LDS

[Recovering Agnostic]

So that would be yes, he is the nutjob who thinks the WTC was destroyed with a controlled demolition.

I hear he doesn't like to talk about the Mormon thing too much, though - people might think he's a nutter.

Janadele, do you agree with Stephen Jones's troofer beliefs on the WTC?

 

[Blue Mountain]

Janadele, if a prophet of the church told you that women were now able to admitted to the priesthood, would you accept that teaching?

Blue Mountain, such a statement could only be given by a false prophet.

Thanks. Now if the President (who I believe you also regard as a Prophet--apologies if I'm wrong) or one of his successors said it, would you accept that teaching?

 

[halleyscomet]

From my previous posts it should be clear that there are differing degrees of knowledge... both amongst the LDS membership, and also in what is considered necessary and appropriate to discuss publicly, or to teach to the general membership. One does not teach higher degrees of learning and knowledge to those who cannot understand nor accept the basic fundamentals.

Nonsense. That is the claim of a mystery religion, like Scientology. Mormonism places all of its holy texts in the open for anyone to read. Claiming that there's secret knowledge or understanding withed by the church based upon a person's ability to understand it is absurd. While Mormonism impersonates mystery religions in the ritualism it cribbed from Freemasonry, I've seen no indication it does the same with actual theology or doctrine.

More to the point, in the Internet age, the "mysteries" of mystery religions are pretty easy to find. The highest ranking "secrets" of Scientology are so exposed they've been parodied on South Park. Videos of the ultra-secret (and frankly, anticlimactically boring) secret Mormon rituals can be found online.

You are trying to sidestep your lack of curiosity and the LDS fetishization of ignorance by claiming the church leaders think you're too stupid to receive those lessons. If you, by your own logic, lack the wisdom to receive the teachings that would prepare you for the discussion in this thread, they why do you insist upon engaging in the discussion?

As one who was a missionary, sunday school teacher, home teacher, etc., I can say that I know the "higher degrees of learning". IMO: Janadele, that's a load of nonsense.

I wonder, does she realize no such mystery lessons exist?

If she knows no such mystery lessons exist yet uses claims of their existence to sidestep this discussion, she is a liar.

If she honestly thinks there are mysteries she is not yet ready to learn, and has blind faith they exist yet no indication from higher-ups that they do, then is she not a fool?

Instead, what is being tested is how much regard, empathy, and love you have for your fellow mortal human beings.

I'm pretty sure you just described a deity who would hold Fred Rogers in high regard as one of the greatest of men.

Fred Rogers, the man who, upon being horrified at the things on TV decided, not to move towards censorship, but to provide the kind of television HE thought children should be watching, and did so in such a way that people of ALL faiths watched his show.

I like the idea.

What
Would
Fred
Do?

 

[Flo]

You are trying to sidestep your lack of curiosity and the LDS fetishization of ignorance by claiming the church leaders think you're too stupid to receive those lessons. If you, by your own logic, lack the wisdom to receive the teachings that would prepare you for the discussion in this thread, they why do you insist upon engaging in the discussion?

You're far too kind. She is trying to avoid ever answering embarassing questions by telling us we're not intelligent and worthy enough of the wisdom she pretends to detain.

Standard apologetics by brainwashed, and very full of themselves, new converts who are basically unable to argue their point of view in any rational way. Variants include "It's very complicated and you wouldn't be able to understand without having been initiated in bla, bla, bla ...", "You need to open your mind / think outside the box ...,"

 

[halleyscomet]

You're far too kind. She is trying to avoid ever answering embarassing questions by telling us we're not intelligent and worthy enough of the wisdom she pretends to detain.

Standard apologetics by brainwashed, and very full of themselves, new converts who are basically unable to argue their point of view in any rational way. Variants include "It's very complicated and you wouldn't be able to understand without having been initiated in bla, bla, bla ...", "You need to open your mind / think outside the box ...,"

Sounds like alternative medicine and free energy cranks. Personally, I suspect claiming we're too stupid to receive the answers to our questions would dance on the edge of a forum TOS violation.

