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12/21/2011 7:52:00 AM
Have No Fear of God? http://www.squidoo.com/fear-of-god
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Tyrone1 12/07/2011 3:07:00 AM
Funny. But sometimes you have to sacrifice historical and doctrinal accuracy for comedy. So, good job.
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Francesco Orodinapoli 12/03/2011 3:16:00 AM
Excellent article. For those interested in going a little deeper, there is a spectacular chapter on Mormonism in Paul Kurtz's "The Transcendental Temptation". Also, an excellent chapter on Islam: http://www.amazon.com/Transcendental-Temptation-Critique-Religion-Paranormal/dp/0879756454
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Randysgramps 12/02/2011 5:17:00 AM
Thank You.
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Dfirestone 11/30/2011 1:29:00 AM
I didn't even read this article, just the headlines. Why should we hate someone because they have a different belief system than ours? Hate is a very strong word here....Why hate anyone??? Don't we have enough problems in the world without filling our hearts with hate?
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11/24/2011 3:14:00 PM
AMAZING HOW LONG THIS HOUSTON PRESS GARBAGE HAS LASTED THIS LONG. I GOOGLED SOMETHING AND THIS STUPID WEBSITE POPPED UP. LET ME CLICK AND GET OUT AS I CAN SMELL THIS SHIT STINK THRU MY COMPUTER.
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Jannypanny88 11/23/2011 4:50:00 AM
You seemed to be a reasonable person for most of your post, but your last paragraph gave you away. Mormonism makes as much sense as your clarification of hot drinks and soda. Cognitive dissonance is key here; one must have it to believe. Intelligence, on the other hand, is not necessary or useful, although some are.
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11/21/2011 5:34:00 AM
I hurt something laughing. I'd sue you but I'd probably hurt myself more laughing at the evidence for the court case.
My favorite line: finding a good drink in Utah is like "fishing for lobster in a parking garage". ;)
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11/15/2011 9:19:00 PM
Thanks for proving my point.
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11/15/2011 8:12:00 PM
Exactly as I thought. Instead of "investigating" you bear testimony. My original statement stands...
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nvlawyer 11/15/2011 5:58:00 PM
I would like to see the waiting period dropped and a simple civil ceremony conducted by a justice of the peace to be married under the law and then immediately cart off bride and groom to their temple wedding. If nothing else, as a courtesy and a showing of respect to the non-member parents as they have raised good and decent children and deserve that reward.
My wife and I had a ceremony after the temple marriage, but it was all show and tell and I know that the parents knew that as well.
Having said that, the temple is not closed to any person wanting to convert and live by the rules of the church, but that is obviously not going to happen. For me, however, kneeling down over a simple alter and holding the hand of my bride and sealing ourselves together for time and all eternity by the priesthood power of God is a very powerful expression of love and faith. Church weddings and all of their pomp and circumstance can't even compare.
Perhaps that is why so few LDS marriages fail. They start on the right foot by looking into the soul and less on the expense and quality of the wedding dress. The Scots would be proud.
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nvlawyer 11/15/2011 5:51:00 PM
Though humorous, this diatribe fails to state that Mormons are some of the most educated congregants in the nation, save the Jews. So let's smirk and then understand that this faith that asks a lot out of its members in terms of both temporal and physical restrictions, seems to appeal to a bunch of folks that have a lot of choices in religion. Any religion would love to have these parishioners, but THEY choose the Mormon faith.
I'm just saying that is OK to poke fun at the faith, but there really is something to it. The faith consists of very deep thinkers, who don't take themselves too seriously -- as we are all ultimately human. My wife and I both have Doctorate degrees and are very faithful in the church -- despite the fact that we continue to poke and prod the doctrine and the establishment.
You might recall that Senator Harry Reid, #3 Democrat in the Nation and Senate Majority Leader, is also Mormon. So for every argument you have made here, you would have to argue the opposite side to include him. Politically Romney and Reid are polar opposites, but religiously, they are on the same page. So you can see that the doctrine of the church creates politicians on both sides of the aisle and condemns neither.
For the most part, and there are always exceptions to the rule, Mormons are law-abiding, church-attending, community-supporting members of society. People you might be surprised are faithful Mormons: Eldridge Cleaver (Former Black Panther Activist); Gladys Knight (Soul Singer); Brandon Flowers (Lead Singer of "The Killers"); Jimmer Freddette (Basketball phenom); TJ Fredett (His Street Rapping Brother); and many other icons who don't wear black and grow beards -- or worship Joseph Smith.
The faith is probably the most "Chirstian" congregants of all American religions in the way they practice their faith -- Though Salvation Army is probably a close call. For Mormons, it is everyday a Mormon. There should not be a divide between who they are and what they believe.
By the way, "hot drinks" which means coffee and tea, are not allowed, but Hot Cocoa is allowed. Caffeine is not prohibited (surprise), so soda is fine. Also, to solve the getting up in the morning issue, "Five Hour Energy" is not restricted and I use it from time-to-time if I am running low. All things in moderation is the key.
Cheers.
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11/15/2011 4:30:00 PM
Look, friend, the very first thing that I wrote in response to you is that there might be a reason to reconsider the one year policy. If you don't like the way the rest of your comments made you appear, then maybe you should give that some careful thought. Don't blame the messenger, you know? ;-)
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11/14/2011 10:18:00 PM
Growing up, I was always aware of both manifestos. I think now that the church has grown and most members aren't descendents of polygamists, the issue is kind of moot. There is no reason to focus on details that are irrelevant to current members. It's fodder like this that does nothing but feed the troll.
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11/14/2011 10:10:00 PM
The second manifesto was 1904. George Romney was born in 1907. He never lived at a time when the church performed plural marriages. Sure, the older generation may have had stories to tell, but by the time he was alive, plural marriage was gone and done with.
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11/14/2011 8:51:00 PM
You keep saying that waiting one year is no big deal. Then why is the fear still being taught? Check out this current and official LDS curriculum manual:
http://lds.org/manual/young-women-manual-2/lesson-15-temple-marriage?lang=eng
President Spencer W. Kimball told the following true story:
“A few years ago a young couple who lived in northern Utah came to Salt Lake City for their marriage. They did not want to bother with a temple marriage, or perhaps they did not feel worthy. At any rate, they had a civil marriage. After the marriage they got into their automobile and drove north to their home for a wedding reception. On their way home they had an accident, and when the wreckage was cleared, there was a dead man and a dead young woman. They had been married only an hour or two. Their marriage was ended. They thought they loved each other. They wanted to live together forever, but they did not live the commandments that would make that possible. So death came in and closed that career. They may have been good young people; I don’t know. But they will be angels in heaven if they are. They will not be gods and goddesses and priests and priestesses because they did not fulfill the commandments and do the things that were required at their hands.
