the LDS pineapple plantation in Hawaii

[_sock puppet]

When I was a mid-teenager, a classmate of mine was sent off for a summer by his bishop father to 'pick pineapple' on a Church farm in Hawaii. The 14 year old boy had been caught feeling up his girlfriend, also 14 years old, in some out of the way corner at school near the end of the school year. Picking pineapple was purportedly going to make him 'straighten up and fly right' as his father liked to say.

When the 14-year old boy returned from his summer of pickin', his teeth showed visible rot from eating too much fresh pineapple and he was no longer interested in girls. Now, he was interested in boys.

Myself and other classmates were astonished. Sure, he had been a horn-dog since puberty began, but he'd always been oriented towards girls. Now, that was gone and he was openly gay, which he remains to this day. He has consistently and frequently mentioned that he had never really thought about other guys in a sexual way until he went to Hawaii, but claimed it was pretty common there at the LDS pineapple farm, and he was hit on the second day there by one of the older guys.

Anyone else heard of homosexuality over at the pineapple farm?

[_DrW]

Given the reported goings on in Hawaii, one wonders what they are up to here in Florida, where the LDS Church, through its Deseret Ranch and associate holding company, Farmland Reserve Incorporated, owns at least 0.7% of the land area in the State, which is worth more than a billion dollars.

County_______________ Acres __________________Value
_________________________________________________________________

Osceola_______________ 182,685.50________ $763,252,812.00
Orange_______________ 64,843.57________ $208,286,252.00
Brevard_______________ 41,559.66________ $12,552,680.00
Hillsborough-FRI______ 3,952.94 ________ $30,145,012.00
_______________________________________________________________
Total__________________ 293,041.67 _________ $1,014,236,756.00

[_Chap]

Given the reported goings on in Hawaii, one wonders what they are up to here in Florida, where the LDS Church, through its Deseret Ranch and associate holding company, Farmland Reserve Incorporated, owns at least 0.7% of the land area in the State.

County Acres Value

Osceola 182,685.50 $763,252,812.00
Orange 64,843.57 $208,286,252.00
Brevard 41,559.66 $12,552,680.00
Hillsborough-FRI 3,952.94 $30,145,012.00
_______________________________________________________________
Total 293,041.67 $1,014,236,756.00

Is there any way of guesstimating how much money the CoJCoLDS makes from its investments compared with what it gets from tithing?

If it turns out that the latter is still of greater importance, then the renewed pressure on members to pay up no matter how hard things get will be a purely practical decision. But if investment income greatly predominates, then the insistence on paying tithing no matter what the hardship might best be interpreted as yet another instance of the tactic 'make them give up stuff so as to increase their investment in belief, so they will stay loyal'.

And from what I hear on this board, less and less money comes back to the membership at ward level. So what has the church been doing with its income?

[Guest]

Chap,

It is really hard to know what the operating income of Deseret Ranch would be. I would imagine that, until recently, they were looking at substantial ROI from increases in land values alone.

In terms of farm revenue in general, the LDS Church does well, I think. They have managers who understand agri-business very well, lots of free labor when needed, and do not have to go to the financial markets for operating capital.

The Church also has substantial agricultural land and operating farm holdings in Southeast Washington State. The overall area manager for these businesses was in my ward for many years and I know that these farms did very well, indeed. They were big enough producers of agricultural commodities that they could play in the commodity and commodity hedge and options markets, and for many years made (or preserved) income from that activity alone.
____________________________

This individual, who was one of the nicest, smartest and most articulate folks you could ever hope to meet, fell asleep at the wheel and was killed in a one car-roll over accident while on his way to the Seattle Temple at zero dark thirty in the morning.

Since Seattle was a 210 mile trip one way, the faithful members would often leave at 3:30 - 4:00 am on Stake Temple day. In the winter time over the Cascade Mountains, this could be a dangerous trip.

Within five years of this tragedy, (and several other similar accidents) a temple was built in his home town, a little more than a mile from where he had lived.

