Do they know it's not true?

[_Coggins7]

Coggins,

If I were still a TBM and had the curse of being your bishop, I would release you from any calling that required any semblance of a Christ-like countenance.

You are here for the contention, aren't you? You treat the Mormon church as if it were simply your favorite soccer team - GOOOOOOOOAL!! - merely a spectator on a couch living vicariously through those you think represent you.

Where in the hell is Jesus, Coggs?

What is it that you truly live?

No inconceivable. The real question is, why are you here?

[_Inconceivable]

Arguing (however poorly) against one of the several arguments for their sincerity hardly leads to your closing conclusion: "They knew."

Your argument also assumes a vast conspiracy..

..left a trail of insincere personal diaries, family letters, letters to one another, etc., etc., etc., affirming what they all knew to be false, but without ever breaking ranks or even hinting that it was false.

..It would be infinitely easier to believe that you yourself are the pretender--a TBM posing as an ex-Mo to make the rest of us look like fools who will believe any outlandish thing that makes the LDS church look bad.

Back up, Don. Your journals - always the truth? Always what you would write if you were on truth serum? Hardly. You are painting a self portrait. I kept 2 journals over the past 10 years. A small (encrypted) one for myself that will go when I die and one for my posterity.

If the GA's don't (did not) know, particularly over the past several years, surely they have separated themselves from the masses as many social architects do (besides, they know what is best for us, so they are selective in their tutalage).

Call it conspiracy or a vast one. Or call me a foolish ex-mo pretender TBM? Whatever. GA's are not chosen by the people, they are chosen by those that maintain the corporation's cohesiveness.

It's a little church. It's insignificant to the rest of God's children and always will be. Although it has affected me and my loved ones most deaply.

[_Inconceivable]

You're not seriously suggesting one should live the religion they're defending, are you, Inconceivable?...

Don

Yeah.

Don?

[_Coggins7]

You're not seriously suggesting one should live the religion they're defending, are you, Inconceivable?

Have you considered that Coggins might be an ex-Mo bent on embarrassing the church by (self-)portraying the saints as mean-spirited, dogmatic bigots who rage like the devil in the name of Jesus?

;-)

Don

Actually, this sounds a great deal like D. Michael Quinn. Indeed, Bradley's smarmy little ant bite only makes all the clearer the real concentrated lack of substance that lies just below the surface of the September Six type of intellectual who's clever and refined articulation of concepts and language mask a mushy, decomposing core.

I know who the bigots are here. We all do. But the pretense and obversion will no doubt continue on indefinitely as the actual dogmatic bigots continue their pose of sincere rationality and phony impartiality.

[_Ray A]

Yea, they are all liars, knaves, deceivers.

The man has been gone five minutes, and I could predict a thread like this. No mercy, let's rip into 'em asap. Expose the fraud.

God, grant me one wish, that people would see virtue and truth beyond their own narrow views of "reality".

Thanks, Runtu. Thanks heaps. I didn't even expect 24 hours grace.

[_DonBradley]

Back up, Don. Your journals - always the truth? Always what you would write if you were on truth serum? Hardly. You are painting a self portrait. I kept 2 journals over the past 10 years. A small (encrypted) one for myself that will go when I die and one for my posterity.

You're merely dodging the argument, Incon, not answering it. As the size and impenentrability of an alleged conspiracy grow, its improbability increases exponentially. That none of the participants in your vast General Authority conspiracy would break ranks over several decades, or longer, or leave extant records even suggesting their nonbelief is astronomomically improbable.

Name one General Authority called since the life of Joseph Smith who has let on to the church being a fraud or left record of their view that it is. That the LDS church could have this tight a conspiracy and this tight a grip on all this evidence is preposterous. They certainly haven't displayed that kind of tight control over other leaks and negative evidence. It's sheer silliness.

I don't, of course, think you're a TBM posing an ex-Mo to embarrass ex-Mos. But to the extent that you take up this kind of silly argument, you'd might as well be.

Don

[_DonBradley]

You're not seriously suggesting one should live the religion they're defending, are you, Inconceivable?...

Don

Yeah.

Don?

You didn't detect a whiff of sarcasm there, Inc?

[_Coggins7]

Yea, they are all liars, knaves, deceivers.

The man has been gone five minutes, and I could predict a thread like this. No mercy, let's rip into 'em asap. Expose the fraud.

God, grant me one wish, that people would see virtue and truth beyond their own narrow views of "reality".

Thanks, Runtu. Thanks heaps. I didn't even expect 24 hours grace.

Let's see how long it takes for GBH to get the Jerry Falwell dancing-on-his-grave treatment.

[_Ray A]

Let's see how long it takes for GBH to get the Jerry Falwell dancing-on-his-grave treatment.

I feel enormously sad...beyond words.

[_Inconceivable]

No inconceivable. The real question is, why are you here?

I expected your reflexive response. It doesn't shut up a bishop or SP during a temple recommend interview though, does it? Nevertheless, your secret is safe with everyone here.

Perhaps I should been more prudent and not have let you in on it.