NOM

With my whole family out and living outside the Mormon Corridor, Mormonism isn't hurting me on a regular basis anymore and the need for a support group fades. I miss the interactions I had here with all of you fine people but I just don't care about Mormonism that much anymore and just check in from ...

I'm an apatheist. I don't believe in any gods, but I also feel very strongly that any decent god wouldn't leave us struggling to figure out if they exist or who they are and demand that we believe in them. Belief on scant evidence isn't a virtue. Any god like that wouldn't be worth worshipping. (And ...

Oh, I feel sick after reading that. To steal a line from Thomas Paine: Speaking for myself, if I had no other evidence that the [church is false], than the sacrifice I must make to believe it to be true, that alone would be sufficient to determine my choice. I just can't believe that this is the way ...

If the Bible had said somewhere, "Thou shalt not hold slaves" it probably would have had a major impact on the history of the world.

I'm pretty excited for you. Congratulations. I totally know that feeling of bracing for the possibility of a retrench. In the case of my wife, she had already done a lot of quiet soul searching to herself before she suddenly announced she was done to me. I didn't let myself believe it at first but ...

These gotcha conversations rarely work but if I were to attempt one on this subject it'd go like this: Step 1: Ask the person if they believe that slavery was God's will. They will hopefully say no. Step 2: Bring up Brigham Young's two 1852 speeches to the Utah legislature where he unambiguously ...

It's an interesting strategy to try to resolve a plot hole by pointing to another plot hole. What's funny is, it does seem to work if you aren't thinking too hard. I used to do this, point to the awful stuff in the Old Testament to explain the awful stuff that I saw around me in my lived church ...

Bonfire wrote: ↑Fri Jan 14, 2022 4:56 pmWhy do you think slavery is an indication of immorality?

I would have thought it would be obvious that enslaving other humans was immoral. Is this not so?

So, you asked (in this thread) if we should sacrifice for God. I'm simply playing off of that. Should we sacrifice for God? Does he deserve it? But hey, looks like you just want to preach past us instead of really telling us what you think. :roll: I just want to know how you know God is worth ...

Heavens no. Sounds like a pitiful bronze-age mythical god. If you find the institution of slavery upheld in a book said to have been written by God, what would you expect to find in a book inspired by the devil? Bonfire, what are your thoughts on God endorsing slavery in the bible? Why should we ...

When I was Elder's Quorum President, I would find myself frequently thinking, "day of rest, my ass."

I never heard actual voices, but I think that it is certainly possible for the human mind to conjure them if you are in enough distress. I find it very difficult to get into the spiritual answer mode in general. I only ever had the "Holy Ghost" prayer experience once. I said a prayer and received a ...

I can't help but notice that Elder Gong's request to his son is certainly at odds with what we read about Jesus freely associating with what the religious authorities considered sinners. Do Mormons still hold the ideal of being Christlike? Was it an aggressive act for Matt Gong to post the picture ...

I grew up in Vegas and Harry Reid would attend priesthood opening exercises in random wards during campaign season. He landed in ours one week. Didn't say anything but I think he was just there to remind people that he was Mormon. I voted for him once before I really started to get politically ...

That Lloyd Dobler rant over there about the holy ghost was probably the most cathartic thing I ever read on the subject of Mormonism. A real gem.

Gee, however could an uneducated but charismatic person with a gift for telling stories dictate a book riddled with anachronisms?

Only a miracle could produce that boring book filled with two-dimensional characters and mistakes! /s

Snuffer seemed to really be tap dancing when they asked for his position on homosexuality. I took his answer to mean that they actively disapprove of homosexual relationships. Snufferism might be better in some respects but it is still a bunch of people pretending to know things they don't and ...

I was never a bishop but when I was EQP with three toddlers and an infant at home, I remember on my drives home from work thinking about how if I got in a car accident and died, death would be a nice rest. Clearly I had too much going on in my life to be EQP, but the feedback I got from my leaders ...

Hey, I remember you! I don't post much here anymore either but browse when I'm bored. My formerly TBM wife finally had her issues boil to the surface earlier this year and left. I think the issue that just pushed her over the edge was that she had direct knowledge that a currently serving bishop had ...

This is a very powerful trick the church plays on people, making it seem that happiness only exists inside the system. I think what really set me up for my disaffection was that I started consciously noticing that I was never more miserable than when I was doing everything the church asked of me ...