Why do Catholics become Mormon?

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acatholic4ever

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As I read about Mormonism I wonder why Catholics join the mormon church? It is so different from Catholicism I wonder what the appeal is. I know I have read some people liked the commericals or they read the Book of Mormon and felt it was true. I also read that people suffered from depression and such and the church was friendly.

I guess I would just like to know why people join. i don’t know if my family would ever join the Mormon church but I wonder why Catholics do 🙂

Thanks for answering
 
I don’t know the answer to that. I think that perhaps it’s as different for each individual as they are different from one another.

I like Glenn Beck. I know that for him, Mormonism has kept him sober. He has made a point of telling the world this.

But I often look at people who actually join the Mormon church, as opposed to those of us who grew up this way and think, “WHY?!” Clearly there are very intelligent people within Mormonism, but how can anyone who actually looks into the evidence believe it all? How can someone who actually looks into the evidence STAY Mormon?

I am just in awe of the fact that God brought me out of it at all. My entire family is Mormon. I am, as far as I know, the only one who has left.

in Christ
Steph
 
Why do Momons join the Catholic church? Its the same thing. I think everyone finds their own way of being with God. For me leaving the LDS church was the best thing that could happen to me. There is good in every church. Some of my best friends are Mormon, I am little confused on why you are posting a post like this. I hope its for a good reason and not somthing else.
 
tundramom said:
I don’t know the answer to that. I think that perhaps it’s as different for each individual as they are different from one another.

I like Glenn Beck. I know that for him, Mormonism has kept him sober. He has made a point of telling the world this.

But I often look at people who actually join the Mormon church, as opposed to those of us who grew up this way and think, “WHY?!” Clearly there are very intelligent people within Mormonism, but how can anyone who actually looks into the evidence believe it all? How can someone who actually looks into the evidence STAY Mormon?

I am just in awe of the fact that God brought me out of it at all. My entire family is Mormon. I am, as far as I know, the only one who has left.

in Christ
Steph
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i believe that most people when leaving the CC is not because they are looking for God, they are looking for something else, like getting better in something like getting rid of an addiction or to get rid of some bad behavior or something that it is a burden to them.
or they trying to get back something they lost or trying to get whatever.
they believe other churches can give them and and the CC cannot.

why this happened? because just listen to what other churches promises to people. we just pray and you get what you want. so people are attracted to that.
 
Well Mormons are expected to believe in a prophet named joseph Smith from the USA in the 1800’s who discovered golden plates and some special stones to read them. The plates were the 3rd testament of the Bible and no one is supposed to have ever seen them except Joseph Smith. JM brought the plates to a publisher and read the plates in some kind of hat so that the publisher could not see. Anyways the rich publisher’s wife was not an idiot and told her husband to get JM to do it again (they pretended they lost the pages that had been inscribed). Well JM was not happy and apparently God was not happy too. So the plate he ahd been reading from was not allowed to be read from again (God would not allow it). And well the publisher continued to inscribe the rest that JM read to him.

Mormons actually believe this (according to South park). That is just a taste of their weirdness.

It is no wonder they would convert. Why RCC? Maybe they want a large Christian Church.
 
I just knew it–I’m going to be the one who has a non-religious reason. Oh well. In my experience, it’s falling in love with a cute Mormon guy or a pretty Mormon girl who will refuse to continue dating unless the non-Mormon becomes Mormon. Or else it’s the initial “love bombing” with the “ready-made” social aspect–friends and activities. Oh, and it’s also that “Forever Family” sounds real nice (the convert just isn’t told that it’s only the Mormons who are the “Forever Family”.)

You do know that conversion to Mormon is only a matter of six lessons–read the BOM and pray (and fast) until you feel that it is true?
 
I think Catholics may convert to Mormonism because of people’s behaviors. They may see Mormons being very friendly and decide to join them. So its the people they may find appeal in. It’s afterwards that they may accept the doctrine. However, I think its an ignorant choice to join a religion without studying the doctrine. Atheists may sometimes seem happy and friendly but that is no excuse to join them.
 
You should consider the experiencial aspect of LDS people. They expect miracles in their life. A sense of awe on a personal level and this appeals to people. As I understand Catholicism, you expect the experimental to be on the cooperate level as a community and frankly this is missing in mormonism because of the indivitualism from being founded as an American religion. So, basically, one who sees something they desire displayed in the other religion are attracted to that aspect of experience.

To safeguard catholics from becoming LDS you should add an emphasize on the personal experincial aspects of your religion like personal prayer, person praise of God using the Psalms as an example, and yes fasting.
 
yes it seems forever families are a very big deal.

I was taught as a Catholic that I would see everyone in heaven. Do mormons think they are the only religion to talk about everyone being together forever?
 
