Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Maybe use the atonement to just have faith that God loves you and hopes for you to feel better. Then maybe look for a therapist skilled in cog behavioral therapy, which based on my understanding of the research in depression, is the better first line intervention rather than meds. Meds can work great, but first step is therapy. Therapist will also look at things like exercise, sleep, diet, sunlight, and social interaction to see how those things might be affecting your depression.
I haven’t seen any evidence that praying more, reading scriptures, or going to church is great in the treatment of depression. Anyone who tells you that is speaking anecdotally or hopefully, and is ignorant of the research.
That’s my 2 cents
But for the grace of God go I. Any one of us, in a certain situation, under certain variables, can behave in ways outside our normal behavior.
Affairs, imo, have complex roots that involve multiple variables.
It sounds like you’ve started the process of forgiveness and he’s started repentance, but as you say you “caught” him, so it’s hard to say if he would have stopped on his own. Also, when depression raises its ugly head again and he feels alone will he again tend to find comfort, attention, and passion with someone else? Tough questions and the vast vast vast majority of bishops are not equipped to help with this. They have the desire and may even have the confidence, but not the training. He may be able to help to assuage your husband’s guilt, by restricting his church participation, but bishops are not typically equipped to even ask the right questions. Counseling is crucial.
But that wasn’t your question. I’m of the opinion that little good can be had in talking to the bishop too soon in this situation. Work things out between the two of you, with the help of counseling. When/if you go to the bishop, much of the real work has been going on a while. He (the bishop) will be appreciative. You can even tell the bishop that hubby wanted to come in right away but you insisted he wait, and as the victim in this scenario you felt you had the right to request this. Your husband can restrict himself the sacrament if he wants– whatever he feels he needs. I also, based on my experience in bishoprics, don’t think this is a case of excommunication in 2021. I would be very very surprised if he was exed over this. Disfellowshipped, maybe.
So, since excom is probably off the table, the uncle HC would not be involved. Ward clerk, however… he’s gonna know. I agree that this is the biggest threat to family leak.
Appealing to the bishop not to tell uncle clerk may or may not be effective. IF there is no formal restriction (ex or diss) the clerk need not be involved. Greater chance of no formal restriction if you wait.
As others have stated, this is two cent advice, but you asked for it.
Question for you is how long married and do you have kids?
I think that given the level of caffeine you feel you need (300mg) in order to function normally, you’d be hard pressed to find that easily with coffee and you’d probably be spending about what you’re already spending on one energy drink, unless you make it yourself, but that also requires some investment. IMO, you’d probably be better off purchasing caffeine pills, and your Dr may be able to get you a prescription for a medication with high caffeine. Just a thought.
If you’ve never drank coffee, you may dislike the taste as it’s rather bitter. I’ve never developed a taste for it, and yes I’ve tried. I just don’t like it and prefer tea, which can also be had cheap and may be another option for you. Again, the amount (300mg) is going to require multiple servings.
Green tea has definite health benefits and does also have some caffeine. There are several drinks that incorporate green tea into an energy drink–the V8 energy drinks come to mind. 80 mg in 8 oz, so again, probably not cost effective for you.
I’m sure you’ve learned to be cautious and informed with “energy drinks” as they are not all created equal. Some have inane amounts of sugar. Others add lots of other stuff that may give you additional boost, like guarana and vitamin B.
Also, in your situation, are testosterone shots off the consideration list? IMO, that’s more effective than caffeine.
Good luck
F&T meetings can be tedious. I also cringe at the little kids rehearsing the same drivel — I want to bear my testimony, I know the church is true (no you don’t, you’re not even sure about Santa Claus), I know that president nelson is a true prophet (you still can’t tie your shoes), and Joseph Smith is a true prophet (you keep using that word.. I’m not sure it means what you think it means), I love my mom and dad (ok, now you said something I believe) and my brothers and sisters (that’s not what you were saying yesterday), namaJesuschristamen. What’s worse is when teenagers get up and say essentially the same thing. Even worse is when a parent holds a kid on their hip in front of the microphone and says that little Suzy just begged to get up and bear her testimony but now little Suzy won’t even repeat the drivel that Mom is whispering in her ear.
Every now and then I’ll hear something worth listening to, rarer yet something edifying to me. Our ward also has a guy that seems to like using testimony time and prayer time to preach sermons, so my family immediately puts him on the stop watch and makes over under bets (when in doubt, take the over.. just saying).
We also have this game we call testimony pool that we very irreverently play on our phones. The rules are simple: identify the people who are going to bear their testimony that day. Lock in your votes before the bishopric member conducting gets up to give his testimony (he doesn’t count, of course). One point for every person correctly identified. Minus one for each miss.
Maybe it’s the spirit telling us, but after a while you get pretty accurate if you pay attention to who was baptized, who has family visiting, who is moving, etc.
