A Book of Mormon tour

[hosemonkey]

I think the point is that the missionaries are trained to mis-direct the feelings that people get. It is a bait-and-switch tactic.

After talking about the Book of Mormon, which the investigator may or may not care about, the missionary will testify that Jesus is our savior, that he really lives, that he loves us and wants us to be with him in heaven forever. The investigator will often feel good to hear this, as well he should.

Missionary: “Are you feeling something?”

Investigator: “Yes, I feel kind of good inside.”

Missionary: “That feeling is the Holy Ghost telling you that the Book of Mormon is true and that Joseph Smith was a true prophet of God. You are very special; not everyone receives a witness from God as quickly as you did.”

Investigator: (Flattered) “Well, I’ve always been kind of spiritual.”

Missionary: “I can feel that you are. You have received personal revelation from God. The Holy Ghost is witnessing to me right now that you are a very special, chosen child of Our Heavenly Father, and he is calling you to be baptized.”

Investigator: “Really?”

Missionary: “Yes, we should obey this revelation from our Heavenly Father. Let’s schedule your baptism as soon as possible. Would next Wednesday evening be all right?”

Investigator: “Well, I guess so.”

Missionary: (Thinking) “Got one!”

So the salesman (er, missionary) steers the process from testifying of Jesus to convincing the investigator that he has had a Moroni 10:4 experience. A classic bait-and-switch. Most people aren’t nearly sophisticated enough to spot the scam. At age 21, I wasn’t.

You nailed it Bro!
Above all, The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Truth. The Holy Spirit will not testify to a lie. Because mormonism is based on lies, then I seriously doubt that the Holy Spirit of Christianity, the Holy Spirit that we know, is at work among mormons. I believe that the Father of Lies Himself, is the Spirit that deceives mormons.
So, that ol’ “burning in the bosom” probably smells like sulphur.

 

[jbogedahl]

Personally I find all of the attacks on other faiths in these forums very non-Christian. What happened to respecting other beliefs and loving our neighbors? It seems like this particular forum of Non-Catholic Religions is a place for every “anti-whatever the religion may be” people to gang up and bash on those members of that religion who hold those beliefs dear to their hearts.

I find many of the posts here distasteful and even hateful. Did you like to pick on the fat kid in school or the kids with pimples and freckles too?

I think discussions are only valuable if people are really interested in understanding other religions. If you’re just here to bash, then I think it’s destructive for yourself as well as anyone else who is unlucky enough to read them.

 

[zaffiroborant]

And you are being disrespectful as well. How can anybody take advice from you when you’re so obviously biased?

I frankly think that this is a big gap in RC education. The evangelicals and pentacosticals get it. But it takes a lot of work and faith to develop a sensitivity to the Holy Ghost. **And those memorized prayers are not so helpful. The entire idea that prayer should be a communication with God instead of a duty is different. ** And without that communication, spiritual sensitivity is harder to develop.

Any you’re not biased and disrespectful here?

As for prayer being a duty for Catholics as opposed to LDS.
Number thirteen in the list of requirements for exaltation is…

“Have family and individual prayers every day.”

 

[hosemonkey]

Personally I find all of the attacks on other faiths in these forums very non-Christian. What happened to respecting other beliefs and loving our neighbors?

You do not have enough background to make that accusation. There are a number of mormon posters on these forums who have come here, not to enquire about Catholicism, but to present us with all sorts of accusations and slurs regarding our faith and attempting to proselytize the Catholics on these boards. We are informed that the mission of Jesus failed, that the Catholic Church “apostasized”, that Joseph Smith is a “true prophet”, etc, etc, etc. mormon posters evade all questions, are not truthful regarding morman doctrine and in general will not respond to difficult questions. We are like that famous zoo animal, the sign on whose cage read,“This animal is viscious, when attacked, he defends himself.” We have no problem with legitimate inquiries about our Faith, but we will not condone the deliberate dissemination of mormon error.

I find many of the posts here distasteful and even hateful. Did you like to pick on the fat kid in school or the kids with pimples and freckles too?

