However, regardless of the determined course of action, the goal is to help an individual put his or her life in order by providing all of the support we can offer.
Unfortunately the Newsroom is being disingenuous here. The final line should read: "...the goal is to help an individual put his or her life back within what the Church deems as the acceptable behaviours expected of a Mormon..."
Laurie Goodstein correctly writes that this member is being disciplined “because he is an apostate who is trying to lead church members astray,”
Mary, you are right to be disappointed. The Newsroom has already decide he is an apostate and publicly speculated as to what his reasons for his actions are.
But it's not a cult...
“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
Church disciplinary matters are confidential. While some may want to make their version of an issue public, the Church will not discuss the private lives of individuals. To do so would be a betrayal of confidences and would affect others besides the person facing discipline. These matters are handled by local Church leaders and are done in an attitude of love and caring.
Which, being interpreted, meaneth:
Even if you publish a detailed transcript of what took place in a church court, and beg us to confirm it by releasing an official version, we shall never do so.
This will have the advantage of enabling all kinds of rumors to be spread about you, so that loyal members (who might not like to be confronted with the brutal truth that you were excommunicated for stating inconvenient facts) can take refuge in dark mutterings about "Well, we don't know the full story ... ", and hinting that you are a child molester, a drug addict, a wife beater etc. etc.
Neat, eh?
Zadok: I did not have a faith crisis. I discovered that the Church was having a truth crisis. Maksutov: That's the problem with this supernatural stuff, it doesn't really solve anything. It's a placeholder for ignorance.
Mary wrote: I'm truly disappointed. Thus the demonization begins, without any attempt to give the man a fair hearing.
Well, when you read his blogs and read the site, one can see that he is speaking against the church. No demonization is necessary. The people at mormonthink need to ask themselves just why do members find their site to be antimormon. And of course, it is because of the tone and direction the information take.
And of course, since the site gets kudos from all the critics here, only proves my point. A more faith promoting site would not get so many kudos from critics on this site and other critical sites of Mormonism.
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
just why do members find their site to be antimormon
A terrible question why me.......
Members have been repeatedly taught that the only source for "true" Mormon history and doctrine is LDS.org, the brethren and the manuals. Why would they distrust other sources? Because they have been conditioned to.
I have been told at various times that direct quotes from the JOD must be from anti Mormon sources. That results from family search (a LDS church owned site) are anti Mormon. Essentially anything that disagrees with the current party line is immediately labeled as anti Mormon, and the majority of the sheep will then avoid it.
It doesn't matter if "it" is true, actual, or factual..... some truths are "not very useful", so label them anti Mormon.
It is better to be a warrior in a garden, than a gardener at war.
Some of us, on the other hand, actually prefer a religion that includes some type of correlation with reality. ~Bill Hamblin
Mary wrote: I'm truly disappointed. Thus the demonization begins, without any attempt to give the man a fair hearing.
It has not begun, it is complete. The second he was informed by his stake president he was being tried for apostasy he was guilty. There is no defense allowed in these proceedings. We have seen this in previous excommunication trails. One is not allowed to present evidence of the kind that is being presented here. The stake leadership absolutely will not debate historical evidence. He could show (if they would let him and they won't) that everything on his web site was in R.S.R. and still be convicted. The mentality in the trial will be very similar to what Why Me continues to show here. He is guilty because he has been accused. Really he only has two courses of action left to him at this time, short of the stake president backing out of the trail, he can confess his guilt (without really knowing exactly what he is guilty of) and hope for leniency or he can remain defiant and expect to be excommunicated. Think Salem witch trails or Monty Pythons "She's a witch scene."
"Any over-ritualized religion since the dawn of time can make its priests say yes, we know, it is rotten, and hard luck, but just do as we say, keep at the ritual, stick it out, give us your money and you'll end up with the angels in heaven for evermore."
How can the truth about Mormon history be anti-Mormon?
“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
A more faith promoting site would not get so many kudos from critics
True. Because critics are interested in truth. Critics support reality-based living. You are making our point here. The church and its members object to Mormon Think because it contains unvarnished facts that have not been manipulated, molded, and massaged by the Mormon church's correlation committee. The unvarnished facts do not promote faith, because faith is a belief in things not as they are but as the faithful wish them to be. People who care more about facts and truth than promoting faith appreciate the Mormon Think web site. People who care about advancing the Mormon church's agenda do not care about facts, except as far as those facts can be twisted to promote allegiance to the church and its leaders.
"The Church is authoritarian, tribal, provincial, and founded on a loosely biblical racist frontier sex cult."--Juggler Vain "The LDS church is the Amway of religions. Even with all the soap they sell, they still manage to come away smelling dirty."--Some Schmo
Drifting wrote:How can the truth about Mormon history be anti-Mormon?
Can you lead someone astray by telling them the truth? Maybe in the bizarro world of Mormonism.
"It doesn't seem fair, does it Norm--that I should have so much knowledge when there are people in the world that have to go to bed stupid every night." -- Clifford C. Clavin, USPS
"¡No contaban con mi astucia!" -- El Chapulin Colorado
Drifting wrote:How can the truth about Mormon history be anti-Mormon?
Can you lead someone astray by telling them the truth? Maybe in the bizarro world of Mormonism.
Like:
I have a hard time with historians because they idolize the truth. The truth is not uplifting; it destroys. I could tell most of the secretaries in the church office building that they are ugly and fat. That would be the truth, but it would hurt and destroy them. Historians should tell only that part of the truth that is inspiring and uplifting
Quinn (ed), Faithful History: Essays On Writing Mormon History, p 103, fn 22
Edited to add: I should've course have included an attribution of Quinn's quote to Boyd K. Packer.
Last edited by Guest on Thu Sep 27, 2012 10:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
Zadok: I did not have a faith crisis. I discovered that the Church was having a truth crisis. Maksutov: That's the problem with this supernatural stuff, it doesn't really solve anything. It's a placeholder for ignorance.
I have a hard time with historians because they idolize the truth. The truth is not uplifting; it destroys. I could tell most of the secretaries in the church office building that they are ugly and fat. That would be the truth, but it would hurt and destroy them. Historians should tell only that part of the truth that is inspiring and uplifting
Quinn (ed), Faithful History: Essays On Writing Mormon History, p 103, fn 22
I am not sure what is more disturbing, his analogy, which compares personal discretion to historiography, or the fact he thinks most of the women he works with are ugly and fat. /boggle
"Any over-ritualized religion since the dawn of time can make its priests say yes, we know, it is rotten, and hard luck, but just do as we say, keep at the ritual, stick it out, give us your money and you'll end up with the angels in heaven for evermore."