There was a recent shooting at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. One suspect fired at the dinner, and we condemn this action. No matter what someone is going through, there is absolutely no excuse for anyone to use unjust violence against innocent human life or innocent property. We can agree to disagree on issues peacefully without being violently disagreeable. During the commotion after the shots, many people hid under tables and chairs, Secret Service agents and police officers ran to detain the cowardly shooter, and people were scared for their lives. The suspect will be arranged on Monday. Trump and Vice President Vance were rushed out of the White House Correspondents' Dinner by Secret Service agents as the agents did the right thing. The shooter worked as a California teacher, and he is from Torrance, California. He was armed with knives too. CNN's Wolf Blitzer was a witness to the situation, and he was a few feet away from the gunman. The shooter is Cole Tomas Allen, being 31 years old. Allen shot at a Secret Service agent, and that agent survived by the bulletproof vest. There will be investigations about security and other issues by the federal government, Congress, local authorities, etc. At the end of the day, we will not be intimidated by nefarious shooters or evil people who desire violence to be the order of the day. People have the right to express their First Amendment rights without being subjected to this wicked violence. We will not be fearful of evil. We will oppose terrorism and defend free speech, irrespective of a person's ideological views.
Brigham Young continued in his LDS service. By May 4, 1835, Young and other apostles tried to convert people in the East Coast, especially in Pennsylvania and New York. He wanted to convert indigenous people, who he called "remnants of Joseph." In August 1835, Young and the rest of the Quorum of the Twelve issued a testimony in support of the divine origin of the Doctrine and Covenants. He oversaw the completion of the Kirtland temple and spoke in tongues at its dedication in 1836. He and his brother went on a mission to New York and New England. He visited the family of his aunt, Rhoda Howe Richards. They converted to the church, including his cousin Willard Richards. In August 1837, Young went on another mission to the eastern states. He then returned to Kirtland where he remained until dissenters, unhappy with the failure of the Kirtland Safety Society, forced him to flee the community in December 1837. He then stayed for a short time in Dublin, Indiana, with his brother Lorenzo before moving to Far West, Missouri, in 1838. He was later joined by his family and by other members of the church in Missouri. He became the oldest member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles when David Patten died after the Battle of Crooked River. When Joseph Smith arrived in Far West, he appointed Young, along with Thomas Marsh and David Patten, as "presidency pro tem" in Missouri.
Under Young's direction, the quorum organized the exodus of Latter Day Saints from Missouri to Illinois in 1838. Young also served a year-long mission to the United Kingdom. There, he showed a talent for organizing the church's work and maintaining good relationships with Joseph Smith and the other apostles. Under his leadership, members in the United Kingdom began publishing Millennial Star, a hymnal, and a new edition of the Book of Mormon. Young also served in various leadership and community organization roles among church members in Nauvoo. He joined the Nauvoo city council in 1841 and oversaw the first baptisms for the dead in the unfinished Nauvoo temple. He joined the Masons in Nauvoo on April 7, 1842, and participated in an early endowment ritual led by Joseph Smith that May and became part of the Anointed Quorum. Young and the other apostles directed the church's missionary work and the immigration of new converts from this point forward. Young served another mission to the Eastern seaboard. Brigham supported Joseph Smith's endorsement of plural marriage among church members. Brigham Young disagree with Martha Brotherton who said that she was pressured by Young and Smith to accept polygamy. Young convinced Hyrum to accept polygamy too. Brigham Young married Lucy Ann Decker in June 1842. That was his first plural wife. Young knew her father, Isaac Decker, in New York. Lucy was still married to William Seeley when Young married her. Young supported her and her two children while they lived in their own home in Nauvoo. Lucy and Young had seven children together. Young was one of the first men in Nauvoo to practice polygamy, and he married more women than any other polygamist while in Nauvoo. While in Nauvoo, he married Clarissa Decker, Clarissa Ross, Emily Dow Partidge, Louisa Beaman, Margaret Maria Alley, Emmeline Free, Margaret Piece, and Zina Diantha Huntington. These wives bore him children after they moved to Utah. He also married in Nauvoo, but did not have children with Augusta Adams Cobb, Susannah Snively, Eliza Bowker, Ellen A. Rockwood, and Namah K. J. Carter. Eight of Young's plural marriages in Nauvoo were to Joseph Smith's widows.