The mormons who post here, as a rule, are not here to learn or understand, but to attack and spread falsehoods.
“Error has no rights”
Sounds harsh, I know, but cancer is not cured by kumbaya, it requires surgery.

 

[jbogedahl]

The mormons who post here, as a rule, are not here to learn or understand, but to attack and spread falsehoods.
“Error has no rights”
Sounds harsh, I know, but cancer is not cured by kumbaya, it requires surgery.

I do not represent all mormons… I can only speak for myself, but I still find your attacks distasteful and yes I’ve been reading a lot of the forums and have seen a lot of the attacks and I can’t answer for mormons that attack, they are not living up to their beliefs if that is the case… I am here to try and correct some misperceptions because not all people are as well-versed in mormon doctrine as you might be. I respect your beliefs and do not ridicule them, please give the same respect.

Thanks,

Jacob

 

[hosemonkey]

I do not represent all mormons… I can only speak for myself, but I still find your attacks distasteful and yes I’ve been reading a lot of the forums and have seen a lot of the attacks and I can’t answer for mormons that attack, they are not living up to their beliefs if that is the case… I am here to try and correct some misperceptions because not all people are as well-versed in mormon doctrine as you might be. I respect your beliefs and do not ridicule them, please give the same respect.

Thanks,

Jacob

My mormon BS detector is set on HIGH. I’ll be keeping an eye on you.

 

[jbogedahl]

My mormon BS detector is set on HIGH. I’ll be keeping an eye on you.

Still going? I welcome the challenge to live up to my beliefs… can I give the same challenge to you?

Jacob

 

[PaulDupre]

Personally I find all of the attacks on other faiths in these forums very non-Christian. What happened to respecting other beliefs and loving our neighbors? It seems like this particular forum of Non-Catholic Religions is a place for every “anti-whatever the religion may be” people to gang up and bash on those members of that religion who hold those beliefs dear to their hearts.

I find many of the posts here distasteful and even hateful. Did you like to pick on the fat kid in school or the kids with pimples and freckles too?

I think discussions are only valuable if people are really interested in understanding other religions. If you’re just here to bash, then I think it’s destructive for yourself as well as anyone else who is unlucky enough to read them.

If you go back through all the LDS-related threads, you’ll find that most of them were started by Mormons who came here to inform us of our errors and bring us the “light and truth”. We have the right to correct their misconceptions about our beliefs and point out the flaws in yours.

Most of the Catholics who are most active in the LDS-related threads are former Mormons like myself. Most of us know far more about Mormonism than the Mormons who come here to proselytize us spouting the carefully sanitized PR the LDS organization puts out today.

 

[majick275]

I do not represent all mormons… I can only speak for myself, but I still find your attacks distasteful and yes I’ve been reading a lot of the forums and have seen a lot of the attacks and I can’t answer for mormons that attack, they are not living up to their beliefs if that is the case… I am here to try and correct some misperceptions because not all people are as well-versed in mormon doctrine as you might be. I respect your beliefs and do not ridicule them, please give the same respect.

Thanks,

Jacob

spare us. you are here as a missionary trolling for converts. you can stop with the persecution complex because no one here went to LDS sites or even “neutral” sites to combat mormon heresy. you came here. your church starts all missionary discussions with the “great apostasy” and the JS story. you call our creeds an abomination to God and all of us who profess them corrupt so don’t try to play the victim here. relativism that you pretend to espouse here is a heresy. islam is wrong and so is buddhism. you believe that too. mormonism believes no other church has any sacramental grace, that goes even further than the catholic church in proclaiming the true church.

we do not have to agree with heretics to be “christian”. i respect other religions by not going to their websites and proselyting. i stay here where people make choice to seek “catholic answers”. there are no misconceptions or untruths for you to correct here. all of our statemetns about the LDS church are easily verifiable.

 

[hosemonkey]

Still going? I welcome the challenge to live up to my beliefs… can I give the same challenge to you?

