Mormon Religion

[Stephen168]

Yes, Stephen, I most certainly did. I refer you to my answer to twopekingguys.

We are talking about your post #258 and your total and complete lack of understand of what you read in Code Law. We are talking about your total and complete lack of desire to try and understand. You are a bigot and want to stay that way.

 

[Stephen168]

Yes, Stephen, I most certainly did. I refer you to my answer to twopekingguys.

What do they have in common? You will not even take one step to understand because you need to stay ignorant.

 

[twopekinguys]

I have many of them…and after looking at them all, I see that I was incorrect. The victim herself was NOT excommunicated, and that specifically because of her age. Her mother and her doctors WERE excommunicated, but her rapist (her stepfather, who had been sexually abusing her since she was six) was not.

This nine year old was pregnant with twins. This was found out when she was rushed to the hospital complaining of stomach pains…she was four months pregnant and in grave danger of her life. The abortion was an emergency procedure.

The reason I first stated that the nine year old was also excommunicated is because the first articles about it claimed that she was–but it turns out that she was not. I’m very glad to learn that.

I will admit, however, that the church’s actions in this matter really bother me. Here you have a child who had been raped by her stepfather for three years. As a result of this rape, she is made pregnant, and is rushed to the hospital in great pain and in grave danger of her life; her pregnancy was NOT her choice. Her ‘sin’ was NOT her choice. The odds that she would have been able to carry those two babies to term were extremely poor, and the longer she was forced to remain pregnant, the more damage would have been done to her system–and that doesn’t address the emotional trauma she is going through, either.

So the mother was facing an unholy decision; sacrifice the life and health of her child for a CHANCE that two other children might live? As tragic a choice as that was, I believe she made the only one she could have made. This young girl MIGHT have a life; a chance to grow up and have babies. Without that abortion, rather than one life with a ‘maybe’ chance, we would have, in all probability, all three children dead.

…and the church excommunicates the mother and the doctors who chose to save one life rather than lose three, and NOT to excommunicate the man responsible for raping his own stepdaughter.

You can find a pretty good article about this here:

and here

Thanks for the link, but I used the one that Rebecca supplied.

Abortion is a touchy subject no matter what the circumstances. It is extremely difficult when children are involved.

But here’s the deal. All human life is sacred, from conception until natural death.

In a case like this, people think the church is wrong for its strict stance concerning a 9 year old girl. If the church had made an exception in this case, what would that have done? Plenty, none of which would have been good.

We would have been wrong for caving in to the proabortion crowd.

We would have heard how Catholics changed the rules on that, when are they going to change the rules on issues A, B, or C?

Either way, the church would receive flack.

As far as the stepfather/rapist, I don’t know if he was Catholic. Nothing I have read states one way or the other. If he wasn’t, then of course the Church would have no jurisdiction in that.

Let me go back on one thing here. No one said the 9yr old girl sinned in this case.

As far as the odds of her carrying the babies to term, we have no way of knowing now, do we? There are many documented cases of extremely high risk pregnancies that Dr.s never thought would make it to delivery, but have. Successfully, I might add.

I might also add that you are embelishing a bit. One of the articles states she went to the hospital complaining of “Severe stomach pains”. The articles do not mention that she was in danger of death. Although I am sure, to a 9yr old, whatever she was feeling was painful for her.

No one is saying that she sinned. No one is saying that it isn’t a horrible thing. In fact, if you read the article that Rebecca posted, you will see that the church is calling for punishment against the person that did this.

 

[Stephen168]

Thanks for the link, but I used the one that Rebecca supplied.

Abortion is a touchy subject no matter what the circumstances. It is extremely difficult when children are involved.

But here’s the deal. All human life is sacred, from conception until natural death.

In a case like this, people think the church is wrong for its strict stance concerning a 9 year old girl. If the church had made an exception in this case, what would that have done? Plenty, none of which would have been good.

We would have been wrong for caving in to the proabortion crowd.

We would have heard how Catholics changed the rules on that, when are they going to change the rules on issues A, B, or C?

Either way, the church would receive flack.

As far as the stepfather/rapist, I don’t know if he was Catholic. Nothing I have read states one way or the other. If he wasn’t, then of course the Church would have no jurisdiction in that.

Let me go back on one thing here. No one said the 9yr old girl sinned in this case.

