LDS II: The Mormons

RandFan said:
Agreed 100%

FWIW: I've been asked by others what is the best strategy to talking to missionaries about the obvious sham Mormonism is. First off, and this is simply my opinion, but I wish people would avoid the desire to be coy or answer the door naked or engage in some other degrading act. I get it I really do... (snip of post that I fully agree with, just to save space)
Click to expand...

What he said. As part of my interest in learning about the church way back when, I took the whole missionary discussions--a series of, I dunno, six or eight meetings. I let them know from the beginning that I had no interest in joining, but was just wanted to learn more about the church, and they were okay with that.

I didn't expect to drag them away from their beliefs, any more than they expected to convert me to theirs (though I'm sure they were secretly hopeful). As original as non-members may think their come-backs are, missionaries have heard it all before, just as atheists/skeptics have heard all the basic theist arguments and can refute them in their sleep.

Missionaries are, in my experience, nice people, and though they may prey on the vulnerable, I don't think they do so any more than car salesmen, mortgage lenders, funeral home owners, or anyone who tries to sell someone more than they can afford with an attractive loan and carefully tuned sales techniques. They're salesman; it's what salesmen (and -women) do.

I find, like Craig4 said and RandFan agreed, that missionaries do love to talk about their religion and it's fair game if they approach someone (me), but the usual snarky approaches are about as useful and convincing as a Biblical literalist saying, "If people evolved from monkeys, how come there are still monkeys? Gotcha there, didn't I?"

Just as skeptics have heard that before and rarely suddenly see the light and renounce their belief in evolution, a missionary has heard most of the usual skeptic approaches before.

Just as a skeptic might walk away from a Biblical literalist like that, rather than waste time engaging with someone who clearly not only has a closed mind but is more interested in a war of sound-bites than education, a missionary might do the same and just walk away from someone clearly hostile rather than engage in a fruitless argument.

One needs to be a bit more subtle and get beyond the usual approaches, to be able to really discuss things. Of course, if one doesn't want to discuss things, saying "I'm not interested" works well.
 
*shrug*
When they show up (keep in mind, I'm technically registered as Mormon), I talk history.
Instead of religion hour, it quickly becomes anthropology of religous culture in societies, and then keeps going...

They are quite fascinated wih the topic usually, and I tend to know more than they do on the subject and it tends to be a neutral topic as they do not show any sign of threatened, but instead fascinated - especially when I bust out my Hebrew texts, tome on the history of the Bible as a product (meaning, how they have been made and why), maps, archeological papers and dig reports, and some of my own Greek translation works.

My various collections and tangents of material relating to Vikings in North America and Celtic/Gaul in the Mediterranean, diffusionist theory, and Asian engineering and ship design usually are big hits.

I've even covered the acoustical properties of Stonehenge and shown how the geometry is similar to studios and concert halls, and show them Dr. Till's really cool work on the subject.
This one always gets wows.

I just turn it into history hour. :D
 
Last edited:
RandFan said:
You will not likely find someone who is more resistant to argument than a missionary.
Click to expand...

Fun Fact: Remember the gay Mormon porn site mentioned in an article I linked to earlier in the thread? I heard an interview with the site's founder a while back. He claimed many of the men in those videos were recruited / seduced when they came to his door as Mormon missionaries. Most the models who were not Missionaries were recruited BY the Missionaries through word of mouth. The site's founder claimed he learned a LOT about Mormon theology as a result and now uses that knowledge to his advantage to facilitate future seductions. He USED to be married and his wife was part of the seduction process, but she divorced him. The divorce was not over the bisexual threesomes and foursomes they had with young Mormon men, but over her growing discomfort with the misogyny in Mormon theology.

That could of course just be the marketing version of the story to better enhance the appeal of the site. "Most these guys were seduced by my wife and I and only agreed to be on the porn site after a few orgies," makes for some pretty good marketing copy, doesn't it?
 