Catholics become Mormons because they are seeking something better than what they think we have. It’s a sad truth, but rather than looking deeper into their own faith for answers, they look outside and listen to the naysayers.

Often it is because we (parish and nuclear family) did a poor job educating them in the Catholic faith. Perhaps the CCD program was shallow and all-inclusive to the point of triviality. Perhaps the parents weren’t concerned about ensuring the kids received a proper religious education. Perhaps regular Sunday Mass was simply not a priority.

Sometimes something bad happened that caused the young person to turn against the church. And sometimes the young person is in rebellion against his/her parents and rejects both their authority and the (rules, rules, rules) authoritarian church.

Whatever the reason, the Catholic in question is left with a void in his/her life, and has begun to recognize something is missing.

Along come the missionaries, nice, polite, well-dressed fellows who have the outward appearance of a fellow Grandma would approve of. They bring a copy of the Book of Mormon. (Oohhh! Secret knowledge the Catholic Church refused us!)

They also bring a tract saying, “You can know this message is true. If you ask your Heavenly Father in prayer, you can receive an answer from Him through the Holy Ghost… The Holy Ghost confirms the truth through feelings, thoughts, and impressions… These feelings from the Holy Ghost are personal revelation to you that the gospel of Jesus Christ as restored through Joseph Smith is true.”

There you have it. Hook, line, and sinker. This is the ultimate “warm fuzzy” religious message.

Pretty scary that someone would fall for it, but it happens every day.
 
Nan_S said:
Catholics become Mormons because they are seeking something better than what they think we have. It’s a sad truth, but rather than looking deeper into their own faith for answers, they look outside and listen to the naysayers.

Often it is because we (parish and nuclear family) did a poor job educating them in the Catholic faith. Perhaps the CCD program was shallow and all-inclusive to the point of triviality. Perhaps the parents weren’t concerned about ensuring the kids received a proper religious education. Perhaps regular Sunday Mass was simply not a priority.

Sometimes something bad happened that caused the young person to turn against the church. And sometimes the young person is in rebellion against his/her parents and rejects both their authority and the (rules, rules, rules) authoritarian church.

Whatever the reason, the Catholic in question is left with a void in his/her life, and has begun to recognize something is missing.

Along come the missionaries, nice, polite, well-dressed fellows who have the outward appearance of a fellow Grandma would approve of. They bring a copy of the Book of Mormon. (Oohhh! Secret knowledge the Catholic Church refused us!)

They also bring a tract saying, “You can know this message is true. If you ask your Heavenly Father in prayer, you can receive an answer from Him through the Holy Ghost… The Holy Ghost confirms the truth through feelings, thoughts, and impressions… These feelings from the Holy Ghost are personal revelation to you that the gospel of Jesus Christ as restored through Joseph Smith is true.”

There you have it. Hook, line, and sinker. This is the ultimate “warm fuzzy” religious message.

Pretty scary that someone would fall for it, but it happens every day.
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People become Mormons (from whatever religion) because the Spirit of the Lord witnesses to them that it is true—except for a tiny minority who do so for some other reason, such as for social reasons, or falling in love with the missionaries, or something daft like that. Those ones don’t stay Mormons very long.

zerinus
 
acatholic4ever said:
As I read about Mormonism I wonder why Catholics join the mormon church? It is so different from Catholicism I wonder what the appeal is. I know I have read some people liked the commericals or they read the Book of Mormon and felt it was true. I also read that people suffered from depression and such and the church was friendly.

I guess I would just like to know why people join. i don’t know if my family would ever join the Mormon church but I wonder why Catholics do 🙂

Thanks for answering
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To be quite honest, the majority of the Catholics I (regrettably) converted to the LDS faith when I was on my mission to Germany were almost exclusively poorly catechized Catholics. In fact, once I started my own journey to Catholicism I was astounded by how much misinformation was given to me as a missionary by self-defined “devout Catholics”.
ETA: This is mere anecdote. It’s nothing more than my own personal experience and is in no way intended to reflect all former-Catholic-current-LDS. Remember empirically that anecdote never equals a cause-effect relationship.
 
Also that conversion to Mormonism is very different from conversion to Catholicism.

Converting to Mormonism:

The missionaries give you 4-6 “discussions” (about an hour and a half each) and by the second “discussion” they ask the “investigator” if s/he would like to be baptized into the LDS fold.

Compare that to Converting to Catholicism:

The “catechumen” seeks out the church (not the other way around) and spends up to a year studying the Catholic faith inside and out, and then requests baptism and confirmation around Easter.