[_Sethbag]

It's expensive to build buildings, and to maintain buildings. Over the last twenty years the church has built dozens and dozens of new temples, and probably thousands of new ward/stake buildings. This is a ginormous money sink. It wouldn't surprise me if the church was increasing their liabilities related to building and infrastructure at a faster rate than revenues were increasing, and thus heading for problems.

[_Buffalo]

Sounds like the Utah Boy's Ranch.

[_Buffalo]

It's expensive to build buildings, and to maintain buildings. Over the last twenty years the church has built dozens and dozens of new temples, and probably thousands of new ward/stake buildings. This is a ginormous money sink. It wouldn't surprise me if the church was increasing their liabilities related to building and infrastructure at a faster rate than revenues were increasing, and thus heading for problems.

I wonder if they view temples as profit centers. After all, you must be pay a hefty sum to the church to attend. In which case, it makes sense to invest in them.

[_LDS truthseeker]

A good friend of mine went Old Testament the pineapple farms to work one summer. He said it was the most miserable time in his life. BYU makes it sound like a great, fun job but in reality it was a slave camp. Not sure about the homo part but wouldn't surprise me. He use to get beat up there.

[_cinepro]

I wonder if they view temples as profit centers. After all, you must be pay a hefty sum to the church to attend. In which case, it makes sense to invest in them.

Sounds like what the Church was doing in the 1960's. Here's how Quinn tells the story:

This movement was linked with the fact that the LDS church issued its last public statement of expenditures at the April 1959 conference. Moyle, appointed second counselor two months later, assumed direction of Church finances, with President David O. McKay's optimistic encouragement. President Moyle immediately set aside the current budget and launched a massive increase of expenditures, especially in the construction of new buildings. Six months later the LDS church had spent $8 million more than it had received in 1959. This was extraordinary when compared to the Church's surplus income of $7 million after 1958's expenditures. Because the last published report of expenditures included the building program, Elder Moyle persuaded President McKay not to publish even an abbreviated accounting of Church spending. There has been no itemized financial report of LDS expenditures from 1960 onward.3

President Moyle's financial program for the LDS church was fundamentally linked with his missionary program. First, he expected a major increase of tithing revenues from a significant rise in convert baptisms. Second, he was convinced that massive increases in Church membership meant there soon would be a thousand Mormons in towns and cities where now there were only a few dozen. Therefore, Counselor Moyle ordered the LDS church building program to construct meetinghouses for that projected growth rather than for the current needs of thousands of small branches.

This massive building program plunged the LDS church into huge spending deficits. At the time, Apostle Harold B. Lee waged a losing battle in what he called "my stubborn resistance to the principle of `deficit spending,' supposedly justified in the hope of increasing the tithing of the Church to cover the deficit."4 Such an increase in the building program required a virtual explosion in the number of tithe-payers to avoid bankrupting the Church. In effect, this left the Church's financial survival directly in hands of youthful full-time missionaries.

[Guest]

I wonder if they view temples as profit centers. After all, you must be pay a hefty sum to the church to attend. In which case, it makes sense to invest in them.

Absolutely profit centers for the LDS Church. Put tithe-required-for-admittance building in plain, proximate view of the US faithful, so that their stakes and wards more frequently are organizing temple trips, calling other ward members to see if they can go--increasing the pressure on them to be 'full tithe' payers so they will qualify for a TR and are not then seen as less faithful by the others in their wards and stakes. When the closest temple is 350-400 miles away, it's easy for that member that hasn't been paying time to beg off saying he or she just can't take that much time off work to go that far, 'maybe next time'--which wouldn't be for 3-6 months anyway. With a temple nearby, the ward excursion to it is at least monthly. So having a temple nearby turns up the heat on members to pay tithing.

ETA: If I recall correctly, the GAs even note in talks that when they build a temple in a locale, then the number of TR holding members in the region goes up. Of course, the outward implication is that building such an edifice in their midst makes them strive harder and be more spiritual and become worthy to hold TRs. The part not trumpeted is that there is a corresponding increase in tithing revenues from the members in those locales, as it is required to get that TR.