Mormonism

[Hux]

I'd guess Mormons must have been delighted when Scientology came along, toppling it as the nuttiest religion of all.

Anything that can produce a Glenn Beck needs to seriously examine itself.

 

[justcharlie09]

I'd guess Mormons must have been delighted when Scientology came along, toppling it as the nuttiest religion of all.

Anything that can produce a Glenn Beck needs to seriously examine itself.

Glenn Beck scares me, but in an oddly entertaining sort of way. My husband and I were laughing at a bit of his show earlier tonight (don't watch it, just channel flipping). It was equal parts Top 40 Hits morning radio, variety act, "tv news broadcast", and guy-in-sandwhich-board-proclaiming-the-apocalypse.

Only in America. I guess. Are there any like this in other countries that I'm unaware of??

 

[kuroyume0161]

Wait until you get to the part about the 'magic underwear'.

 

[justcharlie09]

Wait until you get to the part about the 'magic underwear'.

I'm already, unfortunately, aware of it (though I have only SEEN it in books--kthnxbye). We do live in a very Mormon area and I have step-in-laws who are "Jack Mormon".

Certainly isn't my cup o' tea, but the people are generally friendly. I did eventually start avoiding the park on the local ward's "play dates". I got tired of fending off conversion attempts or trying to politely remove myself from conversations about the ways in which evolution in school could damage their children.

Couldn't be Mormon, but different strokes and all of that....

Tolerance and freedom.

 

[tyr_13]

My last ex girlfriend couldn't stand the ritual nature of her Catholic upbringing and the contradictory nature of some of it's messages.

So she dumped me, moved to Texas, became a Mormon, and married a Mormon all within one year. Now she's pregnant.

I've already told her, as her friend I support her choices but understand completely why EVERYONE else in her pre-Texas life has expressed concerns to her. I've also made it perfectly clear that she doesn't want to talk about her religion with me.

I've been reading the Book of Mormon and the Quaran. They are interesting in that they are both obviously all about one man justifying his control of people and his lifestyle choices.

 

[kuroyume0161]

I'm uneducated on this, so perhaps someone can clear this up for me.

Do Mormons really believe that Israeli's were the real native Americans, and the Indians were native Americans who had their skin died, or something?

Or is this just an allegory? I'm having a hard time believing that any sane Human being (Let alone a possible GOP nominee in four years) could possibly believe this.

After being a skeptic and atheist for quite a while, you'd be less surprised by how many insane beliefs are held by somewhat reasonable people.

For instance, that someone can fall for an obvious joke/scam by a 'sci-fi' author claiming a new way to achieve new levels of success using 'dianetics' which leads to 'sci-fi' ideas such as Xenu, Thetans, and auditing. But, as with any other belief system involving levels, the more acceptable ideas are provided first while the less are provided only to those who have swallowed the pill/drunk the kook-aid (sic).

Not to drag christianity in here in general, but at the time it was a new religion many had the same skeptical complaints about the claimed beliefs. We only accept this bull now because it was institutionalized and enforced for millenia, usually under pressure of death and other nasty enticements.

 

[SezMe]

The Hebrews that came here from the Middle East never broke a vase!

That's just not true. You've never heard of Elmer and his Glue?

 

[Marduk]

A most efficacious arrangement--even if I do say so myself.

I had to google "efficacious"

 

[Richard S]

The Wikipedia page for "Lamanite" is pretty good. It says that the Book of Mormon doesn't go so far as to say Lamanites had dark faces because of some sinful status. But, there is a clear implication that if Native Americans convert, they should expect a lightening of their skin, and this idea has been repeated in Mormon publications from time to time over the years.

To be fair, judging each Mormon based on this would be like judging each Jew for believing in Kabbalah, or each Scientologist for believing in Xenu. *duck*

 

[Northernskeptic]

I was raised Mormon, before I found my atheism and skepticism that really is what I believed. It is what we were taught in church and reiterated over and over again.