Some of my family has argued that we should tally the points differently, that the little Magillicuty girl who starts walking up before the bishop sits down should not count as much as Brother NoTie Johnson who hasn’t born a testimony this century. So we’ve allowed a long shot vote that doesn’t count against but basically gives you the win if you can hit it. One time my SIL picked me. Yeah, I considered it, but.. that would have given him the win!
Interesting. This is mostly how I would have described myself through the decade or so prior to my disaffection, though I might have added an understanding of the fallibility of modern prophets and apostles, and the need to navigate the mire with personal revelation.
Could this be a theological rope to handle cognitive dissonance? A new paradigm for hope?
We have not sat down for tithing settlement for several years. I just tell the clerk to tell the bishop “we pay online. Put us down for full.” That keeps everyone happy.
If we pay, it’s online and it’s been that way for years. Putting us down for full isn’t saying we are full in what they might consider full, but it is what we consider full and appropriate, and we usually consider multiple years and not just a single year.
The belief bias effect and confirmation bias. Yes. I agree, On Own Now.
And not only do we seek the info that aligns with our belief, we are hand fed that info through our smart phones and social media. We don’t have to seek very hard.
Here’s something I’ve noticed that might explain the huge polemic chasm between the two sides: I’ll start by saying I have friends and family on either side. Politically, I’m an independent, but that’s really beside the point. I do try to seek both sides of act issue.
What I’ve noticed is that both sides are basing their strongest opinions on two vastly different sets of “information”. When the bulk of information you access points to the other side or other candidate as being so awful, it gives you decreased sympathy and empathy for anyone who does NOT support your side. And really, it makes sense. How could anyone in their right mind not agree? They must be ignorant and misinformed, or just plain delusional or dumb! Yes, but the problem is you’re accessing a different cadre of”information” than they are, and the cards they’re playing with make it seem impossible for a rational thinker to agree or support your side.
This is what I have been noticing… And maybe being a guy in the middle helped me to have some access to the two different poles. I feel like I’m now kind of on a tightrope in the middle and the chasm has become the Grand canyon.
Then recently I watched “The Social Dilemma” and… Wow, an exclamation for my observations. A worthwhile documentary if you’ve not seen it.
We live in the age of disinformation.
And I don’t think it’s a grand scheme from some nefarious secret combination, but a natural effect of when super tech AI is allowed free reign in it’s quest for $$$. I’m an optimist, but I’m not sure how we are to save ourselves from civil war.
Aside from two talks, Dieter and Holland, I thought the event was a snooze fest as well. It really bothered me, as Hawk girl said, that very few even mentioned the big elephant in the room—the pandemic! Also, little things, like them following the teleprompter and looking to one side, away from the camera, which works when there is a camera there and when tv viewers know there is an audience, but when Cook kept looking off to his left, I just wanted to kick him… Hey buddy, we’re all over here! Conference also was a divider in my house. Maybe it was because we rarely watch so much of it. This time we watched the entire thing, even the Saturday evening session. In the past, we typically just watch on Sunday.. maybe. I couldn’t keep from voicing occasional negative comments, which upset my wife even though she’s not a TBM, has long since stopped wearing garments, and has her own interpretation of the word of wisdom. I don’t really know where her sudden change of heart came from, but things were fine between us on Friday and they suck now. Thank you, Pres Nelson and co.
I am ok with a big fast and collective prayer on good Friday. I thought that was rolled out pretty well by Nelson. I hoped we would hear about some more tangible service things the church Corp had planned, but I’m sure that was too much to ask. I think pres Nelson answered everyone’s question regarding that by stating that the church was well known for its great humanitarian efforts but the REAL purpose of the church was to prepare the earth for the second coming or bring souls to Christ or something like that. So, don’t ask about all that money, we’re not about healing the sick or alleviating suffering, we’re making more temples and preaching the gospel! Prayer and fasting… We’ll ask God to do the dirty work for us.
I chuckled at how Oaks slammed the door on any hopes or thoughts of women receiving the priesthood. Let me rephrase.. I cringed at how Oaks shut the door an any hopes of women ever receiving an OFFICE in the priesthood, because obviously they have it already, he explained. And, he gave the green light to women blessing the children in their home in the absence of a father… not a priesthood blessing, mind you, but since they preside, they can care for and bless their children. Thanks. My non TBM wife said, “I can do that anyway, and i could give them a blessing if I wanted or even the sacrament!”. I said, you can do whatever you want, baby,.
So I guess it’s only ok if she talks bad of the brethren. I’m still working that one out.
I felt the overall tenor of conf was doubling down. We’re about THIS first vision, don’t forget it! I expected a big focus on the restoration since it’s the bicentennial year, but I did not expect another proclamation that sorta cements the gold plates in stone. I hoped that a future generation or two might have some wiggle room out of that myth-like story, but… maybe the First Pres was worried about that happening. Idk.
