NOM

Posted: **Thu Mar 22, 2018 6:52 am**

RubinHighlander wrote: ↑Thu Mar 22, 2018 6:41 amNot that it really matters now, but growing up, I'd been taught that everyone will be at their prime, like 20 somethings, after they are ressurected? I don't know if that was actual dogma or just TBM interpretation.

I was riffing on Joseph Smith's declaration of Baby Gods in the King Follett Sermon: "But as the child dies, so shall it rise from the dead, and be for ever living in the learning of God. It will never grow [in the grave]; it will still be the child, in the same precise form [when it rises] as it appeared before it died out of its mother's arms, but possessing all the intelligence of a God. Children dwell in the mansions of glory and exercise power, but appear in the same form as when on earth. Eternity is full of thrones, upon which dwell thousands of children, reigning on thrones of glory, with not one cubit added to their stature."

Posted: **Thu Mar 22, 2018 7:19 am**

Hagoth wrote: ↑Thu Mar 22, 2018 6:29 amEternal nuclear families are impossible.

This was a shelf item for me when I was a believer, and I didn't really even know it.

When I would hear the "no empty chairs" rhetoric, or other crap like that, I would think to myself: "It doesn't really work that way. People 'grow up', leave home, and start their own family, and that family 'grows up'... Andy the cycle continues." The only person that really matters is your spouse(s), and as far as I can see, a whole lot of spouses really don't want to be with each other for ETERNITY.

And then I'd move on to the next crazy thought in my head...

"Families are Forever" really is just one more tool that the corporation uses to beat followers into submission. When you really think about it, it just doesn't work, and no-one in the corporation can really answer any of the questions about it except for: "Oh, you'll find out when you're dead."

It really isn't a "happy" thing when you get down in the trenches, especially when you consider the polygamous aspects of the LDS version.

Posted: **Thu Mar 22, 2018 8:54 am**

wtfluff wrote: ↑Thu Mar 22, 2018 7:19 am "Families are Forever" really is just one more tool that the corporation uses to beat followers into submission. When you really think about it, it just doesn't work, and no-one in the corporation can really answer any of the questions about it except for: "Oh, you'll find out when you're dead."

Yeah it's really wacky when you think about it. Someone looks at the family portrait on the mantle with their spouse and 2.5 smiling kids between the ages of 4 and 7 and thinks "it's going to be just like that forever in heaven." Two seconds of critical thinking blows it all out of the water.

Posted: **Thu Mar 22, 2018 10:24 am**

Hagoth wrote: ↑Thu Mar 22, 2018 6:52 am Children dwell in the mansions of glory and exercise power, but appear in the same form as when on earth. Eternity is full of thrones, upon which dwell thousands of children, reigning on thrones of glory, with not one cubit added to their stature."

Isn't this (the doctrine) just a crock.

Makes me just shake my head...

Anyway, I'm too tired/lazy to get the references for this but here's a statement from a blog regarding the church's actual position on children in the resurrection. If you really twist my arm extremely hard, I'll go dig them up but would rather not waste the time. It is interesting though how this doctrine got changed.

"Not for several decades after Joseph’s death did people begin to think about the question.[3] Finally, when Joseph’s scribes were dead or out of the picture, they got the blame for bad reporting. Joseph F. Smith was particularly unsatisfied with the idea of permanent babies. He found (very late) witnesses to testify that Joseph had said on one occasion or another that babies would grow to full stature in the resurrection. And while church president, the year he died, he more or less made it the official church position."

https://www.google.com/amp/s/bycommonco ... ldren/amp/

Posted: **Thu Mar 22, 2018 11:12 am**

I love the responses here all of them. It helps me to continue to digest this stuff. I don't know what to do, I really don't believe in the church anymore, and I don't want to keep up the pretence, but I don't want to make my family sink into depression over this. Why the hell is it so hard to get away?

Posted: **Thu Mar 22, 2018 11:13 am**

MoPag wrote: ↑Wed Mar 21, 2018 2:31 pmAll the moms in my bereaved moms group (including me) believe we will be with our children again. And it would take one giant f%$#ing a$$hat to tell us we won't.

I think I know who you're talking about...

Posted: **Thu Mar 22, 2018 11:21 am**

On another post I've been hitting the Near Death Experience (NDE) thing pretty hard. With the recent death in my family, its kindof been on my mind.

Frankly,...I am fascinated by the topic, and the consistency of the idea that consciousness DOES and CAN exist outside the human body. But, I've encountered contradictions between NDE literature and LDS Dogma. One of the biggest is the consistency of dead people being greeted by their deceased family and friends.

BUT WAIT!!! How can a family member who is NOT sealed (these NDEs I refer to are NOT LDS people) be showing up? Ain't that for "paradise" only?

Relationships appear to continue to exist over there.