In March 1844, Brigham Young was an inaugural member of the Council of Fifty, which later organized the Mormon exodus from Nauvoo. Young supported Joseph Smith's presidential campaign in 1844. After Joseph Smith was killed by a mob, Brigham Young was the acting church's president. Young led the church as president of the Quorum of the Twelve until December 5, 1847, when the quorum unanimously agreed to organize a new First Presidency with Young as president of the church. A church conference held in Iowa sustained Young and his First Presidency on December 27, 1847. Many Mormons left Young. Rigdon became the president of a separate church organization based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and several other potential successors emerged to lead what became other denominations of the movement. Later, Brigham Young condemned the counterfeiting after some Mormons counterfeited American and Mexican money. Young moved from Nauvoo after anti-Mormon violence. Brigham Young moved into Salt Lake Valley, which was part of Mexico back then (before it became Utah). Young organized the journey that would take the Mormon pioneers to Winter Quarters, Nebraska, in 1846, before continuing on to the Salt Lake Valley. By the time Young arrived at the final destination, it had come under American control as a result of war with Mexico, although U.S. sovereignty would not be confirmed until 1848. Young arrived in the Salt Lake Valley on July 24, 1847, a date now recognized as Pioneer Day in Utah. Two days after their arrival, Young and the Twelve Apostles climbed the peak just north of the city and raised the American flag, calling it the "Ensign of Liberty."
Brigham Young helped to form the city of Salt Lake, re-baptize and re-dedicate people, and led the church as the President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, Young reorganized a new First Presidency and was sustained as the second president of the church on December 27, 1847, at Winter Quarters. Young named Heber C. Kimball as his first counselor and Willard Richards as his second. Young and his counselors were again sustained unanimously by church members at a church conference in Salt Lake City in September 1850. The Utah Territory was formed by Congress as part of the Compromise of 1850, and Young was the Governor of Utah Territory. Mormons built bridges, roads, forts, and irrigation projects. They made public welfare. The problem was that many Mormons formed a militia to issue a selective "extermination" order against male Timpanogos. After many wars, they made peace with the Native Americans.
Young supported slavery and its expansion into Utah and led the efforts to legalize and regulate slavery in the 1852 Act in Relation to Service, based on his beliefs on slavery. Young said in an 1852 speech, "In as much as we believe in the Bible ... we must believe in slavery. This colored race have been subjected to severe curses ... which they have brought upon themselves." Seven years later in 1859, Young stated in an interview with the New York Tribune that he considered slavery a "divine institution ... not to be abolished." So, Brigham Young was an anti-black racist. In 1856, Young organized an efficient mail service known as the Brigham Young Express and Carrying Company, which transported mail and passengers between Missouri and California. In 1858, following the events of the Utah War and Mountain Meadows Massacre, he stepped down to his gubernatorial successor, Alfred Cumming. Young was the LDS Church president for 29 years. He funded educational services for children. There was the Brigham Young Academy in 1876 and later there was the Brigham Young Unviersity. Young also organized a committee to refine the Deseret alphabet—a phonetic alphabet that had been developed sometime between 1847 and 1854. At its prime, the alphabet was used in two Deseret News articles, two elementary readers, and in a translation of the Book of Mormon. By 1870, it had all but disappeared from use. Young supported Mormon temples being built in Utah. There is the famous Salt Lake Tabernacle, St. Geroge, Manti, and Logan temples. His teachings are found in the 19 volumes of transcribed and edited sermons in the Journal of Discourses. The LDS Church's Doctrine and Covenants contains one section from Young that has been canonized as scripture, added in 1876. Brigham Young believed in heresies like blood atonement that excuses Jesus Christ's power to redeem eternal sin, Adam being the biological father of Jesus, and didn't want priesthood for men of black African descent. Young didn't want black people to participate in Mormon temple rites like endowment or sealings. These racist policies ended by 1978 by church president Spencer W. Kimball. There were the Utah War and the disputed role of Young in the Mountain Meadows Massacre (when over 120 men, women, and children were killed). Young was the richest man in Utah during his time (being involved in business ventures from banks to gas works) being worth $600,000 or $18,100,000 in 2025. Mormons were involved in some of the largest migrations of American cities creating about 350 towns in the Southwest. They traveled from the Rockies to the Sierra Nevada.
