Hey Jon — Thought you would find this CNN​.com article on Six Apart interesting: http://​www​.cnn​.com/​2​0​0​5​/​T​E​C​H​/​i​n​t​e​r​n​e​t​/​0​2​/​1​9​/​t​r​o​t​t​s​.​b​l​o​g​.​a​p​/​i​n​d​e​x.html My friends and I read Dooce and Blurbomat on a daily basis and have grown to think of you and Heather as a Utah based extension of our circle of friends. We all cheer about Leta’s every milestone, congrats on raising a little beauty! Thanks for giving us a glimpse of what (hopefully) lies beyond the early-twenty-something rat race.

I’ve been a card carrying member of three different denominations in my lifetime(I’m 42, btw). Methodist, Baptist, Episcopalian, and Baptist again. All of them have their quirks, and they’re all pretty obsessive that they are right, and everyone else is wrong. Even the Episcopalians are like that, no matter that they say they are totally inclusive.

When I read what Jesus said in the Gospels, I always come away feeling that he would be disgusted at how splintered the church has become. To me, the different denominations are fighting the same battles that Paul, Peter, and James had with one another so long ago.

Personally, I don’t think it matters how you get to Jesus, just as long as you get to him.

As for the comment above where someone questioned the Jewish Catholic, please don’t forget that Jesus was a Jew, and early Christians worshiped in synagogues as part of the “Jesus movement” within Judaism.

Foxforcefive, believers are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.

People should stand by their beliefs as long as they have reason to believe them. I think everyone should be open to the possibility that they are wrong. On the other hand, everyone else (i.e. nonbelievers) should refrain from mocking those that choose to believe. Criticizing (rather than mocking) someone’s beliefs is fine, as long as the criticism is fair and informed. Many of the statements above — like Rebecca’s mockery of her father’s “faith” (and her amazement at the fact that a smart engineer could be so duped); Marsha’s comment that Mormons believe “wierd made up crap” (and her accompany list of inaccuracies and distortions about Mormon doctrine and history); Krista’s comment that Mormons “creep her out” — are ill-advised and only serve to expose the speaker as close-minded, disrespectful, and prejudicial. Everyone believes in things that are irrational to a certain extent, and there’s no reason to mock some people because their irrational beliefs are religious in nature, rather than political, ecological, aesthetic, or moral.

foxforcefive:

Thanks for sharing. Maybe this world would be a little better if people didn’t generalize and judge so much.

If you really want to know what Mormons think of women please check this out:
http://www.lds.org/conference/talk/display/0,5232,23–1-479–26,00.html

Of course, if you’d rather not be educated and only believe what you want to believe by all means, please ignore this link. But I thought that it was all about “education, education, education”.

Sorry, Long boring rant to follow.

Patatomic, I was a Mormon, my whole family is full of them. I have as much experience listening to what they think about women and seeing how they treat them as you do.

When asked, “will there ever be women priests in the Mormon church?” President Hinckley said in the Boston Globe: “in so far as I can see, no. The women have their place.… They have a voice in determining policy and doing many things in the church. I haven’t found any complaint among our women. I’m sure there are a few, a handful somewhere who may be disaffected for one reason or another, but I’ve never seen any evidence of it.”

That is a bunch of bull. Thousands of women who are still in the church or who used to be in the church have voiced their concern in a myriad of ways including print, film and personally to the leaders of the church.

When I was 15 my stake had a fireside with the intent of answering young peopleís questions about the church. I asked why women couldnít hold the priesthood. The stake president told me that I should pray for my answer. Being the good girl that I was I told him that I had been praying about it for 8 months, which I had been. He asked me if god had given me an answer. I told him if god gave answers by leaving a feeling of what was right in your gut then yes he had answered me. He asked what god had said. I told him the only answer that felt ìrighteousî was that of course women should be able to hold the priesthood. He turned to me with that glazed over patriarchal grin and said ìYou must be praying in the wrong spirit, go back to the Lord and ask him again.î In other words until I got the answer they wanted me to I was doing it wrong.

Patatomic, you have proved my point. The only information you site in defense of how women are viewed in the LDS faith is propaganda from the church itself. If you want to try and defend the Mormon faith start by defending these Mormon beliefs.

How can it be righteous for the LDS Church to teach, as official Church doctrine, for over 150 years that “Negroes” were the descendants of Cain, and inherited the “Curse of Cain” therefore were to denied the right to hold the priesthood?

