[MisterCurie]

I got the same thing. I first got it when I was at work and was worried that the University had blocked StayLDS, but I still had access to NOM and FacesEast, so that didn’t make much sense.

I’m glad to see the site it back today.

[MisterCurie]

I personally don’t think any of the Old Testament prophets had any real idea about the coming of Jesus Christ. Mormon theology would have us believe that if the Old Testament were translated correctly and had not been manipulated by evil and designing men, it would read much more plainly and testify about Christ like the Book of Mormon does with essentially Christians living since the time of Adam. I don’t believe the Old Testament supports this view (but then I don’t think the New Testament actually describes actual events such as a virgin birth or a resurrection or view the Book of Mormon as an ancient text either).

I think the symbols are fine and are largely created by people from their own view. The historicity of the symbol is less important than the meaning of the symbol for the person who is it.

On the other hand, I think there is a lot of importance behind “original intent” and I just don’t think the Old Testament had Jesus Christ in the original intent.

Just a reminder, I’m in Stage 4 and all the symbols are dead to me.

[MisterCurie]

And how many women are mentioned in the bible?

There are prophetesses, etc. is this anachronistic for the bible?

How many women are mentioned by name in D&C?

[MisterCurie]

I believe it was Elder Eyring who bore testimony this past conference:

“I know this is the Church of Jesus Christ . . . of latter-day saints.”

Now that is a testimony I can believe in!

[MisterCurie]

I have not felt that StayLDS encourages someone to fall into apostasy or even to go against the rules of the church. In fact, I have regularly felt like StayLDS puts pressure on people to not do such things. At times I have felt that StayLDS is a less friendly place for the Stage 4 people than for the Stage 5 people. But I think it is useful for the Stage 4 person to have their black and white view of faith (mostly black in the “dark night of the soul”) challenged to avoid becoming too complacent. Besides, I can always post at NOM if I want my Stage 4 tendencies reinforced and validated .

Stage 5 seems to find new, and even brighter and greater truth in the paradoxes. I liked how the podcast described Stage 4 as the fish has leapt out of the fishbowl. In Stage 4 the person sees the symbol as a symbol and thus the symbol becomes dead. That is where I am at. Concepts like apostasy, obedience, letter of the law, spirit of the law, eternal progression, to me these all seem to be dead symbols. Indeed, the night is very dark.

However, I don’t think that there is any specific action that someone must do to progress through the stages. I don’t think someone has to stop attending church, stop paying tithing, start breaking the word of wisdom, or anything else in order to progress through the stages. As all of the symbols have become dead to me, I don’t think it really bothers me to no longer do the things I believed were so important in Stage 3, as I no longer find they have any meaning (I look forward to and anticipate Stage 5 where they will regain a new and higher meaning that is more beautiful than I could ever imagine possible in Stage 3). However, I can think of lots of reasons why some people would continue doing these things and I do not think that will inhibit their progression through the Stages of Faith.

I do wonder if someone needs to abandon the concept of obedience to progress through the stages of faith? Stage 4 is about individuative-reflexive faith, where Stage 3 is Synthetic-Conventional faith. Stage 3 is about conformity, but Stage 4 and beyond are very personal journeys. To be individuative and reflexive, I think one may need to stop worry about conforming to an outside force. What do others think?

[MisterCurie]

Valoel, thanks for the tip to listen to this. Brian sure did a nice job explaining each stage! It must be all that practice he gets discussing them on StayLDS . Brian sounded just like a psychologist explaining the stages :ugeek: .

I have to say that from my Stage 4 perspective, I liked the response that in Stage 5, the person already knows its all false, but they decide to jump back into the pond. I know that betrays what Stage 5 is all about, but my Stage 4 thinking can wrap its head around that.

I also liked that it was specifically noted that Fowler describes structure of faith and not faith content. The stages of faith do not specifically or uniquely apply to LDS faith.

I very much look forward to a follow-up podcast with more depth to Stage 4 and 5 in the church.

[MisterCurie]

I like the thought that he meant human beings, rather than that he is racist. I’m not sure what the original intent was, though.

[MisterCurie]

I think the church largely thinks it agrees with this quote. Unfortunately, as with the apologists, for them the truth begins and ends with the teaching of the LDS church. They think they believe it because they believe that the church has ultimate Truth and will prevail against all the doctrines of the world.