“Sometimes we have people who say, ‘Oh, someday I will go to the temple. But I am not quite ready yet. And if I die, somebody can do the work for me in the temple.’ And that should be made very clear to all of us. The temples are for the living and for the dead only when the work could not have been done. Do you think that the Lord will be mocked and give to this young couple who ignored him, give them the blessings? The Lord said, ‘For all contracts that are not made unto this end have an end when men are dead.’ (D&C 132:7)” (in Conference Report, Japan Area Conference 1975, pp. 61–62).
You know something trytoseeitmyway? I brought attention to a Mormon marriage policy that is harmful to families. You want to argue, assume, call me names, lay the blame back on me and call me bitter. . Thank you for proving my point.
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11/14/2011 8:47:00 PM
You know something trytoseeitmyway? Thank you for proving my point.
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11/14/2011 8:28:00 PM
If they were born before 1864, then yes. But since they weren't . . . lol
Romney's dad, who I would been happy to have voted for except I was just a kid, was born on a polyg colony. Not a former polyg colony, but an active practicing polyg colony. He probabably had plenty of tales to tell about it to his son, just like my grandma told tales to me about her grandfather hiding out from the feds and getting busted when he came to one of his wives (my ggreat grandma) funerals.
If are in a polyg family, and romney is one of the most famous non-apostolic ones, you know much more about polygamy than if you are just someone who grows up in the church.
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11/14/2011 8:17:00 PM
No, it's possible to leave. The problem is that when people leave (about 7 million have) the LDS church still counts you as a member until you turn 110 years old. That's why mormons claim so many more members than they actually have, they are dishonestly reporting ex-members as members. Their offical memership numbers are not based on reality, one year they even had a negative number of people leaving. That's right, not only did no one quit, no one died, but a few must have gotten a head start on their resurrection. ;-)
I just checked on a couple of towns I served in in SA and they have the same number of congregations as when I was there. It really bothered me that the kids had no one their own age to go to church with when if they combined the two tiny wards they could have one that, while still small, was functional and would have had a better support group for the kids. Maybe they have that now
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11/14/2011 8:09:00 PM
There is no historical evidence for "babies with bullet holes in their heads" or a "fancy carriage" ridden by Brigham Young. This story gets some serious embellishment here. The simple fact is, the Mormons were leery of outsiders crossing to get to the Gold Rush in California (which by the way, Mormons were of the first to find gold but they chose to continue back to Utah rather than get caught up in the "get rich quick" atmosphere - so much for the greedy Mormon theory). Anyway, so this band of travelers were apparently not so kind to the Mormons and as they camped near the remote Mormon settlement, tensions rose leading to the massacre. Brigham Young was contacted but with no telegraph his response to let them pass without confrontation came too late. Yet, even with this indisputable evidence, critics of Mormonism still claim Young ordered the attack.
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11/14/2011 7:30:00 PM
Ok I will give you some context on Mountain Meadows. The mormons were poor, trying to build communities with next to no resources. One of the richest wagon trains to ever cross Utah made the fatal mistake of passing through Salt Lake City.
They were attacked a couple of weeks later on their way out of Utah by a group of mormon priesthood leaders. After withstanding the initial attack but running low on water and ammunition, they were convinced by John Lee to surrender their weapons in exchange for protection from "the indians" (who as reported by the survivors were white men wearing disguises). In other words the pioneer's situation was so grave, they were willing to be robbed in exchange for not being killed.
But the mormons killed the defenseless men women and children anyway. In cold blood. The mass grave was later mistakenly uncovered. Babies with bullet holes to the head. They kidnapped the few remaning young children whom they thought were too young to testify and demandd a ransome form the federal government. (The kids were later rescued and returned to their relatives when the mormons gave the children up when soldiers came for them.) The loot from the wagon train? The gold, the cattle the racing horces, the wagons? All stolen by the mormons. The wagonmasters fancy carriage? Brigham Young was riding it in Salt Lake City the next summer.
That wagon train was estimated to be worth 300-400,000 dollars. That's several million in todays dollars. That is the context.
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11/14/2011 7:18:00 PM
Have you ever read the Doctrine and Covenants? DId you make it all the way to Section 132? I take it you didn't or you would not make outlandish claims like Smith not having sex with 14 year old Helen. The one and ONLY justification for plural marriage is . . . sex. The revelation specifically says that if you "take" a virgin it is not adultery, that you are justified." Earth to bytebear - adultery is sex. (It's also the only justification for polygamy in the book of mormon)
You use the word evidence like you don't understand it. A marriage is evidence that the couple had sex because, that's what people do when they are married, they have sex. If we were in a court of law the marriage itself would create a rebuttable presumption that they had sex, IOW the burden of proof would be to show there was no sex. Which would be pretty hard to do in the Kimball sex situation when she publicly stated that she would not have agreed to it if she knew it was anything more than a ceremony. (Apparently either Smith or her Father lied to her.)
In legal actions from the 1880s to the early 20th century, the surviving wives signed 13 affadavits swearing under penalty of perjury that the marriages were consummated. The origin of the nonsensical claim that the marriages were non-sexual came from competing mormon sects who claimed that polygamy never happened. They lost.
Not to mention documented claims that Smith told his first counselor about a girl who gave him more pleasure than any other girl, eyewitnesses who saw Smith spending the night with his wives and even several who saw him having sex.
Scant evidence? The ONLY evidence against it is that Smith, and others, said the marriages never happened, and it's conclusively proven and admitted to on lds.,org that Smith was lying when he said he wasn't married to all the women. That's what scant evidence looks like.
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11/14/2011 6:58:00 PM
You can speak for all mormons everywhere? Nice
Here is a suggestion, since you are so powerful, why not take the first manifesto, the one that lied about having already stopping the practice of polygamy in 1889 and remove it from the scriptures. ANd publish an article in the ensign telling mormons to stop lying about when polygamy ended. I assume you were joking about providing a source where mormons say polygamy ended, since if you paid me a dollar for each one you would owe me more than a million dollars. I personally have heard it or read about it at least ten thousand times, in sunday school, primary, seminary, gospel doctrine classes, in every mormon book I have read on the topic, in every ensign article on the topic etc etc etc. Not to mention the , , , actual canonized manifesto.
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11/14/2011 3:58:00 PM
So there you go. You arranged to have your mother in law meet with the stake president so he could explain to her what you were unwilling or unable to explain. He then did so, and you blame the Church on account of it. Personal responsibility, what a concept.
