I'm surprised no one has (as far as I can see) posted this link yet; You can get the Book Of Mormon here Yahweh,
http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/BOM/index.html
Mmm... annotation!
http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/BOM/index.html
Mmm... annotation!
Acrimonious
Scholar
- Joined
- Nov 21, 2002
- Messages
- 111
I was "active" in the church until around the age of 14. I was "inactive" until 18. I'm now extremely inactive.
Most of my knowledge of the church comes from how they treat teens:
*Not allowed to attend a "dance" until age 14.
*Must dance with at least a fore-arm's length from your partner at all times.
*Not allowed to date until age 16.
*Heavily discouraged from dating anyone except fellow Mormons. (A very large problem in a small community with a tiny minority of Mormons)
*Heavily encouraged to go on a mission.
*Heavily encouraged to marry ASAP (in the temple) (after your mission) and start a (large) family.
*Promotion of Morality at all times (both males and females) I must have received a church-sanctioned pamphlet every 3 months detailing the following:
- cannot wear revealing (even remotely) clothing of any kind. All shorts/skirts/dresses must be long enough to cover the knees. No tank or halter tops.
- Thou Shalt Not Masturbate. They went on to suggest ways to resist the temptation of this sinful activity, such as cold showers, singing church hymns, or praying for strength.
In my experience, rule #2 made rule #1 irrelevant. Prayer, again in my experience, does not effect hormones. Hymns are no match to the power of a pair of breasts, no matter how many shirts and sweaters you pile on them in the name of "morality." Most Mormon teens I knew were, simply: rabidly horny. With no release, it didn't matter that the hot mormon young women weren't showing any skin... We lusted anyway.
Most of my knowledge of the church comes from how they treat teens:
*Not allowed to attend a "dance" until age 14.
*Must dance with at least a fore-arm's length from your partner at all times.
*Not allowed to date until age 16.
*Heavily discouraged from dating anyone except fellow Mormons. (A very large problem in a small community with a tiny minority of Mormons)
*Heavily encouraged to go on a mission.
*Heavily encouraged to marry ASAP (in the temple) (after your mission) and start a (large) family.
*Promotion of Morality at all times (both males and females) I must have received a church-sanctioned pamphlet every 3 months detailing the following:
- cannot wear revealing (even remotely) clothing of any kind. All shorts/skirts/dresses must be long enough to cover the knees. No tank or halter tops.
- Thou Shalt Not Masturbate. They went on to suggest ways to resist the temptation of this sinful activity, such as cold showers, singing church hymns, or praying for strength.
In my experience, rule #2 made rule #1 irrelevant. Prayer, again in my experience, does not effect hormones. Hymns are no match to the power of a pair of breasts, no matter how many shirts and sweaters you pile on them in the name of "morality." Most Mormon teens I knew were, simply: rabidly horny. With no release, it didn't matter that the hot mormon young women weren't showing any skin... We lusted anyway.
billydkid
Illuminator
- Joined
- Aug 27, 2002
- Messages
- 4,917
Re: Re: Re: What do Mormons believe?
Please understand, I think all religions are stupid to the extent that none of them have any particular interest in the truth. But, what I mean't by stupid people are the people who accepted Joseph Smith's claim at the time and participated in the creation of the religion - who just up and decided to believe that this guy's story. Once a religion is established and people are born into it, that is a different story. I believed in protestant Christianity for a long time because it was the religion I was born into and indoctrinated with. I don't consider myself stupid for that (although I do consider myself stupid for many other things) nor would I consider you stupid for having been a Mormon.
RandFan said:
Please understand, I think all religions are stupid to the extent that none of them have any particular interest in the truth. But, what I mean't by stupid people are the people who accepted Joseph Smith's claim at the time and participated in the creation of the religion - who just up and decided to believe that this guy's story. Once a religion is established and people are born into it, that is a different story. I believed in protestant Christianity for a long time because it was the religion I was born into and indoctrinated with. I don't consider myself stupid for that (although I do consider myself stupid for many other things) nor would I consider you stupid for having been a Mormon.
RandFan said:
It's insulting. It's appropriation. It's yet another assumption by Christians that Jews need saving. It's saying 'we don't respect your beliefs, culture, religions, traditons, philosophies, so we're going to ignore all that and do what we want," --
I'm just saying. . .
Gwyn ap Nudd
Critical Thinker
- Joined
- Jan 15, 2005
- Messages
- 381
Ossai said:
I'm not sure about earlier incidents, but the one in the news last year was a diliberate smear by a woman who left the LDS and who had recently converted to Judaism. The list she pointed out which "still" had the holocaust victims names was the IGI, a partial index to names from the microfilms of church and civil records from all over the world that the LDS collects for genealogy purposes.
