Do LDS give their Soul to the Church, or to Jesus?

[deacon blues]

Do LDS give their Soul to the Church, or to Jesus?
This is kind of a rhetorical question, but it shouldn't be.
The temple answers this question for me, but there may be TBM's or even NOM's that might see things differently.
Some TBM's might say that giving your soul to the Church is the same as giving it to Jesus. I would reply, " If Jesus told you to disobey the Church/Prophet/Corporation, would you do it?
Anyway, I just felt like putting this out there.

[Palerider]

This is a little like that member I talked to awhile back who attempted to justify\defend the church having an extremely large amount of money. She tried to say, "It isn't the churches' money, it's the Lord's money..."

I told them they were splitting an awfully fine hair there.

Temple trigger warning for those of you who might get the vapors or hyperventilate while reading something this sacred in a common context.

Here's what the temple ceremony says:

"It is that you do consecrate yourselves, your time, talents and everything with which the Lord has
blessed you, or with which he may bless you, to the Church of Jesus Christ of
Latter-day Saints, for the building up of the Kingdom of God on the earth and for
the establishment of Zion."

I suppose one will have to draw their own conclusions.

[dogbite]

I don't think it's that binary. Mormons come in many varieties from zealots to social members.

I think if you change soul to percent money donations they each make you could score their religiosity fairly well.

[deacon blues]

Pale's post above says it very clearly. When you come out of the temple they want you to think they own you body and soul, (and spirit if you want to get doctrinal). And they don't give you much warning either.
The temple ceremony says "C___, C___, C___," all the way through. Joseph Smith really knew what he was doing. And then the current Q15 pat themselves on the back for "fixing" parts of it. The final Oath (see Pale's post above) is the part they ought to friggin' delete. Makes me want to barf.

[blazerb]

To me, the worst part is that they ask you to give everything to the church; then when it goes badly they'll say that you were never asked to give up whatever the last was that left you broken. The church cannot take a chance on asking people to give their soul to Jesus. It leaves too much doubt about how much control the church has over them. Hugh Nibley, for all his faults, tried to warn us that the managers would take over from the leaders. The managers don't trust people to follow the Spirit. It's just not something that they can control.

[deacon blues]

I think Joseph was trying to get control, but he couldn't ask people to give their soul to Joseph. That would be too obvious. He couldn't ask people to give their soul to Jesus Christ. That would be too vague. So he tells people to give their soul to the Church. And Joseph ran the Church, at least he thought he did. Remember the words, "I have more to boast of than ever any man had..."
Check out 'The Seed of Secrecy' thread here in Doctrinal Discussions.

[Cnsl1]

Well, Joseph was pretty good at getting others to do what he wanted by getting specific and convenient revelations from God to them. Many of these were canonized in the D&C.

I think later prophets missed out on that perk.

It seems rather clear to me that the church has packaged Jesus pretty well, so that in worshipping Jesus you're giving your all to the church. So this kinda seems like a rhetorical question. LDS people give their soul to the church via the LDS version of Jesus. Which to be fair, isn't the worst version of Jesus by any means. It does seem to be one of the more expensive versions.

Like Ricky Bobby, I kinda prefer the 8 lb 6 oz baby Jesus version of Jesus.