I don't know if you appreciate how poorly this all reflects on you. Look: you had a choice to have a civil ceremony if you wanted one, and if it was all that important to you or your wife's family. You're saying you would have been "scorned," but that's just nonsense. Members of the church get married in civil ceremonies literally every day. You could then have gone to the temple a year later. Your choice was your choice. If it hurt your mother in law terribly, well, it was still your choice. No one forced you to do anything you didn't want to do. What a crybaby you are, and in your 50s too. You say perhaps I don't understand what turmoil that would have caused, and that you were worried about not being together in the eternities if one of you died in the meantime. That's nonsense, and you know it. It is fascinating to see you trying to blame doctrine (actually, remarks by Pres. Kimball at a fireside in 1973) for your decision. He didn't say that if one of you were to die while waiting for a temple sealing after a civil ceremony, you could not be sealed vicariously. He didn't, and it is foolish for you to claim otherwise.
But more importantly, you ALSO had a choice to have a very kind and loving conversation with your mother in law about why you and your wife would chose the temple over a public, civil ceremony. You had a choice to find ways to let your mother in law know of your love for her and to let her feel included in the celebration. That's what our family has done in similar circumstances, and that's what hundreds of thousands of church members have likewise done. No great harm has been done to family relationships EXCEPT where there is unresolved bitterness over the mixed marriage. Which often happens, of course. But then there will be problems for that reason, with or without a temple wedding. I could not understand how in the world you allowed your mother in law to confront your stake president over this. But you've explained. You were unable to overcome her anger, and the stake president tried to help. For this, you castigate him 30 years later while trying to smear the Church. No good deed goes unpunished, obviously.
It's telling that these events happened 30 years ago, and that you're complaining about them so bitterly now ... two years AFTER you left the Church (which you now regard as "silly") for other reasons. You want me to believe that after 30 years you suddenly decided that it was all like believing in Santa Claus. That's your story and you're sticking to it.
I'm delighted that you and your wife are still very much in love, and apologize for ever doubting it. My wife and I are too. My decision to join the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and to be sealed to her and our children for time and eternity was the second best decision of my life, ranking in importance only after the decision to marry her in the first place. The Church has been a source of peace, joy and spiritual growth. I treat our Savior and His Church with utmost respect, because He is the Creator of the Universe and the author and finisher of our faith. If you have found happiness outside the Church, I am happy for you on that account as well ... but your evident bitterness leads me to wonder how candid you are being in that regard. I'll never know, of course, but happy people don't usually express themselves as you have. It is usually left for those who harbor ill feelings.
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11/14/2011 7:31:00 AM
yes, and then he freed them.
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11/14/2011 6:54:00 AM
By your logic, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton were born in slave states.
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11/14/2011 6:52:00 AM
I've heard this argument before. It contradicts the other argument that it's impossible to leave once you join. But I digress. There was an issue in South and Central America with membership. They simply had too many converts and not enough leaders. Church leaders got burned out because the church grew too fast. They adjusted the Stakes and focused more on leadership building, and church membership has grown once again, but this time with the infrastructure to support the growth. There was an article on this just a few days ago.
http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/lifestyle/2011/11/13/growth-mormonism-in-latin-america/
In Africa, they learned from their mistakes and the church has the largest retention rates of any area of the world. There will soon likely be more black African Mormons than white Mormons. Kind of ironic, eh.
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11/14/2011 6:47:00 AM
Of course the article ignores facts. It gives no context. even your comment about Mountain Meadows Massacre has no context. It wasn't as cut and dry as you claim. It's those details that make the difference in understanding history. You have chosen to only see one facet of history, that conveniently makes you feel justified in your antagonism toward Mormonism.
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11/14/2011 6:43:00 AM
There's no evidence that he had sex with 14 year olds at all, and only scant evidence that he had sex with any of the women. And the concept of sealings was not solidified when he was sealed to many of those women. You do know that he was sealed to men as well. In fact, there was a time when virtually everyone who was prominent in the church was sealed to Smith. Helen Mar Kimball (one of those 14 year old brides) was sealed at the request of her father so that both families would be connected spiritually. It had nothing to do with sex at all.
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11/14/2011 2:36:00 AM
How typical of folks like you. Name calling now? Blame me for the hurt? Accuse me of bitterly complaining? This is your response for my pointing out a policy that harms families?
Personal attacks from Mormons toward critics is disgusting and I am not impressed by you.
We arranged for my mother-in-law to visit with the stake president because he suggested it. He suggested that he might be able to help her understand why we chose to be married in the temple. Your pompousness in the ludricous accusation that I was insensitive to have a family member meet with my religious leader is beyond absurd.
Yes, your church is silly. My leaving it had nothing to do with bitterness about the marriage. I liken my leaving to growing up and realizing that Santa Claus is not real. It is a shame that my attempt to point out a misguided policy that does hurt families gets turned back on me as if it is my fault what those old guys in Salt Lake are failing in.
It is not nonsense about the idea of not being together if death happened during the one year wait. Perhaps you do not know the teachings of Spencer W. Kimball: "Remember, the temples of God are not for the vicarious temple ordinances for those who have known the gospel"
From his 1973 speech "Marriage is Honorable".
http://speeches.byu.edu/reader/reader.php?id=6056
Yes, there was fear put in us. Fear that if we rejected the opportunity to marry in the temple until a year later, there was no assurance that we would be sealed later in death. It was not nonsense at the time.
Why would you assume "ex-wife"? We are more deeply in love now than ever. Each year is golden. You are displaying a bigoted stereotype toward someone who left your silly church. Guess what? People can be happy outside of Mormonism!
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11/14/2011 1:03:00 AM
Oh, I get it. You think your former religion is silly and want to vent. I agreed that there is a "rub" associated with the fact that the sealing ordinance also doubles as the civil wedding ceremony. But you're the one who hurt your wonderful former mother in law, not the Stake President. How did you let it get to that point anyway? I don't know if you appreciate how poorly this all reflects on you. Look: you had a choice to have a civil ceremony if you wanted one, and if it was all that important to you or your wife's family. You're saying you would have been "scorned," but that's just nonsense. Members of the church get married in civil ceremonies literally every day. You could then have gone to the temple a year later. Your choice was your choice. If it hurt your mother in law terribly, well, it was still your choice. No one forced you to do anything you didn't want to do. What a crybaby you are, and in your 50s too. You say perhaps I don't understand what turmoil that would have caused, and that you were worried about not being together in the eternities if one of you died in the meantime. That's nonsense, and you know it. Crybaby, I do know all about spiritual turmoil surrounding marriage - the point of my story is that my LDS wife married me, a non-member, without ever knowing whether she would go to the temple with me. Of course I know about spiritual turmoil. I dealt with it constantly, and still do in my relationships with my non-member family. So don't lecture me. And vent your bitterness as someone else; I'm not in the mood.
In the alternative, you ALSO had a choice to have a very kind and loving conversation with your mother in law about why you and your wife (ex-wife now?) would chose the temple over a public, civil ceremony, and find ways to let her know of your love for her and to let her feel included in the celebration. That's what our family has done in similar circumstances, and that's what hundreds of thousands of church members have likewise done. No great harm has been done to family relationships EXCEPT where there is unresolved bitterness over the mixed marriage. Which often happens, of course. But then there will be problems for that reason, with or without a temple wedding. How in the world you allowed your mother in law to confront your stake president over this is beyond me. You must have been as insensitive then as you are now.
