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SBR, I am going to piggy back on your thread. I just received my copy of RSR and delved into it with a vengeance. I have very little time for personal reading because I have required course reading for my degree, so my Christmas break is it. It is long, and the print is tiny 😯 . I found much the same as you did, but I was honestly hoping it would help me to deal with my doubts. It hasn’t.I also noted the “made up” story of the dead man, and I feel like Bushman glossed over the polygamy/polyandry part. Someone on here said they felt Bushman was very even-handed in his treatment of JS, but I got the feeling Bushman was rationalizing JS’s behavior somewhat. The idea of “translating”, without having the books open, or even near; the Book of Abraham; even the “continual revelation”, when JS was in a meeting and would just start saying things as though The Lord was speaking.
I too agree that some of these things are hard to explain away, and probably have a spiritual explanation, but we are still stuck with the question of what is from God and what is from JS or BY, or whomever. I am not sure that in this life we will ever really know.
Quote:Be as active as you can be, in whatever way makes the most sense for you. Hold onto your own defining experiences and worship God according to the dictates of your own conscience. In the end, you can’t get any more Mormon, theologically, than that – and, at the most basic level, that’s all we teach that God will require.
Ray, I love that, and it brought tears to my eyes. Being reminded that we only need do what God requires seems very freeing.
Rachael, welcome. I have not been here long but it has been a welcome place to be when things are hard, and even when they aren’t. I hope you find what you are looking for, I think it’s here if you are really trying to stay LDS. I think I understand where you are coming from. When it is all you have known or you see your religion as defining you (which it often does), leaving it behind even when its hard can be difficult. tI would mean redefining who you are, and I for one just don’t want to spend the energy doing that. Best of luck on this journey, you certainly are not on it alone
🙂 Katzpur, I am sorry you are having such a difficult time. I think your biggest problem is that you appear to be a Utah Mormon. Believe me, you have just described my neighbors. That is the cultural part of living in Utah. Outside of Zion, many are much more accepting of diversity. I myself am the “family feminist” and they get to hear my comments in RS. I wish you could pick up and move elsewhere, but I doubt that even enters the realm of possibility. I wish you didn’t feel so alone at church, I know I do at times too. But remember that God loves the R’s and the D’s, He looks on your heart. I just heard Joel Osteen today and he said to find people who celebrate you and don’t hang out with people who tolerate you. I love that. There will be a few you can find that love you for who you are. Don’t waste a minute of your time worrying about the other people. Sometimes I hang onto the first line of the YW theme–We are daughters of a Heavenly Father who loves us, and we love Him. That is the most important thing to remember. Wow, you are resisting an urge that didn’t even come to me. I would have had to resist the urge to ask him why a PPI would take priority over attending his meetings? A PPI can be done anytime, a lesson is taught during priesthood or SS. Being there is being an example to the members, shouldn’t that be more important than the convenience of the PPI? And the other temptation: Really? You are the judge of what is a gospel truth and what isn’t? Perhaps it would be best if you just keep working on those PPI’s. People like that are so irritating. It is such an example of pride it isn’t funny. My husband once taught a PH lesson and the EQP told him he wasn’t allowed to read from the manual. My husband used a few quotes from the manual during his lesson, and an angry EQP confronted him afterward for ignoring the policy. Apparently in our ward you can’t read a quote, you need to memorize it. No wonder people get offended, it’s because people can be so darned offensive.
I’ll step away from the soap box now, you just really touched a nerve. God loves all of His children, and he doesn’t love the leaders more than the followers.
By the way, just for us on these boards, next time this brother makes it to your class, bring up lds.org and read one of the essays. That should be fun, and it is doctrine after all
😆 I think it is basically meaningless. It sounds very new age and philosophical, but really doesn’t mean anything, Can truth really be contained? Are there any boundaries for truth? I don’t think so. You can’t put truth in a box to call it truth. However, getting into a philosophical discussion on it would be exhausting :yawn: SilentDawning wrote:
Quote:Yet people seem to believe in the restoration nonetheless. I have trouble accepting that Joseph smith made these mistakes, but was a valid prophet anyway.
