“We have been richly taught and spiritually edified. . . . As we read and study [these talks], we will be additionally taught and inspired.”  — President Thomas S. Monson, today.

Well, it was a feast, wasn’t it?  Isn’t it great how the meat of the gospel can both fill us and fuel us?

And so, in an effort to remember, study, and apply the principles taught this weekend, a new round of the General Conference Book Club begins.  Here’s how it works:

The goal is to read one General Conference talk a week and discuss it together as an on-line “book club.”

(If you’re not familiar with General Conference or the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, go here and here and here for more information.)

A new talk will be posted each Sunday.

You don’t have to do anything to “join” the club– You can just visit the Sunday post at any time during the week and share thoughts, findings, favorite quotes, applications, even questions from the talk of the week. Personally, I think it would be a good idea to subscribe to comments from the post so that we can read each other’s insights and have a “real book club” conversation.  (There are two ways to do this:  1. Below the actual talk post, click on Comments RSS below the “Actions” list to subscribe to an RSS feed for comments, or 2. click the little box under the “Submit Comment” button so that comments are emailed to you.)   Or of course, you can just check back often to see what folks are saying.

My own plan is to try and use the talk as a guide for my personal scripture study throughout the week.  First I’ll read the talk all the way through, then look up and read all the scripture references he quoted, and then break the talk down into segments to study them carefully and try to find other related scriptures that help me understand it better.  Feel free to share any ideas of how you plan to study or apply the talks we read.  (You’re allowed to do this however you want.  You can simply have a goal to read the talk before the week is over, and that’s good, too.)

Here’s a little button you can put on your own blog if you’d like to.  Feel free to invite friends (the real kind and bloggy kind as well) to participate.  The more the merrier.  You can link it directly to this page or to the host page at https://diapersanddivinity.com/gcbc since it has all the instructions for the Book Club challenge.

And try to comment when you’ve read each article, even something as simple as “I did it.”  Then we have a certain motivation/accountability to each other to meet our goal of reading all the talks from the previous General Conference. The objective is to read the words of the living prophets and learn from them.  Our book club community is for sharing and encouraging, but please don’t feel pressure that you have to come around and make profound insights or write eloquent summaries.  Just show up and be counted!

Next Sunday, we will begin with our very first talk.  (They will be available online by Thursday.)  It will post sometime Sunday, usually in the evening, and then you can read it and comment at any point during the week and be part of a discussion group about the principles learned.

For Week 1, starting now, I would love to hear some of your favorite snippets from General Conference this weekend:  favorite quotes, thoughts about overall themes, most poignant talks, your experience and testimony of General Conference overall, etc.  You can bet I’ll have plenty to say in the comments; good luck getting a word in edgewise. 🙂  Welcome back to those of you who have been here all along, and a genuine welcome to newcomers as well.