Janadele,

Are you trying to claim we aren't intelligent enough for you to answer our questions, or that your superiors in the church don't deem YOU intelligent enough to be taught the answers?

If you consider us too stupid to receive the answers to our questions, why are you bothering to post to this thread at all?

What "teachings" are you referring to when you assert there are ones that can answer our questions?

The thread has an active LDS member and a few of former ones. At least one of them has asserted that the mystery teachings you refer to don't actually exist. How do you answer that assertion?

 

[godless dave]

At least he knows who butters his bread. Sorry for the cynicism but I've little reason to think otherwise. The guy is evil IMO.

Never apologize for cynicism!

 

[godless dave]

From my previous posts it should be clear that there are differing degrees of knowledge... both amongst the LDS membership, and also in what is considered necessary and appropriate to discuss publicly, or to teach to the general membership.

Doesn't the bolded part, all by itself, repel you? It's disgusting. Knowledge should be for everybody, not doled out by authority figures.

 

[RandFan]

Doesn't the bolded part, all by itself, repel you? It's disgusting. Knowledge should be for everybody, not doled out by authority figures.

Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful

Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities .

As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter .

And Samuel said, Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams.

If you want power, money and fame then start a religion. If it is successful your sheep will be willing to kill themselves on your say so.

Behold the awesome power of faith:

 

[Myriad]

I'm pretty sure you just described a deity who would hold Fred Rogers in high regard as one of the greatest of men.

Fred Rogers, the man who, upon being horrified at the things on TV decided, not to move towards censorship, but to provide the kind of television HE thought children should be watching, and did so in such a way that people of ALL faiths watched his show.

I like the idea.

What
Would
Fred
Do?

I don't object to that notion at all. I hold Fred Rogers in extremely high regard myself.

Respectfully,
Myriad

 

[Craig4]

If you want power, money and fame then start a religion. If it is successful your sheep will be willing to kill themselves on your say so.

Behold the awesome power of faith:

I'm so in the wrong line of work. I could be fleecing the likes of Jandalee with some flowery language and dramatic false modesty. I'd make a mint of her kind.

 

[halleyscomet]

I'm so in the wrong line of work. I could be fleecing the likes of Jandalee with some flowery language and dramatic false modesty. I'd make a mint of her kind.

I think the 20th Century's most famous Christian Apologist, C.S. Lewis, author of "The Screwtape Letters" and "Mere Christianity," described part of the problem very nicely:

"I am a democrat because I believe that no man or group of men is good enough to be trusted with uncontrolled power over others. And the higher the pretensions of such power, the more dangerous I think it both to rulers and to the subjects. Hence Theocracy is the worst of all governments. If we must have a tyrant, a robber baron is far better than an inquisitor. The baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity at some point may be sated; and since he dimly knows he is doing wrong he may possibly repent. But the inquisitor who mistakes his own cruelty and lust of power and fear for the voice of Heaven will torment us infinitely more because he torments us with the approval of his own conscience and his better impulses appear to him as temptations.

"And since Theocracy is the worst, the nearer any government approaches to Theocracy the worse it will be. A metaphysic held by the rulers with the force of a religion, is a bad sign. It forbids them, like the inquisitor, to admit any grain of truth or good in their opponents, it abrogates the ordinary rules of morality, and it gives a seemingly high, super-personal sanction to all the very ordinary human passions by which, like other men, the rulers will frequently be actuated. In a word, it forbids wholesome doubt. A political programme can never in reality be more than probably right. We never know all the facts about the present and we can only guess the future. To attach to a party programme -- whose highest claim is to reasonable prudence -- the sort of assent which we should reserve for demonstrable theorems, is a kind of intoxication."

--C.S. Lewis

 

[Janadele]

General Conference April, 2013.

