Mormon Religion

[zaffiroborant]

I was wondering if an ex-Mormon could tell me: Is this attitude of judging people’s hearts and minds; and telling them what they should think is a typical part of Mormon culture?

I see alot of it over on New Order Mormon.

 

[scottj]

New to this site and started reading this whole long thread thinking it would be one thing and sad to see it’s like little kids on a playground screaming my mom is better than your mom instead of a sharing of idea’s and learning about each other’s religion. I’m Catholic- I have a cousin who is Mormon. I love her and pray for her, as she does for me. More so, I respect her right to worship God and Jesus however she wants to. I don’t have to like it, just respect it.
This is not meant as a personal attack to any poster here, just an outside observation. Thanks.

 

[sablouwho]

New to this site and started reading this whole long thread thinking it would be one thing and sad to see it’s like little kids on a playground screaming my mom is better than your mom instead of a sharing of idea’s and learning about each other’s religion. I’m Catholic- I have a cousin who is Mormon. I love her and pray for her, as she does for me. More so, I respect her right to worship God and Jesus however she wants to. I don’t have to like it, just respect it.
This is not meant as a personal attack to any poster here, just an outside observation. Thanks.

It’s really nice to see someone say this–particularly a Catholic considering that there is so much apparent hatred of Mormons here.

 

[Answersplease]

I have not, Answersplease. However, since your method of posting makes it a royal pain in the behind TO quote and answer you, you will have to excuse me if I choose not to answer posts which are as off base as this one is. For instance…

Yes, Answersplease, that IS what happens with latae sententiae excommunication–something that I have also stated many times. This is, again, a case of my declaring that the sky is blue and you telling me that I’m wrong because the sky is actually blue.

OK. So? Are you talking about latae sententiae, where the sinner pretty much excommunicates himself, or the other sort–which is not merely recognized, but is actually imposed?

No. Suicide is suicide. Euthanasia is not. Euthanasia, though it may not be murder in the legal sense, is certainly the killing of one person by another. I’m sure that in some, if not many, instances the victim is aware of, and approves, the action, but it’s still done by someone else.

Actually, answersplease, you aren’t repeating yourself. You are repeating ME—and then claiming that I still don’t get it right, even when everything you are ‘correcting’ me about is actually in full agreement with what I wrote!

But ok, if you want to talk about LDS excommunication, go right ahead. I don’t know a lot about the full range of Mormon excommunication, though. Some of the smaller Mormon groups have a very different view of it than the CoJCoLDS does.

Yep. I said that.

I see. “Quinn was actually excommunicated because fo those publications because he said so himself…???” Even though he didn’t attend the disciplinary meeting that resulted in that excommunication, and even though it is public record that he was excommunicates for, FIRST, actions unbecoming a member of the church (an charge that is used ONLY in matters of moral problems–active homosexual lifestyle, adultery…stuff like that) and only SECOND for apostasy–and that last charge was not unanimous?

Personally, no matter how much you WANT to believe Quinns’ side of this, given that he WAS kicked out by Mormons and all and you automatically want to assume that nobody ever gets excommunicated by the LDS church who actually deserves it, the facts simply do not support you.

Fact: Quinn is gay. He was actively gay at the time of his excommunication. We do indeed excommunicate actively gay members, for the same reason we tend to excommunicate others who break those very simple moral laws. Especially after they have been through the Temple, abandoned his wife and otherwise broken most of his Temple covenants…and that is why he was ex’d. If you want to call that ‘anti-gay,’ be my guest–though it isn’t being gay that is the problem. it’s ACTING upon it that is. It is a very difficult path to walk, being faithful, LDS and gay.

OK.

You don’t excommunicate active gays. You also do not excommunicate murderers, rapists, child molesters and a few others who commit horrendous and very mortal sins. Your choice.

Whether that is a good thing or not is in the eye of the believer, I suppose. You think it’s a good thing you don’t, and I think it’s a good thing we do.

Yes, you always go back to that subject of how the Catholic Church doesn’t excommunicate murderers and rapists and etc.

YOU WERE TOLD MANY TIMES BY ME THAT THERE IS NO CONFUSION ABOUT THOSE SINS (the people who commit them know they are wrong but they do them anyway), therefore there is no need to formally pronounce an excommunication, the informal excommunication IS ENOUGH, and those sins are ENOUGH to send them to hell if God judges that they deserve it.

THERE IS A LOT OF CONFUSION ABOUT ABORTION (millions of Catholics think it is not so bad), therefore the Catholic Church must clear up that confusion by FORMALLY PRONOUNCING an EXCOMMUNICATION.

You just like to keep bringing it up again just so you can make it seem like that the Catholic Church condones that kind of behaviour and to BASH THE CATHOLIC CHURCH with it.