As far as the odds of her carrying the babies to term, we have no way of knowing now, do we? There are many documented cases of extremely high risk pregnancies that Dr.s never thought would make it to delivery, but have. Successfully, I might add.

I might also add that you are embelishing a bit. One of the articles states she went to the hospital complaining of “Severe stomach pains”. The articles do not mention that she was in danger of death. Although I am sure, to a 9yr old, whatever she was feeling was painful for her.

No one is saying that she sinned. No one is saying that it isn’t a horrible thing. In fact, if you read the article that Rebecca posted, you will see that the church is calling for punishment against the person that did this.

This thread of discussion also goes back to Dianaid’s ignorance of Code Law displayed in post #258. Amazing

 

[dianaiad]

First of all, you original comment about dropping the host did not refer to intentional desacration. You only included that in a later post. So that point is moot.

No. it is not. ‘dropping the host’ all by itself may refer to both intentional and unintentional actions. As you have been conversing with me for quite some time, you should know that I meant an intentional action, not an unintentional one, and it is THAT which I clarified in a later post.

As such, it is anything BUT ‘moot.’

Of course an individual who intentionally defames the blessed sacrament would incur an excommunication, because of intent.

Well there now. We agree.

Now, onto the taking a swing at the Bishop.

What you are missing with all of this is " latae sententiae". That is a self imposed excommunication. Meaning that the individual knew what they were doing wrong, they are now in a state of sin, and should not approach the sacraments.

How interesting that I could write ‘latae sententiae" so many times, explain exactly what it means, and then you tell me that I’m missing “latae sententaie” because it means what I had already told you it means. “Automatic” and "self imposed’ are, in THIS case, equivalent. Excommunication. The WORD IS ACTUALLY USED, y’know…and when the words 'reserved to the Holy See" are used, it is my understanding that such an excommunication can only be lifted BY the Holy See.

Now THAT’S excommunication.

That is far different that a ecclesiastical excommunication, which would be a formal declaration from the Church heirarchy.

No argument there…I never claimed that they were precisely equivalent. However, excommunication is excommunication. The remedy for either one is that the excommunications, which are very real, must be LIFTED by a the proper authority, specifically.

With a latae sententiae, if the person was repentant, they would then go to confession, etc. and all would be good.

Not quite; evidently a simple confession with the parish priest is not sufficient. For instance, the Pope himself must lift those 'reserved to the Holy See" and it takes a Bishop to lift others–unless he authorizes the priests in his area to do so. I understand that some do—and some don’t. However, whether they do authorize this or not, it requires something more than a simple confession to take care of the matter.

Let’s look at the lady that climbed the rail at St. Peters on Christmas Eve, pulled the Pope down, and also knocked down a Cardinal (I think he was a Cardinal). Keep in mind this is the second year in a row she has jumped the rail trying to get to the Pope.

Assuming that she was Catholic, it does not mean that she would receive an ecclesiastical excommunication. Based on reports I have seen, it appears the woman was unstable, and therefore was probably not responsible for her actions.

Possibly not…however, if she were Catholic and she was responsible, and if, in any part of her life she had read canon law (or had heard about this) then the penalty is right there. This method of yours of arguing with me by agreeing with me is interesting, if a little bemusing.

Canon Law is like civil law. Canon Law is written for canon lawyers to interpret, not lay people.

It seems pretty straight forward to me.

As for the ex-ing of the calendar guys, maybe you haven’t been clear in your previous posts. What do you guys do, print out a newsletter of who got ex-d this week?

Are you serious? The publicity surrounding this issue was so supermarket tabloid shark attack that IF any of the models had been excommunicated, that fact would have been bleated about like trumpets in a fanfare. In fact, since they were not, THAT issue HAS been made much of; Hardy ex’d, the models not…and buried in almost every news story is a throwaway line about how many/most/some of the models attended disciplinary hearings.

I have news for you, sir; being CALLED to such a hearing is discipline enough. Most of those things end up as counseling sessions; some result in some form of probation, or disfellowship—but excommunication would be a matter of church record and someone would have glommed onto that like a piranha fish.

continued on next post

 

[zaffiroborant]

“Dropping the Host on the floor” (and you should know that I meant a deliberate action, not an accidental one, given that the view on ‘sin’ is very similar between Catholic and LDS beliefs; if you do not intend to sin, and don’t know you are sinning, then there is no sin; if that wasn’t obvious, I’m sorry) is very much covered in the above statute as ‘throwing it away.’