 

[Undesired Walrus]

one of the nicest guys I ever met was a Mormon, he freely admitted that the beliefs of Joseph Smith were baloney and that very few of his fellow Mormons believed it, he said that his religion was much more about being good to others and leading a good life than it was about long disproved fables and he made a good point, all religions are built on easily disproved claims and should be measured on the behaviour of their adherents than what their adherents neccesarily believed about history.

What was the point of being a Mormon then?

 

[popscythe]

What was the point of being a Mormon then?

The money.

Oh, you mean from the bottom rung?

The exclusion of people different than yourself. Nothing's quite like a room full of people patting each other on the back.

 

[Rasmus]

one of the nicest guys I ever met was a Mormon, he freely admitted that the beliefs of Joseph Smith were baloney and that very few of his fellow Mormons believed it,

I would not be surprised myself if I found that many alleged followers of various religion are smarter than they make themselves appear. Or at least, un-smart in a different way.

he said that his religion was much more about being good to others and leading a good life than it was about long disproved fables and he made a good point, all religions are built on easily disproved claims and should be measured on the behaviour of their adherents than what their adherents neccesarily believed about history.

That is not a good point at all.

I can judge both, how the people act and how ridiculous their holy stories are. On top of that, however, I can also have a look at what type of things are caused by the stories and that's when religion starts to look pretty bad.

He also stated that he was more than happy with just the one wife and as polygamy was reserved for higher ups in the church he had no religious ambitions as he had no desire to ruin his life completely. hehe

I always found him very refreshing.

What was the point of being a Mormon then?

Or a member of any religion, let alone a member of any one religion rather than another.

 

[justcharlie09]

I had to google "efficacious"

"I have learned from experience that a modicum of snuff can be most efficacious."

If it's good enough for Baron Munchausen, it's good enough for me

ETA: The word, not the snuff... I think.

 

[justcharlie09]

Or a member of any religion, let alone a member of any one religion rather than another.

I could be wrong, but I think religion is one organization in which it is not considered polite to hold multiple memberships at once.

 

[Marduk]

What was the point of being a Mormon then?

Its a bizzarre concept called "fellowship"

 

[Rasmus]

I could be wrong, but I think religion is one organization in which it is not considered polite to hold multiple memberships at once.

Such as political parties or football fan clubs, I guess.

But I meant: If the premises is true, then what reason could one have to be a Christian rather than a Hindu?

You could either claim that there realyl is no reason or attempt to explain that CXhristians are - as a rule - much better behaved.

 

[justcharlie09]

Such as political parties or football fan clubs, I guess.

But I meant: If the premises is true, then what reason could one have to be a Christian rather than a Hindu?

You could either claim that there realyl is no reason or attempt to explain that CXhristians are - as a rule - much better behaved.

Reasons for being Christian rather than Hindu? Preferences, inclinations, culture of origin... there are lots of reasons for selecting one group over another.

All religions do have the same general set of goals: creating a mythic structure for understanding/relating to unknowns, setting up moral codes/values/ways of behaving that benefit the community/individual (to varying degrees), etc.

I enjoy the hell out of history and comparative religion.

Anyhow, there are many ways of looking at the situation. It depends on how dogmatic the religious person is about the subject. So, I guess the best answer is that it depends on who you're asking.

I've certainly met people who are convinced their branch of Christianity has the whole truth and nothing but and everything else is counterfeit.

But, then, I met a very nice female minister who happily describes her son as a Buddhist with Christian leanings without any real concern that his soul is in jeopardy of hellfire.

As for one group making people behave better...well, every ideology/worldview/religion eventually tries to CLAIM that it makes people healthier/smarter/better/faster/whatever...but I've yet to find anything to convince me that any specific way of thinking makes humans any less obnoxiously human in their tendencies toward biases, poor risk analysis, groupthink, etc. Even the scientific method can't inoculate against the human propensity for bad behavior.

 

[dropzone]

My last ex girlfriend couldn't stand the ritual nature of her Catholic upbringing and the contradictory nature of some of it's messages.

So she dumped me, moved to Texas, became a Mormon, and married a Mormon all within one year. Now she's pregnant.