Pup said:
Missionaries are, in my experience, nice people, and though they may prey on the vulnerable, I don't think they do so any more than car salesmen, mortgage lenders, funeral home owners, or anyone who tries to sell someone more than they can afford with an attractive loan and carefully tuned sales techniques. They're salesman; it's what salesmen (and -women) do.
Click to expand...

I've had plenty of pleasant enough conversations with missionaries, but that list isn't exactly a good selling point.
 
halleyscomet said:
Fun Fact: Remember the gay Mormon porn site mentioned in an article I linked to earlier in the thread? I heard an interview with the site's founder a while back. He claimed many of the men in those videos were recruited / seduced when they came to his door as Mormon missionaries. Most the models who were not Missionaries were recruited BY the Missionaries through word of mouth. The site's founder claimed he learned a LOT about Mormon theology as a result and now uses that knowledge to his advantage to facilitate future seductions. He USED to be married and his wife was part of the seduction process, but she divorced him. The divorce was not over the bisexual threesomes and foursomes they had with young Mormon men, but over her growing discomfort with the misogyny in Mormon theology.

That could of course just be the marketing version of the story to better enhance the appeal of the site. "Most these guys were seduced by my wife and I and only agreed to be on the porn site after a few orgies," makes for some pretty good marketing copy, doesn't it?
Click to expand...
At the beginning of my mission there was an evangelical minister who converted to Mormonism. He was very charismatic and very intelligent. The missionaries gravitated to him. He often had groups of missionaries at his home and he would regale us with his life's stories as a minister. Near the end of my mission this individual left the church and as a result a number of missionaries also left.

I suspect missionaries are vulnerable to certain kinds of personalities. I also think it would be a major mind **** to go through something like that or to go from being a missionary to orgies. My mission messed with my head enough as it was.
 
gabeygoat said:
I've had plenty of pleasant enough conversations with missionaries, but that list isn't exactly a good selling point.
Click to expand...

I think it's apt, though. There's no doubt they have an agenda to sell something, and they're generally "on the clock" when interacting with random members of the public, so it's like going into a car dealership--you can talk about football, but only for so long before the salesman will bring it around to whether you want to buy a car, and you can talk about cars, but only for so long before the salesman will bring it around to the cars he has for sale. It's just the nature of the interaction.
 
I'm never snarky and I don't do the silly stuff like come to the door naked or anything. My goal is to open the eyes of missionaries to reality and rationality. In my younger days I will admit to telling a couple that I had jello in the oven but I'm past that sort of thing. Explaining that someone's beliefs are lies has to be done gently and with an understanding of the trauma it may cause.
 
The last time I was in a situation like that, there was no time to even have a conversation, much less pose a conundrum. Mississippi summer (close to 100 degrees); I'm working on (specifically, under) my sister-in-law's car (and working on cars is something I don't like doing even under the best of circumstances); and I see a couple of pairs of old-lady shoes approach. I pause, thinking maybe they'll just go away (surely they've heard some of the choice language I've been using on the car); but, no- "excuse me, sir? May we talk to you about Jesus?" So I crawl out from under the car (evidently, I wasn't invisible after all), and stand up to see a couple of mid-fifties ladies with the inevitable leaflets in hand. Now, I'm not a particularly big guy- 6'2", around 240 lbs- and I don't think I have what anyone would call an intimidating manner; but there must have been something about the long hair, the beard, the dripping sweat (Mississippi summer, remember?), and the obvious frustration with the car (they must have heard some of that choice language) that set off a "Charles Manson!" alarm. They both scuttle about three quick steps backwards; I'm pretty sure I hear one say something like "omydeargod" under her breath; and the other kind of blindly thrusts out a pamphlet in my direction and blurts "we'll, we'll, ah, we'll come back when you're not so busy." End of conversation.

