I have a question for you, (or any other ex-Mormon who served a mission) TokyoBayer.
Have you ever contacted any of the still-practicing Mormons that you converted and/or baptized while serving on your mission and told them that you have now discovered the LDS Church to be a massive fraud, and encouraged them to investigate the various inconsistencies for themselves?
I have not. I really didn’t keep in contact with my converts very well. There was one family that I sent Christmas packages to for a few years. And really, I moved into their area right after their conversion.
There is one entire family that I converted. 18 months later, I was heartbroken to learn that the ward had been dissolved and that my converts were not attending any other wards. I’d had high hopes for them. Fortunately for them, by now they’ve probably completely forgotten their brief experiment with Mormonism.
Most of my other converts were the 9-year-old children or the teenage friends of Mormon families. They probably would have been baptized (and eventually become inactive) with or without my efforts. Even if they hadn’t, they would have ended up as members-of-record of another Christian denomination. As an ex-Mormon atheist, it is not my duty to spread atheism “to the isles of the sea.” And I wouldn’t exactly feel proud if I could persuade one of my converts that we had been wrong, only to have him become a JW instead.
I was under the impression that it was pretty common for missionaries to keep in contact with their converts, often becoming somewhat close friends, even if just in a penpal kind of a way…
When I told my parents I wasn’t going on a mission, it had an impact on them that is hard to explain, and I am sure that they are still somewhat hurt and disappointed, now over 25 years later.
I’m Facebook friends with a family that I baptized. The dad is in the Stake Presidency (a mid-level lay position in the Mormon church). He regularly posts really glurgy stuff and cheesy pics of Jesus on his Facebook wall, so I know anything negative I had to say probably wouldn’t be appreciated. And honestly, he’s probably better off within the church than outside of it. He lives in an economically depressed developing nation and hasn’t had regular employment for decades. The church provides him a support network, connections, and probably a decent amount of self-esteem that he didn’t have when he couldn’t support his family.
I talked to the family on the phone a few years back when I was doubting but before I had become convinced the whole thing was a sham. The mom was distressed that I wasn’t attending church but I’m glad I didn’t elaborate my reasons for doubting. I mean, if they really wanted to know why I didn’t believe I’d tell them, but they are so enmeshed in the church now that I think they’d be better off without any more meddling on my part.
Plus, there is very little information on the web on these topics in Spanish. I wouldn’t even know where they could read about this stuff.
I’ve had a conversation with one of my old companions. Actually, I tried to avoid the topic but he kept pressing the issue, so I sent him this:
He wasn’t impressed. Basically, I’m an apostate and that’s really sad because obviously the Church is still true and I’ve been blinded by Satan and I’m missing out on Eternal Life, etc. I wasn’t really trying to convince him of anything, just explain my position that I am happy with my choices and I did not come to the decision lightly. Occasionally another former missionary will find me on facebook, be excited to have reconnected, read a bit of my bio, and then apparently block or unfriend me (my religious status is “Apostate”).
My wife is still in facebook contact with one of her converts. They chat once in a while and comment on each other’s photos. Surely she has noticed by now that my wife is no longer a Mormon. But she hasn’t asked, and my wife doesn’t give unsolicited details.
:becomes extremely jealous of Rhodes and his Tahitian mission:
On the other hand, you spent two years in Tahiti and never went to the beach (without feeling insanely guilty). Heh. I pity you.
Two years with no swimming and no dating and doing my damnedest not to stare at tits. It wasn’t a vacation, but may be the most beautiful place to work.
Sorry.
If she comes back to this thread or jumps into another one, I’ll simply take it to the Pit, which is what I should have done this time. It should make it easier for everyone as it seemed that other posters were also commenting about each other.
I’ve got to run now, but I’ll comment on MBP’s question later.
To answer MPB in Salt Lake I kept in touch with some companions and converts for a few years. But I haven’t seen anyone in over a decade, when my mission president was set apart as a 70. And I haven’t shared even a short email in at least five years. Of course most of them are back in Brazil, and we drifted apart before electronic communication became common.
