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David Archuleta Amazes BYU Students with Surprise Performance (Video)

During BYU's Homecoming opening ceremonies, students were shocked when David Archuleta took the stage to sing his first hit single "Crush" and "Glorious," which was featured in the Church's movie Meet the Mormons.

Famous Latter-day Saints

10 famous Latter-day Saints who served missions (and where)

By Jeff Hampton

The prominence of being a celebrity might be taxing at times, but it does provide a unique opportunity for people to publicly share and stand up for their beliefs.

The surprising faith of 8 American presidents

Presidential religious lives are, for the most part, rather unremarkable--just like the majority of Americans they represent. As the 2012 presidential race, and especially the Republican nomination, dominate the news, the religion of the sometimes-frontrunner Mitt Romney continues to be an issue for many Republican voters. Americans have a hard time imagining a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a Mormon, as President. Yet Mormonism is, perhaps, the most American of all religions, founded by an American citizen and based on a sacred text that tells the story of God's work in the Americas. As many question Romney's religious heritage, it would be enlightening to look at eight presidents whose religious lives have troubled and fascinated Americans, or whose faiths may surprise us even today.

Latter-day Saint Life

Survey On How Americans Spend Their Time Reveals Surprising Results About Home Life

MR says: How and where do you spend most of your time? Check out how you compare with the rest of America.

LDS Church hosts African American genealogical conference

“I want to start with the common belief we have that African-American personal histories are unknown and unknowable. Indeed, this is a common idea both among professional historians and among those of us who do genealogies,” stated Dr. Leslie Harris, keynote speaker at the 9th annual African-American Genealogy Conference held March 9 at the Harlem LDS meetinghouse. Sponsored by the Afro-American Historical and Genealogical Society and the Church, the conference drew many attendees from the greater New York metropolitan area.

What do Americans think about Mormons?

Many Utahns may have been surprised to learn that only four in 10 Americans correctly identified Mitt Romney as a Mormon in the July Public Religion Research Institute/Religion New Service Religion News Survey. But perhaps that's not so surprising, given the percentage of Americans who say they don't know much about Mormons in general.

Ben Schilaty

Ben Schilaty works as an Honor Code administrator and adjunct professor at Brigham Young University in Provo, Utah. He holds three degrees from BYU: a bachelor’s degree in Latin American studies, a master’s in Hispanic linguistics, and a master’s in social work; he also earned a PhD in second language acquisition and teaching from the University of Arizona. Ben learned Spanish and Portuguese during his mission in Chihuahua, Mexico, and when he lived in Bolivia, Peru, and Portugal. He put his language abilities to good use by teaching Spanish for a decade at middle school, high school, and college levels.

Latter-day Saint Life

New FamilySearch Records Allow African-Americans to Find Slave Ancestors

MR says: You can help with this exciting, collaborative project to recover the name of Civil War-era African Americans through indexing.

Michalyn Steele: "I Know that He Loveth His Children”

Michalyn Steele has devoted her life to civil rights work. On today’s episode, Michalyn shares her thoughts on how we can better “mourn with those that mourn” amidst current discussions surrounding racism. She resonates with a well-known scripture in 1 Nephi 11:17, stating that while she does not understand the meaning of all things, she knows God loves His children.

How Americans View Mormonism

We spent an hour with Gary Lawrence last night. He was gracious enough to come up to visit our stake in Camarillo from his home in Orange County. Dr. Lawrence is an American opinion pollster who also happens to be a Latter-day Saint. He has been travelling around the church sharing the results of a poll he conducted in the spring of 2007 on American’s perception of Latter-day Saints in the United States. He published a book in 2008 with the findings of his poll, How Americans View Mormonism: Seven Steps to Improve Our Image. Dr. Lawrence received a PhD in communications psychology from Stanford University in 1972. He said that of over twenty doctoral candidates in his group, he was the only LDS, Republican, conservative hawk among them. So he knows a little about being in the minority.