DiscussMormonism.com

I give the church 25 years as a carny philosophy version of a mainstream institution. Romney is going to unleash the first cork. This election is going to spell doom for Salt Lake City. It will be a Mormon Armageddon. This generation is swaying closer to reason. Eventually it will reach a tipping point wherein the decline of the LDS church will be hemorrhaging resignation letters and the rolls of the lost sheep file will fill the missionaries blue pocket calendars.

Mormonism has already lost the battle to the internet. Thank god I got in on the ground floor. Missionary numbers are declining because of reduced rolls, lower births and maturing of the LDS middle class. the great spooky world is outside inviting peace from a life locked in personal discomfort and limitation. Eventually the retraction will hapen and once again all Mormons will be fundamentalist nutjobs with too much power instead of businessmen with too much power.

Mercury wrote:I give the church 25 years as a carny philosophy version of a mainstream institution. Romney is going to unleash the first cork. This election is going to spell doom for Salt Lake City. It will be a Mormon Armageddon. This generation is swaying closer to reason. Eventually it will reach a tipping point wherein the decline of the LDS church will be hemorrhaging resignation letters and the rolls of the lost sheep file will fill the missionaries blue pocket calendars.

Mormonism has already lost the battle to the internet. Thank god I got in on the ground floor. Missionary numbers are declining because of reduced rolls, lower births and maturing of the LDS middle class. the great spooky world is outside inviting peace from a life locked in personal discomfort and limitation. Eventually the retraction will hapen and once again all Mormons will be fundamentalist nutjobs with too much power instead of businessmen with too much power.

I'd take that bet. We may shrink someday but we'll survive. Likely the nutjobs will be the survivors. We call them the 'faithful' in the Church though.

If the church grows, it is the "rough stone rolling."

If it stops growing, it is just separating the "chaff from the wheat!"

;-)

My guess is that it will take longer than twenty-five years... more like a hundred or so.

If I recall correctly, seems the rise and fall of countries, organizations, and possibly religions is roughly a bell curve. I think the LDS church hit its peak about ten or fifteen years ago.


~dancer~

Naw....there are lots of religions that are much weirder than Mormonism that have thrived.

I hope that someday we can evolve into a species that doesn't need a God to make us accountable for our actions, but I doubt it will happen.

The Nehor wrote:

Mercury wrote:I give the church 25 years as a carny philosophy version of a mainstream institution. Romney is going to unleash the first cork. This election is going to spell doom for Salt Lake City. It will be a Mormon Armageddon. This generation is swaying closer to reason. Eventually it will reach a tipping point wherein the decline of the LDS church will be hemorrhaging resignation letters and the rolls of the lost sheep file will fill the missionaries blue pocket calendars.

Mormonism has already lost the battle to the internet. Thank god I got in on the ground floor. Missionary numbers are declining because of reduced rolls, lower births and maturing of the LDS middle class. the great spooky world is outside inviting peace from a life locked in personal discomfort and limitation. Eventually the retraction will hapen and once again all Mormons will be fundamentalist nutjobs with too much power instead of businessmen with too much power.

I'd take that bet. We may shrink someday but we'll survive. Likely the nutjobs will be the survivors. We call them the 'faithful' in the Church though.

The branch davidians are thriving. Same thing with Heavens Gate.

Scottie wrote:Naw....there are lots of religions that are much weirder than Mormonism that have thrived.

I hope that someday we can evolve into a species that doesn't need a God to make us accountable for our actions, but I doubt it will happen.

Amen, brutha.

I don't see Mormonism going away any faster than all the other religions (on average). I do think humans will evolve out of the god need, but I just don't think it will be in our lifetime. However, we are laying the groundwork for it now, and I'm proud to be a part of it.

Mercury wrote:

The Nehor wrote:

Mercury wrote:I give the church 25 years as a carny philosophy version of a mainstream institution. Romney is going to unleash the first cork. This election is going to spell doom for Salt Lake City. It will be a Mormon Armageddon. This generation is swaying closer to reason. Eventually it will reach a tipping point wherein the decline of the LDS church will be hemorrhaging resignation letters and the rolls of the lost sheep file will fill the missionaries blue pocket calendars.