“There is a law, irrevocably decreed in Heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated—And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated” (D&C 130:20–21).
http://www.lds.org/general-conference/print/2013/04/obedience-to-law-is-liberty?lang=eng

Surely there could not be any Doctrine more strongly expressed in the Scriptures than the Lord’s unchanging commandments and their connection to our happiness and well-being as individuals, as families, and as a society. There are moral absolutes. Disobedience to the Lord’s commandments will always deprive us of His blessings. These things do not change. God reveals to His Prophets that there are moral absolutes. Sin will always be sin. Disobedience to the Lord’s commandments will always deprive us of His blessings. The world changes constantly and dramatically, but God, His commandments, and promised blessings do not change. They are immutable and unchanging. Men and women receive their agency as a gift from God, but their liberty and, in turn, their eternal happiness come from obedience to His laws. As Alma counseled his errant son Corianton, “Wickedness never was happiness” (Alma 41:10).

In this day of the Restoration of the fulness of the Gospel, the Lord has again revealed to us the blessings promised us for being obedient to His commandments. May we ever be a light on the hill, an example in keeping the commandments, which have never changed and will never change.

 

[Myriad]

“There is a law, irrevocably decreed in Heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated—And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated” (D&C 130:20–21).
http://www.lds.org/general-conference/print/2013/04/obedience-to-law-is-liberty?lang=eng

Surely there could not be any Doctrine more strongly expressed in the Scriptures than the Lord’s unchanging commandments and their connection to our happiness and well-being as individuals, as families, and as a society. There are moral absolutes.

Nope. Read those scriptures. There have been new commandments and several new covenants.

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.

NEW commandment. NEW, not unchanging.

Respectfully,
Myriad

 

[Disco]

Thanks. Now if the President (who I believe you also regard as a Prophet--apologies if I'm wrong) or one of his successors said it, would you accept that teaching?

"Research supports this resistance to change. In late 2011, a Pew Forum report found that 13 percent of Mormon men think women should be ordained as priests, while only 8 percent of Mormon women felt the same way. A year before, research done by Robert Putnam and David Campbell in the book American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us, similarly found that 90 percent of Mormon women are opposed to females holding the priesthood—while only 52 percent of men felt the same way."


http://www.thedailybeast.com/witw/a...-women-face-off-over-right-to-priesthood.html

Unfortunately, the odds are against it.

 

[RandFan]

“There is a law, irrevocably decreed in Heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated—And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated” (D&C 130:20–21).
http://www.lds.org/general-conference/print/2013/04/obedience-to-law-is-liberty?lang=eng

Surely there could not be any Doctrine more strongly expressed in the Scriptures than the Lord’s unchanging commandments and their connection to our happiness and well-being as individuals, as families, and as a society. There are moral absolutes. Disobedience to the Lord’s commandments will always deprive us of His blessings. These things do not change. God reveals to His Prophets that there are moral absolutes. Sin will always be sin. Disobedience to the Lord’s commandments will always deprive us of His blessings. The world changes constantly and dramatically, but God, His commandments, and promised blessings do not change. They are immutable and unchanging. Men and women receive their agency as a gift from God, but their liberty and, in turn, their eternal happiness come from obedience to His laws. As Alma counseled his errant son Corianton, “Wickedness never was happiness” (Alma 41:10).

In this day of the Restoration of the fulness of the Gospel, the Lord has again revealed to us the blessings promised us for being obedient to His commandments. May we ever be a light on the hill, an example in keeping the commandments, which have never changed and will never change.

"I freed a thousand slaves I could have freed a thousand more if only they knew they were slaves." - Harriet Tubman

The first step to control people is to get them to be their own master to your commands. To feel guilt for failing to follow your commands and to promise a reward after death for following them.

See Kissing Hanks Ass.

