Gene first came to my attention when, as a graduate student at Berkeley in the late sixties, I heard of a couple of Mormon intellectuals “down the peninsula” at Stanford who were founding “a journal of Mormon thought.” I had not met Gene (or Wesley Johnson, the other founding editor), but I immediately assumed that I would like him. The life of the mind is addictive, and I knew I wanted to...
(appeared in BYU’s Kennedy Center Bridges Alumni Magazine) A MIDDLE EAST ODYSSEY by J. Bonner Ritchie, emeritus professor of organizational behavior, Brigham Young University Ancient and modern prophets have repeatedly reminded us of the sacred responsibility we have toward each other. The opportunity and obligation to serve our neighbors is codified in the great commandment, second only to...
Sunstone, August 1992. The limits of contention ought to be tight; the limits of difference ought to be wide. IT IS A COMMON AND USUALLY CONSTRUCTIVE reality that there is tension between an organization and its intellectuals. Regardless of the institution–governments, trade unions, churches–there will always be tension. It is part of the larger world of conflict between...
From the podcaster: “A few weeks ago, a very close friend of mine named Russell mailed me a CD full of his favorite Sunstone Symposium MP3s. While several of struck me as profound, one presentation in particular was groundbreaking, and almost breathtaking to me. It was a presentation delivered in a 1992 “Pillars of my Faith” session by J. Bonner Ritchie — a former BYU Professor of...