It's telling that these events happened 30 years ago, and that you're complaining about them so bitterly now ... two years AFTER you left the Church (which you now regard as "silly") for other reasons.
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11/14/2011 12:29:00 AM
I will repeat; A marriage, the legal portion of it, is not open to non-LDS family members when a young couple does it in the temple. The sealing ordinance is not a wedding. It is a ceremony that many non-LDS family members would not even care about. But a wedding, the legal marriage is combined with the sealing ceremony in the U.S. This is the rub.
In the UK a young couple can have their wedding ceremony that legally binds them, then go to the temple the same day. This is forbidden in the U.S. Families are divided, forbidden from being a part of the wedding. Mormonism needs to seperate the legal wedding from the religious sealing ceremony and stop hurting families.
Your own experiences with your wife and yourself are quite different from those who have been hurt. You did not face the situation of having a loved one told by a Stake President "you are not worthy" to even see your own child get married. This was told to my mother-in-law simply because she was not LDS. The choice of my wife and I were to have a real wedding for all to attend but that would have forced us to wait one year before we could be sealed. Perhaps you have no understanding of the religious turmoil that causes in a person of faith. You seem to lack any understanding of the words we were told from a bishop and stake president that if one or both of us were to die during that year we might not ever be together in the eternities.
It is disgusting to place that kind of a mind game onto young couples with the only correct choice in the eyes of the LDS being to set family aside and do it for God. The requirement to wait a year is not doctrine. It is not in the scriptures. It is a foolish policy that is not even consistent with procedures outside of the U.S.
I am under no obligation to refer to the old guys in Salt Lake with adoration or admiration. I was married in the temple nearly 30 years ago. I have been out of the silly religion for the past two years. I can never go back and undo the hurt that it caused my wonderful mother-in-law. She died nine years ago.
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11/13/2011 11:47:00 PM
I can understand why this would be desirable. But referring to prophets, apostles and general authorities as "[t]hose old guys in Salt Lake" probably isn't the way to approach them. Nor is it helpful to refer to the policy as "disgusting." I think that there has long been a preference for temple sealings over civil ceremonies, and for good spiritual reasons.
In my case, my wife and I went to the temple more than 15 years after we were married So we had a "regular" marriage, with guests and exchange of rings and etc., and we had a temple wedding for time and eternity. Only a handful of people were there for that, and none of my own family, since I'm the only Mormon on my side. But because our children had been born in the meantime, they were present to be sealed to us. It was the most spiritually fulfilling experience of our lives. I hardly remember the civil ceremony at all, although of course there are pictures.
When our daughter was sealed to her husband, there were family members on my side who were unable to attend the sealing. They enjoyed other aspects of the wedding celebrations. It is true that there can be unhappiness by non-members (or members who for whatever reason don't hold a temple recommend) in the family, who feel excluded. The best way to handle that is to explain how we regard temple ceremonies, to explain that it has nothing to do with the love we have for each other within the family, and to be sure that they feel a part of wedding celebrations at other times. I mean, by the end of a nice reception, nobody really minds not having sat through a church ceremony anyway. ;^)
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11/13/2011 11:34:00 AM
The problem with the LDS Church in the U.S. is that they require the young couple to choose a temple wedding and exclude family members or have a civil wedding but be scorned and forced to wait a year before the sealing.
There is a group of active LDS at this time trying to get the First Presidency to listen to their concerns and change the policy in the U.S. to that of England. It is a very serious matter for many LDS even now.
The solution is to drop the one-year wait so that true weddings can be done before the sealing. A legal marriage should be a wedding for all to attend and it does not need to be in the temple. In the U.S. the church emphasizes to be married in the temple without waiting a year. It is a policy that does exclude loved ones. It is a very disgusting policy of the LDS church.
A young couple gets married only once and sadly the LDS have taken control over that moment to the harm of family. Those old guys in Salt Lake need to ease up on that one-year wait.
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11/11/2011 6:57:00 PM
You keep referring to projecting. You must be projecting when you do that. ;^)
The idea that you have an axe to grind came from the fact that you brought up this stuff about the aftermath of the 1890 declaration in strongly personal terms. It helped to explain why you offered up your other bigoted comments.
So, anyway, like I say, this whole matter about what did or didn't happen after 1890 is not something I've heard much if anything about until you bring it up here. I can tell it's important to you. It's just less important to me. I am therefore pretty sure that I personally have never defamed your ancestors, and so you can please leave me out of any generalization about what those darn "Mormons" have done or not done. That sounds fair, yes? I mean, since you love me and all. (Referring to different reply from you to me.)
Here, I have an idea. Please provide an exact quotation and a source for the quote that you consider to have been defamatory. I will then apologize to you on behalf of all Mormons everywhere. You can then feel better about the whole thing, and not continue to feel so unhappy and victimized and everything. OK? Does that work for you? You get an apology out of it. I promise it will be very sincere.
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11/11/2011 6:25:00 PM
You love me? That's so cool. Thank you. Just keep being nice, just like that. It works.
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11/11/2011 6:00:00 PM
One of us loves you, and it is me. Stop the projecting and enjoy life.
Calling people haters isn't any way to enjoy life. "Men are that they might have joy" Joseph Smith
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11/11/2011 5:53:00 PM
Wow, that was an amazing non-answer by stopnsee, so let me give you my answer.
I read all of the six differing and mutually contradictory accounts that Smith gave of his "first" vision.
Obviously, since they contradicted each other, they could not all be true.
Research shows that, when recalling events the first version is more likely to be the most accurate. Yet when a person is a rpoven liar, you really shouldn't trust anyting he says, without corroborating witnesses. There were no corroborating witnesses.
Brigham Young did not believe the "official" version that is mormon scripture, he believed in one of the early versions, that god did NOT visit Joseph.
For me it comes down to which is more likely, did Smith lie 5 out of six times or six out of six.
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11/11/2011 5:45:00 PM
ANd Joseph Smith called him Nephi before he changed the story to Moroni.
Which is worse, mispronouncing the name of someone Smith made up? Or calling the "angel" who supposedly visited you multiple times a completely different name?
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11/11/2011 5:36:00 PM
I don't understand your axe to grind comment, sounds like you are projecting there though. Have fun with that. Or did you mean I have an axe to gring about telling the truth? Well yeah, truth matters to me.
And I guess I wasn't clear enough when I said I didn't like my ancestors being defamed. Not clear enough for you obviously. Since I'm not sure wheter or not your obtusesness is real or not let me give you the benefit of the doubt. My ancestors were mormon polygs who, despite the mormon lies for more than a hundred years, including the lie you quoted above, did NOT desert their extra wives in 1890.