Back to the OP, I had forgotten President Paternoster’s blog post on the subject.
The part about getting your own planet (or universe) isn’t specifically spelled out, but he describes how God was able to get his own planets (or universe) by following the same path that faithful Mormons are following now. To support his claims he uses an AprilR-approved source: The King Follett Sermon
I’ve posted this previously, but for my mission, I’m one of the few who had negative numbers. I was in Japan right during the explosion of baptisms in the Land of Rising Sun. The Tokyo temple had just been dedicated in 1980 by the prophet Spenser Kimball who declared that the Lord had told him that this was the time for Japan, when the multitudes would join the faith.
And they did. There were thousands and thousands who were signing up on the dotted line. Our teachers at the MTC (Missionary Training Center) who had been there during this time were all so excited that we would be going over at this special time. They were there for the beginning, as we were to help continue.
Most were in the Tokyo missions, but even the humble Fukuoka mission was part of this great and exciting time.
But there was just one teeny, tiny problem. In spite of the tens of thousands of new members, there wasn’t a lot of growth in meeting attendance. My first branch had 15 people coming, in a city with four full time missionaries who had been there a decade.
Something was clearly wrong. The architect of this growth and General Authority for East Asia, Elder Kikuchi, sprang into action. We had area conferences where he would come and harangue us for not getting the numbers. We were lacking in faith. We were not fulling the promise from a living prophet to the Japanese people. We were not up to the standards of those perfect elders who had graced the blessed ground. OK, not quite those words, but we got the message.
It’s funny. I had grown up with complete faith and trust in the General Authorities, those men who regularly talked with God. And I sat in the back of a basketball court, on wobbly metal folding chairs with my mind simply refusing to form the thoughts it so desperately wanted to say: “This guy is full of shit.”
When it crashed, it crashed hard. Kikuchi was [del]fired[/del] reassigned to a desk job back in HQ where he could be watched more carefully. A few months later, the replacement came over and there were bunch more area conferences. This time, we had a new mission (no pun intended). The system was overloaded. Well over 90% of all the people who had been baptized in the previous five years were completely “inactive.” There were branches with several thousand members of record, and 16 people showing up. You can’t even begin to know where to start to fellowship.
From here
No. Year Members Annual Growth Rate
1 1976 27,516
2 1978 31,948 7.45%
3 1980 45,958 17.98%
4 1982 65,682 17.67%
5 1984 70,998 3.89%
So the new plan was to track down all these people and ask if if they wouldn’t agree to a “no harm, no fault” approach. We’d simply cancel their baptism, and it would like it had never happened. They could drink and smoke, and no one would bug them about that 10%. Most of them had been rushed into joining without knowing what was really involved. In a classic bait and switch routine, they were promised friendship with foreigners, no mention of the WoW or the other pesky commandments and then once they were actually in, the gaijin foreigners would go on to other [del]targets[/del] “investigators” and the cycle would continue.
Although I was still technically a believer and a missionary, it shouldn’t be surprising that I found my new calling and excelled in the role. No one out did me in the out doing process. I quickly made up for the four “Ins” with an magnitude great number of “Outs.” The funny thing is that the High Counsel was less impressed with my talents than the guys who had come back eight months earlier with more notched carved into their BoMs, although I left the Japanese church off in a stronger position when my time was up.
For the four who joined – although we had actually taught them the entire lessons, I didn’t feel they were ready but my senior companion overrode my objections. They were all inactive within six months of when we left the area.
I didn’t keep up with any of my companions, so I don’t know what has happened to them. I did meet one of the senior leaders in our mission. We were both in a bar in Roppongi, so there must be some more of us out there.
1% alcohol will not have much effect on bacteria. The reason beer (including small beer) is safer in terms of pathogens, is that the water is boiled in the process of making it.