The big reason for families being forever is sex. Its woven into the entire theology. JS was a sex nut.

Posted: **Thu Mar 22, 2018 12:57 pm**

Rob4Hope wrote: ↑Thu Mar 22, 2018 11:21 am The big reason for families being forever is sex. Its woven into the entire theology. JS was a sex nut.

Bingo.

Posted: **Thu Mar 22, 2018 8:57 pm**

Reuben wrote: ↑Thu Mar 22, 2018 12:57 pm
Rob4Hope wrote: ↑Thu Mar 22, 2018 11:21 am The big reason for families being forever is sex. Its woven into the entire theology. JS was a sex nut.
Bingo.

The problem with Joseph was that he couldn't imagine living without sex in the next world. Like most men (and women?) he probably got a little anxious thinking that Heaven might not actually feature sex as part of it's economy and he would really, really miss it.

By dying young, he never would gain the experience of having to go through the aging process and realizing that sex isn't the be-all end-all that it is in the younger years. Hormone levels drop. Bodies don't perform as they used to. He never gained the maturity of the aging experience which, I believe, is a pretty important, mind expanding aspect of life.

I wonder if his thoughts on Celestial marriage would have softened or if he would have just spent his time longing for the good old days....

I know some old men turn into old lecherous bastards. For some, old age may slow down performance levels at the same time it releases inhibitions. Would have been really interesting to see which way Joe would have gone.

Posted: **Fri Mar 23, 2018 8:25 am**

Palerider wrote: ↑Thu Mar 22, 2018 10:24 am
Hagoth wrote: ↑Thu Mar 22, 2018 6:52 am I'll go dig them up but would rather not waste the time.
Naw, it's all just wall jello anyway. Since every single doctrine in the church has changed at some point anybody can find a quote from an apostle of prophet to support just about any crazy-a$$ thing they can imagine.

Posted: **Fri Mar 23, 2018 12:37 pm**

I still believe the ultra-orthodox swing to modesty and sexual self-denial, even repression, that came from guys like JFS, HBL, SWK and others IS THE RESULT of them being raised up in polygamous families where their mothers, to counter the aggressive sexual lives of their husbands (always going after more and younger women, etc), decided to teach virtue and restraint to their sons. I think these women were unhappy and saw SEX as the reason. To protect their son's and daughter's futures, they emphasized ULTRA restraint.

Maybe some of these sons saw the pain and sorrow of their mothers, and decided that sex was the reason: as the sexual appetite of the men were nurtured and encouraged in the name of "building their kingdom", there were casualties. These women were hurt.

Its it such a stretch to see these women as countering it anyway they could?...perhaps through their children?

Its a whiplash affect.

Probably no research on any of this, but It sure would be an interesting read if there were...

Posted: **Sun Mar 25, 2018 6:17 pm**

It seems to me that most religions preach that you can be with loved ones in the eternities in some fashion. It is mormons that say you cannot.

Posted: **Sun Mar 25, 2018 6:20 pm**

Great opening post!

How about these problems with “Families are Forever” that I’ve been thinking about lately.

First, I was wondering how much I would even have in common with my grandparents now that I’m an adult. They were great grandparents for me as a child. They did all the grandparent things, but now as an adult there are decades and decades of difference in time. I’m in my forties, but I have grandparents that came of age in the 1920’s-50s. Totally different experiences.

Also, I wonder if it would be hard to relate to my grandparents and parents as peers. In this life, we have generational age differences that determine how we relate to parents and grandparents. But, we’d probably have an extremely different relationship if we were peers the same age. Think about it, competing for wives with your grandpa!

Finally, once you get above the grandparents level how much really do we know great-grandparents. In this life, the age difference is so great that most people never know their great-grandparents because they usually die when we are pretty young.

But, even if in the CK you can meet your great-grandparents how well would we know them? We each have 8 great-grandparents, 4 grandparents, and associated uncles and aunts. How could we really get to know all these people?

And then, for the great-grandparents, they might literally have a hundred great-grandkids! How are they really going to know or care about all those kids! Especially when they are one of 8 greats!

Posted: **Tue Mar 27, 2018 9:03 am**

I told DW, that the way we cultivate our relationship and how we learn to treat on another is far more important to my version of God than secret handshakes and clubhouse passwords. She agrees.

NOM

What is the actual benefit of "Families are Forever"

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Re: What is the actual benefit of "Families are Forever"

Re: What is the actual benefit of "Families are Forever"

Re: What is the actual benefit of "Families are Forever"

Re: What is the actual benefit of "Families are Forever"

Re: What is the actual benefit of "Families are Forever"

Re: What is the actual benefit of "Families are Forever"

Re: What is the actual benefit of "Families are Forever"

Re: What is the actual benefit of "Families are Forever"