In 1890 the mormon church released a press release saying that no mormons had entered into new plural marriages since 1889. This was not true. But it got the feds, who were about to seize the temples and the tabernacles, off their backs. New plural marriages continued for another 16 years. Mormons did not stop practicing polygamy in 1890. They stopped when the old polygs died off. Men did not repudiate their children and extra wives. Mainstream LDS polygamy ended in 1954, not 1890. The president of the LDS church until 1918, Joseph F. SMith, had eleven children with his multiple wives and took one new wife, AFTER 1890.
I am saying the exact opposite of your probably faux obtuse claim. I am NOT saying anyone, mormon or not, criticized my ancestors for continuing to practice polygamy after 1890. I am saying that the mormon lie that the mormons stopped practicing polygamy in 1890 is defamation to my mormon ancestors. They did NOT desert their families in 1890, picking their favorite wife and leaving the rest. They, just like the grandfather of current LDS apostle Eyring, who was a practicing polyg until 1954, practiced polygamy until they, or all but one of their wives, died.
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11/11/2011 5:30:00 PM
Look, friend, one of us is a hater. And it ain't me. :-)
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11/11/2011 5:23:00 PM
It is always interesting to see how reference to Mormons and their Church brings out such anger and hatred. This one is so telling: "They" (Blake says) "stole my family." How did "they" steal his family? Well, his children are converts. You would wonder how they could become converts to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints IN THE FACE OF ALL OF THE HATRED, AND IN THE FACE OF ALL OF THE RIDICULE AND MISINFORMATION. Despite all of this, so prevalent in our culture, some of us manage to penetrate the hatred, ridicule and misinformation to find beauty, truth and the will of God. And yet, this turns people like Blake against his own children.
Hey, Blake, does it help to let you know that a Temple wedding "costs" zilch, zero, nada? Since your love for your children is affected by your love for your money ("but I can pay for the wedding!") you might want to know that each of them can be sealed to their spouse for time and eternity at exactly no charge. And you would be welcome to attend; all you need to do is repent, be baptized and live in a manner worthy to enter the Lord's house. I've done it, and it is not hard at all. It is actually really very good.
When Jesus said, if you love me, keep my commandments, he was inviting us to live in such a manner. He didn't warn against keeping his commandments; he asked us to do so. Hope that clears this up for you.
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11/11/2011 5:16:00 PM
You really need to look up the word bigotry.
According to your defintion is bigotry speak out against the Penn State cover-up of child rape. It is bigotry to tell the truth about anything bad an organization does. According to you, telling the truth is anti-mormon bigotry.
I hope someday you can get out of your delusion bubble and join us in the real word. It is wonderful.
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11/11/2011 4:32:00 PM
Oh, so you have an axe to grind. Got it.
This is interesting, because I've never heard anyone defaming your ancestors. But I think I understand what you're saying. Your ancestors were polygamist Mormons during the time that plural marriage was practiced within the Church. There came a time in about 1890 when the President of the Church declared, "Inasmuch as laws have been enacted by Congress forbidding plural marriages, which laws have been pronounced constitutional by the court of last resort, I hereby declare my intention to submit to those laws, and to use my influence with the members of the Church over which I preside to have them do likewise." He also said, "There is nothing in my teachings to the Church or in those of my associates, during the time specified, which can be reasonably construed to inculcate or encourage polygamy; and when any Elder of the Church has used language which appeared to convey any such teaching, he has been promptly reproved. And I now publicly declare that my advice to the Latter-day Saints is to refrain from contracting any marriage forbidden by the law of the land."
Now you're saying that after that event, someone criticized your ancestors for failing to dissolve the unlawful (according to acts of Congress) marriages. Is that right? I guess you think that Congress should have had a grandfather clause or something. I would definitely encourage you to write your Congressman about that and complain.
(If this offends you at all, just think of it as satire. That should help. At least, I recall that as your advice to me.)
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11/11/2011 4:17:00 PM
Well, exactly. And "the Jews" really did kill Jesus. I totally get what you're saying. "Catholics" really did torture and murder heretics. "Protestants" really did enslave black people and justify it in the name of God. It's not bigotry to say these things, just satire.
Well, no, that's wrong. It's bigotry after all.
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11/11/2011 4:05:00 AM
I despise Mormons. They stole my family. My two teens are knee deep in the LDS horse manure. Jews in America before Christ?! Swords and huge battles, steel and iron in "ancient" America? Elephants? The word "Bible" appears in the Book of Mormon, supposedly before there WAS a set of agreed upon books called a "Bible"! The whole thing is obviously Joseph Smith pulling people's legs. My teens have been brainwashed against their own family and their own Christian upbringing. They are being told to only marry a Mormon. I can't see my children "married" in the Mormon temple unless I become a Mormon (but I can pay for the wedding!) No wonder people ran Mormons out of Illinois and Missouri. Mormons should be ashamed of themselves. They treat Jesus like a figurehead to give them cover in a Christian land and then run around about all sorts of other things that don't have anything to do with Jesus really: temples, genealogy, priesthood just for men, living prophets, worthiness interviews, eternal plural marriage, spying on fellow members by "home teachers" and "visiting teachers;" special underwear. Mormons call everyone else "gentiles"--even Jews! I think Mormonism would be able to get along just fine if the New Testament didn't exist. They are really more about the Old Testament anyway, especially with their emphases on works and law. They seem like the Pharisees that Jesus tried to warn people against.
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11/11/2011 2:39:00 AM
It's not a joke, it's satire. The nasty things he writes about really happened. Mormons priesthood holders really did massacre helpless men women and children so they could steal the richest wagon train to ever cross Utah. Mormons really did raid non-mormon towns in Missouri, looting and burning. And got kicked out of the state after they lost the war they started. There weren't really orgies, just Joseph Smith having sex one at a time with the children and wives of his followers. And his teenage servants and foster daughters.
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11/09/2011 11:49:00 PM
Yeah, I guess we should lighten up and take a joke better, huh? "Them there Jews control international banking. Hey, it's just a joke!" "Now don't get me started on that Mohammed guy; lemme tell you, what a nutcase .... Whoa! It's a JOKE." "Martin Luther, now, he thought all Jews were evil. Well, he DID." Hey, lighten up, OK.
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11/09/2011 6:07:00 PM
Caharper4, I think you mean "this article is funny" because it is.
They aren't trying to be accurate, they are trying to stretch (a lot) real history into something fun to read. And they did it. And its funny. And I'm Mormon.
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11/09/2011 8:35:00 AM
No, what's weird is you lying about what I said. I said that obama had little contact with his dad. And that Romney's own father, who was born in a polyg colony and raised him was not ancient history like you claimed.