ALL THOSE HORRIBLE SINS IMPOSE INFORMAL EXCOMMUNICATION AND MAKES PEOPLE UNWORTHY TO RECEIVE THE EUCHARIST. You have been told this time after time and you just ignore it just so you can keep using your current favorite bashing tactic of mentioning that the Catholic Church doesn’t excommunicate people for horrible crimes.

You can’t defend your position so you just ignore certain points, do you honestly think observers can’t see that?

Anyone, from any religion, can read this thread almost from the beginning and see how you ignore points that nnullify your bashing, but you just ignore those points so you can continue bashing.

 

[zaffiroborant]

Yes, you always go back to that subject of how the Catholic Church doesn’t excommunicate murderers and rapists and etc.

YOU WERE TOLD MANY TIMES BY ME THAT THERE IS NO CONFUSION ABOUT THOSE SINS (the people who commit them know they are wrong but they do them anyway), therefore there is no need to formally pronounce an excommunication, the informal excommunication IS ENOUGH, and those sins are ENOUGH to send them to hell if God judges that they deserve it.

THERE IS A LOT OF CONFUSION ABOUT ABORTION (millions of Catholics think it is not so bad), therefore the Catholic Church must clear up that confusion by FORMALLY PRONOUNCING an EXCOMMUNICATION.

You just like to keep bringing it up again just so you can make it seem like that the Catholic Church condones that kind of behaviour and to BASH THE CATHOLIC CHURCH with it.

ALL THOSE HORRIBLE SINS IMPOSE INFORMAL EXCOMMUNICATION AND MAKES PEOPLE UNWORTHY TO RECEIVE THE EUCHARIST. You have been told this time after time and you just ignore it just so you can keep using your current favorite bashing tactic of mentioning that the Catholic Church doesn’t excommunicate people for horrible crimes.

You can’t defend your position so you just ignore certain points, do you honestly think observers can’t see that?

Anyone, from any religion, can read this thread almost from the beginning and see how you ignore points that nnullify your bashing, but you just ignore those points so you can continue bashing.

Murder and rape are illegal, these things are acknowledged by civil laws as wrong, abortion on the other hand has no penalties, nothing to say that it is wrong. All around the world more and more laws allow for abortion, somewhere there must be a voice that says this is wrong. The Catholic church is that voice and it says it by excommunication.

As an aside I find it very ironic that an LDS would think that high standards (against abortion) are the cause of dismal abortion statistics, in every aspect of poor behavior (out of wedlock birth, drinking, importance of families and so on) the high standards of the LDS are touted as the reason for their success.

 

[TheosisM]

As an aside I find it very ironic that an LDS would think that high standards (against abortion) are the cause of dismal abortion statistics,.

Yeah, I’ve seen that argument over on MADB as well(the person said that the Catholic standard makes it seem as if the Church doesn’t care about people’s situations), and it just doesn’t make sense to me.

 

[RebeccaJ]

This has been explained several times, by more than one person. Catholics understand the absolute truth, what is available to all, is forgiveness of sins. All sin. We also understand that we cannot do whatever we like and then on Saturday go to confession. Presumption is a sin against the Holy Spirit.

Clearly, there is not a problem where Catholics believe that rape, murder, or any other mortal sin but abortion, is not against Church teaching. In the case of abortion, clearly there is a problem where many Catholics do go against Church teaching. Either they believe the Church is not teaching correctly, or, they presume that abortion for “their reasons” are justified, and therefore not a sin.

An ecclesiastical penalty for a mortal sin is an unusual action. It is not to punish, it is to teach. To correct. To make it clear that abortion is a mortal sin. I do not know of any person in good mental health who believes rape or murder can be justified according to their own ideas or circumstances.

 

[ParkerD]

Yeah, I’ve seen that argument over on MADB as well(the person said that the Catholic standard makes it seem as if the Church doesn’t care about people’s situations), and it just doesn’t make sense to me.

TheosisM,
I don’t look at MADB at all, but I would disagree with those kinds of assertions as to the cause of higher abortion rates among that general group (Catholics).

I still think it has to do with an impression that may be in society of a “double standard” and also the natural desire women have to have companionship, even at the cost of a risk of grievous sin. So if the men were taught and had conviction deep in their soul as youth that to be with a girl or woman in that way is to commit to being married (obviously before being with them but if not, then understanding that immediate repentance is absolutely obligated including immediate marriage) and supporting a family, and if that teaching were emphasized in the homes by the fathers to their sons in indelible ways that they could teach by having done so through their own example as well as by precept, then that particular statistic would have a dramatic drop in a few short years.

This comment is about going to the root of the problem, not “hacking at the branches”. (Thoreau)

 

[Answersplease]

TheosisM,
I don’t look at MADB at all, but I would disagree with those kinds of assertions as to the cause of higher abortion rates among that general group (Catholics).

