Interesting New Revelations

When I first saw the seer stone in a photo on Facebook, I was skeptical. I didn't expect the Church to have actually published a picture of the stone. As I looked into this matter further, I found information that was even more surprising.

According to an article on MormonNewsroom.org, "the official resource for news media, opinion leaders, and the public," which can currently be reached via a link on the main page of lds.org, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and the Community of Christ have been working together to preserve historic artifacts important to both churches, including an early manuscript of the Book of Mormon. Why is this surprising? Because the Community of Christ was formerly known as the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or RLDS church. I don't know much about that church or the history of its formation, but until today, I had thought that we were rivals, if not enemies, with the Community of Christ. That our people are working together with their people was a revelation to me.

Another interesting piece of news is this Ensign article, which reveals a picture of one of the seer stones. One thing I found especially interesting about the article is its date of publication. Apparently, the article won't be published in an actual Ensign magazine until October, even though the article is already posted online. I don't know why the article isn't going to be printed in the August or September Ensigns, and I also don't know why it has been published online already if it's not going to be published in print until October. I'm sure they have their reasons, but I find this whole situation unusual.

It's surprising to me that the Church is making the manuscript publicly available, that our church is working together with the Community of Christ (and vice versa), and that the seer stone is brown, striped, and oval-shapped, rather than clear and circular, as I had imagined. Yet, this news is coming from official sources, so it must be true. I'm not sure how much this will impact our future - probably not much - but after finding out that these news stories were true, I felt like I should pass the news along. All this news may or may not change anything, but it certainly is interesting.