I have lots of thoughts and a fair amount of experience on this topic.. I don’t know if I can distill them into anything useful for you, but I’ll try. First, groundhog, it would probably be best to start a new thread.. Takeaways from this morning’s session. Holland’s talk was great. Worth a second listen.
Oaks has no sense of rhythm. Worth a second watch. You might laugh.
Everything else was same ol same ol, or complete must misses.
Based on my research on this issue, it seems pretty clear that tax laws were violated in two places. Under their articles of incorporation, Ensign Peak Advisors exists as a 509 a3 and investing arm of the church and a charitable organization. They pay no taxes but as I understand the tax law , they’re supposed to allocate all out go to charitable, educational or humanitarian purposes. The records given to the IRS suggest they haven’t given any money to those purposes. Rather they have taken approximately $1 billion/year in excess tithing (tithing money not needed cover expenses of the church) and over 20 some years got it up to over $100 billion. As I understand it, the money sits in a treasury fund for a while , building up, then is invested in a number of ways. As of now, none of that money has been used for charitable purposes and no taxes have been paid. That’s problem one. How can EPA claim they are a charitable organization when for 20 + years they’ve done no charity? Problem two is that two payments were made from that treasury fund.. not from any of the investing funds, where one might argue consisted of interest or revenue bearing accounts that were a step removed from tithing, but rather the fund holding the excess tithing money. One of these payments was to bail out Beneficial Life, an insurance company owned by the church. The other was to bail out or fund the final parts of the City Creek Mall project. Tithing funds may not have been used to build it, but it seems like they were used to finish building it.
Those two payments were illegal, based on my understanding.
Granted, my bank account will help testify that I’m far from a financial guru, but this story bothered me enough to investigate and this is what I learned. I’m sure there’s more to come.
The short answer is that gender is no longer considered binary. There may be a biological female who does not identify strictly feminine and may be uncomfortable with being called a chairwoman. Or vice versa. It’s not just a woman thing.
Gender is related to much more than penises and vaginas. Gender is considered more of the state of masculine and feminine, and relates to social and cultural, sex and personality factors.
I think this is why standard questions on forms and whatnot no longer ask for “gender” but rather “sex”. In some circles, especially church, we don’t like to say the word “sex” so we soften it by saying “gender”, yet have no idea that the concept is not what we think it is, or refuse to budge from our paradigm.
Most of us probably used to consider sex and gender as synonymous terms. Obviously, many people still do, and this issue has become a social and political brouhaha. In my opinion, we all just need to have some patience and understanding, with a willingness to adapt our paradigms as new data becomes available.
dande48 wrote:
Minyan Man wrote:
We have a number of medical students in ward. There are times when, because of their schedules, they come to sacrament meeting in theirscrubs.
Have you ever worn scrubs? SUPER comfortable. If I am ever exalted and become a god, I’m declaring scrubs as church attire.
I just got the image of young Elojamie telling his buddies, “Man, these garmies are soooo comfortable. If I’m exalted and become a God, I’m making my kids wear these things ALL the time. They’ll love it!”
I think everyone has to answer Sabbath day (and WofW, and tithing, and even LofC) questions on their own, based on a number of factors such as belief, family situation, consequences, etc., but since you asked for opinions, here’s mine. I don’t hear it so much anymore, but I remember members giving anecdotal examples from the pulpit about how they went through medical school and never studied on Sunday, or saying the only reason they made it through this or that school was because they obeyed the law and kept the Sabbath day holy and didn’t do homework. Whatever. Good for them, I thought. Even as a mostly tbm college student and grad student, I studied on Sundays. I did homework on Sundays when I needed to. I was married with children as a grad student, working full time and going to school full time, so I was a busy guy. It was a tough time. I spent time with my family, I held church callings, but I also sure as heck put school as a high priority and I did school work whenever I could, often on Sundays. And, I finished with a 4.0 GPA. Studying and doing homework on Sundays worked for me. I’m sure that if I would have taken a complete school break on Sundays for those years, I would not have kept a 4.0 and who knows?
I remember discussing with my wife things like TV watching on Sundays, or swimming for the kids, but she never gave me grief for doing homework. She told me of odd things her mother insisted on when she was growing up… Like they couldn’t ride their bikes or swim on Sunday, but they would go out for Sunday dinner to a restaurant. In my family, we’d not go out or go to the store, but we’d watch football on TV. As a youth Sunday school teacher, I heard kids talk about things they couldn’t do on Sundays, which often bewildered other kids and forced me to maintain a straight face and not chuckle. Things like no board games, walks with family okay as long as the kids didn’t run or jog, no playing instruments unless they played hymns, no reading unless it was scriptures, no getting together with friends, no phones, etc. No wonder so many of these kids hated Sundays.