I still think it has to do with an impression that may be in society of a “double standard” and also the natural desire women have to have companionship, even at the cost of a risk of grievous sin. So if the men were taught and had conviction deep in their soul as youth that to be with a girl or woman in that way is to commit to being married (obviously before being with them but if not, then understanding that immediate repentance is absolutely obligated including immediate marriage) and supporting a family, and if that teaching were emphasized in the homes by the fathers to their sons in indelible ways that they could teach by having done so through their own example as well as by precept, then that particular statistic would have a dramatic drop in a few short years.

This comment is about going to the root of the problem, not “hacking at the branches”. (Thoreau)

More of your: Mormons good and Catholics bad, passive agressive bashing.

Maybe if the Catholic Church brainwashed its members like say a certain group did…

Then there wouldn’t be so much confusion about the topic.

Also many Catholics understand that the Catholic Church cannot keep them out of heaven, only God can judge that way. That is partly why many Catholics openly defy the Catholic Church.

 

[ParkerD]

Answersplease:
Answersplease,
It is a far different thing to feel “brainwashed” with fear placed in one’s heart because of how they are taught and how traditions are used to make them feel “forced”, than to feel conviction in one’s heart because what they have been taught as a child continues to ring true to their soul and makes an indelible impression that they choose to live by. A youth in their teenage years often rebels against the former, but if they have had a truthful “in word and deed” example from their parents then although they will pull away from their parents by nature, their heart will tell them certain things they had been taught are true and the Holy Spirit will confirm those impressions to their soul and strengthen them to live by those impressions.

But I give up on whether one such as yourself will ever understand the difference. Oh, well–that’s life.

 

[JMJ4]

New to this site and started reading this whole long thread thinking it would be one thing and sad to see it’s like little kids on a playground screaming my mom is better than your mom instead of a sharing of idea’s and learning about each other’s religion. I’m Catholic- I have a cousin who is Mormon. I love her and pray for her, as she does for me. More so, I respect her right to worship God and Jesus however she wants to. I don’t have to like it, just respect it.
This is not meant as a personal attack to any poster here, just an outside observation. Thanks.

 

[bookgirl32]

You are conflating the two concepts of ‘the worst thing that can happen to a person’ with ‘excommunication.’ Bookgirl, this idea that I am saying that excommunication is the worst thing that could happen to a person isn’t one that I have ever promoted. I AGREE WITH YOU that the worst thing that can happen is that you never repent of your sins and you go to hell. I have posted, several times, that both the Catholic and the LDS church view excommunication similarly in this way; it is not imposed as a ‘punishment’ so much as it is a REMEDY. A prompt to get the sinner BACK.

That, of course, assumes that, having been excommunicated, it is possible for a sinner TO come back, and of course in both faiths that is very true. It is, in fact, the point.

It is ALSO true that in both faiths, whatever excommunication means to either faith or the members of either faith, it is THE most severe consequence either church can impose upon its members. Neither church can do anything worse than excommunicate a person–with the possible exception of refusing to take an excommunicant back, and neither church does that. Forgiveness of sins, and coming back to the fold, is permitted and encouraged by both faiths.

So, can we lay that one aside? What happens to a person in terms of his or her own spiritual life and God–and the eventual eternal destination–is between him and God. The CHURCH, however, has this thing called excommunication that is in addition to the natural consequences of committing sin.

I have been accused here of ‘telling you what you believe,’ and getting things wrong. Perhaps I have, but I don’t see where. Most of the problems seem to lie in things like your post; you are assuming that I mean, and am inferring, things that I do not—and in fact have clearly stated several times that I do not.

Excommunication is something that the churches do. It is separate and apart from what the sinner does, and I am speaking specifically about what the CHURCH does.

A lot of what you say here is true. But the big difference between the two excommunications here is that a Catholic excommunication is based on one action, and the Mormon excommunication is based upon any number of personal things, having to do with the person’s personal history and collections of actions. In other words, it’s a personal judgement upon that person. A Catholic excommunication is only a judgement on that person in that it states that, yes, they did do this one, specific thing, and knew very well what the Church says about it and what it would incur before they did it. There is no interview, no examination of previous sins, no judgement based upon personal history, etc. In other words, it is a statement about the action that can be universally applied to any person committing this one, specific act in full knowledge of the consequences. The consequences that had already been set forth, in no personal connection to themselves in any way, and stated previously to the act committed. Can you really say that about a Mormon excommunication?

 

[StevieD]

It’s really nice to see someone say this–particularly a Catholic considering that there is so much apparent hatred of Mormons here.

Like most Catholics, who know anything about the subject, I have great personal regard for rank and file active Mormons. They make extraordinary financial and other sacrfices for their religion and try to lead good lives.

However the word “hatred” is a fairly accurate one, as far as my own personal feelings are concerned, for the awful heresy in which these good people are entangled. (e.g. the belief that God is made of flesh and blood, subject to change as we are and reproduces as we do, that we can become Gods and that Jesus and Satan are ‘spirit brothers’ etc.etc.). I am fairly sure that some member of the LDS will tell me that I am mistaken but I am equally sure that I am not, even some of their own membership is unaware of the true extent of the LDS heresy.

 

[ParkerD]

Like most Catholics, who know anything about the subject, I have great personal regard for rank and file active Mormons. They make extraordinary financial and other sacrfices for their religion and try to lead good lives.

However the word “hatred” is a fairly accurate one, as far as my own personal feelings are concerned, for the awful heresy in which these good people are entangled. (e.g. the belief that God is made of flesh and blood, subject to change as we are and reproduces as we do, that we can become Gods and that Jesus and Satan are ‘spirit brothers’ etc.etc.). I am fairly sure that some member of the LDS will tell me that I am mistaken but I am equally sure that I am not, even some of their own membership is unaware of the true extent of the LDS heresy.

StevieD,
As you have noted, you have no idea what you are talking about. A person supposedly familiar with the Bible such as yourself, ought to re-read Jude 1:9-10 and realize that even Michael the Archangel let the Lord do the judging.

Particularly would this be so in the case of a person such as yourself who knows nothing about the subject you pretend to have knowledge of (wrong) and only knows their own heart which as you stated, is not following Christ nor His gospel of love.

 

[StevieD]

StevieD,
As you have noted, you have no idea what you are talking about. A person supposedly familiar with the Bible such as yourself, ought to re-read Jude 1:9-10 and realize that even Michael the Archangel let the Lord do the judging.

Particularly would this be so in the case of a person such as yourself who knows nothing about the subject you pretend to have knowledge of (wrong) and only knows their own heart which as you stated, is not following Christ nor His gospel of love.

I am REQUIRED to hate heresy, not the poor heretics themselves, and I do. If you really feel that I must hate you personally because of my comments about Mormonism, you may want to remind yourself what Smith in his book and Young in his writings said about Catholicism (as well as all other Christian religions) I await your apology on their behalf.

 

[ParkerD]

I am REQUIRED to hate heresy, not the poor heretics themselves, and I do. If you really feel that I must hate you personally because of my comments about Mormonism, you may want to remind yourself what Smith in his book and Young in his writings said about Catholicism (as well as all other Christian religions) I await your apology on their behalf.

StevieD,
I suppose you will want to demonstrate your knowledge of the Bible by quoting the passage that teaches you to have the quality you described in your heart, ever.

Joseph Smith told the world what Jesus Christ told Him, and Jesus as is often the case, quoted the scriptures, so if you have a problem with the words of Christ or the words of the Bible (and it appears your words have already shown that you do), then that would an be a self-evident answer to why the Lord reminded that “their hearts are far from me.” I think it’s unfortunate, but it’s one’s personal choice, and each person lost amidst that wrong choice of having a heart “far from Christ” can change that today, tomorrow, or whenever they choose to change.

The chief quality that will be manifest in that change, as taught well by Christ and by Paul and by John, is love for all humankind, real love, from the heart. You don’t need to change religions to do that, but one needs to change their heart by their own choice, and Christ will then help and grant His grace.

 

[StevieD]

StevieD,
I suppose you will want to demonstrate your knowledge of the Bible by quoting the passage that teaches you to have the quality you described in your heart, ever.

Joseph Smith told the world what Jesus Christ told Him, and Jesus as is often the case, quoted the scriptures, so if you have a problem with the words of Christ or the words of the Bible (and it appears your words have already shown that you do), then that would an be a self-evident answer to why the Lord reminded that “their hearts are far from me.” I think it’s unfortunate, but it’s one’s personal choice, and each person lost amidst that wrong choice of having a heart “far from Christ” can change that today, tomorrow, or whenever they choose to change.

The chief quality that will be manifest in that change, as taught well by Christ and by Paul and by John, is love for all humankind, real love, from the heart. You don’t need to change religions to do that, but one needs to change their heart by their own choice, and Christ will then help and grant His grace.

I don’t think that you have read properly/understood my comments. (Obviously I do not accept Smith’s book as scripture nor his rants about Catholicism as coming from Jesus). If you are saying that it is OK for the LDS to attack me as a heretic but that I am not allowed to return the ‘compliment’ then thank you, this appears to be summarise the LDS on Christianity very neatly.

 

[Jay53]

Isaiah 5:21
Luke 16:15
Luke 18:9-14

 

[jake23]

Is this getting anywhere? The cult is of no importance!

 

[Tmaque]

Is this getting anywhere? The cult is of no importance!

Calling the LDS Church a cult serves no purpose but to turn Mormons away from Catholicism. The LDS Church may be wrong but it is no more a cult than the Catholic Church.