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The topic in sacrament meeting was obediance. One speaker recounted a story of a man who was with the coast guard in WWII. The ship went in to port and all the sailors got drunk except for him. When going back out to sea, a battleship hailed them and demanded that they identify themselves or else they would be fired upon. Unfortunately everyone was drunk except the Mormon boy. He didn't know what to do, but then his borhter appeared to him and told him how to respond to the other ship. He did so and they were safe. Later he found out that his brother had been killed.


Analysis? Why is this not seen as evidence of the supernatural? Knowledge was apparently obtained through this that he would not otherwise have been able to obtain.

Also, what sort of supernatural event would it take for you to regain your testimonies?

Now, did this happen to him, or did this happen to one of his friends, who, when pressed will admit that it didn't actually happen to him, but to HIS friend, who when pressed......and on and on....

Also, isn't it funny how "drunk" automatically equals incapacitated in the LDS culture.

Also, isn't it funny how they let a crew of drunk men leave port? Not just drunk, but so drunk they couldn't even function. Doesn't it take dozens of men all working together like a well oiled machine to run a ship? Yet, they could leave port with ONLY the Mormon boy functioning??

Also, you can't leave port without immediately being fired upon??

Good points, Scottie.

So they were too drunk to identify themselves, but they were sober enough to operate a ship??

asbestosman wrote:Analysis? Why is this not seen as evidence of the supernatural? Knowledge was apparently obtained through this that he would not otherwise have been able to obtain.

Whatever. There was no magic involved. He just made a default roll against Seamanship, which is like IQ-5 or something, and he got lucky. People do it every day in role playing games, so why not in real life.

How did the drunk crew stoke the boilers? How did they regulate the steam pressure to make turns appropriate to leaving the waters of a harbor? How did they coordinate with the harbor pilot, the port officials, etc.? How did they set a course that didn't run the ship aground? How did they weigh anchor?

And where were the ship's officers? Where was the captain? The mates? The radio operators? They were all so slobberingly drunk, after however many hours since they left the bars on shore and returned to their ship, fired up the boilers, and went through all the routines necessary to prepare to cast off or leave their mooring, that they still couldn't respond to a simple radio message?

As others have pointed out, this story is just so obviously stupid on the face of it, that it's actually mind-boggling that anyone doesn't see through it immediately, and takes it seriously enough to keep passing it on.

Please tell me it was a deacon or a beehive who stood up and passed on this Faith-Promoting Rumor as part of a youth talk. Any adult ought to have known better.

As I was reading I was starting to get all tingley with the spirit, then Sethbag’s and Scottie’s posts ruined the whole story for me.

Sethbag wrote:How did the drunk crew stoke the boilers? How did they regulate the steam pressure to make turns appropriate to leaving the waters of a harbor? How did they coordinate with the harbor pilot, the port officials, etc.? How did they set a course that didn't run the ship aground? How did they weigh anchor?

And where were the ship's officers? Where was the captain? The mates? The radio operators? They were all so slobberingly drunk, after however many hours since they left the bars on shore and returned to their ship, fired up the boilers, and went through all the routines necessary to prepare to cast off or leave their mooring, that they still couldn't respond to a simple radio message?

As others have pointed out, this story is just so obviously stupid on the face of it, that it's actually mind-boggling that anyone doesn't see through it immediately, and takes it seriously enough to keep passing it on.

Please tell me it was a deacon or a beehive who stood up and passed on this Faith-Promoting Rumor as part of a youth talk. Any adult ought to have known better.

that's easy: the three nephites and a magic compass were aboard.

Sethbag and Scottie have merely demonstrated that my recollection of the story is somewhat incorrect, or at least incomplete. I'm often half-asleep during sacrament meeting.

Some points of interest:

I'm certain that the one recounting the story was old enough to be my father.

I asked my wife and she said that she thought the sailor's name was Legrand but wasn't sure if it was Legrand Richards.

Anyhow, I'm not sure how drunk they were--maybe they simply couldn't remember one important detail for responding to the hailing ship, but they were sober enough to get the ship going. Maybe they brought alcohol with them. Maybe not everyone was drunk to the point of being incapacitated, but the people who needed to operate the radio / flashlight semaphore were unable to perform their function.

Abman, it sounds like you are more than willing to massage the story to help it seem plausible. If that's what it takes, then how could this sort of thing be of any use in gaining/regaining a real testimony? Both the story and the resulting testimony are shams.

Of course you already know this....

Beyond any doubt, I know the true facts.

There was only one who was drunk, the storyteller itself. He repeated his story many times - according to his best knowledge. He modified it every time, precept upon precept, precept upon precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a little - to sound better.

You know only the last version, the best one.

CFR? Please googlesearch "First Vision".