Before his death in Salt Lake City on August 29, 1877, Young suffered from cholera morbus and inflammation of the bowels. It is believed that he died of peritonitis from a ruptured appendix. His last words were "Joseph! Joseph! Joseph!", invoking the name of the late Joseph Smith Jr., founder of the Latter Day Saint movement. On September 2, 1877, Young's funeral was held in the Tabernacle with an estimated 12,000 to 15,000 people in attendance. He is buried on the grounds of the Mormon Pioneer Memorial Monument in the heart of Salt Lake City. A bronze marker was placed at the grave site June 10, 1938, by members of the Young Men and Young Women organizations, which he founded. Therefore, this concludes the long, controversial life of Brigham Young.
The religion of Mormonism has many false doctrines that contradict mainstream Christianity, history, and other themes. Mormonism (or the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, LDS) claims to be the true gospel and a revelation of the true God. Joseph Smith claimed that the Book Of Mormon was the most correct book of any book on Earth: “I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book.” (History of the Church, Vol. 4, page 461). Yet, the Book of Mormon says that Jesus Christ was born in Jerusalem as found in Alma 7:10. The Bible clearly states that Jesus Christ was born in Bethlehem. The verse of 1 Nelpi 20: 1 (the 1964 edition) and the 1981 edition have changes. Many editions of the Book of Mormon have been edited in a massive level. Mormons like Brigham Young said that the Garden of Eden was in the United States, but the Pearl of Great Price 3:10-14 claims that the Garden of Eden was in the area of Assyria. Joseph Smith said he saw God the Father (and Jesus) in the first vision in 1820. Smith said he received the priesthood in 1829. In the Doctrine and Covenants 84:21-22 Smith said that you cannot see the face of God and live without the authority of the priesthood. How did Joseph Smith see God when he didn’t have the priesthood? The Bible says that the Father cannot be seen (1 Tim. 6:16). John 6:46, mentions that, “Not that anyone has seen the Father, except the One who is from God; He has seen the Father." If the book of Mormon is true, why have both National Geographic and the Smithsonian Institute rejected it as being archaeologically reliable? What does the book of Mormon contain the word “church” in 1 Nephi 14:3, 9, 10, 12 which was set around 600 BC, yet the word church was not used until the time of Jesus (Matt. 16:18)?
