The MADB Body Count

[_Inconceivable]

Many members know very little of this real Mormon history.

It is like being married to a cheating spouse. It is nearly impossible to forget the day that you catch your spouse in the act of cheating. It changes everything in your life.

Finding real Mormon history is the same. The personalities and their presentation at MA&D is like the cheating spouse blaming you for their cheating behavior and doing so with vitriol.

Thanks Port,

Additionally, they not only blame you, but have no remorse for their impetuous act.

No one should ever confuse a heartfelt apology with being apologetic.

Your example is worth sharing with every Mormon I know until the day I die.

[_Buffalo]

MAD certainly weakened my faith, but it was science that convinced me that there was no God, which is what convinced me that of course that no church is true.

[_Buffalo]

I too would have ended up outside of the chapel doors, but like many the personalities at MA&D(back then the FAIR board) expedited my exit.

Many members know very little of this real Mormon history.

It is like being married to a cheating spouse. It is nearly impossible to forget the day that you catch your spouse in the act of cheating. It changes everything in your life.

Finding real Mormon history is the same. The personalities and their presentation at MA&D is like the cheating spouse blaming you for their cheating behavior and doing so with vitriol.

That's a great analogy. It's very much like that.

[_Buffalo]

Like General Authorities being indistinguishable from televangelists.......

Or the LDS Church spending on humanitarian efforts, over the course of a couple of decades, a fraction of what it is spending on a mall in Salt Lake City........

Or Latter-day Saints mocking and sitting in judgment over those who are struggling with their faith and looking for help........

Or "sin" invariably being defined as something to do with sex, something to do with alcohol or cigarettes, or failing to support anything and everything church leaders say or do without question.......

Or plagiarizing Masonic handshakes and telling people this is how you get into God's secret club, and telling people that underwear with magic Masonic symbols on it will protect them from evil.....

Or campaigning about "traditional marriage" when one is in a religion founded by a man who secretly practiced polygamy and polyandry, and which religion continued to practice polygamy until it lied about stopping it in the 1890's so Utah could become a state, and then stopped it again nearly a decade and a half later......

Or a grown man sitting alone in a closed office talking to a 12 year-old about masturbation......

Or telling people that there was a vast pre-Columbian Hebrew civilization in the Americas somewhere that practiced New Testament Christianity and even knew New Testament verses centuries before the New Testament was written......

Or telling people that Egyptian funerary documents were the record of Abraham teaching Mormonism to an unnamed pharaoh who could not have the priesthood himself because he was a negro.....

Yes, I will admit that sin was a contributing factor.

I believe the appropriate expression here is "oh, snap!"

[_zeezrom]

My lowest point of my questioning was during the time I spent posting on MAD. Usually it had to do with getting criticized for my trouble with polygamy. Don Bradley and a couple others are an exception. DCP was usually pretty civilized but never replied to me as if he had any hope for me - even from the very beginning. The worst for me was when I would ask about the nature of God. I was saddened by the responses for some reason. I can't really explain it very well. I think I could sum it up as: My experience on the MAD board was very depressing.

Oh, I recall they have this rule that you can't get personal on that board but every apologist tries to make your argument become personal because they feel like your criticisms of church/leaders is a personal attack on them. Maybe that is why it was so depressing. Ugh... I don't even like to think about that board. Thank God they kicked me out forever.

[_Themis]

A Jedi uses the Force for knowledge and defense, never for attack.

[/quote]

Questioning or critiquing something you think is incorrect is not actually attacking it, but trying to help correct it. Attacking in this context has to do with attitude, and not towards an individual or group. There is nothing wrong with trying to correct beliefs.

[_Darth J]

Yes, I will admit that sin was a contributing factor.

Excellent! Though some of those aren't sins or didn't actually happen, you are on the way to full recovery and a TR.

The fact that you and others of a similar mindset think that what I listed are not sins or did not happen tells me everything I need to know.

[_Darth J]

Being a critic is easy because sowing doubt in today's world is not at all difficult.

You bet. Coming to terms with my entire belief structure, concept of my identity and place in the universe, and my hopes and dreams all being based on falsehoods and mythology was easy as pie. A total walk in the park.

Apologetics is a tough business.

You mean trying to make the LDS Church's truth claims appear plausible to anyone who is not already a fervent believer in the LDS Church? Yes, that is a tough business indeed.

[_Hoops]

MAD certainly weakened my faith, but it was science that convinced me that there was no God, which is what convinced me that of course that no church is true.

Someone who allegedly is steeped in only rational thought should be able to recognize how utterly preposterous this statement is.

[_Buffalo]

MAD certainly weakened my faith, but it was science that convinced me that there was no God, which is what convinced me that of course that no church is true.

Someone who allegedly is steeped in only rational thought should be able to recognize how utterly preposterous this statement is.

Enlighten us all.