Jacob

Still going? I’ll stick to you like a burr. Your challenge to me has no validity, I am a member of the Church founded by Jesus Christ Himself, not by an upstate New York farmboy with delusions of grandeur, I am on a Catholic forum, you are a guest.

 

[jbogedahl]

If you go back through all the LDS-related threads, you’ll find that most of them were started by Mormons who came here to inform us of our errors and bring us the “light and truth”. We have the right to correct their misconceptions about our beliefs and point out the flaws in yours.

Most of the Catholics who are most active in the LDS-related threads are former Mormons like myself. Most of us know far more about Mormonism than the Mormons who come here to proselytize us and spouting the carefully sanitized PR the LDS organization puts out today.

I have been going through many of the threads and most that I have read have been started by ex-Mormons who have joined the Catholic faith and started up conversations that incite this type of diatribe. I agree with you up to “and point out the flaws in yours”… because that’s where I feel you step over the line. Respect my beliefs, flaws and all… if that’s the way you see it. I don’t believe the same as you, but I don’t think that it’s going to prove anything for me to point out the “flaws” in your beliefs. I don’t need to put your beliefs down to make mine meaningful to me, why should you put down mine?

Thanks,

Jacob

 

[hosemonkey]

spare us. you are here as a missionary trolling for converts. you can stop with the persecution complex because no one here went to LDS sites or even “neutral” sites to combat mormon heresy. you came here. your church starts all missionary discussions with the “great apostasy” and the JS story. you call our creeds an abomination to God and all of us who profess them corrupt so don’t try to play the victim here. relativism that you pretend to espouse here is a heresy. islam is wrong and so is buddhism. you believe that too. mormonism believes no other church has any sacramental grace, that goes even further than the catholic church in proclaiming the true church.

we do not have to agree with heretics to be “christian”. i respect other religions by not going to their websites and proselyting. i stay here where people make choice to seek “catholic answers”. there are no misconceptions or untruths for you to correct here. all of our statemetns about the LDS church are easily verifiable.

Hooooorah!!!

 

[jbogedahl]

spare us. you are here as a missionary trolling for converts. you can stop with the persecution complex because no one here went to LDS sites or even “neutral” sites to combat mormon heresy. you came here. your church starts all missionary discussions with the “great apostasy” and the JS story. you call our creeds an abomination to God and all of us who profess them corrupt so don’t try to play the victim here. relativism that you pretend to espouse here is a heresy. islam is wrong and so is buddhism. you believe that too. mormonism believes no other church has any sacramental grace, that goes even further than the catholic church in proclaiming the true church.

we do not have to agree with heretics to be “christian”. i respect other religions by not going to their websites and proselyting. i stay here where people make choice to seek “catholic answers”. there are no misconceptions or untruths for you to correct here. all of our statemetns about the LDS church are easily verifiable.

I’m not asking you to agree with me or any other religion for that matter. I’m just asking for some respect for my beliefs. I’m not going to tell you what you believe, don’t try to tell me or anyone else what I believe.

I’m not here to proselyte. I’m here because I feel that what’s being said here about my beliefs and others, is not always true and not constructive in any way. Why does this forum about Non-Catholic Religions exist? I doubt it’s meant for bashing other religions and beliefs.

Thanks,

Jacob

 

[dolphinlove]

Still going? I’ll stick to you like a burr. Your challenge to me has no validity, I am a member of the Church founded by Jesus Christ Himself, not by an upstate New York farmboy with delusions of grandeur, I am on a Catholic forum, you are a guest.

delusions of grandeur???
Come now hosemonkey, your been too nice…
The stuff that Joseph Smith came up with is much more psychotic than delusional.

 

[hosemonkey]

Respect my beliefs, flaws and all… if that’s the way you see it.

 

[PaulDupre]

I don’t need to put your beliefs down to make mine meaningful to me, why should you put down mine?

Thanks,

Jacob

I don’t point out the heresy in your beliefs to give meaning to my beliefs. Not necessary, thank you. I do it because I know that Mormonism destroys families and ruins lives. They deceive and trick people into joining their cult and then alienate them from their non-member families, turn them against their parents and then make it as painful as possible for them to leave when and if they figure out that they’ve been lied to.