In addition, the LDS church has a rule (presumably in an attempt to avoid just this kind of bad publicity) that you must be related to someone for whom you request a "sealing" (Sealed to parents = proxy baptism; Sealed to spouse = proxy marriage).
Dr Adequate
Banned
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- Aug 31, 2004
- Messages
- 17,766
Yeah... the trouble is that given what Mormons believe this is actually a nice thing to do for Jews.turtle said:
Think about it the other way round. Suppose that they had instituted this method of, if I understand it, getting people into heaven retrospectively for everyone except Jews. What would we think of them then? I'd say that that would be definitely anti-Semitic --- given the religious beliefs of the Mormons.
By the way, would it be wrong for a medium to contact the spirit of a firm disbeliever in spiritualism and the afterlife?
RandFan
Mormon Atheist
- Joined
- Dec 18, 2001
- Messages
- 60,135
Riiight... and telling the rest of the world that Jews are god's chosen people is not insulting.turtle said:
Whatever Jews read into this act is their problem. Mormons do it out of a sincere (and seriously deluded) belief that god told them to. No one sat down and said, hey, let's piss off Jews and show them how much we disrespect them.
On the contrary, Mormons AIU had good relations with the Jewish Community prior to this.
Look, I could give a flying F*** what anyone does with my dead descendants name. I guess I could read something into it and get upset but what the he11 is the point?
RandFan said:
Huh?
Nice.
No matter how well intended something might be, if someone tells you that they find it offensive, then you should cease. I may not have any bad intentions at all calling someone Bobby Jim Jo when their name is Robert James Joseph. But if they tell me they're offended by that, I have two choices:
Say "Oh, sorry, I'll call you by your full name" or,
"Humpf, bug off, I don't mean any harm, and I'll continue to call you what I want because it's your problem what you read into it."
Just because "God told them to" doesn't make it all right. That's the problem with the world: lots of people telling other people that "god told them to" do something, regardless of what others say about it.
They may indeed be sincere, and no ill intent on a conscious level is meant. That's not the point.
Debatable. And beside the point.
Then I would suggest you keep your opinions as your own, and leave those who do find it offensive to do what they will about it.
RandFan
Mormon Atheist
- Joined
- Dec 18, 2001
- Messages
- 60,135
Sorry, I assumed that you knew. The Jews have a thousands of year old belief that they are "god's chosen people". They have a name for the rest of us. It is called "gentile". In the past it was used pejoratively as a pagan or heathen.turtle said:
Yes, I know, Tu Quoque. My favorite fallacy. I just see little good coming from religious complaints. Get along folks and forgive each other. Don't take your beliefs so god damn serious.
FWIW, I don't take gentile offensively for the same reason I don't think Jews should take this seriously.
Bad analogy, did god tell you that the only way for Robert to be saved was for you to call him Bobby Jim Jo? He told the Mormons that the good and decent people otherwise known as the Jews can't be saved without this moronic ritual.
So some idiot performs a ritual for your dead relative...
Duh, but how do you tell people who are prepared to die for god that his "marvelous work and a wonder" must be stopped because some of the descendants of those with whom you are working to save don't like what you are doing?
When it comes to religion it is. That IS the problem. I agree that there is a problem. I don't see why the Jews need to read into what is not there.
I note the wink and take it in the spirit offered. I can accept that they are offended but I stand by my original statement. I don't think that it is all that big of a deal. I think religious people get too bent out of shape over stupid things. This is a stupid thing IMO.Then I would suggest you keep your opinions as your own, and leave those who do find it offensive to do what they will about it.
Dr Adequate
Banned
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- Aug 31, 2004
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- 17,766
RandFan said:
If the wink means that you know what you're saying is stupid, then why not say something smart?turtle said:Then I would suggest you keep your opinions as your own, and leave those who do find it offensive to do what they will about it.
swstephe
Thinker
- Joined
- Jan 13, 2003
- Messages
- 176
as far as athiests are concerned, it logically doesn't matter what you do to a dead person, it is simply irrelevant. once you are dead, you are just a rotting pile of meat, bone and "juices". you could flush the body of an athiest down a giant toilet, or recycle it into fertilizer, for that matter. but culturally it is in bad taste or whatever. what one religion does to an athiests' remains is their problem, so if you go around making dead athiests into honorary members of heaven's gate, that is just a bunch of useless fluff.
