Jehovah’s Witnesses want brains!
They are. Rotting corpses have no god belief, I gawr-an-tee.
And they don’t have water in Jewish Heaven? If not, how can all the ritual ablutions be performed? Schlomo doesn’t even need a proxy to perform it. John the Baptist died a good Jew.
I’ve known a few and, while they weren’t intellectual, that is an unfair characterization.
Both the leadership and the members are guilty, just like Prop 8, where the leadership says that the church itself didn’t make any donations - just members, kind of by accident. Bunch of rebels, those Mormons. Same thing here.
When I first saw this thread, my reaction was why repeat this again, but once I read the article I saw it was because the church was dishonest about holding to the agreement.
So, I guess you offer the souls a choice whether or not to be baptized?
It’s not that they don’t have water in heaven–though I have no idea if something like water would exist in Heaven, why would anybody need it? The point is, the rite of baptism is a physical one, and that’s why one body can be substituted for another.
Jewish Heaven? What Jewish Heaven? To Mormons, the afterlife is as the Mormons order it, which when you think about it is only natural. The LDS’s beliefs are based on their understanding of the afterlife, based on their leaders’ teaching and their holy books. Similarly, the understanding of the afterlife of almost every other religion is informed by whatever that religion believes. That’s hardly controversial. So the way this works, in the Cliffs Notes version, is this:
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You must be baptized to be saved. To be fair to the LDS, a lack of salvation may bar you from any of the kingdoms (Mormon Heaven), but unlike more fundamentalist Christian credos, it does not condemn you to Hell, the LDS not believing in the classic idea of Hell (i.e., eternal damnation, burning, and suffering), AFAIK. Instead, if you are not saved, you will be cast into the Outer Darkness, akin to Purgatory, where you must wait to be judged at the End of the Age. But you will not be happy there. You will not be in communion with God.
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The only operative baptism is an LDS baptism. Baptisms done without “priesthood authority” – meaning, of course, LDS priesthood – are insufficient.
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Thus, with the best of intentions, a good-hearted Mormon who genuinely wants all people to enjoy the blessings of Heaven faces a quandry: You must be baptized in the Mormon faith to have that, but millions of people had no opportunity to receive that sacrament or ordinance before they died. So what to do? Again, give credit where credit is due here: The answer for many other, more rigid Christian denominations has been “Sucks to be you; guess you’re burning in Hell.” But the LDS has what they genuinely believe is a better solution.
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Baptism after death. The deceased is baptized, with a very good Mormon young man or woman serving as a proxy. The deceased may then decide if they want to enjoy the fruits of the true (Mormon) baptism and thereby go to Heaven, or refuse it and remain in the Outer Darkness. There’s not much comment on how many people the LDS seriously think would say “No thanks!” once the correctness of LDS doctrine has been made manifest to them in the afterlife, but I’m guessing they think that number is mightly low.
No, there is obviously no choice as to the rite, which is a temple ordinance performed in the name of the dead. But there is a choice given as to whether to accept or reject the baptism – to accept and be baptized or to disavow and remain effectively unbaptized. The problem with this as far as other Christian faiths are concerned, is that we believe the sacrament is the end product of a process of belief, repentance, and rededication (talking here about non-infant baptism); it’s the last step, not the first. It is not something that is done and then you decide if you want it; it’s something you decide you want, take certain steps to make ready for, and then it is done.
The LDS holds that because the soul can disavow the baptism, making it essentially void ab initio, there is “no harm, no foul” for those who would decide to decline. This overlooks the fact that to many (including myself), it is the very performance of the rite itself on behalf of non-believers that is offensive.
Out of curiosity, should atheists be similarly offended that good Christians pray for their eternal souls?
That’s not an argument – it’s an observation and a question.
Nice going there, linking this practice to Confederate hate symbols.
Because atheists always perform Christian rituals in church? Does that make any sense?
I’m not actually bothered myself at this, but I am at the idea that this is apparently breaking an agreement of some kind. Nor do I suspect that the breaking of an agreement to do something which many think is quite offensive is really all that smart.
I agree with this sentiment wholeheartedly.
I’d like to say I did that on purpose… so I will. 
I had the same thought later as Jodi though; in Christianity if you’re a nice guy but don’t believe, if you’re from some African tribe the missionaries missed, or if you just lived 5000 years ago, tough tamales. LDS is at least a bit more reasonable and trying to offer an out.
OTOH, if they were truly pious, they wouldn’t have had to let anyone know they were doing this and there wouldn’t have been a problem. From the article, it seems like they came to some agreement over 10 years anyways, but some people aren’t happy about it recently.
I can’t speak for others, but for myself it’s usually only mildly offensive, in that the subtext is that I am somehow wicked, ignorant, unsaved, unclean, etc.
For the most part it’s a :rolleyes: thing, since I don’t even believe in a god, let alone theirs.
I mean, how offended can I be that Mr. Soandso is fervently praying to the Invisible Pink Unicorn to save my soul, since neither the IPU nor my soul actually exist?
It’s the judgement of me that is offensive, mostly.
YMMV
A couple of nitpicks: Not all Christian denominations believe that, only the most fundamentalist of them. I am a Christian and my church does not damn people to Hell. And if you are contrasting “Christians” and “LDS,” it’s worth pointing out the LDS consider themselves a Christian sect and are so treated by most liberal Christian denominations.
I am an atheist.
I think I am going to write to the LDS and ask them to keep me off the list,or put me on a blacklist or something.
I think that even if after I die I find out that Mormonism is the one true religion I still don’t want anything to do with it. I would prefer that death would be the one place that i could escape crazy religions groups.
When I die I sure as hell hope I never go to heaven. I couldn’t imagine a fate worse than spending eternity with born again Christians, or Mormons for that matter.
Sign me up for the Do not call list after death.
He wouldn’t need to. We don’t consider the dead to be bound by any of the mitzvot. In fact, some of us bury our dead in a prayer shawl with one of the corner fringes cut off, to symbolize the fact that the dead aren’t obligated by the mitzvot.
That’s my objection. This smells a little too close to forced baptism for my taste. And the idea of forced baptism is very offensive and very frightening to Jews.
I kind of feel this way, too. I do hope there’s a heaven, but I hope it’s not like the born-agains or Mormons say it is, and that I don’t have to spend eternity with them. There wouldn’t be coffee or wine in Mormon heaven, would there? The Talmud says that, in Jewish heaven, we get wine that has been aging since the creation of the world.
Oh, and if that sounds good to you, you could go there, too, even if you’re not Jewish (that’s also in the Talmud). The born-agains might even be tolerable, once they saw that the rest of us were there too. Or maybe they get their own separate section, and they think the rest of us are in hell, but we’re not.
Okay, I know that many Jews don’t believe in an afterlife while others think ones soul goes to some Grecian Hades where souls have a neutral shadow existence, but I like to think Jewish Heaven is like a subdivision in Boca or the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Either way, I’ll be able to sneak over and get a decent pastrami because nobody in Catholic Heaven knows how to make it. And passover Coke, with no corn syrup.
Actually, Purgatory is where you are purged of your sins, as its name states. And nosiree, you aren’t purged by spending a few millenia in the dark. It’s just like Hell, except you are comforted by the thought of eventually being in the presence of God. Okay, that’s Catholic Purgatory. Other faiths have purgatories without the part where your soul is cleansed by fire for an eon, but that hardly seems sufficient.