DarkHelmet wrote:Several years ago I was involved in the young men's program and our big focus was on reactivation and retention of the youth. We had 3 deacons, 1 teacher, and 2 priests who were active. Even with that pathetic activity rate, one of the priests was only going because his dad forced him to, and he told us that as soon as he turns 18 he's never stepping foot in the church again. The church has very little to offer young people today. The world has changed dramatically since the 1950s, and handing a 16 year old kid Mark E. Peterson's How to Stop Masturbating pamphlet just doesn't work anymore. A lot of people (especially young people) are turned off by the racial theology in the Book of Mormon and the anti-gay politics in the ward buildings. Every week you learn how Joseph Smith was the greatest person to ever walk the earth other than Jesus, and gay people suck. It gets old really fast.
Please tell me they are NOT still using that handbook!
The last time I saw that pamphlet was in 2004. My Bishop handed it to me after I confessed to that "M" word.
Our ward had a zillion kids under 12, our over 12 group was fairly small. At the time one of the ward leaders was lamenting the fact that the temple marriage rate for the young people from our ward was 1/3. He was asking us why we thought that was the case. Of course we all said we didn't know, but were all certainly going to be married in a temple. We didn't beat the 1/3.
Being a Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction -Pope Benedict XVI
Abaddon wrote:The last time I saw that pamphlet was in 2004. My Bishop handed it to me after I confessed to that "M" word.
Was your Bishop named BC Space, and did the pamphlet help you with your problem?
"We have taken up arms in defense of our liberty, our property, our wives, and our children; we are determined to preserve them, or die." - Captain Moroni - 'Address to the Inhabitants of Canada' 1775
Craig Paxton wrote: Something is wrong...these are not the members that the church should be losing...and yet it is the members that the church is losing.
Geeze,,, I don't know. Maybe this happens because the Church refuses to teach the REAL gospel of Jesus Christ, where the power to convert and keep abides, insisting that you live as your fathers did in awe of the cult of the prophet and all the GAs who are his sycophants. I can not imagine anything more unbearable than belonging to a pretense. At least I sought for and got the gospel right before I returned. They thought I as a liar and persecuted me until they sought to cast me out for telling them why I was right and they (GAs) were wrong. But that is a long story I have told too many times already.
My home ward in Northern California as gone from 160 active members to 32 active in the space of twenty years. I got these numbers from my dad, who is the membership clerk.
My sister's ward in SLC has not seen a convert baptism in five years.
My aunt and uncle have been called on a mission to Ogden. My uncle tells me that many wards there do not have enough active Priesthood holders to operate effectively, so they are being augmented with senior Missionaries.
These are not good signs for the church. Just sayin.
Craig Paxton wrote: Something is wrong...these are not the members that the church should be losing...and yet it is the members that the church is losing.
Geeze,,, I don't know. Maybe this happens because the Church refuses to teach the REAL gospel of Jesus Christ, where the power to convert and keep abides, insisting that you live as your fathers did in awe of the cult of the prophet and all the GAs who are his sycophants. I can not imagine anything more unbearable than belonging to a pretense. At least I sought for and got the gospel right before I returned. They thought I as a liar and persecuted me until they sought to cast me out for telling them why I was right and they (GAs) were wrong. But that is a long story I have told too many times already.
"Cult of the Prophet". I like that. It sums up the modern church very well. The latest example was the televised birthday party for TSM.
"Cult of the Prophet". I like that. It sums up the modern church very well. The latest example was the televised birthday party for TSM.
I was just today rereading a paper I wrote that noted the exact moment when the official cult commenced with Brigham Young. He did not even realize what he had done. All the worse, it was never undone. And now it has lost its luster and wonders when panic will set in. Will there be Kool-Aid?
it is not surprising that this is the case. It is not easy to be Mormon these days. It takes much commitment and it takes a lifestyle that is more or less against the tide. Not to mention the internet and all the crap that is on their about the church. There is certainly a frontal attack against the LDS church.
However, this is not unique for the LDS church. Throughout its history people have left the church. We have the early thirties, the kirkland years etc. But the church grew and survived. So, nothing new here at all.
I intend to lay a foundation that will revolutionize the whole world. Joseph Smith We are “to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to provide for the widow, to dry up the tear of the orphan, to comfort the afflicted, whether in this church, or in any other, or in no church at all…” Joseph Smith
"Cult of the Prophet". I like that. It sums up the modern church very well. The latest example was the televised birthday party for TSM.
What is strange is that if one follows the teaching of the LDS church one can have a nice moral life fulled with empathy and love for neighbor. Nothing that the LDS church teaches creates an evil, selfish, self-centered person. But in this world of ours it is the 'good' that suffers.
I intend to lay a foundation that will revolutionize the whole world. Joseph Smith We are “to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to provide for the widow, to dry up the tear of the orphan, to comfort the afflicted, whether in this church, or in any other, or in no church at all…” Joseph Smith
why me wrote:it is not surprising that this is the case. It is not easy to be Mormon these days.
How would you know?
“We look to not only the spiritual but also the temporal, and we believe that a person who is impoverished temporally cannot blossom spiritually.” Keith McMullin - Counsellor in Presiding Bishopric
"One, two, three...let's go shopping!" Thomas S Monson - Prophet, Seer, Revelator