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I’d like to share a chilling poem. It was written by a young man who died in the trenches in WWI.

Quote:

Parable of the Old Man and the Young

So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,

And took the fire with him, and a knife.

And as they sojourned both of them together,

Isaac the first-born spake and said, My Father,

Behold the preparations, fire and iron,

But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?

Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,

and builded parapets and trenches there,

And stretchèd forth the knife to slay his son.

When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,

Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,

Neither do anything to him. Behold,

A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;

Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.

But the old man would not so, but slew his son,

And half the seed of Europe, one by one.

Wilfred Owen

[turinturambar]

Roy: Who conducted this in-service?

[turinturambar]

I think that any gay person would be crazy to join the church as it currently stands.

[turinturambar]

I’m curious what the performance will be like. I’m curious about the soloists, and whether they will cut any numbers or do the whole thing (2.5 to 3 hours). I wonder what the tempos will be like, etc.

I am a huge fan of the original orchestration (strings, oboes, bassoons, trumpet, timpani, basso continuo), and of smaller choirs. Since the orchestra at temple square will join them, they will probably use the Mozart orchestration (strings + full winds and percussion), which I don’t care for anymore (it was the first one I heard). Here’s a great article about that version: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/21/arts/music/oratorio-society-of-new-yorks-messiah-review.html?_r=0

[turinturambar]

I liked E Zwick’s words on empathy.

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Sorry, guys. I realize that was kind of negative. I am just so disappointed with the retrenchment on gay issues in conference. I was hoping for the podium rhetoric to match the PR. It hasn’t, yet.

[turinturambar]

Quote:

“Remember, we all are children of God – gay, lesbian or straight.”

Talk is cheap. It would be very simple for the brethren to offer words of comfort from the podium, but they won’t do it. Conference after conference, I wait for some tidbit of solace, some crumb from the feast–but it doesn’t come.

mackay11 wrote:

I just wish someone would say it that clearly from the pulpit. I also wish the phrase “people don’t choose to be gay” would find its way from the obscure church website to the pages of the conference report. I’ve a friend who still maintains that the brethren don’t really believe that and that the website is purely an outward facing PR exercise.

I think you’re right, and I have no reason to believe otherwise.

[turinturambar]

Sneakers: take a look at this post for more info on tithing http://puremormonism.blogspot.com/2012/12/are-we-paying-too-much-tithing.html

[turinturambar]

Last year, my mother had a health crisis that could have ended her life prematurely. Blessedly, we were able to find the best surgeons in the country, and she is healthier than she has been in a long time. The experience was the first time I considered my parents’ mortality. They will probably die in the next twenty years.

Although I am no longer sure that the mormon Plan of Salvation is true/accurate, I have a strong belief that death is not the end–that we continue on. I have pondered on the life cycle of butterflies and moths, and have been filled with wonder at the enormous transformation when they emerge from their cocoons in glory. I believe we are a larval version of something, and that death is a passageway to a more glorious reality.

Sorry, I realize that this is O/T from the obedience thing, but your mention of butterflies sparked this memory.

[turinturambar]

cwald wrote:

This article represents the best of Mormonism, IMO.

Sent from my SCH-I545 using Tapatalk

I agree. This essay was well done. This is the stuff that keeps me around.

[turinturambar]

Here is my take: The majority people in Old Testament times were preliterate. With the exception of the ruling and scribal classes, nobody else could read or write. They relied on myth-making and storytelling to transmit ideas and values of their culture to the next generation. The more vivid and possibly fantastic the stories, the more likely they could be remembered and perpetuated. They lived with ways of knowing the world and the cosmos that had different underlying assumptions than our literate, pragmatic, empirical epistemology.

So where does that put us? I think the scriptures require more than just a translation into our language, but also translation into our ways of knowing and being–our empirical epistemology, our sociology, our way of transmitting knowledge, etc. So I think if we take those things literally, we miss the point. I know this isn’t taught this way in the Church, however.

[turinturambar]

Quote:

Highly doubtful. The church produces new content very slowly with lots of people getting to review it first.

This. I think this fact suggests that the essays have been in the works for months, if not years. I think access to information previously difficult to come by on the internet is the major motivation for the essays.

[turinturambar]

I have suffered from anxiety and depression for the past 20 years. I was actually severely depressed the year before my mission (my freshman year in college), but I didn’t recognize it, so I didn’t think of it being an issue for me going out on my mission. I was depressed from the second month in the MTC until nine or 10 months in the field. (Almost all of this depression was related to feelings of self-loathing related to very occasional masturbation, and feelings of inferiority and regard to the numbers game in the field). I began to develop feelings of severe anxiety during finding activities. Street contacting was the most anxiety producing activity, and I simply could not do it without shutting down.

I continue to struggle with depression through my second year of college, but did okay the next three years. (With the exception of seasonal depression during the months of winter when weather inversions cap the Salt Lake Valley for weeks on end. Then I started teaching high school. It was extremely stressful, especially the second high school at which I taught. To top things off, I was rear-ended while stopped at a stoplight, and began having severe back and neck pain. I felt that I had no control over my own life, and sank back into an awful depression. Twice during that time I had panic attack episodes that I thought were cardiac symptoms, and after two negative EKGs, I was told by a doctor that I was simply having panic attacks, and that I should try an antidepressant. I have been taking one every day for the past 10 years, and I added an additional antidepressant during the winter months. I also have done quite a bit of talk therapy.

I do believe that I have a genetic predisposition for serotonin problems, but there are very good explanations for my anxiety depression otherwise. My good intentions and perfectionistic tendencies did not mesh well with the high expectation and severe judgmentalism of Wasatch front Mormon culture, to say nothing of the crushing feelings of self-loathing that I developed in relation to my same-sex attractions. So yes, I definitely suffer from anxiety and depression.

[turinturambar]

Thanks, guys. If I am an amazing person, I’d be the last person to believe it. I’m working on that.

I like being a Mormon. But you know, being “blessed with commandments not a few”, sometimes when our religion is practiced it’s very good at making good people feel bad about themselves. I don’t want to let that happen to me anymore. But it’s difficult to break old habits. And if there is any way I can be an influence to help other people see how wonderful they are, and stop the awful things poorly practiced Mormonism can make some people believe about themselves, that is something I can feel good about.

[turinturambar]

Here’s a thought that I just had. I realize that the digital divide is very real in the worldwide church. However, one of the advantages of having curriculum online is that it can be quickly edited, adapted, and/or scrapped without having to go through the whole publication and distribution process. If something changes very quickly in the church (and I think the Internet related faith crises and disaffection’s of the last few years totally caught the COB by surprise), then the new curriculum could be approved and posted quickly.

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