And you should know that as Catholics we would associate “dropping the host” with well, you know, dropping the host during communion. It is after all something we really don’t want to have happen and the chance is there every Sunday.

If “dropping the host” is equivalent to “throwing the host away” then a “temple recommend interview” is equivalent to “temple recommend interrogation” after all they are both nothing more than a question and answer session.

 

[Xavierlives]

I’m sorry, but in this case I’ll have to insist…and refer you to the 1983 code of canon law.

For “dropping the Host,” see Part II, “Penalties for Individual Delicts” Title 1, Delicts against Religion and the Unity of the Church, Cann.1367: " A person who throws away the consecrated species or takes or retains them for a sacrilegious purpose incurs a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See; moreover, a cleric can be punished with another penalty, not excluding dismissal from the clerical state."

“Dropping the Host on the floor” (and you should know that I meant a deliberate action, not an accidental one, given that the view on ‘sin’ is very similar between Catholic and LDS beliefs; if you do not intend to sin, and don’t know you are sinning, then there is no sin; if that wasn’t obvious, I’m sorry) is very much covered in the above statute as ‘throwing it away.’

Come to think of it, your statute doesn’t seem to have a lot of ‘give’ in it. One may throw consecrated communion wafers and wine away–even knowing that they WERE consecrated, without intending sacriledge. However, the above statement separates the two concepts, so that *disrespectfully *throwing them away would fall under the OTHER clause: “Takes or retains them for a sacrilegious purpose…” that purpose being disrespectful disposal. “Dropping the Host on the Floor” is a rather deliberate bit of sacrilege, unless one is simply being a true innocent klutz. There are, I understand, rules for how a priest who ACCIDENTALLY drops a wafer should behave.

For attacking the Pope or the Bishop, see:

Can. 1370 §1. A person who uses physical force against the Roman Pontiff incurs a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See; if he is a cleric, another penalty, not excluding dismissal from the clerical state, can be added according to the gravity of the delict.

§2. A person who does this against a bishop incurs a latae sententiae interdict and, if he is a cleric, also a latae sententiae suspension.

§3. A person who uses physical force against a cleric or religious out of contempt for the faith, the Church, ecclesiastical power, or the ministry is to be punished with a just penalty.

I’d say ‘taking a swing at a Bishop’ is rather clearly covered by the above.

Hey, it’s not MY canon law. It’s yours. You may become more familiar with it here.

I’m not telling you what you believe. Only you know that…and evidently you don’t believe that dropping the Host on the floor and taking a swing at a Bishop is worthy of excommunication. Well, in a way you are correct; those things are not WORTHY OF excommunication, as in 'You might get excommunicated if you do these things." They are self accomplishing events. It’s not ‘you might be…’ but “oops, you just excommunicated yourself. Now you need to figure out how to become a communicant again, because as of the instant of the sin, you are ex’d.”

I’m quoting Canon Law to you, chapter and verse. Go look for yourself.

If they had been excommunicated, we would have known. The exact reasons FOR it wouldn’t have been published…but the fact of it would have been known. Any lesser discipline is none of our business.

Who is under more condemnation, sir…Adam and Eve, who ate of the fruit, or Satan, for orchestrating and tempting them?

There very much IS a difference.

But the Mormons are a bit more free and loose with their excommunication. Tick them off and show some boy flesh and POOF! You are gone!

I wonder if you have to pay up your tithe before you are allowed to attend your excommunication hearing?

 

[Stephen168]

Let’s look at the lady that climbed the rail at St. Peters on Christmas Eve, pulled the Pope down, and also knocked down a Cardinal (I think he was a Cardinal). Keep in mind this is the second year in a row she has jumped the rail trying to get to the Pope.

Assuming that she was Catholic, it does not mean that she would receive an ecclesiastical excommunication. Based on reports I have seen, it appears the woman was unstable, and therefore was probably not responsible for her actions.

She is hilarious.
[/QUOTE]

 

[Stephen168]

But the Mormons are a bit more free and loose with their excommunication. Tick them off and show some boy flesh and POOF! You are gone!

It seems to me it is sales. What the former missionaries did would not effect sales; but what Hardy did would.

 

[Stephen168]

And you should know that as Catholics we would associate “dropping the host” with well, you know, dropping the host during communion.

