As pepperlandgirl pointed out, the church was founded in a different era. Of course, that doesn’t explain why Mormons denied people of African descent full membership until 1978. I mean, 1978! It’s astounding, really.
The problem, Annie-Xmas, is the way Mormons select their prophet. They have a group of 12 Apostles (in reality 14, for reasons not important enough to go into), and whoever has the most seniority when the last prophet dies becomes the next prophet. All the apostles serve for life. What happens is that you have a church that is headed by an 80-year-old and 14 other senior citizens. How on earth could that church ever become progressive? The short answer: it doesn’t and is constantly 30 years behind most social trends like civil rights. For the record, most Mormons I knew seemed embarassed about all the racist stuff. As we should be.
We are supposed to write our parents a letter once a week during the mission, but we could only telephone them twice a year, Christmas and Mother’s Day, like you said. In these days of internet, they are permitted to email once a week, if they have access to email. So yes, I went to South America for two years and only spoke to my parents on the telephone four times total. I’ll bring that up if they complain I don’t call enough.
I have to say I haven’t seen Big Love, although it is my impression that it’s about a Fundamentalist Mormon polygamist family, not a mainstream Mormon family. But yes, a 50-year-old single Mormon women probably face a lot of adversity even in a mainstream Mormon community.
As for planets, they don’t get too specific. The idea is that eventually any human can progress enough to become like God if they are faithful enough. Then you get to start your own new world presumably, just like God. The couplet is: As man is, God once was; as God is, man may become.
The long answer is that I:
[ul]
[li]stopped believing that man was made of anything but science and nature[/li][li]wondered aloud how the other members could be intelligent and yet believe some of the wild crap[/li][li]asked for (and received) permission to stop going to church[/li][li]asked the bishop to please explain to me how there could be nothing to back up the specific beliefs of the Mormon church and yet he believed it[/li][li]thought the whole testimony thing was really weird and creepy and expressed that feeling[/li][li]wondered why the church was so secretive about stuff and compared it to a bunch of school children with a secret club[/li][li]got hit on by – and complained about said hitting on – 2 missionaries (yeah, somehow it was my fault that these boys’ hormones were overactive!)[/li][li]commented that if someone actually read the Bible (which I did) then they could clearly understand how the belief in vampires could begin[/li][li]I read such horrible things as the Koran, the teachings of the Buddha and some other religious texts in an effort to understand why I was having trouble accepting religion as a whole[/li][/ul]
I am pretty sure that’s the whole list, but I could be leaving something out, after all it’s been 25 years! The short answer is they said I was a witch, and possibly demon-possessed and a bad influence (even though I hadn’t attended the church in over a year by that time!). I was summarily excommunicated, wiped from the records and a note stuck on our front door saying all that – my dad went ballistic and probably made a few threats but then decided that if I thought it was funny, it wasn’t worth getting bent out of shape over and dropped it. Like I said, he never stopped believing, he just stopped going to church. The missionaries were always welcome at his house and he always offered rides when he saw them walking. In honour of him, I will talk to the missionaries on the rare occasion they knock on my door, and invite them in (I never do that for the JW’s) but they usually don’t stay long when I explain that I am excommunicated.
I have to say that the church has come a long way recently in how it perceives single women. I know several 50-something single women in my area, and none of them seem to have a particularly difficult time with it.
As to the sexism issues, I don’t know a woman in the church who would perceive it as such. They are very into the ‘different but equal’ notion that you find in any conservative community. Mormon women aren’t inherently subservient - especially if my mom and my wife are any indication - and they aren’t stupid. They are aware that there are things that they aren’t ‘allowed’ to do at church. It’s just that they perceive themselves as having different roles to play.
I think that wins the thread, Cat Fight. Hilarious.
Yeah, Litoris, how did you get exed at 12?
For me, the only part of Mormonism I find positive is this idea that anyone can progress to become a God. I mean it’s a load of hooey, but it is cool in a democratic, Walt Whitman kind of way. I also liked the idea of being able to do something during the eternities beyond playing a lute in the clouds all day. Everything else in Mormonism I feel is pretty damaging, unhealthy, and stunting.
