LDS restoration

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Ummm…gazelam…I think it is safe to say that we agree that Christ, through the ministry of His Holy Church, brings people to salvation.
So…did Joseph Smith accomplish what Jesus Christ could not, did not?
Is the Church of Jesus Christ:
-a church He established that still stands today?
-one that fell apart after less than 100 years or so?
-a restored church that has stood the test of time for nearly 200 years?
And if the latter, does this logically conclude that Joseph Smith was a better steward of God’s Word than Jesus Christ? That Joseph Smith was a better/more convincing teacher of the Gospel? That Smith chose a wiser, more faithful and stronger group of men to carry forth the work of the church?
 
And if the latter, does this logically conclude that Joseph Smith was a better steward of God’s Word than Jesus Christ?
Well Joseph certainly thought so, as RuthAnne pointed out in Joseph’s own words:
“I have more to boast of than ever any man had. I am the only man that has ever been able to keep a whole church together since the days of Adam. A large majority of the whole have stood by me. Neither Paul, John, Peter, nor Jesus ever did it. I boast that no man ever did such a work as I. The followers of Jesus ran away from Him; but the Latter-day Saints never ran away from me yet.”
 
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So…did Joseph Smith accomplish what Jesus Christ could not, did not?
FYI, a lot of us LDS folk don’t really spend any time thinking about Joseph Smith’s boast. When we do, we’re not particularly interested in defending it. We say to ourselves, “Yep, Joseph was not perfect. He tended to boast. And that one boast especially wasn’t helpful, and has ticked off Christians for 180 years.” Then we go back to our discipleship and trying to be a good follower of Christ and whatnot.

I mean, there are plenty of prophetic utterances we’ll fight for and defend, but Joseph imperfect behavior isn’t really one of them.

Hope this helps.
 
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Mormon Church has misled members on $100 billion tax-exempt investment fund,…

A former investment manager accused the church of stockpiling surplus donations from members instead of using them for charitable works, according to a copy of his complaint to the IRS. He also accused church leaders of using the donations to prop up…

The LDS church gives no accounting of its finances to the members. Only a few at the top know where all the money goes. Their absurd excuse for this cannot stand.
Thank you for posting this. It’s a real eye-opener. Whatever the Washington Post’s liberal and anti-Trump biases — they are relentless on the latter, and as a daily online subscriber, I tire of it after a while, they run it entirely into the ground — they do an excellent job in exposing financial corruption. All religious and charitable entities should be absolutely transparent in all of their financial matters.

I was also interested to see how the financial offerings of Catholics are very modest by comparison. Catholic religious giving is nowhere near what it could (and perhaps should) be, that’s just something that has never really been emphasized. It does not cost nearly as much to run a church, when you can get by with paying the clergy and religious so little. That is one benefit of celibacy — Catholics don’t have to support priests’ families, because (with a very small number of exceptions, Eastern Rite priests and clerical converts from Protestant sects) they don’t have families to support.
 
I’m not the one who cited Smith’s quote, and that I really don’t take issue with it. I am only interested in the conclusion we must reach if we accept that Smith’s work was more fruitful than Christ’s work, in terms of building the church.
 
FYI, a lot of us LDS folk don’t really spend any time thinking about Joseph Smith’s boast.
Maybe they should, because this is only the tip of the iceberg (and LEAST problematic) of Joseph’s bad behavior. Perhaps if they were willing to look at the real historical man and see the full extent of his many serious transgressions, they would come to know the truth that Joseph isn’t at all whom they romanticize him to be. Among other things, he was a fraud, a conman, and a false prophet. Once you know the real man is not the false picture presented by the Mormon church, there is no way you can hold him in high esteem.
 
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Isn’t Joseph Smith the gatekeeper for Mormons to get into heaven as well? Perhaps my memory is off but I remember being told that every Mormon has to get JS’s approval to enter! Talk about an ego!
 
All religious and charitable entities should be absolutely transparent in all of their financial matters.
The LDS church is the opposite of transparent when it comes to many issues, its finances being just one of them.
I was also interested to see how the financial offerings of Catholics are very modest by comparison
That’s the difference between requiring tithing in order to not lose your family for eternity (Mormonsim), and not requiring tithing to fully participate in all rites and blessings (Catholicism). One is pay-to-play, the other is not. You can’t really fully admire the giving of LDS to their church because it is compelled and not voluntary. In fact, each Mormon is required to attend a personal interview once each year with their bishop, where they are asked many personal questions, one of them being whether or not they are a full tithe payer. In order to attend the temple and be in good standing with the church, that answer must be “yes.”

And yes, Catholics should give more, but at least it’s not forced. The Church does encourage Catholics to tithe, giving 5% to the church and 5% to charities of their choice, but no one ever asks for that personal information, and it has no bearing on whether one can fully participate in the rites of the Church. In the case of Mormonism, tithing is required and the full amount must go to the church. If one wishes to donate to other charities, that’s above and beyond the tithe to the church. Doing so is quite admirable because that IS voluntary.
 