[MisterCurie]

Welcome! We’re glad to have you here. We try to be kind and non-judgemental and not press our own beliefs onto anybody.

Hope you find the support you are looking for here.

[MisterCurie]

overit wrote:

I am curious about your comment concerning Utah transplants in your East Coast ward. What was your ward like before they moved in? Do you think they were able to influence ward leadership because they were from “Zion”? What changes came about from their influence? Are there other members from the East that can identify the changes/influence?

It wasn’t so much that Utah transplants moved into the ward, it was more that we moved into a ward of Utah transplants (mostly students going to East Coast schools for 4 years before moving back to Utah to put down roots). It probably didn’t help that we were considered part of the Utah transplant crowd. I am from Idaho and went to BYU and we had just gotten married and I was moving out East for school, although I plan to put down roots in the East, and DW was lumped into the diligent wifey following her husband to the East for school, although she was already in the East and had been raised in the East and it could more accurately be described that I was moving out to be with her. She would get very annoyed that introductions were inevitably accompanied with the question, “What are you doing out here?” and that most of the others answers were “My husband is going to dental/law/medical school.” But she was even more annoyed that if she answered by saying “My husband is going to medical school” they would cut her off, expecting that to be the whole of the answer, without letting her conclude “and I’m going to graduate school getting my PhD in Bioengineering.”

DWs first ward upon converting to Mormonism was very liberal with lots of hippies, card-carrying members of the communist party and feminists getting higher education while their husbands cared for their kids. The ward we moved into upon getting married was an inner city ward with lots of transient student transplants and some longer term Utah transplants from the suburbs to provide “leadership.” The transplants were the leadership. It was just annoying to sit through testimony meetings about how hard to was to be so far away from family and friends, but that they were happy for the opportunity to be in the “mission field”.

DWs real issues with Mormonism came from trying to tease apart culture and doctrine and realizing they were the same. She had always placated herself with things by saying that it must be a cultural thing and not a doctrinal thing, but when she dived into it, she found out it was “doctrinal”. She was coming from a Catholic upbringing as an educated feminist. For example, it can’t really be church doctrine that women shouldn’t get an education, it must just be a cultural thing that so many women stay home to raise their families, but when she dug down into it, while there are some statements that women should get an education, there are many more addresses from General Authorities in GC that women should stay home and raise their families as that is the ideal (there’s the whole Proc. on the Family that is regularly quoted as well). She had similar issues with practically teenagers getting married (19 year old girls getting married today and old maids if they have to go on a mission at 21! – not to mention JS’s 14 yo wives), needing to be from a “stock Mormon” family to serve in upper positions in the church (how many of Qo12 are converts?), etc.

[MisterCurie]

Valoel wrote:

What I meant by my comment about the Christianized OT prophets is the view that they had the whole picture. They were really followers of Christ back then, like in the Book of Mormon where they actually speak Christ’s name and describe his ministry before it happened. It is very explicit in the BoM. I think it seems more interpretive in the Bible, meaning Christians later imposed their new understanding like an overlay on the old prophets. I just don’t think someone like Moses (if there was such a person) was consciously trying to create a vast tradition that pointed to Jesus Christ symbolically. He just couldn’t tell anyone because it was a mysterious secret that they would not understand (or something like that).

Our LDS interpretation of the material in the OT could be right. I just don’t think it is necessarily as explicit as it seems.

I agree with Valoel. Mormon theology seems to emphasize that Christ was known throughout all the dispensations (see the explicit references to Christ in BoM) and that God’s church has always been the same (Adam, Moses, etc. received the same temple endowment, were taught about Christ, etc.). The Church seems to teach that evil and designing men took these truths about Christ out of the OT bible to make it confusing, but if those truths were adquately restored, the Bible would read just like the BoM with all the references to Christ. Early Christians were reinterpreting the Bible to mean Christ in its old passages, but I don’t think the original writers of the OT really were thinking about Christ when they wrote it.

A good counter example is the interpretation of the OT by Jews, who reject all the Messianic interpretations of the OT as referring to Christ. I think Jewish interpretation of the OT is probably closer to the original intent than Christian readings of the OT (although I’m sure many of there interpretations are no closer to the original intent than Christian readings, even if they are different).

