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Janadele said:
It seems this "privilege" is allowable exclusively for Skeptics.
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No. A very good friend of mine who is a skeptic and an atheist was banned from the forum for personalizing the discussion. Lots of skeptics and atheists have been banned. If I attack you personally you should report me. If anyone else attacks you personally you let me know and I will take them to task for it.
 
Well... to someone who has no identity of their own apart from their church, I imagine that any criticism of the church probably does feel like a personal attack.
 
Janadele said:
It seems this "privilege" is allowable exclusively for Skeptics.
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Not so. I've seen many a skeptic receive warnings, suspensions and even bans for personalizing arguments. If you feel that you, or anyone else, have been the subject of an ad hominem attack, report it to the moderators.
 
Stomatopoda said:
Well... to someone who has no identity of their own apart from their church, I imagine that any criticism of the church probably does feel like a personal attack.
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Agreed. If we dislike or disagree with the LDS religion, those who are strongly invested in it feel we dislike or disagree with them as individuals just because they are part of it.
 
skyrider44 said:
Your transparently false premise is that humans--even prophets--are capable of achieving absolute perfection in mortality. I think you know better than that. There are degrees of perfection. Whom will you follow? A person who has made minimal progress toward becoming perfect, or one who--like Brigham Young--made exemplary progress toward becoming perfect, warts and all?

All the hand-wringing discussion that occurs on this thread comes down to one overarching fact: You are a closed-case atheist by your own admission. Consequently, for you, God doesn't exist--and never will. What that means is that there is nothing a faith-based person can post that will be acceptable to you. Thus, exchanges with you are merely exercises in debate, which, I confess, does have value as entertainment.
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Would you be so kind as to point to any statement by RandFan in which he indicates that his mind is closed on the subject of gods, and that nothing could ever convince him otherwise?
 
DragonLady said:
Agreed. If we dislike or disagree with the LDS religion, those who are strongly invested in it feel we dislike or disagree with them as individuals just because they are part of it.
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Scientologists, Muslims, Catholics, Jews, Baptists, etc., etc. all play the victim card. So do televangelists who bilk people out of billions.
 
DragonLady said:
Agreed. If we dislike or disagree with the LDS religion, those who are strongly invested in it feel we dislike or disagree with them as individuals just because they are part of it.
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Obviously the skeptics disagree with the LDS religion, no surprise there. But I do not feel that the skeptics have been inconsiderate of me; and yet I feel as though I'm at least as strongly invested as either of the other two LDS are. The skeptics and I have had to agree to disagree a few times, but there's nothing wrong with that. :cool:
 
Cat Tale said:
...The way I was taught in the church is that all the leaders of the Church are only human and therefore are prone to sometimes say or do things that only humans might do. But when they're acting as the mouth of God, they are then in the capacity of a Prophet and not a man, and what they say is truth. ....
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How do we know when a leader of the Church is acting 'as the mouth of God'?
 
RandFan said:
You are breaking forum rules by personalizing the discussion. If you have evidence then present it. My mind can be changed. I've changed my mind about many things.
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Have you forgotten that the line above your photo reads "Mormon Atheist"?
 
skyrider44 said:
Have you forgotten that the line above your photo reads "Mormon Atheist"?
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And?
There must be a point you are making, but it has escaped me entirely.

By the way, you have not addressed the question which I have posed more than once.
You have referred to people being 'called' to do stuff for god.
Who does the calling? If it is god, why would he call people who get it wrong, when he himself is never wrong?
 
Filippo Lippi said:
Let me get this right. In 1978 the mormon church became slightly less racist. Well done them.
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From what I've read, admittedly not a whole lot, the Mormon church itself has abandoned racism pretty thoroughly. What it has not done, because it cannot, is first to disown its racist past, and second to alter the mindset of the many many mormons who went along with that past racism when it prevailed. Clearly, it's not done for a loyal Mormon to suggest that the church was ever wrong, and institutions can find it easier to change than people do. But to be fair, it seems that the church itself has abandoned racism in its entirety, and one can at least hope that the tendency of members to do as they're told without question will work as well when they're told to do the right thing as it did when they were told the reverse.

skyrider44 said:
Have you forgotten that the line above your photo reads "Mormon Atheist"?
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Proving in a single phrase what the term "changing one's mind" means!
 
pakeha said:
How do we know when a leader of the Church is acting 'as the mouth of God'?
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In my opinion based on what I've been taught over the years... It basically goes back to the Church membership having a common goal, to achieve the Celestial Kingdom. If a revelation brings us closer to meeting that goal then obviously I think it sounds plausible, and then it is up to me to put it to the test. Test is LDS lingo for 'study the revelation, ponder it out in our minds and hearts, pray about it, and act accordingly.' Those who accept what a Prophet says remain active in the Church, those who do not can decide if it's something they can live with inside the church, or they can find another church where they feel more akin to the doctrine.
 
Foster Zygote said:
Would you be so kind as to point to any statement by RandFan in which he indicates that his mind is closed on the subject of gods, and that nothing could ever convince him otherwise?
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What I said was that for him God doesn't exist, and, yes, I also said he won't change his mind.

I base those statements on the fact that he has repeatedly said (in post after post) that science-based evidence is mandatory in order for him to change his position (the wording varies but that represents his basic position). Consequently, for him, faith--the first principle of the Gospel of Jesus Christ--is not acceptable. I will qualify my original statement to this extent: As long as he rejects faith as a means by which to become a theist, he will never find God, at least not in the Christian sense. I am expressing an opinion here based on what he, himself, has said.
 
pakeha said:
How do we know when a leader of the Church is acting 'as the mouth of God'?
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It probably has something to do with spitting vs. swallowing.


















Ahem, minds out of gutters. Spitting vs. swallowing in this scenario means rejecting unproven assertions vs. mindlessly accepting unproven assertions.
 
Foster Zygote said:
What of it? "Atheist" means someone who lacks belief in gods. It doesn't mean that someone denies the possibility that gods exist.
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Wrong. Atheist: "One who believes that there is no deity." (Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 11th ed., p. 77) No other definition is listed.
And as for atheism, the dictionary reads: "a disbelief in the existence of deity" and "the doctrine that there is no deity."

Perhaps the word you're looking for is agnostic. Check it out.
 
skyrider44 said:
Wrong. Atheist: "One who believes that there is no deity." (Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 11th ed., p. 77) No other definition is listed.
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Atheist means without theism. I am without theism. I lack a belief.
 
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