Froggie wrote:I thought I smelled something funny. ;)
Very interesting read, Shades! Missions are such a superconcentrated Mormonism, I find it interesting to read the dynamics of how the missionaries are treated.
Big green hugs,
Froggie
Hey, I remember you. You used to post at ZLMB.
Good to see you again.
Let me chime in with Bridget here. :)
It's great to see you on the board, Froggie! I always enjoyed your posts on MAD. Glad you have decided to post on "the better board".
I am reluctant to go into detail about personal experiences because each person must discover for themselves how to deal with the Holy Spirit, but I recommend you seek out general authorities and others members that have shared their personal experiences, dreams, visions because it is a life long learning experience. Also I read some of your other posts and you sound like your questions are honest. God has blessed me with many of those examples that are covered in the scriptures and it has been a life long learning experiences to try to understand them. I have never felt I was prone to a deep emotional side and was raised to be tougher than a wood peckers lips but would fight for the underdog with a desire of fairness and justice.
This burning question! This first happened when I was in my early 20’s so I know that it was not some new undiscovered emotion that I felt or was it a feeling that is considered the norm in society because people in general don’t talk about it nor is it dealt with in the field of physiology. I was at a dangerous cross roads in my life where I needed to make some major life changes or end it all. I was depressed and angered but not even thinking about suicide. I was looking for the fact that there must be something more to life then just the world around us because most of what I knew about life was crap. I was not religious but did seek out God because I wanted Him to be there. I talked with God more from a deep internal struggle of frustration. When I did confront God I had a total burning of peace, mental enlightenment, and shock from my head to feet that lasted for many seconds. Other things happened in the room that I will not talk about but this cemented even more that the experience was real and not some delusion. I did not at the time know what it meant except that my frustration left me and I knew there was a God. I did not join some church but just went on with life and college.
I will try to address your other questions as I get time.
Bridget Jack Meyers wrote: He's, like, the evil overlord of the anti-Mormons.
Ha! Do you think I should use that as my new tagline underneath my avatar?
Froggie wrote:Very interesting read, Shades! Missions are such a superconcentrated Mormonism, I find it interesting to read the dynamics of how the missionaries are treated.
Thanks, but I can't possibly stress enough the fact that missionaries are treated differently purely according to whom their mission presidents are. The one I described is only one out of many thousands over the years.
Mission presidents run the gamut from humble, loving, Christlike servants of the Lord all the way to Nazi wannabes treating their stewardships like their own personal Fourth Reichs and the missionaries as personal possessions--and, quite literally, EVERYTHING in between.
For many more examples of how mission presidents can be, take a look at the following:
"Finally, for your rather strange idea that miracles are somehow linked to the amount of gay sexual gratification that is taking place would require that primitive Christianity was launched by gay sex, would it not?"
friggs wrote:Yes I am a heretic and I am attracted to heretics like Joseph Smith, Avraham Gileadi, and Prophet Thomas S. Monson. I just want to throw out some red meat out to see what level of people I am dealing with. The point I was (I will go really slow so those the don't want to look at anything other than anti-Mormon information can understand) getting to was if you are no expert on the book of Isaiah the you might want to direct your concerns to someone like Avraham Gileadi. But I am sure you have all the answers from the anti-Mormons. Yes I am a heretic and I am attracted to heretics like Joseph Smith, Avraham Gileadi, and Prophet Thomas S. Monson.
Dude, Chiasmas!
From the Ernest L. Wilkinson Diaries: "ELW dreams he's spattered w/ grease. Hundreds steal his greasy pants."
Bridget Jack Meyers wrote:Random question, Shades. Can you explain your avatar to me?
Sure. When I was a junior companion in Japan (I really need to quit talking about my mission all the time; I'm even starting to bore myself) I was riding the subway one day when I saw an advertisement across from me. It featured the woman in my avatar, albeit many years younger (she would've been 25 at the time).
I was/am awestruck at how beautiful she was/is. My avatar really doesn't do her justice. Luckily my senior at the time was Japanese, so he could tell me who she was: Yasuko Sawaguchi, model and actress.
Here are a few more pictures of the lovely Miss Sawaguchi. As before, these photos really don't do justice to how she was 19 years ago:
Why is it a woman?
Because I'm only attracted to females.
"Finally, for your rather strange idea that miracles are somehow linked to the amount of gay sexual gratification that is taking place would require that primitive Christianity was launched by gay sex, would it not?"
Dr. Shades, Thanks for the link http://www.salamandersociety.com/foyer/mpfromhell/ about the missions and there presidents. I went to the SLC mission in the 80’s and can not complain about my two mission presidents but I, as many were older converts with back grounds in business, military, gangs, and cults and had a little better handle on the way things are rather than how they should be. We did get some of the elders from other missions but we did not always know why they came there. Some of mine and the other older converts problems was the immaturity of some of the younger elders and bad actors in Utah and Mormon country. Yes I was a up tight prick and I now know how hard other missions were for many missionaries. I and other older convert missionaries quickly got my fill of the hypocrisy of the leaders and members and some went home early. One of the things it taught me is not to take any crap from members or leaders and to do what I know is right.
A couple of things from your web link is, I have to laugh at President Kimball’s statement that he felt he got most of the homosexuality cleaned up in the church. I wonder how shocked he would be to know of how many elders are gay. I am sure he is rewriting this book on sinning. The other thing is the posting about President Bird and all the guilt trip he put everyone through. When I went through the mission training center he was there and said he was in the FBI and was in charge of going over all the porn in the United States to determine if it was legal or not. I don’t know if he lived long enough to hear about the possibility of FBI J. Edgar Hoover, may have been gay. It would have driven Bird to take his service revolver and stick it in his mouth thinking the hand he was shaking all those years had man ass all over it. If this did not warp Bird out all that porn did take its toll.
"We hear all the time about the persecution the Mormons endured in Missouri."
"Nits make lice" was the response of the hairlip Ira Glaze when asked why he killed children at Hauns Mill. Ira and the rest of the Glaze clan hated Mormons for the stealing and property 'appropriation' they did to his relatives. Ira probably didn't really need an excuse as he was a thug but it sounds better that he was 'retaliating' rather than just killing for the fun of it.
Before you criticize someone, walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you do criticize them you'll be a mile away and you'll have their shoes.
Froggie wrote:I thought I smelled something funny. ;)
Very interesting read, Shades! Missions are such a superconcentrated Mormonism, I find it interesting to read the dynamics of how the missionaries are treated.
Big green hugs,
Froggie
Hey, I remember you. You used to post at ZLMB.
Good to see you again.
I remember froggie from the old foyer. Good to see you again!
