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We visited my wife's family for the holidays and went to their sacrament meeting. A young couple gave talks. They seemed like really nice people so I don't mean to make fun of them, but the wife told a faith promoting story that made my head hurt. In summary, this is what happened to them.

They were newly married and decide to they needed to start having kids. They tried and tried, but she couldn't get pregnant. They went to a doctor, and he said she can't have kids. Obviously, this was devastating to her. She went to the temple and while sitting in the temple she received a very strong revelation that she was put on this earth to adopt a child. The child was a girl, and she was given the girl's name. So the couple set out to adopt a girl. They went through LDS family services, and waited for a birth mother. Several months went by and they never got a call. This woman got depressed, and wondered why she would receive a revelation that wasn't coming true. Her husband gave her a blessing. During the blessing he said that a birth mother would come forward within 3 months. As the 3 month deadline was approaching, no leads came forward, so the woman started getting anxious again. Then it hit her. Maybe she was the birth mother. So she bought a pregnancy test, and it was positive. They went to the doctor and it turned out she was not only pregnant, but she was pregnant with twins, a boy and a girl. They had the twins and their names are...when she said the names I was confused because the girl was given a name that was different than what the mother received in the temple revelation.

So that was the story. I'm happy for the couple that it all worked out even better than expected. However, I have no idea what the temple revelation was all about since it didn't come true, and she didn't even use the name that was given to her. The husband's blessing didn't really come true, but they retrofitted it to kinda fit after she found out she was pregnant. She seems like a sweet girl, and I'm really happy for her that she is so positive about it and sees the hand of god in that experience, but for me, being the cynical jerk that I am, I see doctors making a dumb mistake, creating an emotional roller coaster for this poor young couple, but luckily it all worked out in the end.

I also like to imagine if that young couple was inactive. Imagine if she was the only inactive person in her family and she had all of that happen to her (except for the temple and the blessing) while the rest of her sisters had flawless pregnancies. Then it would be an example of what happens when you don't have the gospel in your life.

Believers are so willing to deceive themselves, it's hardly necessary for their priests to do much lying at all.

The culture and the religious doctrine are in a symbiotic relationship with each other. Mormon doctrine creates part of the Mormon culture, and the culture adapts to Mormon doctrine and creates a context in which it is interpreted. There is feedback between the two, and motion until, eventually, the two are harmonized and run in synchrony with each other. I think this is the ultimate reason why members have no problems interpreting pretty much whatever happens to them in ways that agree with their doctrines, and the doctrines allow this - they are made for each other, by each other.

I think this is a far more parsimonious restatement of the sentiment expressed above about the parishioners so thoroughly deceiving themselves as to require little deceptive assistance from their clergy.

This is true of pretty much all religions with substantial bodies of members over time, and explains why Jehovah's Witnesses are able to interpret all they see going on in ways that just happen to support and agree with JW doctrine, Christian fundies do the same, etc.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: There's no more effective fertility drug in the world than a doctor telling you that you can't have kids.

Sterility is hereditary. If one's mother has no child, then he/she hasn't too.

I wonder if she was on Chlomid.

No matter the outcome, god wins. Even if she had never had a baby or adopted ever in her life god would have come out victortious.

Dr. Shades wrote:I've said it before and I'll say it again: There's no more effective fertility drug in the world than a doctor telling you that you can't have kids.

I can attest to that one.

After my girls, I had a miscarriage a few years later, and the doctor said it was unlikely that I would have more.

Hence, my son was quite the "surprise" when I got pregnant with him at 40! LOL