I highly recommend the book Learn to Program.
http://pragprog.com/titles/fr_ltp/learn-to-program
My teenage brother started with this book and loved it because it was clear and easy to understand and wasn't boring. Even my dad started to get into it.
The link he gave wasn't specific enough. It talks about the why here:
http://mormon.org/mormonorg/eng/basic-beliefs/heavenly-father-s-plan-of-salvation/your-life-on-earth
Basically, we are beings that existed before in another form and will continue to exist in another form. Life on Earth is a kind of school. It is very often hard, but necessary to learn the things we need to know. God set things up so that we could learn the difference between good and evil and have choices and consequences to those choices to learn from. It is important to be separated from God to learn things for ourselves. Of course, that is a really simplified explanation of a deep subject.
Now many people believe that faith is just accepting something without proof. If someone told me the story above and asked me to just believe it I would have laughed in their face. (In fact it took me a long time to go from being a firm atheist to an agnostic who could accept that such a story *might* be possible.) Real faith, rather, is trying an experiment, believing that you will get an outcome. Scientists have faith that their experiments will lead them to the truth so they exercise that faith and perform the experiment. The LDS have an experiment to try, but it's not easy, which is part of the point. God could come down right now and announce that he does, in fact, exist, but that would undermine the entire reason for the existence of the Universe. He does show things and give evidence to individuals when they have faith and do the experiment.
I personally believe in evolution and I don't see any conflicts with evolution and my religious beliefs. They are simply unrelated. Knowing how my body developed is unrelated to knowing why my body developed. I think it's important to make that distinction. Too many people confuse the issue.
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I highly recommend the book Learn to Program. http://pragprog.com/titles/fr_ltp/learn-to-program My teenage brother started with this book and loved it because it was clear and easy to understand and wasn't boring. Even my dad started to get into it.
The link he gave wasn't specific enough. It talks about the why here: http://mormon.org/mormonorg/eng/basic-beliefs/heavenly-father-s-plan-of-salvation/your-life-on-earth Basically, we are beings that existed before in another form and will continue to exist in another form. Life on Earth is a kind of school. It is very often hard, but necessary to learn the things we need to know. God set things up so that we could learn the difference between good and evil and have choices and consequences to those choices to learn from. It is important to be separated from God to learn things for ourselves. Of course, that is a really simplified explanation of a deep subject. Now many people believe that faith is just accepting something without proof. If someone told me the story above and asked me to just believe it I would have laughed in their face. (In fact it took me a long time to go from being a firm atheist to an agnostic who could accept that such a story *might* be possible.) Real faith, rather, is trying an experiment, believing that you will get an outcome. Scientists have faith that their experiments will lead them to the truth so they exercise that faith and perform the experiment. The LDS have an experiment to try, but it's not easy, which is part of the point. God could come down right now and announce that he does, in fact, exist, but that would undermine the entire reason for the existence of the Universe. He does show things and give evidence to individuals when they have faith and do the experiment. I personally believe in evolution and I don't see any conflicts with evolution and my religious beliefs. They are simply unrelated. Knowing how my body developed is unrelated to knowing why my body developed. I think it's important to make that distinction. Too many people confuse the issue.