I don’t think of the word ‘drop’ as a deliberate act either, ‘throw’ but not ‘drop,’ but it is her Catholicism lesson to us Catholics.

 

[aspirant]

Only in peculiar circumstances. The person must, for example, already know both the relevant canon law and its consequence. The person must be at least 16 years old and not lack the use of reason.

So conditions have to be met, and the ones I listed are among them. These things don’t just happen.

Are you claiming that no Catholic anywhere is aware of this?

No, but as I have pointed out repeatedly, many Catholics do not. The average Catholic knows very little about canon law. This is not the sort of thing one learns in grade school religion classes, which focus on far more important matters.

It wasn’t that long ago that the church excommunicated an entire family, including the nine year old involved, for procuring an abortion for her after she was raped by a relative. Her not being 16 didn’t seem to affect her own excommunication for this action.

You’ve made some errors here. The people who procured and performed the abortion, if the other conditions were met, excommunicated themselves. This is how latae sententiae excommunication works. The child, of course, was not excommunicated, because she was incapable of meeting the conditions for excommunication.

The law must be deliberately violated, the person not coerced by grave fear, the person not acting in legitimate self-defense or defense of another, etc. It’s difficult to incur this kind of penalty, and impossible to incur it without knowing in advance it’s going to happen. One must, so to speak, be very committed incurring the penalty in order to incur the penalty.

One cannot accidentally excommunicate oneself, as you’ve previously implied. Many conditions must be met. As I said, one must be pretty committed to incurring the penalty in order to incur it.

On one hand, you seem to be saying that since Catholics don’t KNOW about this provision of canon law, that they aren’t excommunicated, so that’s all right.

I’ve said nothing of the sort.

Why DON’T y’all know? Isn’t this stuff in the catechism?

No, the Code of Canon Law, Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches, and particular canon laws of the various Eastern Catholic Churches are not in the Catechism. They are several large tomes to themselves.

The purpose of the Catechism is aid the teaching/learning of Catholic doctrine and morality. We are free to study canon law, and I think it is very good when we do, but, as I have said a number of times now, doctrine and morality are far more important.

I mean after all, if it is important enough to get you EX’d, don’t you think you should be TOLD about it?

The moral teaching of the Church about things like abortion, for example, are common knowledge. Few Catholics would be unaware that procured abortion is gravely wrong, and a mortal sin if procured or performed with full knowledge and deliberate consent. This is far and away more important.

But if you aren’t told–WHY aren’t you told?

Anyone is free to study canon law, but since few of us will become professional canon lawyers and such, there are much more important things on which we should focus.

It’s no secret–anybody can find it.

Correct.

 

[dianaiad]

continued from previous post

I asked you why the models didn’t get ex’d, and your response was something like…I don’t know, maybe because they can’t get ex’d twice.

Yes. I wrote that. Something about 'I don’t know…" and “maybe” should have given you a clue that the next phrase was a wild guess. At the time I honestly didn’t know whether any of the young men HAD been excommunicated. I later learned that no, they had not.

My first thought was that I couldn’t imagine that a young returned missionary who was still active, and who didn’t have a problem with the church would DO that. It seemed to me then, (and it still does) that this modeling gig was a pretty big statement of “F*** YOU” to the church by those models.

Leading one to assume they had been ex’d. Then you said they were disciplined, then you said no one knows.

Let’s look at the inconsistencies of ex-ing in the lds.

You have a guy that created a beefcake calendar that had the models more covered than they would have been at the beach. He gets ex-d.

You have several guys model for the calendar, voluntarily, and sought to be photographed in a beefcake calendar where they have more clothes on than they would at the beach. No-exing.

Now I’m going to back a little further.

Indeed. You are about to go back four years…

How about 3 missionaries, on their mission who desecrated a Catholic shrine, and post pictures on the internet. No-ex-ing there either.

Do you see the inconsistencies yet?

All of them were formally disciplined; disfellowshipped, and the one young man who was still serving his mission at the time was sent home in disgrace. The members of the church involved forgave them, and did not, finally, pursue felony charges against them. Had they been Catholic, they would have attended confession, and all would be fine with them now.

But nothing is fine with them now. They would have been better off excommunicated. There is nothing, and I mean NOTHING, that could have been done to them that would have been worse than being sent home from a mission with dishonor. The two whose missions were completed were disciplined…disfellowshipped…and you can be assured that these three men’s lives have been ruined. They will never hold any sort of important position in the church. They will never be able to run for office, nor get any sort of state license to do anything. They will spend the rest of their lives regretting that action.