Joseph Smith and Mormons claim that the present Christian Church church is false and Smith restored the "truth." Yet, the Bible says that the enemy shall not completely prevail over the church as believers in God have existed for over 2,000 years from the apostles, Claudius of Turin, the Waldensians, and other people. Christianity teaches that there is only one God. Mormonism teaches polytheism or that there are many gods. The Bible says that there are no other gods besides God (Isaiah 43:10; 44:6,8), Christianity teaches that humans can't become a god with their own parents and spirit wives. Mormonism teaches that you can. In fact, Mormonism teaches that God used to be a man on another planet who became a god and brought one of his wives with him to this world: “The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s..." (D&C 132:20). God warned us to not serve false gods (Exodus 20), which are really not gods by nature (Gal. 4:8). He warned us to believe in the true Christ–not the false ones of the cults (Matt. 24:24). Joseph Smith, Orson Pratt, Brigham Young, and other Mormons can't save us. Only God Almighty can save us. Mormons teach that Jesus Christ paid for all of our sins in the Garden of Gethsemane, but the Bible is clear that Jesus Christ paid for all of our sins on the Cross. Mormons teaches baptism for the dead including non-Mormons, but the Bible says that baptism is only reserved for living human beings. After we pass away physically, we are judged by God for our actions. No baptism can save us after death. Mormons believe in the old heresy that Jesus and Lucifer were spirit brothers (as found in Doctrines and Covenant 76:25-27) when the Bible says in the NT that Jesus created the world. Mormons believe that the Trinity is three separate Gods when the Trinity is one God in three distinct persons. In one exception, the second-largest Latter Day Saint denomination, the Community of Christ, is Trinitarian and monotheistic. Mormons believe that the people of the Book of Mormon lived in the western hemisphere, that Christ appeared in the western hemisphere after his death and resurrection, that the true faith was restored in Upstate New York by Joseph Smith, that the Garden of Eden was located in North America, and that the New Jerusalem would be built in Missouri. n the earliest days of Mormonism, Joseph Smith taught that the Indigenous peoples of the Americas were members of some of the Lost Tribes of Israel. Later, he taught that Mormons were Israelites, and that they may learn of their tribal affiliation within the twelve Israelite tribes. Members of the LDS Church receive Patriarchal blessings which declare the recipient's lineage within one of the tribes of Israel. The lineage is either through true blood-line or adoption. This view is similar to the old lie and heresy of British Israelism as Joseph Smith (whose ancestors came from Western Europe) was not a direct descendant of ancient Hebrews. Mormons believe that they must receive baptism, obey God's commandments, and all ordinances to be saved. Mormons teach that we must accept the teachings of the false prophet, Freemason, occultist, and polygamist Joseph Smith. We don't need to follow Smith, but God alone.
During the late 1700s and the 19th century, it was an age of massive revolutions in the world. Christians were in the middle of that era too. In America, the American Revolution existed by the late 1700s. Back then, the British Empire had the most powerful empire on Earth. It had colonies from Asia, Africa, and to America. The American colonists had to pay taxes to the British, and some colonists wanted representation in the British government. King George III refused to do so, so some colonists rebelled and fought the British Empire that led into the American Revolutionary War. We already know that many people on both sides of the war were Freemasons, members of the Hell Fire Club, members of British intelligence, etc. George Washington and Benjamin Franklin were Masons. Also, there was both an occult influence in early America and a strong Christian presence in early America too. John Wesley and George Whitfield were strong evangelists who spread the gospel in America. The growth of Congregational, Methodist, Presbyterian, and Baptist Churches existed in part by the Great Awakening. By 1787, about two thirds of the three million people of the United States were professing Christians. William Carey and Samuel J. Mills were prominent missionaries. Many missionaries did good to fight corruption, but some were agents of European colonization that exploited the name of God in order to control black people and other persons of color in the world. The worldwide missionary movement was powerful with the British and Foreign Bible Society being formed in 1804, American Board of Missions formed in 1810, Wesleyans creating Sierra Leon Mission, and many missionaries going to India, South Africa, Madagascar, Burma, etc. While many Freemasons were involved in Revolutions in America, Mexico, France, and other places, many Christians grew in influence to fight slavery and other evils from Harriet Tubman to William T. Still.
The first American art came from Native Americans. Native Americans did art in many different ways from calligraphy, sculptures, and other large sculptures. There was a great cultural overlap between the Siberian Yupiit, who have great cultural overlap with the Native Alaskan Yupiit people. There were Native Americans using paintings, basketry, textiles, and architecture in the form of American art. Many Native Americans have a carved profile of walking mammoth or mastodon images dating back to 11,000 B.C. There was the painted object from 8.050 B.C. Researchers found a petroglyph of a caravan of bighorn sheep near Moab, Utah in America. Facemasks, sculptures of falcons, and clay cooking utensils were used by the indigenous peoples of the Americas for a long time. Cooper plates, Rogan plates, and other images were found in the Mississippian culture spanning from 800 to 1500 A.D. Beads and baskets where diverse designs were found in early American art made by Native Americans.
