Today's funny: Pope John Paul II now a Mormon? ....

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_MormonMendacity
_Emeritus
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Post by _MormonMendacity »

Mister Scratch wrote:
moksha wrote:I seem to remember that Adolf Hitler had been Baptized for the Dead at least eight times on record. I think that a few more times than Ann Frank.

The point I have wondered about is why folks who think such a baptism has no efficacy are so upset by it. It stands more our less as an expression of one groups own way of caring about others. Whenever somebody tries to do something nice for me, I usually just say thank you - even if it was something I could do without. If I knew a group was having a séance to bless one of my dead relative, I would not be creeped out by it - even if it meant sacrificing a live chicken, nude clogging or Jell-O wrestling. I would just smile and say, "That's nice".


Yeah, I think that Shades makes a good point. And the problem is that the act cannot simply be read as "an expression of one group's own way of caring about others." It can *also* be read as the group feeling that its beliefs supercede everyone else's. The dual nature of the way this can be read becomes especially acute when people from the same family fight over whether or not the ordinances should be performed.

Not that I think actual baptism has the slightest efficacy, but didn't baptism provide more symbolism than anything else? I know Mormon doctrine (as well as Catholic) requires authority for it to mean something to God, but it was originally a symbol of rebirth for the Initiate; their indication of accepting a covenant and starting a new life. Being symbolically "born again".

The catholics started doing it before the initiate had a chance to want it under the notion that it would damn the child if it died before accepting it. The Mormons pushed it out 7.99 years to make it look like a choice.

It just seems counter-intuitive (in many, many ways) to do anything for the dead -- and particularly baptism. It strikes me of the one-upmanship typical of many of Joseph's doctrines: little value except as a differentiator.
"Suppose we've chosen the wrong god. Every time we go to church we're just making him madder and madder" --Homer Simpson's version of Pascal's Wager
Religion began when the first scoundrel met the first fool.
Religion is ignorance reduced to a system.
_moksha
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Post by _moksha »

Dr. Shades wrote:What if some group held "excommunications for the dead" which were intended to cancel out your baptism, endowments, and temple marriage?

Would you be a little bit miffed if they put your parents' names through such a ceremony?

This is and easy one to answer - even if I did not find any efficacy in what they are doing, I would probably not appreciate any negative intentions directed toward me or my deceased relatives. If they were trying to do something positive toward me like save my soul, I would view it differently.

Scratch: It can *also* be read as the group feeling that its beliefs supersede everyone else's.

That is a good point. This is rampant in life and apparently so in death as well. As long as the other group wished me well, I would find their wishes benighted but tolerable.
Cry Heaven and let loose the Penguins of Peace
_Bryan Inks
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Post by _Bryan Inks »

moksha wrote:
Dr. Shades wrote:What if some group held "excommunications for the dead" which were intended to cancel out your baptism, endowments, and temple marriage?

Would you be a little bit miffed if they put your parents' names through such a ceremony?

This is and easy one to answer - even if I did not find any efficacy in what they are doing, I would probably not appreciate any negative intentions directed toward me or my deceased relatives. If they were trying to do something positive toward me like save my soul, I would view it differently.


Who said it was a negative intention?

Maybe they feel that in all honesty they are saving the souls of your parents.

Just because something is opposite doesn't equate to negative. It is all a matter of perspective.

From your side of the table, you see things like this as good. From my side of the table I see it as being extremely arrogant, completely irrational and gross insult to the intelligence of the deceased.

Make sense?
_Randall
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Post by _Randall »

It wouldn't matter to me what some one "did for me" after I was dead.

Either there is no consciousness after we die, in which case it doesn't matter.

Or There is an "ater-life" but there is not such thing as organized religion of any type, in which case what someone does "for me" (including myself) either now or after I die, in which case it doesn't matter.

Or it's "true" and in that case I'll have to decide whether to "accept" it or not, in which case it doesn't matter what someone else does for me.
"Kill all the lawyers!" - Walmart. Shakespeare
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