it's mutual night, let's pass out anti gay marriage leaflets

[_SatanWasSetUp]

I'm kind of upset about the whole charade. I'm upset that they roped the youth into this most dubious activity in the first place, and I'm upset that they tried to get plausible deniability for the Church's involvement by cancelling Mutual and then planning this "voluntary" youth activity in its place and time slot.

I haven't had a chance to call up the bishop and speak with him about this. I've told him in the past that I have no objection to my daughter's participation in church activities, but I will tell him that if shenanigans like this happen again, I may very well have to reevaluate my stance on this.

Have I mentioned before to you my belief that your posts evidence a willingness to be bullied?

While I agree with you that the church uses bully tactics, it is not easy to stand up to a bully that is allied with your spouse and kids. I'm not familiar with Sethbag's circumstances, but if his wife and kids are active members, it is not easy to assert yourself against church bullies without upsetting your home life. I'm sure Sethbag would love to tell the bishop to go F himself, but instead he is taking the calm and civil approach out of respect for his wife and kids.

[_Ray A]

Since I haven't discussed this with the bishop yet, I'm interested in any perspectives you guys might have on this kind of thing. I'm still trying to pin down my exact thoughts and what I ought to discuss with the bishop about it, and your comments might help me solidify my response.

I'd raise it with the stake president first. Give him a call (or email) and ask him if he knew about it, and authorised this, or approves of it. It would be interesting to find out how high up this goes, first. These kids probably don't even fully understand what they're handing out (except what they've been told), and I'd consider that using minors, who aren't even of voting age, for political purposes. On a Mutual night?
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[_rcrocket]

Dr. Laura, whom I dislike, would tell you to stand up for yourself and to quit being a doormat.

By going and confronting the leaders, that's precisely what he did.

How did you miss that part?

Let's see. If it were you, would you spend a couple of hours banging out verbose same-length hand-wringing hanky-twisting block paragraphs asking advice about what to do (admitting that you haven't contacted the offending bishop), or would you simply call up the bishop and say, "lay off."

Hey, I find the signature line offensive; why did you put that there?

[_Sethbag]

I did call up the bishop tonight and discuss it with him. The bottom line from him was that this was supposed to have been a parent and child thing only, and that my daughter was not even supposed to have been there participating without one of her parents present. That was not clearly enough communicated, and he apologized for that. I informed him that I was opposed to my daughter being brought into political activities through the church, and he said he supported me in this and would try to see that she never is.

Aside from that, the discussion devolved into a long and rambling argument that, as these things do, jumped from topic to topic, covering ground all the way from evolution to the definition of the word "marriage", Iran and the Taliban, the role of Mormonism in a hypothetical future USA where Christians have aquired the power to pass their religious morals and beliefs into law, and, inevitably, to the Fall of the Roman Empire. ;-) It was quite a back and forth.

One of his opening salvos was the scare tactic of claiming that state laws would require that children be taught that homosexual marriage is just "as good" as heterosexual marriage. Fortunately I happened to be at my computer, and brought up the Morris Thurston paper where Thurston disagrees with, and from his point of view debunks, that particular scare tactic. My bishop wasn't ready to accept defeat on that, so the conversation wandered onto whether I believe schools should hand out condoms, demonstrate their use on bananas, etc.

He also stated that if a child's IQ is under 100 a parent has the right to go in and have their child sterilized, which I simply do not believe. I do know of a case in recent years where a highly physically and mentally disabled girl was sterilized and given hormone treatments that would keep her physically like a child, but even in that case there was ethical hell to pay by the doctors and parents of the child. That's certainly not any sort of norm, and it went way, way beyond "hey, my child has an IQ of less than 100, I'll go get her sterilized."

When he got to the Fall of the Roman Empire, I had to remind him that the Romans made a pretty darn good 1000 year run of it, and by the way, who was in charge for the last several centuries? (hint hint, it was the Christians) I think that a lot of Mormons think of Rome and imagine that it was all one big giant Caligula orgy, and that its fall was some kind of punishment by God or something.

Anyhow, not much was accomplished by either side, except that the bishop did acknowledge my desire that my daughter not be dragged into political things through the church, and his pledge that this would not happen. And he apologized for the miscommunication about the leafletting event.

My (obviously biased towards my side) view of my bishop's beliefs is that he has swallowed a lot of fear tactics hook, line, and sinker. It came out during the discussion (which probably lasted a good 45 minutes to an hour) that he definitely believes that the gays are trying to convert everyone to homosexuality, and that he thinks that this sort of takeover of society by gays has dragged down many civilizations before (his words included "civilization after civilization for the last 10,000 years...").