YOUR people forgave them. We…are requiring more. You have no right to insist that we do more than we are doing; you gave up your rights to their futures when y’all forgave them.
In fact, you don’t even have the right to condemn nor forgive–not when the people whose sacred site they vandalized DID forgive them.

You keep going on about inconsistencies: look to your own. Do YOU not see an inconsistency with excommunicating a mother for taking an action to save her child’s life, but NOT excommunicating the rapist who endangered it?

Now THAT, sir, is inconsistency.

Do you not see an inconsistency in insisting upon our excommunicating three young men who were actually forgiven by YOUR people–whose vandalism went completely unnoticed for nearly two years and would still be unnoticed had those YouTube videos not been aired–but not so much as an expression of regret for all the vandalism that was not only committed by your members, but done so at the direction of your leaders, right up to the Pope?

So you are upset that we don’t excommunicate to your standards?

Tough. I find it inconsistent that an organization will issue indulgences and blanket forgiveness of sins to thousands of it’s members as a reward for the sort of vandalism that is instantly noticed, and generally covered with blood–yet get upset because we have merely destroyed the lives of three young men whose actions would never have been noticed had those YouTube videos not been aired.

I find it inconsistent that an organization will excommunicate heretics and blasphemers, but not murderers and rapists.

I find it inconsistent that there is a clear provision regarding excommunication and the actions that result in it in your canon law, and y’all can actually sit there and claim “well, it doesn’t apply to me—you have to know what you are doing and few Catholics understand that part of canon law–it’s too complicated and needs a lawyer to decipher it–you could find it, anybody else can too so it doesn’t mean anything and by the way, where’s YOUR canon law–” Well now, sirs…those arguments have got to be the epitome of inconsistency.

What we both understand, I think, is that excommunication is never as cut and dried as our opponents want it to be. Everything depends upon one thing; getting the sinner BACK. That, I notice, is the stated goal of Catholicism in terms of excommunication. It certainly is the stated goal of Mormonism…and if we both can get the sinner back on the right track without it, why go that far?

Excommunication, like any form of religious discipline, is about the sinner–not the wishes of onlookers. It doesn’t matter what I want, or what you want; like the confessional, it’s between the sinner, the church, and God.

 

[aspirant]

Aspirant, I’m sorry. I realize that for people who do not know me and my beliefs regarding what sin is, that my words could be taken to mean ‘accidently’ dropping the Host. I was not referring to an accident, at all. In fact, I am very aware that there are specific things that a priest is instructed to do if the Host is accidently dropped–and none of them involve excommunication.

I am referring, always and only, to deliberate acts. That is one thing that Catholics and Mormons have in common

Thank you.

On the other hand, the code of canon law does separate ‘throwing away’ from ‘deliberate desecration.’

In truth, deliberately disposing of a Host in a manner known to be inappropriate (e.g. chucking Jesus into a trash can) is itself a desecration. I think they just wanted to be clear that desecration was not limited to something like using the Host in a Black Mass.

 

[aspirant]

For attacking the Pope or the Bishop, see:

Can. 1370 §1. A person who uses physical force against the Roman Pontiff incurs a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See; if he is a cleric, another penalty, not excluding dismissal from the clerical state, can be added according to the gravity of the delict.

§2. A person who does this against a bishop incurs a latae sententiae interdict and, if he is a cleric, also a latae sententiae suspension.

§3. A person who uses physical force against a cleric or religious out of contempt for the faith, the Church, ecclesiastical power, or the ministry is to be punished with a just penalty.

I’d say ‘taking a swing at a Bishop’ is rather clearly covered by the above.

Using physical force against a bishop incurs interdict, not excommunication.

It’s not ‘you might be…’ but "oops, you just excommunicated yourself.

You asked me why I mentioned all the conditions before. This is why. There is no “oops” about it. One has to be pretty darned determined to incur the penalty in order to actually incur it. It cannot happen by accident.

 

[dianaiad]

If you look at the posts from ldstocatholic, you will see that based on dates and ages given in various posts, they were about in 2nd grade. I’m guessing about 8 yrs old.

I doubt that an 8 yr old sitting there listening to a priest and his mother talking got all of the details, let alone all of the details correct.