 

[halleyscomet]

“There is a law, irrevocably decreed in Heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated—And when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated” (D&C 130:20–21).
http://www.lds.org/general-conference/print/2013/04/obedience-to-law-is-liberty?lang=eng

Surely there could not be any Doctrine more strongly expressed in the Scriptures than the Lord’s unchanging commandments and their connection to our happiness and well-being as individuals, as families, and as a society. There are moral absolutes. Disobedience to the Lord’s commandments will always deprive us of His blessings. These things do not change. God reveals to His Prophets that there are moral absolutes. Sin will always be sin. Disobedience to the Lord’s commandments will always deprive us of His blessings. The world changes constantly and dramatically, but God, His commandments, and promised blessings do not change. They are immutable and unchanging. Men and women receive their agency as a gift from God, but their liberty and, in turn, their eternal happiness come from obedience to His laws. As Alma counseled his errant son Corianton, “Wickedness never was happiness” (Alma 41:10).

In this day of the Restoration of the fulness of the Gospel, the Lord has again revealed to us the blessings promised us for being obedient to His commandments. May we ever be a light on the hill, an example in keeping the commandments, which have never changed and will never change.

I think the following quote form another thread summarizes things nicely:

If a person is unable to explain something in their own words, then it's a red flag to it not being true. Memorization is not understanding.

Janadele,

Please make an effort to respond to questions in your own words. Copying and pasting vaguely tangential content from LDS sites does not constitute engaging in a discussion. Your inability to use your own words to describe your faith and beliefs tells us not that you have faith in the LDS hierarchy, but that you don't understand any of what you're saying.

 

[bruto]

Janadele, there seems to be a conflict here, which you are not explaining very well. On the one hand, you make it clear that the possibility of your church changing its position on women is so far-fetched that it could not even occur to the faithful. And yet, it seems one of the more unusual features of your church is its ability to change, having altered its official positions on both polygamy and race. Were those who foresaw or wished for such changes before they occurred sinners and blasphemers? How do you qualify the difference between changes that have already occurred and those which might?

 

[Pup]

"Research supports this resistance to change. In late 2011, a Pew Forum report found that 13 percent of Mormon men think women should be ordained as priests, while only 8 percent of Mormon women felt the same way. A year before, research done by Robert Putnam and David Campbell in the book American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us, similarly found that 90 percent of Mormon women are opposed to females holding the priesthood—while only 52 percent of men felt the same way."

The reason for many is probably the same as my wife's: if women are allowed the priesthood, they would probably, like men, be required to hold the priesthood to be considered good Mormons.

Ending sexism is usually about providing more choices, like giving women the same freedom as men to choose between being engineers or stay-at-home parents.

But in this case, it would be like saying, from now on, women can no longer be stay-at-home parents, and must be engineers, whether they like it or not.

Unlike other sexism issues, there wouldn't be a female demographic with the opinion, "Well, I wouldn't want to do that myself, but I think women should have the right to if they want to." So it's probably not surprising that most women are happy with their current situation, and would rather not be forced into another one. Otherwise, they would have already joined another church.

 

[SezMe]

Here is a link from the article Disco mentioned above. Janadele, do you support these women?

What is your reaction, Pup?

BTW, look at the pictures on that page. Nearly pure white bread. One woman who MIGHT be mixed race. And one picture of a bunch of black kids, none of whom know anything about women wanting larger roles in their church. That's just sick.

ETA: Click on any of those picture and it shows a small note about the person. Click on the picture of the black kids and a note comes up about some white woman. That's just sick.

 

[Janadele]

Janadele, there seems to be a conflict here, which you are not explaining very well. On the one hand, you make it clear that the possibility of your church changing its position on women is so far-fetched that it could not even occur to the faithful.

The Gospel of Jesus Christ encompasses Eternal Law, and does not change to accommodate the whims of mere mortals. Our Heavenly Mother does not hold the responsibility of the Priesthood, that responsibility is held by Our Heavenly Father.