When I first moved to the border of Wheaton, IL, home of Billy Graham's alma mater, I'd tell the kids trying to convert me that I was Catholic and what they were offering wasn't nearly weird enough to appeal to Catholics. Maybe if they handled snakes or were Mormons or Scientologists they'd have a chance, but mainline and spur line Protestantism was just...boring.

 

[GreNME]

A lot of cynics here. Here's a brief run-down of what gave the LDS church its momentum:

From the 1810's through the 1840's, give or take a decade or two, there were a number of "revivalist" movements along the East Coast religious folk, up and down the coastline. Smith was definitely a huckster in his youth, using "seeing stones" to hunt for treasure, and he eventually stumbled upon a local revivalist group in Pennsylvania. He'd already had plenty of priming during his huckster days in telling tales and maintaining a narrative, and he apparently was a sucker for attention-- even Mormon stories of Smith's youth state he was quite the storyteller as a child. This was also around the time that the Rosetta Stone was discovered, which among intellectual circles (some of whom were familiar with Greek) was quite an interesting find. Additionally, it was a time where Andrew Jackson's anti-Native-American campaigns were fresh and contentions between Americans (and American settlers) were quite high. What Joseph Smith managed to do was take the common anti-Native-American sentiment, the revivalist/millennialist movements growing at the time, and his penchant for telling tales about his ability to speak unknown languages, and build a narrative of religious exceptionalism that connected his story to old and ancient people in a manner relating to the religious movements he was growing more influenced by. He chose what were at the time completely unprovable criteria to fill the gaps in his claims, which is where the Israelite "tribe" came from, as well as his fictional "reformed Egyptian" language, and built a tale that was a fuzzy mirror image of the Exodus story and the Gospels-- two of the more common Sunday School tales that most religious children knew-- into his tale of these unprovable people he was claiming special knowledge of.

So, yes, by all rights, Smith can easily be considered a huckster and a scam artist. However, he built his scam on already-existing religious movements and, over time, adjusted his story and his budding religion accordingly. Many of the people who followed him genuinely seemed to be "true believers," and not simply because Smith was so adept at selling a scam. Many of these earliest members were already involved in the revivalist/millennialist gatherings taking place, and Smith was absorbing members through these other groups. We hear little of these groups because, on the whole, they died down over time or were absorbed into other Protestant denominations (Pentecostals are an example). Further, Smith managed to stifle investigations into his claims by having many early members sign affidavits affirming Smith's claims, and even though one or two early members broke off from the church they never refuted their signed affidavits (they never re-affirmed them, either, as far as I know). People believed Smith not only because he told a fantastic tale that was believable enough for them, but because he had signed statements from people affirming that Smith's claim was true. As far as they could reason, Smith couldn't possibly have been lying since he went through such secular steps to verify his religious claims and had them affirmed with evidence-- not very strong evidence, and certainly not strong enough to validate his claims, but ignorance is bliss. Most of the early decades of the Mormon church grew with this built-in cognitive hiccup, and Smith rode that wave of growth to what can be read of the LDS church history from various sources. Smith himself wasn't too prejudiced against black people-- Smith mostly made up crazy crap about Native Americans-- but Brigham Young (his successor) definitely was. Thousands of otherwise well-meaning individuals starting from the rantings of these leaders of the early Mormon church have basically established the foundation of weird perspectives and beliefs in LDS doctrine, both official and cultural. Their whole point-of-reference has been skewed by the cognitive dissonance necessary to find Smith's original tale of being visited by an angel who was once an ancient Israelite living in the Americas in the pre-Columbian period, who happened to speak this previously unknown language which no one has seen or read outside of Smith himself.

Sure, it's hogwash, and Smith was a scam artist. However, the cultural movement that became the Mormon church was already present and growing, and it's certainly reasonable to assume that had Smith not come along with his story, someone else would likely have come along and formed their own millennialist sect. In fact, others have done just that: the Jehovah's Witnesses are another millenialist sect with similar roots, as are (I believe) the Seventh-Day Adventists.