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That’s the difference between requiring tithing in order to not lose your family for eternity (Mormonsim), and not requiring tithing in order to fully participate in all rites and blessings (Catholicism). … In fact, each Mormon is required to attend a personal interview once each year with their bishop, where they are asked many personal questions, one of them being whether or not they are a full tithe payer…

And yes, Catholics should give more, but at least it’s not forced. The Church does encourage Catholics to tithe, giving 5% to the church and 5% to charities of their choice, but no one ever asks for that personal information, and it has no bearing on whether one can fully participate in the rites of the Church. In the case of Mormonism, tithing is required and the full amount must go to the church. If one wishes to donate to other charities that’s above and beyond the tithe to the church.
Mormons are not the only religion that make large financial demands of their adherents. The Baptist church across the road from my house insists upon seeing its members’ tax returns, to ensure that they are tithing. The “better” churches — the ones downtown that the local elites attend, that very often have “First” in their names — also have large financial expectations of their members, especially when it is known that these members “have money”. In fact, growing up (I was not raised Catholic), one reason we didn’t go to church — aside from faith just not being a priority in our family — was that the “better” churches, the ones downtown that didn’t holler, and shout, and roll in the aisles (as for the latter, some did, some didn’t), the more “sophisticated” or “reserved” churches, had financial expectations that we couldn’t meet. The more “working-class” churches were seen as being “rednecky” and uncouth. So we just didn’t go anywhere.

I will say, though, that as having been a parent of a child in a somewhat prestigious (in their own eyes possibly moreso than in actual fact) Catholic school, there is definitely the expectation that you will either donate large, or else work your hindquarters off in service to the school. I did neither — I didn’t have it to give, and I had a very demanding career that didn’t pay much and that left me, at the end of the day, desiring nothing so much as my easy chair and my bed, to rest for a few hours before getting back up the next morning and doing it all over again. (I tried working with the Scouts on weekends for awhile, as much to foster my own son’s interest in it as anything else, but that didn’t last.) My lack of donation and lack of participation, in retrospect, does not seem to have been received well.

Gone are the days when Catholic schools were “just where you went” if you were Catholic, charged little if any tuition, delivered a solid basic education instead of aspiring to be “all things to all people”, didn’t act as magnet schools for the wealthy of all faiths and none, and had an abundance of priests and religious to teach for very low pay (in the case of the religious, simply room and board with a minimal personal allowance).
 
My lack of donation and lack of participation, in retrospect, does not seem to have been received well.
Well I would say there is a difference between “does not seem to have been received well” versus being denied the opportunity to be sealed to your family for all eternity because you didn’t pay a full tithe. It’s not even close.
 
My lack of donation and lack of participation, in retrospect, does not seem to have been received well.
No, it’s not, I understand that. I simply meant that, in the case of high-powered “elite” Catholic academies, that charge massive amounts for tuition, the tuition itself is just the beginning, they expect donations, or if you can’t afford that, they expect labor. Donating $100 per year to the annual building fund comes across as being a piker. Many deserving Catholic pupils, not all of them high achievers (“average” kids need a Catholic education too!), do not go to Catholic schools because they can’t afford it. Securing financial aid often involves jumping through hoops and having your family finances picked to pieces to make sure that, indeed, you are “poor folks”. (We never applied for FA.)
 
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Isn’t Joseph Smith the gatekeeper for Mormons to get into heaven as well? Perhaps my memory is off but I remember being told that every Mormon has to get JS’s approval to enter! Talk about an ego!
Journal of Discourses 7:289;…no man or woman in this dispensation will ever enter into the celestial kingdom of God without the consent of Joseph Smith. From the day that the Priesthood was taken from the earth to the winding-up scene of all things, every man and woman must have the certificate of Joseph Smith, junior, as a passport to their entrance into the mansion where God and Christ are—I with you and you with me. I cannot go there without his consent. He holds the keys of that kingdom for the last dispensation—the keys to rule in the spirit-world; and he rules there triumphantly… ” – Brigham Young, Salt Lake City, October 9, 1859
 
Of course pretty women have the best chance of getting Joe to punch their passport to the CK. Just saying …
 
Journal of Discourses 7:289;…no man or woman in this dispensation will ever enter into the celestial kingdom of God without the consent of Joseph Smith. From the day that the Priesthood was taken from the earth to the winding-up scene of all things, every man and woman must have the certificate of Joseph Smith, junior, as a passport to their entrance into the mansion where God and Christ are—I with you and you with me. I cannot go there without his consent. He holds the keys of that kingdom for the last dispensation—the keys to rule in the spirit-world; and he rules there triumphantly… ” – Brigham Young, Salt Lake City, October 9, 1859
Could these guys be any more full of themselves? How they allow their signature university to be named after that racist polygamist is beyond all reason.
 
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How they allow their signature university to be named after that racist polygamist is beyond all reason.
As my Jack Mormon uncle used to call it, Bring’em Young University.
 
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And the whole polygamy thing, I just don’t get. How does it even work if there are more men than women in the celestial kingdom? And according to my understanding of Mormonism, that is the case.
 
And the whole polygamy thing, I just don’t get. How does it even work if there are more men than women in the celestial kingdom? And according to my understanding of Mormonism, that is the case.
I hesitate to speculate on this, because there is no way it can come out right, but the men marry younger women, possibly?
 
That doesn’t solve the problem if there simply are not enough women to go around.
 
That doesn’t solve the problem if there simply are not enough women to go around.
Maybe some of the men remain unmarried. I do know that in the fundamentalist communities, they remove some of the younger bachelors involuntarily, I would assume, to free up the younger women to be multiple wives.

I do want to be clear that the mainstream COJCOLDS has renounced polygamy. The small polygamous sects are schismatic from mainstream LDS.
 
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