liz3564 wrote:Imwashingmypirate wrote:I can tell Mr Scratch is either not a church member or is inactive from this thread alone. Or maybe an ExMormon. Mr Scratch does not like to look stupid either. ; D
I'm curious. Why do you think this?
Actually, Scratch has stated publicly on previous forums that he is an active Mormon. I'll take him at his word on that.
Why is it so hard to imagine that there are active Church members with liberal views?
I'm an active member of the Church, but my views are very liberal, and there is Church doctrine I disagree with.
I remain anonymous not because of any fear of Church leadership...I don't really give a rat's ass what they think or don't think. My reasons for anonymity are based on safety.
However, there are friends of mine on the board who know my identity as well, and can attest to the fact that I am an active Church member.
Liberal Mormons
Liberal Mormons comprise the broadest category of Mormons.
Regardless of temporal politics, LMs are considered liberal by virtue of their "odd" or non-conformist notions about Mormonism. Unofficial Church policy and general membership consensus is that they are all going to hell.
Traditionally, LMs vote anywhere to the left of the Republican party. On the average, they have 4.9 children-a token effort in the Church's unspoken policy of Mormonizing the world through reproduction. LMs, when they pay it, pay tithing haphazardly with literally no idea of whether it is 10 percent or not.
Liberal Mormons are also comprised of anyone who does not go to church regularly or even at all and still believes the gospel to be essentially true. LMs who don't go to church resent being called "less active" since the reason they don't go to church in the first place is because other Mormons there tend to be less active themselves; although by Liberal Mormon definition this is more of a cerebral thing than an attendance thing.
LMs do not believe that every word that falls from the lips of a general authority represents the actual personal opinion of Jesus Christ.
A trait singular to Liberal Mormons is their love of baiting normally complacent Mormons with such stimulating statements as "We used to live polygamy because Joseph Smith was a Capricorn."
Female LMs also think that it is highly astute of them to repeatedly point out the anatomical differences in the sexes as a snide indication of true priesthood eligibility. Hopeless LMs like to think that they could read the mind of God if they could only get a doctorate in something obscure and useless like Mesozoic Menstrual Studies.
Faith and obedience are onerous things to most LMs, who demand human explanations for virtually everything with which they don't agree. If pressed hard enough, most LMs would explain the veil placed over our eyes at birth to be the real product of sexism, cronyism, conservatism, or just plain old BYUism. It never occurs to LMs that their intellectual contrariness may be the cross they are required to bear in life instead of a Word of Wisdom or a tithing problem. LMs would argue gospel doctrine with an angel, the burning bush, or even another flood.
LMs tend to worship most diligently at the altar of their own opinion.
"Surely he knows that DCP, The Nehor, Lamanite, and other key apologists..." -Scratch clarifying my status in apologetics
"I admit it; I'm a petty, petty man." -Some Schmo