I thought we were having a discussion between non-liars. Sorry you proved me wrong.
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11/09/2011 5:37:00 AM
Wait, you think Romney had more contact with his GGGrandfather than Obama did with his own father? Weird.
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11/09/2011 3:13:00 AM
You left out one word "According to the latest statistics [OF] the LDS church . . ."
The problem is the LDS church counts dead people and exmormons as members.
In Chile, for example, where census question asks about religion the 2000 census reported that there were 115,000 mormons, yet the LDS church claimed over 500,000.
My reference was to actual scientific surveys, like pew which shows that the LDS church declined from 1.4 to 1.3 percent of the US population, But in finding you a link I see the latest has them back at 1.4, so they are growing at the same rate as the US population over the past 18 years 1990-2008.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_the_United_States#Religions_of_American_adults
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Esplinlin 11/09/2011 12:33:00 AM
Jeffress obviously doesn't know much about Mormons. He can't event correctly pronounce "Moroni".
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11/08/2011 11:31:00 PM
Losing market share compared to who? According to the latest statistics the LDS Church of all major denominations has the highest growth rate (%).
http://www.washingtontimes.com/weblogs/belief-blog/2010/feb/12/latest-church-growth-stats-in/
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11/08/2011 11:09:00 PM
I don't think 16 years is a short time, but maybe you do, fair enough. There were marriages for at least two more years after the second manifesto (that I would call a short time). Some of the marriages were performed in the colonies (where polygamy was also against the law) but many were performed in the US as well. I am not going to look it up, this is from reading I did years ago so I could be wrong, but I think ALL of the post manifesto marriages of the apostles were in the US. And yes Romney's GGGradfather lived in a polyg colony, but so did his dad. It's not ancient history to Romney.
I think the difference between Romney and Obama on the polygamy is that Obama had practically no contact with his father, his father was not a polyg for any belif system, he was a polyg because he was a cad, as your link describes him. Romney is not only a life long mormon, but was a church leader in the LDS church which is only temporarily not practicing polygamy. Section 132 is still in the Doctrine and covenants, and it is mormon doctrine that there will be polygamy again in the millenium and in heaven. That said I find the fact that the last practicing LDS mormon polyg were cousins of Mitt interesting because I am a student of(and a product of) mormon based polygamy but completely irrelevant to his politics.
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11/08/2011 10:34:00 PM
Yes, the church didn't disband existing marriages and the federal government agreed to allow existing families to exist rather than break them up and create hundreds of fatherless children, and for a short time after 1890, some plural marriages were still performed (in LDS colonies in Canada and Mexico where Romney's G-G-Grandfather lived). The church presented a second manifesto that stopped all plural marriage in all areas.
What's funny is people trying to pin polygamy to Romney by looking at long dead ancestors, when Obama's father was a bigamist. (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2011/04/27/135770919/immigration-files-of-obamas-father-paint-unflattering-picture)
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11/08/2011 7:29:00 PM
The LDS church is actually losing market share in the US, growing, but slower than the overall population rate. About half of the people mormons claim as members are dead or exmormons.
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11/08/2011 7:25:00 PM
If you claim it is totally made up you do not know anything about mormon history. It is 95 percent accurate, and the few innacuarcies are the author repeating mormn lies, like polygamy ending in 1890. The mormons looting, rapes and arson of non mormon towns was the primary cause of the 1838 mormon war in Missouri. It resulted in the Gov. calling out the state militia and the defeat of the mormons, and the conviction of Joseph Smith for treason. As part of the settlement agreement the mormons (the treasonous ones anyway, not all) had to leave missouri in less than a year.
They moved to Illinois and founded a town called Nauvoo.
You never heard of this?
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11/08/2011 7:16:00 PM
Not all, several mormons have commented below and thought this was funny.
What really gets me are the mormons who lie about my ancestors (I'm a 7th generation no longer believing mormon). Yes the truth can be embarrassing but please stop defaming my ancestors who didn't desert their extra wives when the LDS lied about polygamy to get the feds off their backs.
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11/08/2011 7:13:00 PM
But you just said that this article ignored facts, when it did not. Why should we trust mormons to be honest on your link when you were dishonest about the truths imparted in this article? Is their anything on that link about the sex practices of Joseph Smith? Is there anything on that link about him getting paid to discover buried treasure with magic? Or how about Mountain Meadows, where mormon priesthood leaders massacred 123 unarmed men women and children in cold blood, then balmed it on Indians?
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Gator 11/08/2011 7:09:00 PM
This article contains the pertinent facts. Blacks WERE excluded until 1978. Smith DID have a Socialist plan that he claimed emanated from God. Sorry all the Mormons are offended by hearing the truth.
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11/08/2011 7:09:00 PM
Fortunately or unfortunately, visions are not authenticated. Sometimes there is more than one witness, but even then, those who hear about it,can choose to believe or disbelieve, such as myself and yourself. As I read the accounts of the first vision, coupled with knowing what has happened since that time, and follow the development of the Latter-day Saints throughout the world as a source for strengthening people's lives and humanitarian aid that is sent wherever there are disasters or suffering, I am truly amazed at what came from that 14 year-old boy.
As atheists attack all forms of belief in God, I am grateful to be able to hold The Book of Mormon in my hands and feel the power of its testimony of the divinity of Jesus Christ as a confirming witness to the inspired writings of the Biblical authors.
As I have studied the history of the initial Latter-day Saints, I am overwhelmed at their devotion and willingness to follow the prophets, in spite of personal costs, in the service of God and their fellow man. God's relationship to His children is complex and He speaks to them and directs them according to the culture that they live in and how to deal with their surroundings. I am sure that Moses' followers were aghast when he produced a serpent of brass and told them to gaze upon it to be saved from the bite of the poisonous serpents that were attacking the Israelites. Those that looked were cured. Those that refused died.
The authors of the writings in the Book of Mormon clearly speak with different voices. They were not the work of one man. Joseph Smith could not have produced the Book of Mormon on his own, it is simply not possible.
If you are looking to build your faith, you will build it. If you are looking to weaken or destroy your faith, you will find plenty of material and voices to assist you in your endeavor. None of the Saints are perfect, from Joseph Smith on down. We are on a pathway, and rely on Jesus Christ to create perfection through the power of His atonement, which he has promised to do. For this I am grateful.
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11/08/2011 7:08:00 PM
The article is 95 percent accurate, and the things it gets wrong are when he failed to do enough research to correct what mormons lie about, like polygamy ending in 1890.
Now some is hyperbole, like orgies. There is no evidence that Smith had orgies with the 14 year old girls, foster daughters and wives of other men that he sent on missions so he could have sex with their wives. But isn't having sex with the 14 year old children of your followers, having sex with your foster daughters, having sex with your servants, having sex with the wives of your followers really WORSE than having an orgy. He abused his authority as a religious leader to coerce these victims into having sex with them, promising them ehaltation for sex. That's worse than an orgy in my book.