Later, many early Americans di portraits of people, other paintings, and other images of art. There were the Romantic school of art and the Baroque style. By the 18th century, famous artists existed like Joseph Badger, John Brewster Jr., and Robert Feke. Jeremiah Theus and John Singleton Copley made images too. By the 19th century, more historical paintings and abstract paintings existed. Also, we have the famous sculptor Edmonia Lewis, who was an African American (with Native American heritage) made tons of work involving the late neoclassicalism type. She made works that deals with African Americans and Native Americans. There were tons of black artists like Henry Ossaaw Tanner and Robert Seldon Duncanson. Joshua Johnson was a great black American portrait painter who was active in Baltimore. He lived from ca. 1763 to ca. 1824. By the 20th century, American artists were used by Jacob Lawrence, Alma Thomas, Romare Bearden, Augusta Savage, Aaron Douglas, Sam Gilliam, Lois Mailou Jones, Charles White, and others who did abstract, regular paintings, sculpture, and other works. After the Harlem Renaissance, the 21st century artists include Mark Bradford, Kara Walker, Theaster Gates, Amy Sherald, Nick Cave, Kehinde Wiley, Jordan Casteel, etc. 21st century artists use cross hybrid works, joy, resilience, resistance, other conventional plus non-conventional works.
By the early 21st century, massive changes happened in the world. By January 3, 2020, Qasem Soleimani was targeted and killed at Baghdad International Airport. From January 16 to February 5, Donald Trump was not voted out of office by the United States Senate in his first impeachment trial. Then, the United Kingdom formally withdrew from the European Union on January 31, 2020. By February 9, Bon Joon-ho's Parasite movie became the first South Korean film to receive the Academy Award recognitions at the 92nd Academy Awards. Then, by March 2020, the United States of America goes into massive lockdown due to the global pandemic of COVID-19. I remember that time just like yesterday. COVID-19 existed in China from November 2019, and it spread rapidly all over the world in December and January 2020. By February 2020, there was massive concern over the virus, but Trump tried to downplay it at first. It became real in America when the U.S. shutdown happened in mid-March of 2020.
I found out in late April 2026 that First Lady Shylene Smith Thoroughgood is my 4th cousin. She married Superintendent YD Bernell Thoroughgood (1951-2018). Their children are Jennifer Thoroughgood, Yvettee Thoroughgood, Diyan Thoroughgood Ward, and Pastor Waddee Thoroughgood. Pamela Rawlings was the adopted daughter of Shylene Smith and YD Bernell Thoroughgood. Superintendent YD Bernell Thoroughgood was born on November 4, 1951, the eighth of nine children, to the late Pastor John Thomas and Missionary Mildred Beatrice Cooper Thourogood. He was born in Princess Anne County, Virginia- currently the city of Virginia Beach. Superintendent Thoroughgood attended Union Kempsville High School until the end of segregation. It was at this time that he attended First Colonial High School during his senior year. After high school, Superintendent Thoroughgood was drafted into the United States Army, where he fought in the Vietnam War. Superintendent is a Vietnam Veteran of Honorable Mention. He married Lady Shylene Smith Thoroughgood in 1971. This was the first union performed by the late Bishop Barnett K. Thoroughgood. They have been married for 46 years. All three of his children are off-springs are licensed workers in the Church of God in Christ.
In 1979, Superintendent Thoroughgood was appointed Pastor of “Bright Star Church” by the late Bishop Samuel L. Green, Jr. upon the sudden demise of his father. During his tenure there, Superintendent Thoroughgood renamed the church to accentuate the focus of the ministry, “the Coming of Christ”; hence the name “Church of the Advent”, of which he is the Founder. Academically, Superintendent Thoroughgood was a student at Tidewater Community College, Regent University, and the College of William & Mary. He holds a degree in Community and Social Services with emphasis on Social Work. He received his Doctorate of Divinity Degree from Rhema Seminary and Bible College. Superintendent received a second Doctoral Degree in Theology from Trinity Bible College of Richmond, VA. He, also, received an additional doctorate degree in Theology from Trinity Bible College (Richmond, VA). His brothers who passed before him were John Thomas, Jr. and Bishop Barnett Karl Thoroughgood, and his sister who passed before him was Constance Spence.