We will have to get it directly from her, of course, but I imagine that her mother told her what happened when she was old enough to understand it. I rather doubt that this small child was PRESENT at all of those meetings, myself. However, we will have to ask her.

You will also see that they go from lds neighbors etc. helping to, wishing the Catholics had something like that.

One post says this was in 1988+/-. Catholic Charities has been around since 1910. This is their centennial year. They have never, and I repeat never turned anyone down because of religious affiliation. St. Vincent DePaul food pantries operated in various parishes have never turned anyone away because of religous affiliation.

She didn’t mention any of those organizations. She mentioned her parish priest. Again, we’ll have to ask her.

A person in need is a person in need, regardless of marital status and religious affiliation.

I agree.

Now, when it comes to tuition in a Catholic school, that is a different story. I can see where the parish would not subsidize the tuition of a person who is divorced and remarried.

First, she specifically stated that her mother was a ‘single mother…’ i.e. NOT remarried. Second, the CHILD was not divorced or remarried; what’s up with that?

If the parent is divorced only, and not living with someone out of wedlock, I’m sure the parish would assist with tuition for the student if financially able.

Actually, most of the parish schools I investigated a few weeks ago would have; they had ‘scholarship’ or subsidies for members of their parishes. However, this poster said that her parish did not. (shrug) Not everybody does everything the same.

I am not saying that this person lied, but I will say they probably don’t have all of the information correct, based on their age at the time of the events.

That is quite possible.

 

[aspirant]

Let’s look at the lady that climbed the rail at St. Peters on Christmas Eve, pulled the Pope down, and also knocked down a Cardinal (I think he was a Cardinal). Keep in mind this is the second year in a row she has jumped the rail trying to get to the Pope.

Assuming that she was Catholic, it does not mean that she would receive an ecclesiastical excommunication. Based on reports I have seen, it appears the woman was unstable, and therefore was probably not responsible for her actions.

I think it is probably safe to say that in her case we’re talking about “a person who lacked the use of reason,” as Canon Law puts it.

Canon Law is like civil law. Canon Law is written for canon lawyers to interpret, not lay people.

Yes. There are longstanding principles of legal interpretation that aren’t even part of the Code itself. To become a canon lawyer requires years of study and degrees in canon law, much like becoming a civil lawyer.

 

[dianaiad]

But the issue of secrecy also leads to widely different interpretations.

But as has been pointed out, the code of canon law is not a bit secret; I found it, anybody can. A mouse click. A question to the Parish priest. Some smidgen of curiousity…

Based on the fact that you do handle things differently, and inconsistently, that is your problem. Do you not see a problem with 85 different bishops interpreting things 85 different ways?

Nope. No more than I see the inconsistencies in the arguments I have seen HERE regarding your own canon law. They are all over the place, you realize that, don’t you?

There wasn’t any slur. I’m not sure how you got that far.

]

It was a joke, sir. I’m a professional educator and a postgraduate student. As such, my research skills are supposed to be better than average.I’m SUPPOSED to be able to find things that would be difficult for the average guy to find. That doesn’t necessarily follow, of course, but I was reacting to the obvious intimation of a lack of such ability, with the ‘if you can, anybody can’ sort.

I didn’t know about this particular case,(the 9yr old with the abortion) as far as canon law, I knew it, I never said I didn’t. I understand latae sententaie quite well.

Back to the abortion thing.

DO you? then why in the world are you arguing with me? As I said before, this 'argument by agreement" is bemusing.

 

[dianaiad]

We are talking about your post #258 and your total and complete lack of understand of what you read in Code Law. We are talking about your total and complete lack of desire to try and understand. You are a bigot and want to stay that way.

Please, sir, exactly how have I misunderstood anything I read in the code of canon law?

 

[Xavierlives]

But nothing is fine with them now. They would have been better off excommunicated. There is nothing, and I mean NOTHING, that could have been done to them that would have been worse than being sent home from a mission with dishonor. The two whose missions were completed were disciplined…disfellowshipped…and you can be assured that these three men’s lives have been ruined. They will never hold any sort of important position in the church. They will never be able to run for office, nor get any sort of state license to do anything. They will spend the rest of their lives regretting that action.

Surely you are mistaken on the “state license” issue. As much as Mormons control the whole of Utah, they can’t limit state licenses.

 

[aspirant]

Let me go back on one thing here. No one said the 9yr old girl sinned in this case.

Given her age and the circumstances, I cannot imagine she did.