Mormonism has already lost the battle to the internet. Thank god I got in on the ground floor. Missionary numbers are declining because of reduced rolls, lower births and maturing of the LDS middle class. the great spooky world is outside inviting peace from a life locked in personal discomfort and limitation. Eventually the retraction will hapen and once again all Mormons will be fundamentalist nutjobs with too much power instead of businessmen with too much power.

I'd take that bet. We may shrink someday but we'll survive. Likely the nutjobs will be the survivors. We call them the 'faithful' in the Church though.

The branch davidians are thriving. Same thing with Heavens Gate.

Good for them. Seeing the growth of my Church as a test of it's validity is silly. I flip open my Bible or my Book of Mormon and see the Church routinely failing/falling into apostasy.

Mercury wrote:I give the church 25 years as a carny philosophy version of a mainstream institution. Romney is going to unleash the first cork. This election is going to spell doom for Salt Lake City. It will be a Mormon Armageddon. This generation is swaying closer to reason. Eventually it will reach a tipping point wherein the decline of the LDS church will be hemorrhaging resignation letters and the rolls of the lost sheep file will fill the missionaries blue pocket calendars.

Mormonism has already lost the battle to the internet. Thank god I got in on the ground floor. Missionary numbers are declining because of reduced rolls, lower births and maturing of the LDS middle class. the great spooky world is outside inviting peace from a life locked in personal discomfort and limitation. Eventually the retraction will happen and once again all Mormons will be fundamentalist nutjobs with too much power instead of businessmen with too much power.

I don't believe the church will have vanished in 25 years, though its steady decline will be painfully obvious. It may only require another 5-10 years to realize that our current 20 somethings just are not going to toe the party line. No more early marriages, no more early child farms, no more sitting through the 3 hour block. We are currently at the point where most members have accepted that middle class America wants nothing to do with the church. We could not baptize our social or economic peers no matter what desperate measures we employed!

"Brother Brown, as you come to know the truthfulness of the principles we've shared with you, WILL YOU obey the law of tithing by giving ten percent of your income to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints?" Crickets chirp as Brother Brown shows the Elders to the door.........

Maxrep wrote:"Brother Brown, as you come to know the truthfulness of the principles we've shared with you, WILL YOU obey the law of tithing by giving ten percent of your income to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints?" Crickets chirp as Brother Brown shows the Elders to the door.........

Why is that a more onerous burden now than it was in the past?

The Nehor wrote:

Maxrep wrote:"Brother Brown, as you come to know the truthfulness of the principles we've shared with you, WILL YOU obey the law of tithing by giving ten percent of your income to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints?" Crickets chirp as Brother Brown shows the Elders to the door.........

Why is that a more onerous burden now than it was in the past?

To aswer your question, Economics. With the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer there is a great recession waiting in the green room. In times lke this there will be the retraction I wrote about. After the banks make it difficult to borrow money and purse strings get tighter we will collapse and return to a different model. Some of the wheels that turn the prosperity we have enjoyed over the past 20 years will come and any system, rel;igious, political and educational institution will keep bowing to the economic institutions we rely on. For most with a middle of the road income the loss of ten percent (plus interest!) was a bad idea 5 to 10 years ago. Commodities are not as cheap in America as they are in China. And now we are seeing the strains on China as well, as money shifting between american, chinese and other banks in between go back and forth over the Pacific. eventually that income will shift and stay in between China and America (US, Mexico and Canada included). OK, enough Economic daydreaming.

So to conclude, the sillyness of Mormonism is unveiled to the entered initiate. It seems folly to invest money that could be going to a 401k. All the money wasted on my mission when I could have been getting an education. The church will die because selling your soul to a farcical institution for ten percent of your income is insane. I'm serious. its insanity.