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11/08/2011 6:58:00 PM
"Of course those that had been practicing polygamy until 1890 continued to practice afterwards." Then why did the mormon church lie about it for more than 100 years, why did the manifesto lie and say that they had stopped the practice in 1899? You are being disengenoius when you pretend the LDS church didn't lie about it for more than 100 years.
Gordon Hinkley (a mormon prophet) wrote a book to tell non-mormons about the history and doctrine of the LDS church in the 1940s. Today you can read the historical part of his book renamed "Truth restored." In this book Gordon claimed that the practice of polygamy ended in 1890. He was lying, he knew that it did not because he had 8 grandparents who were practicing polygamy in the 20th century. Truth restored? Hardly.
ANd you are also wrong that new plural marriages ended in 1890. Most of the apostles serving in 1890 took new plural brides after 1890, including as I noted above and you ignored, Church President Joseph F. Smith. Hundreds, if not thousands, of new plural marriages were authorized after 1890. New plural marriages did not end until the pressure from the government (and the salt lake tribune who published the names of the LDS polygs) got too big and they finally stopped the new marriages in the early 20th century.
The mormons who continued to practice polygamy after 1890 did not do it "without church sanction" The president of the LDS church until 1918 was a polyg. How is that not sanctioned. Here is what really happened, the people who enetered into new plural marriages that were sanction up to the early 20th century, as well as those who were sanctioned before 1890 continued to practice polygamy until they died. It ended in 1954 one of two cousins of Mitt Romney died, leaving the grandfather of current LDS aposlte Eyring with only one wife.
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11/08/2011 6:29:00 PM
Not really a guide, but definitely laugh out loud funny. As a Mormon, myself, I will tell you that if Mitt Romney or anyone else wants me to get naked with a squadron of babushka ladies, I am definitely out!
P.S. You other Mormons should lighten up.
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Imamormon 11/08/2011 4:39:00 PM
Dumb. Anyone can write an article like this about anything if facts are ignored.
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Imamormon 11/08/2011 4:34:00 PM
If you want to see Mormons themselves discuss their faith, instead of having someone that isn't Mormon tell you what we believe, go to mormon.org
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guest 11/08/2011 4:23:00 PM
Not helpful at all, merely ridiculous rambling. This joins the pathetic misrepresentation paraded on Broadway. If you want accurate information find a Mormon friend and ask them about each of these points. Or, go to Mormon.org and read more.
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11/08/2011 3:43:00 PM
Cool. So you are going to heaven---100% certainty?
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Bobbits 11/08/2011 3:35:00 PM
Sophmoric drivel undeserving of anything remotely resembling praise.
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Ckhutch 11/08/2011 3:11:00 PM
I'm mormon but this cracked me up. Totally made up and inaccurate but fun to see what people do with my religion. Calm down everyone, it's called humor. If anyone actually believes anything written here, then they honestly don't even deserve to vote. Otherwise...Kudos. "The Mormons tried torching Christian houses in response, but showed an inferior gift for arson." Had me spitting my soda (decaf) all over the screen.
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Caharper4 11/08/2011 2:48:00 PM
Wow... Are you payed per inaccuracy? You make some half-hearted attempts at being fair, but presenting an army of straw men is cheap and sophomoric. This article is disgusting.
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11/08/2011 2:48:00 PM
Your conclusions are the only conclusions which can be drawn, if one is true to the historical record.. Catching my breath and wiping the tears of mirth, I go back to the minister's charge of cultism.He thought that honesty was the best policy. With neither malice nor guile in his soul, he believed that if he sounded the Concord alarm that the cults are coming, that all good Americans everywhere would jump into action to repel this LDS peril. Rev. Jeffers didn't realize that his hero Perry would duck and feign and parry. So the preacher, thinking that he had been misunderstood, even more loudly proclaimed that "What I meant to say is that mormonism is a cult". Perry flinched and stiffened and weaseled and ran like the dickens as far away from his admirer as he could. see Jeff, Jeffrey, Jeffs, Jeffee.
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Norge Coug 11/08/2011 1:37:00 PM
Those of you on here claiming that the LDS church continued to practice polygamy after 1890 are being disingenuous. Of course those that had been practicing polygamy until 1890 continued the practice afterwards. Of course those polygamous relationships continued long past 1890. So you're technically correct but the Church quit sanctioning such marriages past 1890. Of course some members who considered themselves LDS continued the practice after 1890, but without church sanction.
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Gentilegrrl 11/08/2011 5:30:00 AM
From the perspective of a "gentile" living in Salt Lake for 35 odd years, this satirical history is a crack up. And spot on. Really. (read Fawn Brody) The Mormon woman who told ya'll to go look at the church web site doesn't understand this person's column. Mormons are just folks like the rest of us, making erroneous interpretations of other peoples' teachings and history. Not all of them are rigid, narrow minded, te-totaling, misogenistic and determined to control what goes on in other peoples' bedrooms while they give away the farm to corporate America for the profits.... some are (gasp) Democrats! Having seen Mitt in action in Salt Lake I would NEVER vote for him.. if you lean Right; do look at Huntsman; he is thoughtful and creative and had Utah going in a good direction til he got recruited off to China...
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11/08/2011 2:57:00 AM
It's a funny article. The simple truth is Democrats/Liberals are ok with Mormons if they are also Democrats/Liberals. They don't care what doctrines are odd as long as they support a woman's right to choose and lots of social programs. But there's the rub. Mormons have their own social program which does a whole lot better than government programs. So maybe libs hate Mormons because they are jealous of their success.
As for the conservative Christian, they also didn't care about Mormonism until they found out that their own members were bailing on their church in favor of the LDS Church. Again, Mormons are a victim of their own success. Right now they are the fourth largest denomination in the US. If the numbers continue, they will be number two (behind Catholics) in ten or twenty years. Yeah, I am sure the Christians are scared, but it has nothing to do with doctrine.
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Mlegried 11/08/2011 2:07:00 AM
The geneticist that show by genetics that Native American's came across the Berring Strait from Asia and thus did not come across the ocean from the Hebrew lands like the BOM states are not enemies they are doing research. The archeologist that have never found evidence of things stated in the BOM are not enemies but simply doing their jobs. The Smithsonium's letter regarding no findings consistent with the BOM claims was in response to questions from Mormon's, thus not an enemy. The Egyptologist's who all report the translation of the paprii used in the Book of Abraham is a common funeral writing and has nothing to do with Abraham and was certainly not the written by Abraham are doing their jobs and are not all in some big conspiracy against the church. These people and/or organizations are not enemies but just doing and reporting scientific findings. Scientific evidence shows the BOM and Book of Abraham can not be true.