however, if you have one religious group does to another religious group, without their permission, and against their own laws is something could be considered "intending to cause a riot", or "hate crimes" these days. the logic of the posthumous conversion may be sound, when thinking of the concerns of *the individual who is dead*, but it can be considered offensive to the surviving members.
as a matter of fact, i have some close mormon relatives. i have explicitly requested that they do not do a "baptism of the dead" on me after i'm gone. even though i don't think it has any affect on me at all, i wanted to state my case that i thought it was offensive to me, in principle, to do anything to me without permission.
however, if you have one religious group does to another religious group, without their permission, and against their own laws is something could be considered "intending to cause a riot", or "hate crimes" these days. the logic of the posthumous conversion may be sound, when thinking of the concerns of *the individual who is dead*, but it can be considered offensive to the surviving members.
as a matter of fact, i have some close mormon relatives. i have explicitly requested that they do not do a "baptism of the dead" on me after i'm gone. even though i don't think it has any affect on me at all, i wanted to state my case that i thought it was offensive to me, in principle, to do anything to me without permission.
RandFan
Mormon Atheist
- Joined
- Dec 18, 2001
- Messages
- 60,135
Yes, we don't want to be offended do we? I find your post contradictory. "Offensive in principle"?swstephe said:
There is so much that offends religious people. Taking god out of the pledge of allegiance offends. Removing 10 commandment monuments offend. Howard Stern offends. Bill Maher offends. South Park offends. Hollywood offends. The list goes on and on. Let's be honest, we don't give a sh!t what offends religious people.
On the other hand we are sanctimonious about our being offended because god in the pleadge and 10 commandments are in the court house. I find the whole, getting offended stuff, to be arbitrary.
In any event, I find it odd that we suddenly care about one religion offending another. I have already said that what the Mormons are doing is stupid. I have said that it is a bad PR move. I just think it is a dumb thing to get offended about. IJMO.
Do I understand that religious folk get offended by naked breasts on TV? Certainly! Do I think it is dumb? Yes! And it is dumb not simply because I'm against censorship. It is just dumb.
Naked breasts will cause no more harm to anyone who sees them than the 10 commandments will.
We want the god in the pledge and the 10 commandments out not because we are offended but because it is the right thing to do. If it were a matter of being offended then I say let them stay in.
RandFan
Let me expand it a bit then. Jews claim that they are god’s chosen people.
Christians claim that all non-Christians are going to hell
Muslims claim that all non-Muslims are not going to heaven
Etc, etc, etc.
What is the real difference, if any, of those claims? From my perspective, nothing substantial.
Ossai
That doesn’t mean we can’t discuss it though.
Let me expand it a bit then. Jews claim that they are god’s chosen people.
Christians claim that all non-Christians are going to hell
Muslims claim that all non-Muslims are not going to heaven
Etc, etc, etc.
What is the real difference, if any, of those claims? From my perspective, nothing substantial.
Ossai
Chosen People:
What is often forgotten in the polemics is that the Torah also affirms, from its first words about chosenness, that Israel was not chosen either because it was a superior nation or in order to be a superior nation, but rather simply to be God's servant: Chosenness is a status of obligation, not privilege.
It appears that the problem of understand arises in the meaning and interpretation of the words "consecrated" and "loved." These words have different meanings in biblical Hebrew than they do in modern English and in many other languages. The words "consecrated" comes from the root kuf-daled-shin in Hebrew, which we commonly translate "holy" or "sacred" although this is an insufficient rendering. That which is designated "kadosh" is set aside for a special purpose of God; it is reserved for service to God. The designation of "kadosh" does not imply inherent superiority, but rather ultimate disposition. The People Israel was brought into existence to serve God.
http://www.scheinerman.net/judaism/ideas/chosen.html
What is often forgotten in the polemics is that the Torah also affirms, from its first words about chosenness, that Israel was not chosen either because it was a superior nation or in order to be a superior nation, but rather simply to be God's servant: Chosenness is a status of obligation, not privilege.
It appears that the problem of understand arises in the meaning and interpretation of the words "consecrated" and "loved." These words have different meanings in biblical Hebrew than they do in modern English and in many other languages. The words "consecrated" comes from the root kuf-daled-shin in Hebrew, which we commonly translate "holy" or "sacred" although this is an insufficient rendering. That which is designated "kadosh" is set aside for a special purpose of God; it is reserved for service to God. The designation of "kadosh" does not imply inherent superiority, but rather ultimate disposition. The People Israel was brought into existence to serve God.
http://www.scheinerman.net/judaism/ideas/chosen.html