark on the subject.

The church has said it neither promotes nor opposes capital punishment. It says it “opposes elective abortion for personal or social convenience.” It does not oppose removing a medical patient from “artificial means of life support.” Different denominations deal differently with questions about life’s origins and development. Conservative denominations tend to have more trouble with Darwinian evolution. Does the church have an official position on this topic?

Nelson: We believe that God is our creator and that he has created other forms of life. It’s interesting to me, drawing on my 40 years experience as a medical doctor, how similar those species are. We developed open-heart surgery, for example, experimenting on lower animals simply because the same creator made the human being. We owe a lot to those lower species. But to think that man evolved from one species to another is, to me, incomprehensible.

Why is that?

Nelson: Man has always been man. Dogs have always been dogs. Monkeys have always been monkeys. It’s just the way genetics works.

I especially appreciate this response from Elder Nelson as he, more than any other in the Quorum of the Twelve or First Presidency, has studied biology and anatomy.

Though we do not hear much on this issue from our Church leaders anymore, it is comforting to hear an Apostle verify eternal truth and the sacred origins of man by dismissing these theories of organic evolution.

Nelson does add this, after Elder Wickman appears to try to soften the response:

We have this doctrine, recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants, Section 101: “When the Lord shall come again, he shall reveal all things, things which have passed, hidden things which no man knew, things of the earth by which it was made and the purpose and the end thereof, things most precious, things that are above, things that are beneath, things that are in the earth, upon the earth, and in heaven.” So as I close that quotation, I realize that there are just some things that we won’t know until that day.

I would add to the discussion this verse as well, from the 121st section of the Doctrine and Covenants:

And also that God hath set his hand and seal to change the times and seasons, and to blind their minds, that they may not understand his marvelous workings; that he may prove them also and take them in their own craftiness;”

The theory of organic evolution, especially as applied to human existence, is counter to the true origins of man as taught by the scriptures and by the Holy Spirit.

The entire transcript of the interview can be found here:
http://pewforum.org/events/?EventID=143

Writers will also be provided their own divideasunder.org email address (for example, yourname@divideasunder.org), hosted by Gmail.  I look forward to your responses.