As for their ideas about women Apostle Bruce R. McConkie gives us these gems. He tells us that for a woman the “Loss of virtue is too great a price to pay even for the preservation of one’s life–better dead clean, than alive unclean.î And also “woman’s primary place is in the home, where she is to rear children and abide by the righteous counsel of her husband.”

How does that sit witcha?

Racism in the Book of Mormon

Nephi 12:23 “And I beheld, after they had dwindled in unbelief they became a dark and loathsome and a filthy people, full of idleness and all manner of abominations.”

2 Nephi 5:21 “And he had caused the cursing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing, because of their iniquity. For behold, they had hardened their hearts against him, that they had become like unto a flint; wherefore, as they were white, and exceedingly fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them.”

This is the reading of Joseph Smith’s original 1830 edition. Smith changed the wording “white” to “pure” in the 1840 printing.

Racism in the Book of Abraman and Book of Moses

Moses 6:8 “For behold, the Lord shall curse the land with much heat, and the barrenness thereof shall go forth forever; and there was a blackness came upon all the children of Canaan, that they were despised among all people.”

Racism in the writings of Brigham Young

“Shall I tell you the law of God in regard to the African race? If the white man who belongs to the chosen seed mixes his blood with the seed of Cain, the penalty, under the law of God, is death on the spot. This will always be so.” (Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, 10:110)

“I have never yet preached a sermon and sent it out to the children of men, that they may not call Scripture” (Journal of Discourses (vol 13, page 95),1870)

“When all the other children of Adam have had the privilege of receiving the Priesthood, and of coming into the kingdom of God, and of being redeemed from the four quarters of the earth, and have received their resurrection from the dead, then it will be time enough to remove the curse from Cain and his posterity” (Journal of Discourses 2:143).

The embedded rascism is only one of a million problems with the church. Trying to fix or defend the Mormon Church is a full time job and one I would never choose. If it is the only path to spirituality you can find, you better wear some sturdy shoes.

Rebecca,

Why stop there? What about the racism, misogyny, homophobia, xenophobia, colonialism etc., in the Bible, Torah, and Koran? Do you reject Judaism and Christianity and Islam wholecloth also on the grounds of these “embedded” flaws? Are each of these poor “paths to spirituality”? If so, I congratulate you for your consistency, and I wish you luck in finding “spirituality” in a post-1960’s religion that is not tarnished by the sins of our fathers. I choose to see the light and truth in Mormonism, Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, rather than focus on the culture-bound and time-bound blindspots.

You’ve misunderstood me. I am not pointing to failings of other religions. I am showing you that what you think of as failings are mere vestiges that show up in every culture that developed before about 1963. It’s babies and bathwater, forest and trees.

I also remember when Black men were granted the priesthood through REVELATION from the prophet. What he hell you talkin bout “not church doctrine”

Sure every religion has crap in it. I agree and it does make them all UNTRUE!!! what? Not a chosen religion on the planet? Whatever will we do?

Aaaahh AAAAAAHHHHH The sky is falling!!!!!!!!!

Hey guess what? I disrespectfully don’t believe in GOD EITHER!!! OOOHOOOOHHHoo…

Oh and I am not hardworking or always thinking pure thoughts and there are days I run with scissors.

“Loss of virtue is too great a price to pay even for the preservation of one’s life–better dead clean, than alive unclean.î

It’s a shame we don’t read more, because St. Augustine put this chestnut to bed 1600 years ago.

As for racism in every culture prior to 1963 — every culture has its superstitions and ignorances, but racism hasn’t always been one of them. The Romans, for example, incorporated a wide mix of races into their structure. And Christianity took extraordinary pains to make itself accessible to people of all races, walks of life and prior behavior.

Rebecca:

I understand that your issue isn’t with me (even though your condescending overtone makes me wonder). I just have lots of experience with bitter exMormons and I have seen how hard it is for people to get it out of their systems. Some people leave with no problem, but that obviously isn’t your story.

I just think that it’s dangerous to define your life by what you are not rather than what you are. Your arguements are tired and I have heard them all before. Start looking forward and get over it. I’ll bet that you will be a lot happier.

Of course, if you want to hang on to this anger and hostility ’cause it feeds your art then that is a whole other story.