People need to be forewarned about the Mormon deception so they will not be scammed by you. Forewarned is forearmed.

Paul (a former Mormon)

 

[PaulDupre]

I’m not asking you to agree with me or any other religion for that matter. I’m just asking for some respect for my beliefs.

You want to talk respect? Okay, Jacob, I’ll make you a deal:

You get the LDS Church to remove from the PofGP and from the missionary discussions the passage that calls my creed (The Nicene Creed) “an abomination”* and depicts me (a professor of that creed) as “corrupt”**, and I promise I will never criticize Mormonism again.

• Abomination: A thing that is filthy, hateful and disgusting.

** Corrupt: morally degenerate and perverted : depraved

Deal or no deal?

 

[hosemonkey]

You want to talk respect? Okay, Jacob, I’ll make you a deal:

You get the LDS Church to remove from the PofGP and from the missionary discussions the passage that calls my creed (The Nicene Creed) “an abomination”* and depicts me (a professor of that creed) as “corrupt”**, and I promise I will never criticize Mormonism again.

• Abomination: A thing that is filthy, hateful and disgusting.

** Corrupt: morally degenerate and perverted : depraved

Deal or no deal?

Hooooooorah!!!

 

[hosemonkey]

I do not expose the flaws in your religion just for meanness, but to disprove and counter the errors that mormonism is trying to sell to the unsuspecting world. the flaws in Catholicism have nothing to do with the Founder of this Church, they are the fault of fallible humanity. The flaws in mormonism are the result of the evils of your founder, Joseph Smith and perpetuated by his successors.

I welcome the challenge to live up to my beliefs… can I give the same challenge to you?

Jacob

I personally do not care if you pray to the Great Pumpkin, but please do not whine if I do not view it as True Worship. If you want to come on here and play with the Big Boys, you need to get your facts straight and your arguments very tight. Otherwise we will take you apart. I recognise that you are playing with a handicap, but that is your problem, not ours. Good luck.

 

[rmcmullan]

I think the point is that the missionaries are trained to mis-direct the feelings that people get. It is a bait-and-switch tactic.

After talking about the Book of Mormon, which the investigator may or may not care about, the missionary will testify that Jesus is our savior, that he really lives, that he loves us and wants us to be with him in heaven forever. The investigator will often feel good to hear this, as well he should.

Missionary: “Are you feeling something?”

Investigator: “Yes, I feel kind of good inside.”

Missionary: “That feeling is the Holy Ghost telling you that the Book of Mormon is true and that Joseph Smith was a true prophet of God. You are very special; not everyone receives a witness from God as quickly as you did.”

Investigator: (Flattered) “Well, I’ve always been kind of spiritual.”

Missionary: “I can feel that you are. You have received personal revelation from God. The Holy Ghost is witnessing to me right now that you are a very special, chosen child of Our Heavenly Father, and he is calling you to be baptized.”

Investigator: “Really?”

Missionary: “Yes, we should obey this revelation from our Heavenly Father. Let’s schedule your baptism as soon as possible. Would next Wednesday evening be all right?”

Investigator: “Well, I guess so.”

Missionary: (Thinking) “Got one!”

So the salesman (er, missionary) steers the process from testifying of Jesus to convincing the investigator that he has had a Moroni 10:4 experience. A classic bait-and-switch. Most people aren’t nearly sophisticated enough to spot the scam. At age 21, I wasn’t.

PaulDupree, you know better than this. If you are writing from the conviction of your heart and really believe this, then I feel bad for you. I have known and still know many missionaries. My wife and sons and myself have all served missions. The world is a big mission and I can’t say something like that has never happened but what other approach can you use to develop a person’s faith? We don’t say “believe us, we’re sincere”, instead we work with people to develop enough faith to ask their Father in heaven what His will is. How can you do anything else?

The interpretation of spiritual experiences is still difficult, especially when a person is experiencing a spiritual “re-awakening” through prayer and personal struggle. But again I have to ask, what should the missionaries do or say instead?