If I had had time to pose a conundrum, I probably would just have asked them if Jesus had a dog. In my experience, reason doesn't work with people who have eschewed the need for it; you just get frustrated, and they (for some reason) feel vindicated by that.

ETA: I just realized I've conflated two different threads- this one and this one; I don't actually know if the ladies in my story were LDS (I don't think so, I think just run-of-the-mill Southern Baptist or something; but they're all pretty much the same to me). Anyway, my apologies for a story that was off-point here.
 
Last edited:
This is just adorable.

Mormon's Secret: temple garments for gentiles
http://boingboing.net/2014/12/17/mormons-secret-temple-garme.html

The company was founded by a former Mormon named Ann Jackson who was married as a teenager and has since divorced and left the faith -- she'll sell "temple garments" (AKA "magic Mormon underwear") to anyone who wants 'em, and promises that none of the profits go to the LDS.
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
A bra over a female Mormon top has to be the least sexy thing ever, but those capri style bottoms are kinda sexy, I think. Do most women wear panties over the bottoms too? I had no idea. That would be definitely... not sexy.
 
halleyscomet said:
Well, it's live.

Nephi's Bow by Peter Cornswalled
[qimg]http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51S5zBgYj4L._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-v3-big,TopRight,0,-55_SX278_SY278_PIkin4,BottomRight,1,22_AA300_SH20_OU01_.jpg[/qimg]


The publication of a $0.99 BoM study guide is probably the single most productive thing to come from the entirety of the Mormon discussion on the forum. Kinda sad really.
Click to expand...
Isn't that the guy who accused both Janadele and Skyrider44 of being fake mormons?
 
Pup said:
Just as skeptics have heard that before and rarely suddenly see the light and renounce their belief in evolution, a missionary has heard most of the usual skeptic approaches before.
Click to expand...

My late wife used to go to the Mormon church when she lived in Las Vegas. So, we had Mormon missionaries come to the house sometimes. One of them gave me a copy of the book of Mormon. The next time they came back he asked what I thought of it. I said, "I read the first three pages and it was obviously fake." He was surprised and asked why. I explained to him about formal and familiar tenses and that this was an obvious sign of mimicry by someone who was uneducated, namely Joseph Smith. He said that he had never heard that before. I doubt it changed their minds though.
 
One of the most misunderstood stories in the Book of Mormon is the account of Nephi breaking his steel bow. Criticized as an anachronism by skeptics and explained away with increasingly convoluted rationalizations by laymen Later Day Saints, what should be one of the founding images of Christendom is lost in bickering and excuses.

This study guide explains, in simple terms, the significance and meaning of Nephi’s bow, and how it symbolizes the struggle of the Jews coming to the Americas. Nephi’s bow is not a historical anachronism, but solidly grounded in technologies and weapons that are known to have existed at the time. Nephi is not a clumsy superman breaking an impossible weapon, but a prophet acting out a morality play about the very journey his family is taking.
Click to expand...

:rolleyes:
 
Janadele is an Australian radio personality?

Sorry, Amazon and Peter Cornswalled, you will have to survive without splitting my .99 cents between you.
 
halleyscomet said:
Well, it's live.

Nephi's Bow by Peter Cornswalled
[qimg]http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51S5zBgYj4L._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-v3-big,TopRight,0,-55_SX278_SY278_PIkin4,BottomRight,1,22_AA300_SH20_OU01_.jpg[/qimg]


The publication of a $0.99 BoM study guide is probably the single most productive thing to come from the entirety of the Mormon discussion on the forum. Kinda sad really.
Click to expand...

I have a question according to Ross Hassig's book War and Society in Ancient Mesoamerica, 1992, pp. 47, 119, 123, 197 no. 19, 225 no. 74, the Bow and arrow were absent from Mesoamerica and weren't brought into Mesoamerica until close to 1000 C.E., although it could be as late as c. 1200 C.E., well after the supposed destruction of the Nephites in 400 C.E.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom