Throwing in the towel consequences for LDS ??

[Exian]

What would this mean for all the atheist priests in The Clergy Project? That's certainly fraud, no? If any religious purveyors could be prosecuted, wouldn't they be first in line by their own admission?

[vorlon13]

And I'd see a difference between a pastor exhorting his flock to drink poison and handle deadly serpents while never having done so himself, and myself making a similar request for a demonstration of religious piety in furtherance of their attempts at proselytizing me.

[Hatshepsut]

I wonder if Mormonism started as a joke:

Well, the Book of Mormon started with Joseph Smith's head bent over, immersed in a hat, from which he dictated the words. It might have looked like a comedy, if not sounding like one.

They do seem to be good at keeping records. And keeping the crucial ones secret.

[vorlon13]

With just enough slip ups over the last nearly 200 years to make it really interesting for the Mormon apologists.

I can imagine an apologist starting to read an account of a typical Brigham Young sermon, and internally screaming to himself, "SHUT THE FUCK UP !!!" after the first paragraph.

And you raise a good point about deeming certain records secret, there definitely is a pattern to it that clearly shows the LDS administration is aware of the shifting sands their faith is resting upon.

Curious too, how many times over the decades an item that has turned up with uncertain provenance and the Mormon hierarchy declares it a forgery, only to later grudgingly admit they had the provenance in their own records and knew all along the disputed item was in fact genuine.

[Hatshepsut]

With just enough slip ups over the last nearly 200 years to make it really interesting for the Mormon apologists...Curious too, how many times over the decades an item that has turned up with uncertain provenance and the Mormon hierarchy declares it a forgery, only to later grudgingly admit...the disputed item was in fact genuine.

Or better, when an item like the White Salamander Letter they thought was genuine turned out to be a Mark Hoffman forgery pawned off to them in 1984.

The Mountain Meadows massacre was what got them in recent hot water after having lived down all the 19th century oddities. The Utah legislature initially moved to block the 1990 memorial on Dan Sill Hill by descendants of the Fancher-Baker wagon train party, but backed off as the issue exploded into the press and Salt Lake City began ramping up its bid for the 2002 Winter Olympics. They still hold to a claim that Brigham Young, 250 miles away from the massacre site, did not know about it and hence didn't give the order to do it. Whether he ordered it isn't clear, but he had to have known; the standoff itself lasted about five days and the arrival of the wagon train had been anticipated for weeks. However, no uncensored access to LDS archives has been allowed to historians of this event.

[vorlon13]

They've also released items without realizing what they had. For instance, Joseph Smith's hand written account of his first visitation (the ONLY version of the many accounts known actually penned by Old Horny Joe himself, although several differing accounts were approved for release by Joe) was released without the archivists recognizing Joseph's handwriting. That version, to this very day, is NOT the accepted account of the first visitation, and an LDSer can get in a great deal of trouble for believing that it is THE account of the first visitation.

Kind of makes my efforts at hacking away at all the folderol of Mormonism feel trite when the Mormon poobahs are doing such a fantastic job of it all by themselves.

[Hatshepsut]

For instance, Joseph Smith's hand written account of his first visitation...That version, to this very day, is NOT the accepted account of the first visitation...

For that matter, those little blue paperback Books of Mormon the missionaries will hand you have changed a bit over the years. Not a whole lot, but a current copy does have differences from one circulating around 1980, and both differ from the 1830 first edition. They cleaned up the 1830 grammar a great deal to make it readable. Then, words in a few passages have shifted slightly to support newer doctrines. But if all else fails, there's always another "revelation," as when the church caved on racism and let blacks into the priesthood in 1978. Now the ladies are agitating to get in...will we hear the word of the Lord again?

[vorlon13]

BoM has suffered over 3000 changes since Joe set the seer stones down.*

And the revelation concerning LDS racial shit is unlike all other Mormon revelations, the precise wording with the (heretofore) standard Mormon phrase, "Thus saith the Lord" has never been released and probably never will be. The hierarchy has given the strong impression they would like everyone to believe they were never racist from day one, and instead successfully beseeched, inveigled, and implored the Lord to relent, and He did.


*and realize, the FIRST, unaltered, original version of the Book of Mormon was presented as the most perfect book EVER, and the means of translation guaranteed it was EXACTLY as God dictated it. The seer stones would not reveal any further words from the Lord as long as there was a single particle of error in what was already received. How anyone from Joe on down could subsequently presume to change even a particle of it boggles the mind, don't it ??

[Vox Populi]

I really never see it going that far. The church has so much political influence and money that it can cover stuff up with no problem at all. As for the members (i was one) they are literally programmed to block out any bad thing about JS. The religion will slowly die out for sure, more and more of my former mormon friends are all straying away somehow or someway. There will still be a strong following for a very long time though... even many young people are still dedicated... so maybe 2 generations from now.. sorry real tired i am ranting on... think u all get the jist of it.

[Clueless Morgan]

I really never see it going that far. The church has so much political influence and money that it can cover stuff up with no problem at all.

It's only because they have money that they have political power.