This is difficult for me also. We are taught that the spirit cannot strive with man except we are worthy. How can a man who is taking other men’s wives, for either lust or power, be considered worthy of revelation, not just for themselves, but for the entire church? How do we know that his version of the bible is truly inspired of God, or just what HE thought it meant when he read it? It has been said by more than a few here that if anyone today did what JS did, they would be excommunicated. How then can we take what JS says as revelation from God? I am not suggesting that he was not a prophet, but I do question if everything that he gave us is from God. And if it is not (and I expect most of you here to say it isn’t), how do we pick and choose what IS from God. Yes,we all have the right to personal revelation, but you can’t have a religion where each person gets to decide what is gospel principle and what isn’t. There would be no uniformity of doctrine.
I think this really describes my FC in a nutshell. If JS was breaking the law of chastity, how much of what he taught is actual gospel doctrine, and how much were his own personal belief that furthered and made “acceptable” his behavior. Oh, and why does Emma get such a bad rap? How would you feel if the love of your life was sleeping/marrying around behind your back and all you wanted was your own family back??
I have often found it interesting, and a little irritating,that when one sins, even a grievous sin as described, if the person confesses to their priesthood leader soon after they are often dealth with swiftly and often harshly. Now take that same person and have them confess years later, and if they have remained active and exhibit humility, nothing happens. Personally, I think your wife has probably suffered enough already. We are often our harshest judge. The Lord looks upon the heart, and hers appears to be focused on The Lord and her family. I would just go with it. If you love her, forgive her, and trust that all will be well in the next life. The lesson I have learned from this, and others, is don’t confess now, wait a decade, and it will be easier on you. SunbeltRed wrote:
Quote:
It seems like a hold over from the doctrine that the second coming is around the corner…the LDS church really seems to like to emphasize it more than I personally would prefer.I agree that there is still a huge emphasis on the idea that the second coming is just around the corner. In fact I have a family member who is convinced The Lord will come before she dies, and she is in her late 70’s. I can’t tell you how many people speak of their patriarchal blessings assuring them it is imminent, that they will be part of the “winding up scenes” of the second coming. I am not sure of the purpose of it, we have been warned it is imminent for decades. Are they trying to give us a sense of “you better shape up now because time is running out”? I don’t know about you, but I have enough stress in my life just getting through the day without fearing the second coming and cataclysmic destruction.
I don’t understand the millennium either, and so I rarely think about it. I don’t want to be on earth when the second coming occurs, and as I have traversed my personal FC, I am beginning to realize we are probably totally off base on how it will happen or what it will look like, or if it will happen. Yes, I just said that. I don’t know what to believe on that anymore.
Quote:SilentDawning wrote:
I am about to attend priesthood preview with my son in hour. Feeling a bit sheepish I am attending with a colored shirt..largely due to laundry problems in my home and my refusal to take over the job of laundry myself. I wonder if I will get chastised….
Perhaps you will be chastised only by your wife, but I might suggest that you start doing your own laundry and then you can have whatever shirt you need available when you need it
😆 The best thing I ever did for my marriage was to have my husband do his own laundry, its very freeing
As for the white shirt dilemma, I think it will take men like you and the others on here to start wearing what they choose. As more, younger, or newer converts, see that, things will begin to change. So much of what we do is tradition and not doctrine.
I remember hearing President Monson talk about that very thing. He went to a ward to assist with some sort of ordination or something and they set the chair up in front at some strange angle. He changed the angle to face the congregation. The person conducting put it back and said something like “we have the chair face the temple”. President Monson again moved the chair to face those attending, had the person sit down, and began the ordination. His exact point was that tradition is not always doctrine. So brethren, wear those colored shirts and hold your heads high.