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really? 11/08/2011 2:02:00 AM
I wonder when people will realize that all religions are cults with way more members...
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11/07/2011 10:53:00 PM
OK StopNSee, I'll bite. Would you kindly provide us with a couple of the resources you used to verify the athenticity of the First Vision account? You stated that all of your investigations "have increased my faith in God and in His programs in these Latter-days". I am very interested to know of a couple of them and how the increased your faith in God's latter day programs. Thanks.
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11/07/2011 10:41:00 PM
Dred scott had nothing to do with Utah being a slave territory, five years before dred scott, Utah was given the option of being free or slave and Brigham Young chose slave.
The Dred Scott ruling ruled that african americans were not citizens of the US and that slaves could not become free by being taken to a free state or territory. Nothing to do with Utah except that it ruled that the black slaves owned by mormons couldn't gain their freedom by being taken to a free state.
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11/07/2011 10:28:00 PM
They now claim 14 million, but their numbers include dead people. When mormons lose track of their members who stop attending, they go into a lost members group and they are counted as mormons until they reach the age of 110. They also count people who quit beiing mormons. In countries where the census has a religion question there are always less actual mormons than the LDS claim. In Chile they claimed over 500,000 but the census only counted 115,000. At some point, and it may have already happened, there will be more exmormons than mormons, I would guess it's pretty close to even right now.
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11/07/2011 9:33:00 PM
Thanks for chiming in Chris, and thanks for calling me a liar after thoroughly determining how much I have investigated church and state history. Thanks for the nuanced take on my sources which, of course, are far inferior to yours. The fact is, that human history is not as clean as we would like it to be, and eye-witnesses to just about any event bring their own version of the hows and whys of it all. You can't even get a clear determination on the Kennedy assassination.
My study leads me to the truthfulness of Joseph Smith's declaration as a man called to serve as God's prophet to restore the gospel of Jesus Christ in these Latter-days. Your study has led you to a different conclusion.
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11/07/2011 9:15:00 PM
Danielle is repeating what she hears at mormon church every week. Does anyone else recognize this pattern? Mormons are out on the net defending everything, just as they have been asked by their leaders in SLC.
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11/07/2011 9:13:00 PM
Dear Skyler,
Please print your post and put it away. Read it in twenty years and if you don't turn bright red, I'll buy you a diet Pepsi.
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11/07/2011 9:08:00 PM
Anyone who says that he is mormon and has investigated all the controversies is a liar. Real investigation leads out of mormonism. Now maybe you looked up some stuff in old seminary manuals and other church propaganda, but you did not truly investigate...I call BS.
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ChrisinUtah 11/07/2011 8:50:00 PM
Go to LDS.org and Mormon.org and you'll receive the information the church wants you to know. It's called "Milk before Meat". Only by searching non LDS sights will you learn the truth about the history, beliefs and practices of that religion. There's a valid reason why there's only 11 million members (only 1/3 actually practicing) after 200 years of selling the Mormon religion.
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11/07/2011 8:31:00 PM
in 1857 Utah WAS a slave territory! Dred Scott vs Sanford was the decision that granted that...but since there was not much agriculture it didnt mean as much as it could have!
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11/07/2011 7:00:00 PM
Yeah I stopped reading after that, the smell test? FAIL
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11/07/2011 6:57:00 PM
Young was pro-slavery, he even allowed people to pay their tithing with slaves.
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11/07/2011 6:56:00 PM
Mormons were not run out of missouri because they were abolitionists. A majority of mormons were against slavery at that time, because they were mostly northerners. They were not abolitionists, that is different. Mormons were run out of missouri because they started a civil war agains their non mormon neighbours, killing looting and burning. As part of the surrender they had to leave the state within the next year.
Buchanan sent the troops because the mormons were in rebellion, driving away non mormon judges and officials sent from washington. Young agreed to step down as governor and stop fighing the US officials sent and he received a pardon for his treason. Young had already made Utah a slave territory before the troops were sent. And prophecied later that the south would win the war and slavery would never be abolished.
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11/07/2011 6:47:00 PM
I read the article and it's more than 90 percent accurate. And the of the few things he got wrong, he repeated mormon lies, the truth is more damning not less.
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ChrisinUtah 11/07/2011 6:44:00 PM
It's actually in numerous papers. Yes, shame on the editor for allowing the disclosure of the Mormon church history.
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ChrisinUtah 11/07/2011 6:42:00 PM
You haven't lived in Utah now have you?
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11/07/2011 6:40:00 PM
A married 38 year old man abusing his authority as a religious leader to have sex with multiple teenage girls, some as young as 14 strengthened your faith in god? Sending men off to missions so he could have sex with their wives without the husbands knowledge strengthened your faith in god? Having sex with his foster daughters strengthened your faith in god?
Wow.
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11/07/2011 6:33:00 PM
You would not ask a con man if he were being honest would you? There are a few mistakes, very few, in that article, and they all are more damning than this funny satire of mormon history.
Please point out anything the author got wrong, my guess is it is you that does not understand what he got wrong. I'll give you one hint - he got the commonly repeated "mormons stopped practicing polygamy in 1890" wrong, because despit the fact that mormons have been telling people that for 121 years, they didn't.
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11/07/2011 6:29:00 PM
Going to LDS.org for the "true history of the [LDS]church" is like going to the president of an MLM scam for how to make money in his company.
The article was satire but it was very accurate. Here are a few things it got wrong - The LDS church did not stop practicing polygamy in 1890, in 1890 it issued a press release claiming they stopped in 1889. In fact polygamy continued well into the 20th century. Joseph F. Smith, chuch president until 1918 had eleven children with his six wives . . .AFTER 1890. When Smith was in jail and killed by vigilantes he was not there for being a perv, he and others were arrested initially for destroying a printing press which had exposed smith's pervyness but everyone charged with that got bail, Smith was not granted bail because he also committed treason by calling out his private army to fight his arrest. And mormons never believed that blacks could not get into heaven, they just believed they could not get into the highest degree of heaven and become gods like white mormons could.
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11/07/2011 4:08:00 PM
You only have one life to live. Why not spend it happy and free, instead of chasing a pretend dream of future glory? if you really love the lds life the poster (mantisdolphin) described, then go for it. It sounds like an absolutely miserable life to live if you don't.
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11/07/2011 3:52:00 PM
Going to LDS,org for the true history of the church is like going to Nancy Pelosi for the true history of the 2008 House Democrats. Ummm, no.
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Cgbaines 11/07/2011 3:50:00 PM
Going to LDS.org for the true history of the church is like going to Nancy Pelosi for the true history of the 2008 House Democrats. Ummm, no.
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11/07/2011 1:57:00 PM
Mantisdolphin gave a fairly accurate description of what life as a Mormon entails.
Don't blame him for getting tired and deciding to get off the Mormon hamster wheel.
He wised up. You did not.