[MisterCurie]

Orson wrote:

You mention the church itself fosters unrealistic expectations. I would agree that some of our culture found in the church does foster unrealistic expectations. The important activity in rebuilding a new positive relationship with the church, in my opinion, is separating culture from doctrine. Yes, people in the church are flawed. This probably extends into what many people understand to be doctrine. It is difficult when the culture will not allow some items of “true doctrine” to flourish, but to me personally I gain comfort in knowing that if something is not actually true then in reality it is false doctrine. False doctrine is false to God and also false to the highest ideals of Mormon theology – even if the greater body of the church does not see a specific item as such presently.

I don’t pretend to understand everything myself, but I do take comfort in knowing that God (the greater goodness, or whatever expression you are comfortable with) does not want me to “believe” something that is not actually true. That is what I hold onto, and I believe the people I run into at church – deep in their hearts – support this ideal also.

I don’t think that you can separate things quite so simply into culture vs doctrine when you use the LDS Church as your standard. This is precisely the issue that led to DWs disaffection. As a convert to the church from Catholicism, having grown up in the East and currently living in the East, she was frustrated with what she felt was church culture imported by the Utah transplants in our ward. She decided to start a crusade to separate church doctrine from culture and blog about it (http://www.myriadmormonmusings.blogspot.com” class=”bbcode_url”>http://www.myriadmormonmusings.blogspot.com. Her ultimate conclusions, and hence the disaffection, was that within the LDS church, culture influences doctrine and cannot be separated from doctrine 👿 . She found more evidence for the culture of man influencing the LDS Church doctrine than the eternal truths of God influencing doctrine 👿 . I guess my point is that just because it is Church doctrine, it doesn’t mean it is “true doctrine” and may very well be “false doctrine.” I suppose those elements of “false doctrine” are the things we ignore in the LDS cafeteria.

[MisterCurie]

MWallace57 wrote:

Emma Smith was a tireless public campaigner against polygamy and stated: “We raise our voices and hands against John C. Bennett’s ‘spiritual wife system’, as a scheme of profligates to seduce women; and they that harp upon it, wish to make it popular for the convenience of their own cupidity; wherefore, while the marriage bed, undefiled is honorable, let polygamy, bigamy, fornication, adultery, and prostitution, be frowned out of the hearts of honest men to drop in the gulf of fallen nature”. The document The Voice of Innocence from Nauvoo, signed by Emma Smith as President of the Ladies’ Relief Society, was published within the article Virtue Will Triumph, Nauvoo Neighbor, March 20, 1844. The Voice of Innocence from Nauvoo is also referred to in LDS History of the Church 6:236, 241

I post this here because i believe that Emma Smith actually did more to protect woman’s virtue than many men in the Church (Oliver Cowdry excepted). (Oliver was a tireless proponent of the virtue of women).

At the end of the day, it will be JS who will hear “Praise to the Man” ascend up into the heavens. Emma Smith is not mentioned once in the song. We all choose our heros, but for me, Emma Smith is one.

I just read about this in “Mormon Enigma.” What a great biography of Emma! Seems like it was her stance and outspokeness against polygamy that got RS shut down in 1844 as well. She does seem to be quite the hero.

[MisterCurie]

Orson wrote:

MisterCurie wrote:

Perhaps that is a key to moving on through Stage 4, letting go of those expectations.

I think you’re onto something…

I like to look at it as maturing. Some children who grew up believing in Santa become upset when they learn the bigger picture. After they “let go” of being hung up on details of literal/metaphorical/”deceived” elements, then they can rejoin the fullness of the celebration and understand the value of the innocent view as well as the importance of the mature/enabler perspective to keep the magic of the whole experience alive. The whole of the experience is meaningful, or the children would not re-engauge as adults.

The stories are relevant to the stages. All stages have value.

Uh-oh, DW and I are planning to not do the whole Santa thing with our kids (is this an indicator of an inability to move on to Stage 5? J/K). When we first discussed it years ago, we didn’t want to build false expectations and cause the Santa faith crisis to also cause our kids to question the church, Jesus or God, we wanted them to know that we wouldn’t knowingly lead them astray or lie to them (guess that already backfired with my own questioning of the church and the historicity of Jesus, and God to some degree). Perhaps Santa is useful practice for later disillusionment in faith traditions in general?

[MisterCurie]

I’m not quite sure this book will be very helpful for letting go of unrealistic expectations.

Don’t mind me . . . just some grumbling from my “dark night of the soul.”

[Author]

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