By the way, I am still trying to figure out how you all do that quote thing from my ipad….sorry if it’s messed up again.
Roadrunner says Quote:Currently I believe that a literal resurrection is wishful thinking so my first comment to God wouldn’t be a question but would be something like “Wow – you really do exist!” Followed by – “do I have to wear a beard?”
Not if you plan to attend BYU
😆 SilentDawning perhaps you should listen further to the interview. The man said that he put his career and service to others above his family. That is a problem no matter where you are spending your time, inside the church or in the community. Another time he says that he basically judges himself. It was he who judged himself harshly for that choice, not God. I think that is pretty profound really. We are often our harshest critics. I imagine for each of us this death experience will be very personal. We will experience those things that we personally need to experience, and that varies from person to person, just as our strengths and weaknesses vary. As I research more and ore of these NDE’s I discover that there is nothing that substantially deviates from what I have been taught. They help my faith. The first NDE I ever read was that of the niece of Lorenzo Snow (I think that was the relationship). She was ill and he was at a church meeting and couldn’t get there to give her a blessing. She passed while they waited. When he finally made it to the house she was gone, but he blessed her to come back to life and she did. She goes on to tell her story of what she experienced while she was dead. The story is printed in a book called “If a Man Die” printed by Bookcraft many years ago.
The video is an interview of an atheist and his near death experience. Other than the fact that it is very long, it is very interesting. Well worth a view. MockingJay, I am so sorry for your loss. They say time heals all wounds, but don’t believe it. The hurt softens, but it never really goes away. I tell myself that I still hurt because I love. And I am grateful for that love. My FC came after my loss, but when I lost my husband unexpectedly, I had to know where he was. I was desperate to know what it was like where he was. Was he really anywhere and would I really see him again? And most important to me was would he remember me and still love me and watch over me and the children? I prayed and did feel some comfort at the time, but the thing that helped me the most was reading about other people’s near death experiences. There are some amazing books and stories out there. There are so many similarities between the stories that I believe them. It is not just a hope for me, but a belief after all the reading I did. That gave me the greatest healing. I didn’t need supposition or prognosticating, I wanted to know what other people had actually experienced. I encourage you to read some of them. They are readily available on Amazon.com. I know that there is something there beyond this life. I know that those who have experienced it and come back feel incredible joy at what lies beyond. They feel LOVE. So much love. It doesn’t matter their religion, these people feel love, and they are often surrounded by family and friends who have passed on before them. Interestingly, there was one I read that I bought at Deseret Book called I Stand All Amazed. Her NDE is so vivid, and you will be amazed at what she sees. She was not a member of the church at the time it occurred. Perhaps if you read some of these experiences, you will find comfort in where you father is. It gave me the comfort nothing else did.
I am glad you are here and felt the desire to share. Everyone’s experiences here have helped me so much. I pray you find some measure of comfort here too.
I am a product of the 1960’s and 70’s. I was taught that JS received and actual visitation. That is what has made it hard to swallow. It’s strange now as I type this that I never considered it a vision, but a visitation. But that is due to the way I was taught. When they tell us that we know HF and JC have bodies of flesh and bones and we know that from the FV, it’s hard to picture that as anything but a visitation. I suppose I have a little more belief in the 3 Nephites because my family has a 3 Nephites story. It was actually told by a grandfather several times removed about an experience he had before he joined the church. He was cutting wood and severely injured his leg. He was alone at the time and expected to bleed to death. Apparently a man appeared and handed him a vial of liquid and instructed him to pour it on the wound. The bleeding stopped immediately and the man had disappeared. It was only later when this grandfather joined the church that he learned of the 3 Nephites and he believed with all of his heart that one of them had saved his life. It’s a cool story and one I honestly never doubted. Whether it was Nephite or an angel, it doesn’t matter to me. But I do believe that our Heavenly Father can send us help when it suits His purposes, I just don’t think it happens but rarely.