His living siblings are: Olanda Thoroughgood (Sylvia) - Virginia Beach, Alice Faye Major (Pernell)- Smithfield, VA, Paulette Spence (Joseph) – Norfolk, Donnell Thoroughgood (Jean) – Virginia Beach, and Paul Thoroughgood (Virginia Beach); sister-in-law Ernestine Thoroughgood; six beloved grandchildren: Eugene “EJ” Ward, Joshua Thoroughgood, Chandler Thoroughgood, Ethan Ward, Waddee Thoroughgood III, and Jariah Thoroughgood; six godchildren: Beverly Goodwin, Kyrus Campbell, William Wilson, Andrea Wilson, Andre Jerry, Shaunicka Pinkston- Moore; an adopted daughter, Pamela Rawlings, a host of cousins, special nieces, nephews, as well as great, and great-great nieces and nephews; his beloved Church of the Advent Family and New Jerusalem Church.
The parents of my 4th cousin Lady Shylene Smith Thoroughgood were Abraham Smith (1923-2008) and Mary Eiza James (1931-2006). The parents of Abraham Smith were Henry Smith (b. 1886) and Estelia V. Smith (1901-1976). The parents of Estelia V. Smith were George Smith (b. 1876) and Lizzie Kelly (b. 1877). The parents of my 1st cousin Lizzie Kelly were George Kelly (b. 1830) and Easter Perkins (1840-1910). My 3rd great-grandaunt Easter Perkins were my 4th great grandparents of George Perkins I (b. 1815) and Esther Perkins (b. 1816).
My 3rd cousin Theresa H. Upshur (1946-2022) was born on November 20, 1946, in New York City. She married Norman J. Ballard, and their son is Shawn T. Ballard (b. 1973). The parents of Theresa H. Upshur were Langston Dunbar Sr. (1912-1991) and Cora L. Chandler (b. 1920). The parents of Langston Dunbar Upshur Sr. were Alfred Seymore Upshur (1874-1935) and Juliet Brickhouse (1876-1971). The parents of my 1st cousin Juliet Brickhouse were James Burton (1848-1931) and Ann Eliza Brickhouse (1857-1921). My 2nd great-grandaunt Ann Eliza Brickhouse's parents were my 3rd great grandparents of Johnson Brickhouse (b. 1826) and Julia Perkins (b. 1835).
The Acting Navy Secretary making a Klan joke saying that if the left gives him a hood, he will ask for the hood to be in a certain way (outlining anti-Asian stereotyping). That comment from him represents his ignorance and racism. The reality is anti-racism activists desire justice not paranoia plus accountability not whitewashing reality. This is one of the results of the MAGA filled with racism and mocking the movements to combat racism and bigotry in the world. The Acting Navy Secretary is Hung Cao, and his joke was offensive to Asian people too. He said this on the far-right extremist Steve Bannon on Real America's Voice with Steve Bannon. Ironically, Hung Cao was a Vietnamese refugee. Many MAGA people and far right conservatives don't get that racism is global, systematic (as documented by tons of sociological studies), and still goes on in a massive level. Even to this day, many nations have people who have shown anti-black words and deeds in real life. Trump has promoted the military in the streets of America to target immigrants (thousands of people have been deported before, even U.S. citizens. Now, the Trump regime wants to denaturalize the citizenship status of many American citizens. That means our citizenship is under threat now), has targeted political dissidents, claims near total immunity, and harbors hatred of people who show dissent against Trump's authoritarian policies. We must fight for our democracy, and folks have to wake up about what time it is. Also, Hung Cao omits that Trump is a racist by making a racist remark about Elaine Chao, whose husband is Mitch McConnell. Trump also calls black progressives "low-IQ." Therefore, the Trump administration has been filled with corruption and whose policies are antithetical to democratic rights in American society.
By Timothy
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