At one point I posed to him a hypothetical. Suppose that one of his heterosexual children were in school and a teacher were to actually say, in class, that a homosexual marriage was "as good" as a heterosexual one. Did he believe that his child would actually consider changing over to homosexuality as a result? He agreed it was unlikely, but then cautioned "but give it a couple of more generations..." and of course everyone would be gay and society would collapse and so forth.

Oh well. At least my bishop has thusfar not shown any will to try to drag me through a court of love for apostasy. I can only chalk this up to his desire not to rock the boat as long as I'm not spreading my apostasy amongst the members in the neighborhood, so that he doesn't jeopardize my daughter's continued involvement with the church. Or maybe he thinks one of these days I'll come around, and is inclined to just wait it out.

[_bcspace]

Last night my daughter was getting ready to go to Mutual, which in our ward is held on Tuesday evenings. As she was getting ready to depart, I asked her what they were planning on doing that night. She started to say she didn't know, but 15 or 20 seconds later she corrected herself and admitted that she did in fact know what they were doing, and that they were going to go around the neighborhood handing out "Yes to 102" leaflets.

She had begun to lie to me about this, but immediately thought better about it and "confessed" their true plans. I'm upset that she never discussed this with me in advance, knowing I'd care, and then started to lie to me about it. This would have been the first time she'd lied to me that I know about, and it really pisses me off that this first knowing deception was to cover up a church activity. I'm glad that, when push came to shove, she couldn't bring herself to lie to me though, and repented and told me the truth.

This tells me you don't have a relationship of trust with your daughter. She is independent enough to know for herself yet you won't accept her independence of thought even though you knowingly let her attend a Church who's doctrine you disagree with. Far too much of a mixed signal there for me to sympathize with you.

I got pretty upset about this. They were actually using the youth on Mutual night to go out and lobby their neighbors on a political issue, and a bigoted, hateful one at that?

How is such bigoted and hateful?

[Anonymous]

Let's see. If it were you, would you spend a couple of hours banging out verbose same-length hand-wringing hanky-twisting block paragraphs asking advice about what to do (admitting that you haven't contacted the offending bishop), or would you simply call up the bishop and say, "lay off."

I hardly see my posts as hanky-twisting, and I thought getting on my bike and riding down to the park to tell the leader in charge of the leafletting venture what I thought about it should demonstrate an willingness to be heard on the issue. As for the verbosity of my posts, it's something I have long admitted. I type fast, and I have for many years often failed to keep my posts succinct. Sue me.

[_asbestosman]

Sue me.

Famous last words spoken to a lawyer.
;)

[_Inconceivable]

..I'm glad that, when push came to shove, she couldn't bring herself to lie to me though, and repented and told me the truth.

This tells me you don't have a relationship of trust with your daughter...

What the hell is the matter with you BC?

It's every loving parent's dream to have a child that demonstrates this type of love, loyalty and respect. Here is a concept that you need to look into for the sake of your kids.

good grief.

(Please excuse the off topic, Sethbag. Just ignore BC and I. I'm done.

inc.)

[_Sethbag]

This tells me you don't have a relationship of trust with your daughter. She is independent enough to know for herself yet you won't accept her independence of thought even though you knowingly let her attend a Church who's doctrine you disagree with. Far too much of a mixed signal there for me to sympathize with you.

You are speaking from ignorance. My daughter knows what I think and believe, and she also knows that she is free to think and believe as she will. This is not an empty statement, but is true in fact and not just in theory.

As far as church goes, this isn't a "mixed signal", but rather just the reality that there is a difference of opinion between me and my wife that is non-trivial with regards religion. It's my job to help her learn reason and critical thinking skills, and how to learn and gain knowledge necessary to make informed decisions, so that she'll be able to think for herself. It's not my job to indoctrinate her into any particular set of beliefs.

My wife did try to force her into seminary, but I opposed my daughter being compelled to attend seminary, and when given the choice of attending or not attending, she preferred not to. She does like going to church on Sunday and going to Mutual, at least most of the time. I think that in terms of her general moral attitudes and whatnot, she would be essentially indistinguishable from many other LDS youth, except that she's not Molly in that cloying way some girls are.

[_Brackite]

Proposition 102:

Simple. Clear.
Arizonans Have The Opportunity To Say YES For Marriage


Marriage between one man and one woman. Can it get any simpler than that? Prop 102 simply secures the definition of marriage through an Arizona constitutional amendment.

Prop 102 is 20 simple and clear words that define marriage as the union of one man and one woman.

A YES vote on Prop 102 does one thing and one thing only – defines marriage as the union of one man and one woman in the Arizona Constitution, the highest law in our state.

One man. One Woman. Prop 102. That's Marriage.

This Sounds Great to me. The Traditional Definition of Marriage is indeed, one man and one woman.