Well, I’ve been wading through this a bit, and the short (secular) answer seems to be:
“Mormons doctrine teaches you could get your own planet someday if you rise high enough in the ranks to become a God equivalent, and if you wanted one.
Because the public is likely to be underwhelmed by this assertion, it is typically not emphasized to the unconverted as a formal teaching, but neither has it been formally rejected by any LDS leaders to whom new revelations are given.”
Is this about right?
P.S.
April R and other defenders of the faith: I’m not looking for a cite of doctrine to wade through. Seems like a pretty simple question. If you don’t want to answer it, don’t answer it.
This is one of the best references for Mormon demographics, and it’s run by a true believing Mormon, unlike other places such as Mormon Think who seem to be cultural Mormons.
:smack:“No harm, no foul”
This has been answered upstream.
From sometime in the 90s, the church decided to become mainstream and started to change the emphasis on which things it taught. For obvious reasons, the was one of the first teachings which needed to put into a back closet.
So, would Blood Atonement apply to the sin of Corporte Raiding?
Crane
I’m gonna disagree with you on this part. I stopped going to church around 1985 or so, then started back occasionally around 2007 when my wife converted. The “As man is God once was, as God is man can become” doctrine was around when I was a kid (left as a teenager), and I’ve heard it in the last five years in sunday school and institute lessons. It isn’t on the front page, but hasn’t quite been put into the back closet.
Now the blood atonement and Adam=God stuff that Rhodes likes to go on about, I haven’t heard those anywhere but here. It Brigham Young did say it (and it does sound like him), that stuff has been taken out of the back closet and buried in the yard at midnight. May go over to the BYU library some time and see if I can find it in the Journal of Discourses.
Was amused to hear in General Conference today not once but twice to disregard people on the internet saying that past church leaders said things not aligned with current doctrine. Makes you wonder if they read the dope.
Heh. Can you expand on this (if you remember)? Did they say past church leaders WERE in line with current doctrine and we are a bunch of liars or did they say to just ignore the fact that past church leaders were doing a lot of crazy stuff?
And, no need to dig around the library; I’m pretty sure the entire Journal of Discourses is online.
Was that today (Saturday)? I forgot it was Conference time again; good to know to avoid downtown this weekend. Here’s speechesso far.
It must have given them a break from talking about the scourge of internet pornography.
Both, of course, but more of 1.5, that we’re a bunch of liars.
Following the link above for the conference talks, Anderson touches more on this, but with the typically Mormon deception. He first introduces a Hoffman forgery as an example of how falsehoods can drive people from the Church, then jumps right into how others are shaken by teachings of leaders of the last few decades which don’t seem right. This is where he talks of Doctrine is taught by all 15 members of the First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve.
Going on, he brings out the Joseph Smith quote " I never told you I was perfect; but there is no error in the revelations" which unfortunately, he doesn’t explain how to handle the obvious errors in the revelations and doesn’t discuss Adam-God which Young claimed to be a revelation.
No does he go over the documented changes in revelations given in the D&C and the BoM.
But don’t worry your poor, pretty heads. Them Internets are just all liars.
Yeah, it’s definitely still taught. Just unofficially. I doubt that it’s spelled out clearly in any lesson manuals (although I’ve said that about another topic only to have Erdosain prove me wrong) unless Monson is trying to bring it back after all of Hinkley’s efforts to deny it. My LDS friends still believe the doctrine and seem unaware that it’s a taboo topic.
I don’t care much about Adam-God. It’s blasphemous, but blasphemy isn’t a real sin. I only described it upthread because someone asked. But I confess I enjoy bringing up Blood Atonement. I think it shows that Brigham was a very bad man, and if Brigham was the Mouthpiece of God then his god is also a very bad man.
I was only aware of one of those talks. I put this up on facebook: “Sorry, Mr Quentin L Cook, but I will not ‘repent’ for using the Internet to study history. Anyone making such an absurd demand obviously has something to hide.” It generated quite a stir among my LDS brothers and in-laws.