We Ex-Mo's Were Assuredly "Lazy" When We Were Mo's

[_Bob Loblaw]

You didn't grow up in the church, did you?

One thing no one can answer me is why God would make his true church look exactly like an obvious scam. Does he have a sick sense of humor like that song says?

[_Tobin]

Take a pix of god next time he appears to you, Tobin. Then post it so we can see it.

You'll just claim I photoshopped it. Talk to him youself and don't waste my time. If any of this stuff is true, you should be very capable of doing that.

[_Tobin]

You didn't grow up in the church, did you?

One thing no one can answer me is why God would make his true church look exactly like an obvious scam. Does he have a sick sense of humor like that song says?

What religious claims don't sound like a hoax and a fraud?

[_bcspace]

Most assuredly.

The reason we are exmos is that we weren't lazy. We did our homework and came to the correct conclusions. If we were still blissfully ignorant of the truth behind Mormonism, we could be called lazy. But we're not. Most Mormons are unaware of the truth, but they're not lazy. They just trust what their leaders tell them.

I've yet to see a case of anti Mormonism which didn't suffer from Fortigurn's Lazy Research. You know, no proof, missing details, third hand accounts, yellow journalism, failure to note valid alternative explanations, ad hominem and other logical fallacies, desire to sin etc.

[_Stormy Waters]

What religious claims don't sound like a hoax and a fraud?

Okay, so according to you all religious claims sound like a hoax and a fraud. Mormonism like rest of them 'sounds like a fraud', but inspite of that God requires us to pray fervently to find out if it is true.
Your God sounds like a basket case.

[_moksha]

We Ex-Mo's Were Assuredly "Lazy" When We Were Mo's

Haven't you all wondered whether the lives of Chapel Mormons are made peaceful simply by taking the watercourse way. Floating down stream without struggling against the current takes many burdens away.

[_Tobin]

What religious claims don't sound like a hoax and a fraud?

Okay, so according to you all religious claims sound like a hoax and a fraud. Mormonism like rest of them 'sounds like a fraud', but inspite of that God requires us to pray fervently to find out if it is true.
Your God sounds like a basket case.

It must seem presumptuous of me to believe in a God that can actually answer us and tell us what to believe instead of believing in a God that doesn't speak with us at all. I think people that believe in a God that doesn't exist and can't speak with us is more along the lines of being a basket case and a pretty worthless belief.

[_beastie]

Why, as beastie asks, did it not occur to those of us that had this experience that caring for widows and orphans could have been done without the necessity of BY making those widows his 'wives'?

Could it be that it did not occur to us, and we thus did not dig deeper then, because we were trying to give that seed of desire the test that Alma said required us to hope for the seed to be good, to be true, and to nourish it, we had to avoid naysayers?

Absolutely.

In retrospect, I have often wondered how it came to be that I believed in, and joined, the LDS church. After all, to be brutally frank, its claims are quite unbelievable.

I was at a point in my life where I was foundering. I had lost my focus and had no idea what to do with my life. I was in college, and couldn't even figure out what I wanted to major in. I needed, and wanted, guidance and direction. I wanted answers. I'd also been struggling with belief in God - I couldn't figure out if I believed or not. My older sister seemed to have direction and purpose in her life, after joining the LDS church. Obviously, I wanted it to be true.

The author of the Book of Mormon did have insight into human nature. Once we want something to be true, or hope it is true, we begin to engage in motivated reasoning, something like confirmation bias. We pay attention to and exaggerate anything that could conceivably confirm the "truth", while minimizing, or outright not seeing, anything that could contradict the truth claims.

Here's another example. I had prayed about the Book of Mormon and had a strong numinous experience that I interpreted to mean the Book of Mormon is "true". Yet, the next night, I prayed about Joseph Smith being a prophet and felt nothing. Zero. Zip. I immediately knew this was a problem. I immediately knew the Book of Mormon could be "true" without Joseph Smith being a true prophet. For example, maybe someone else wrote the book. Or maybe he did, but wasn't "called" to be a prophet in general and overreached. So when I expressed my concern to the missionaries and my sister, all they told me was "but if the Book of Mormon is true, then Joseph Smith MUST be a true prophet". And, just like that, I ignored my previous common sense.

I wanted it to be true, and so it was.

[_Cylon]

You did your homework huh? Yeah, right.

Mormonism is based on a personal witness and testimony of God and that God told you to be Mormon. You don't have to do much homework to have it dawn on you that people claiming to see God, Angels, and having Gold Plates land in their lap sure sounds like BS without experiencing that for yourself.

Why do you seem so certain that if God did talk to us, he would tell us to be Mormon? You say he told you that, but among the historical accounts of people claiming God spoke to them, very few of them said anything about Mormonism or its specific claims. From what I can tell, if God exists and speaks to humans, he must just get a kick out out of seeing us all bicker and fight over the completely contradictory things he tells to different people (and sometimes to the same person).

[_Tobin]

You did your homework huh? Yeah, right.

Mormonism is based on a personal witness and testimony of God and that God told you to be Mormon. You don't have to do much homework to have it dawn on you that people claiming to see God, Angels, and having Gold Plates land in their lap sure sounds like BS without experiencing that for yourself.

Why do you seem so certain that if God did talk to us, he would tell us to be Mormon? You say he told you that, but among the historical accounts of people claiming God spoke to them, very few of them said anything about Mormonism or its specific claims. From what I can tell, if God exists and speaks to humans, he must just get a kick out out of seeing us all bicker and fight over the completely contradictory things he tells to different people (and sometimes to the same person).

My point is IF you are Mormon, you should have a witness that God told you to be Mormon. There isn't much homework you need to do for that. Either that happens for you or it doesn't. If it doesn't, I certainly wouldn't be Mormon - that's stupid and you are just fooling yourself with absolutely no proof that any of it is true. Now, if God tells you to do something else, that is perfectly fine with me too. That is of little importance to me, so long as you are talking with God and doing what you believe God wants you to do.