As for why smart people believe dumb things, there’s a whole book on that subject. I think it also helps believers to just not think about all the troubling stuff.
Litoris, it sounds like your Dad was right to be pissed. Sounds like you must have had some pretty nutty local officials. I guess in the end, you were lucky to have awakened as early as you did.
As for my excommunication. There is a kind of longer story with it, and what it boils down to is this: my mother was one of the first people in this town to even talk to the Mormons. She had gone to a Mormon church a few times in her youth (grew up in Idaho/Utah/etc) and liked the church and its teachings and thought it would be nice to get us all into it. I was 7, I think?
We were basically founding members of the church in this town, and in its infancy, there were some whackadoo members. The OMG YOU CAN’T HAVE CHOCOLATE, IT’S EVEEEL! types. Of course, when you think about it – this was 1979 or thereabouts, rural Tennessee – the only people that are going to talk to someone not Baptist, let alone become something not Baptist were the whackadoos, right?
I’ve only seen my dad as angry as he was that time like 3 times. Honestly, I just laughed it off, and still do – it’s a mark of achievement for me. I’ve only met a handful of excommunicated Mormons.
Currently active Mormon checking in, (though my input is probably not appreciated in this thread), I couldn’t let this pass.
I must say, this does not jibe with the way people are ex-communicated. In order to be ex-communicated (as oppossed to voluntarily removing yourself from the church records by request) would be by a church court. No 12 year old would or could be excommunicated without the input of the parents.
As to your list:
WHo were you asking permission to stop going to church from? The only person who could force you to go to church are/were your parents. Was someone else forcing you? Actually, every sunday between 50 and 70% of all our young men and women are gone, and no one would even think of trying to force them to come except there parents.
I have studied and closely read other religious texts since I was in high school. Not only is this not a problem in my ward, in college there was (and is) a class taught at the LDS institute a class which requires reading portions of the scriptures of other religions, and asks you to read the others on your own. The only negative reaction when the bishop has seen my extensive collection of well read scriptures from other faiths is to ask me to teach adult Sunday School.
Two out of every four years in sunday school (and seminary, and institute) is dedicated to a close reading of the Bible, and members are strongly encouraged to do so the rest of the time. I guess I just don’t understand the vampire thing. Are you saying anyone who reads the Bible should believe in vampires? that Mormons do? I guess I just don’t understand.
Most of the rest sounds like you were mostly just rude. Forgivable in a 12 year old (the age of my oldest son), and they may have been glad to see you go, but I doubt you were excommunicated.
(Sorry about being hit on by Missionaries, btw).
Don’t get me wrong, I am not accusing you of being a liar or anything - it is just what you wrote doesn’t comport with what I experienced in my years (decades) in the church, all over the United States, nor does it match the official policies and practices of the church as I know them. I will just chalk up your experiences to either the differences in perceptions of a 12 year old 25 years later, or a really aff base local congregation totally acting against church policy.
I will shut up now. This is a thread for former members, and I don’t qualify. I will just say that I have a few very different perspective than most posters on this thread. It is your party, though, and it is good to read another view.
I don’t have questions yet, but am following closely (all religion fascinates me.) If the OP doesn’t mind, I would actually like to hear what current active Mormons have to say about things that are being brought up in the thread. As long as things stay civil it shouldn’t be an issue.
No questions, I’d just like to step up and say that one of the most delicious affairs of my life was the one I had with a 17 year old Mormon virgin when I was 32.
Erdosain, I live about a block from a Mormon temple in Mexico City. I often see evidently foreign missionnaires walking about the neighborhood, but not really doing anything. That is, they’re never talking to anyone other than themselves, not knocking on doors, not showing their Books, not engaging people in local businesses. Just walking downhill, or uphill, or both.
Is their task to be simply seen? Or are they likely not carrying out their duties?
I don’t have a problem with Reloy3 bringing his perspective as a believer on to the thread. I answered everything to the best of my knowledge and stand by everything I said.
It seems pretty natural to me to be interested in someone’s religiously mandated underwear. It is pretty unusual. What I don’t understand is the compulsion to be so secretive about it.
My guess is that they are probably going to or from meetings in the Mormon building you refer to.