Just from this, I’d say Catholic converts are more learned about their new religion than Mormon converts are.
 
xixxvmcm85 said:
Just from this, I’d say Catholic converts are more learned about their new religion than Mormon converts are.
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this is true without a doubt. I have personally witnessed teh hustling-in of a new convert, without very much instruction. I would also say that even the young missionaries don’t know a lot about their religion, and pretty much nothing about mormon history. They have a set of prrof texts and standard testimonial expressions that seem designed to elicit emotional response. Not much more. I cant’ say that this is universal, since my knowledge of mormons is very localized to where I live.

I will also say that the mormons are very sweet people. They seem extraordinarily well adjusted, are calm, quiet, not argumentative, and are dedicated to their families and a sober lifestyle. the onoly neighbors I would rather have would be devout Catholics.
 
J_C said:
this is true without a doubt. I have personally witnessed teh hustling-in of a new convert, without very much instruction. I would also say that even the young missionaries don’t know a lot about their religion, and pretty much nothing about mormon history. They have a set of prrof texts and standard testimonial expressions that seem designed to elicit emotional response. Not much more. I cant’ say that this is universal, since my knowledge of mormons is very localized to where I live.

I will also say that the mormons are very sweet people. They seem extraordinarily well adjusted, are calm, quiet, not argumentative, and are dedicated to their families and a sober lifestyle. the onoly neighbors I would rather have would be devout Catholics.
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Agreed. When I was Mormon (and on my mission) my mission companion didn’t even know about the “LDS Heavenly Mother”, although to his defense it is a scarcely spoken of doctrine.

Most LDS youth are discouraged from reading any material that is critical of the LDS faith (which they dubiously label “anti-Mormon”). On top of that, the most “definitive sources” for anything concerning the history of the church, or the history of the doctrine of the church, is supposed to ONLY be the church itself. Can we say conflict of interest?

I can attest to the fact that the official LDS church (i.e. via Sunday School, Priesthood, and Seminary manuals) LIE about the history of the church and the history of doctrine.

It’s of no wonder that many young LDS (converts included) know little of the more profound tenets of Mormonism.
 
some time ago I while visiting a friend watched a musical production on BYU TV. I wasn’t able to see the entire program, but I saw most of it. It featured characters of Josehp Smith and Emma his first wife. It gave very sympathetic renditions of them both, but never once dealt with the issue of the 30-something other wives that Joseph obtained for himself. this caused me to ask some questions about Joseph’s wives. It turns out that according to the handful of mormons I’ve spoken to on this subject, none of them seems to know mcuh of anything about them. this seems odd to me.

Another production on BYU TV gave a fairly detailed account of Joseph’s last days. The girl story teller broke into tears as she described Joshpeh’s moment of death. But nowhere in the program was it mentioned that the primary reason Josehph was incarcerated was related to his suppression of free press in order to prevent exposure of polygamous activities. rather, it was stated that he was an innocent victim of religious persecution, and I had the feeling that he was being compared to Jesus.

I’m sure this types of whitewashing takes place in all venues. For example, the hero hyping of Geo Washington during the 19th century. The image we have of Washington probably bears little resemblence to the man. similarly, the image Mormons have of Joseph must bear little resemblence to the man.
 
J_C said:
…] Another production on BYU TV gave a fairly detailed account of Joseph’s last days. The girl story teller broke into tears as she described Joshpeh’s moment of death. But nowhere in the program was it mentioned that the primary reason Josehph was incarcerated was related to his suppression of free press in order to prevent exposure of polygamous activities. rather, it was stated that he was an innocent victim of religious persecution, …]
[Bolding mine].
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I converted to LDS when I was a young divorced mom of three children. This was about 19 years ago. I think for me they were so helpful to me at atime when I needed it most. There was also a void in that for many reasons, I was not an active Catholic. I loved the LDS community and to great extent it filled my spiritual needs for a time. About a year into my time with the Mormons I experienced one of the most difficult periods in my life and when I turned to the leadership I ended up deeply hurt by the response to my family’s trauma. I walked away and never turned back. It has taken me almost two decades to regain trust in religion and now I find myself returning to my Catholic roots.
 
J_C said:
this is true without a doubt. I have personally witnessed the hustling-in of a new convert, without very much instruction. I would also say that even the young missionaries don’t know a lot about their religion, and pretty much nothing about mormon history. They have a set of proof texts and standard testimonial expressions that seem designed to elicit emotional response. Not much more.

Agreed. Couple that with poor catechesis on the part of the Catholic Church, dishonesty on the part of mormon “missionaries” and a tendency of the same missionaries to exploit the ignorance or longing of the prospect to find some sort of answer to the particular need of the moment. Haste in binding the mark to a baptismal commitment is emphasized and full disclosure is certainly not practiced. All the good stuff about the antics in the Temple comes later. IMHO, poor catechesis and lack of knowlege of the Faith lies at the root of the loss of Catholics to other belief systems.
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