(Just for clarification’s sake, Mormons have two types of buildings: churches and temples. They are not interchangeable. Churches are the normal churches and everyone is welcome. The temples are larger, usually nicer, and there are only 128 of them in the whole world. To go into a Mormon temple, you have to be a member in good standing.)
The missionaries have conferences and meeting all the time, so they’re constantly going to and from churches. Perhaps these missionaries were there for a long meeting and took a break by walking around the neighborhood? I can’t think of any other reason for their behavior, No Me Ayudes, Compadre.
Temples often have large meeting halls and mission headquarters near them as well. Missionary conferences often take place in those buildings. Missionaries are supposed to remain in their assigned areas when proselytizing, so if they’re not in they’re assigned area, they’re most likely travelling to/from some other assignment.
I was a Peace Corps Volunteer and we always got a kick out of seeing the Mormons. They always seemed so out of place in Bulgaria, like representatives of America. We bought our clothes at thrift stores in country, but the Mormons were so visible.
Although, maybe we were, too? Once I was walking down the street in Blagoevgrad, BG and I saw a couple missionaries walking towards me. As we passed, I called out, “How’s your mission going?” And one of them said, “Good! How’s Peace Corps?” Heh.
Anyway, I always ran into the missionaries at one of Sofia’s two Indian restaurants (trip to the capital = Indian food!!!). It sounded like they moved around a LOT - much too much to get to know what was really going on in a community. Did you have to do that as well, or did you stay in one place, like the missionaries I knew in my hometown in California? (I did the discussions when I was in high school - long story.)
BTW, my high school Spanish teacher learned the language as a missionary in Argentina. To this day I speak Spanish with an Argentine accent as a result. Gracias, Sr. Martin.
Another former member checking in. And I have to say Erdosain your experience mirrors mine almost exactly… even to the don’t ask don’t tell policy about among my mother and myself. You are probably not nearly as alone as you think you are.
To be fair I think a better way to put that is that does not jibe with how people should be ex-communicated. But as someone who as served in some backwoods kinds of branches I find it completely believible. I knew a guy who served as Relief Society (the womens oginization within the church) President for his Branch for 18 months. They had been told to form a Relief Society and hadn’t read the manual on how it should be run very closely. And while on my mission in the 90s I served in a Branch where the previous missionaries hadn’t pushed the WoW very heavily. Boy was I suprised when everyone got up for the mid-Sacrament Meeting smoke break. Evidently it had become customary for the deacons to roll and pass the tobacoo. And why not, after all they had just finished passing the sacrament. :eek:
In a lot of ways I respect the LDS church; observant/obedient members I have known personally and read about in the media seem to be a remarkably happy and positive lot, even if I don’t personally agree with their strictures. For instance, though I drink very little alcohol, I wouldn’t want to belong to a religion that told me not to do it. In the stake-houses, or whatever the parish centers are called, it seems that the tithe money is put to good use in giving the membership all sorts of community resources and activities.
How on Earth does the hierarchy imagine that seeing you ride around on a bicycle, on a hot day, wearing a shirt and tie, will encourage others to join? I always thought that looked terribly uncomfortable, and certainly not a draw to the youth market.
It depends on the mission you are in, but 4-6 months in a single area is usually the norm, unless the mission is so spread out that traveling is prohibitively expensive. I stayed four months in most of my areas. It was enough time to really get to know a good number of families and the local merchants, but probably not to get to know an entire community. But again, we weren’t really there to serve the whole community, like the Peace Corps. Also, the size of the area depends on how big the mission is. In some places, your assigned area can be half a city, or just a neighborhood within a city.
I’ll have to check the archives to see if there’s an “Ask the Peace Corps volunteer” because I really have no idea what you guys do (I imagine building wells or teaching English or something) and I am very interested in that experience. It sounds great.
As for Argentine accents, everyone knows the the “ll” sound is the best. “¡Callate!” sounds so much more forceful than “¡cállate!”
And while on my mission in the 90s I served in a Branch where the previous missionaries hadn’t pushed the WoW very heavily. Boy was I suprised when everyone got up for the mid-Sacrament Meeting smoke break. Evidently it had become customary for the deacons to roll and pass the tobacoo. And why not, after all they had just finished passing the sacrament. :eek: