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I just wanted to wish all of you fathers out there a very Happy Father's day. I lost my dad 6 years ago so it's now a sad day for me but one of memories.

Wasn't sure where to post this, so I figured the general board was as good as any. Just wanted to share that I am going to the Nauvoo temple today to receive my endowments. It's been a pretty hectic week and I've been going from nervous to excited to anxious and everything in between. The last eight months have been such a progression and change for me, and I am so excited to take this next step in the Gospel. Thank you to everyone who has given me advice and support in things through this forum. You all are wonderful disciples of Christ!

Yesterday was pretty surreal, but I am feeling awesome as I adjust so far. It was good to be surrounded by loved ones (even though none were family, it still felt like I had family there) and to be greeted with big hugs and congratulations in the celestial room. And as soon as I got to the upper floor, I felt so much peace wash over me. I was so at ease and calm, which isn't always a feeling in my vocabulary. Some of it is still processing in my brain, but I think that is expected. Palerider, I actually chose Nauvoo on purpose. In one of my BYU courses, my professor described converts as pioneers for their generations, forward and back, in bringing salvation to all their family. What better place to take this step forward than in the place where the pioneer saints did as well! And there was a pretty strong confirmation of that family pioneer feeling toward the end. I also found out that the original temple dedication occurred on my birthday! Happy coincidence.

Hello all....I am the one who posted the original question to the group as a whole. And, I am the one who did start smoking again. I do have an appt with my doc and am going to try to quit again. I thank you for your opinions and I will accept my punishment with great humility I was doing well and can do well again.

Double-movie daddy date: 1. Inside Out: Incredibly cute, with an interesting psychological outlook (sometimes sadness is needed), and with plenty of humor adults will appreciate. We all gave it 5 stars. 2. Age of Adeline: Interesting love story. The idea is not unique, but the movie carries it out well. Comment about both: Every time I watch a movie I realize I'm no citizen of this world. Story after story after story in which God has no part. There's no malice from the producers, just no understanding.

Sticking with King David, I understand that the Jewish people consider him their greatest king ever--and perhaps the greatest of their people. The Book of Acts tells us he was a man after God's own heart. He failed miserably, but repented and recovered magnificently. Frankly, if his atonement is limited, I'm not sure any of us have much hope.

The only persons we have power to receive revelation for our, ourselves, our children, and our spouse. It is false doctrine that she would be able to talk to spirits for someone else and relay messages. This woman is either lying to your GF or she is being deceived.

Thanks Pam .......I know the feeling about Fathers Day. My father passed away in 1992.

From the scriptures, and also from General Conference addresses. Yes, I probably misspoke. I don't think we actually have "more light and knowledge", except that we know of the revelation given to our generation that was previously lacking. But though my example may have been poor, I think the point remains.

We kept things very simple! Daughter and I made a special breakfast, then made a peach cobbler for later. Still going to grab a cheesecake this evening. Happy Father's Day!

Ram, though I agree with much of what you wrote, I vehemently disagree with the above statement. I think it's plain false, and I am very glad we have no such "rule". (I'm even more glad that the Church membership seems no longer to be getting much of its doctrinal understandings from books written by GAs, but that's another matter entirely.) The idea that we are so much more enlightened than our ancestral Saints of past generations is untrue and potentially very dangerous. Yes, in certain narrow areas, we do indeed have more light and knowledge -- the Priesthood issue is a good example of that. Also true is that our leaders emphasize things that are important for US in OUR generation, so that e.g. we might hear more of an emphasis today on grace. And it is my observation, shared by many, that our current leaders try perhaps to stick more closely to revealed doctrine instead of speculating on various matters in public venues, even General Conference. On these matters, we probably see eye to eye. But the larger idea that we should ignore prophetic teachings from a generation ago or more, as suggested by your words quoted above, goes way too far. I am very confident that the overall understanding of the plan of salvation and of God's work in our lives as held by the apostles and prophets throughout the restoration greatly exceeds my own (and your own), regardless of individual items that, in retrospect, we might recognize that they got wrong.

I believe this seeming conundrum of repenting of murder is brilliantly explained by Elder Scott in a General Conference talk within the last couple of years, regarding the Anti-Nephi-Lehis who covenanted as part of their repentance for their "many murders" never again to shed man's blood under any circumstance whatsoever, then were sorely tested a generation later as they watched their Nephite protectors being slaughtered in their defense. Elder Scott's remarks as to why it was so vitally important that they keep their covenants are highly instructive.

True but even verse 44 tells you to bring it to the Lord and basically leave it in his hands to deal with... For me turning it over to the Lord has always been the biggest and hardest (and most important) step of forgiveness.

I would say being clean is necessary but not sufficient. And indeed the atonement and gospel plan involve much more then simply cleansing. The Lord wants us to be people of strength and power, not just weak beings who must be continually cleansed. We must become holy.

Let's not forget that many of the old apostles insisted that murderers had to pay for their own salvation - that the atonement did not save them (see Miracle of Forgiveness, for an example). We can clearly see that such teachings do not jibe with the Bible or LDS scripture. Yes, murder is very serious and is not on the same level as shoplifting a candy bar. Jesus taught of the two men, one who owed little and the other owed much. When both were forgiven, the one who owed much was more grateful. As for the levels of heaven being separated, I wonder just how separated they really are. The Telestial has the fulness of the Holy Ghost, but does that mean it cannot have the Father or Son visit? What about God and Jesus descending to our world to see Joseph Smith? The ancient Judeao-Christian text, Ascension of Isaiah, shows Christ emptying himself of glory as he descends through the various levels of heaven, so the individuals in those levels are not affected by his fulness. In connection with this, Alma the Younger, while in his coma (Near Death Experience) representing Spirit Prison, repented and was suddenly in God's presence (Alma 36). He saw God on his throne from afar off (in a Telestial state), and wished he could be close up. I believe that God's throne can be seen from all the kingdoms - they just cannot experience his fulness of glory in the lower kingdoms. As LDS we have a huge tendency to take one or two verses and make our entire gospel out of them, often misinterpreting many of them along the way. Pres Uchtdorf noted on in 2 Nephi 25 that many LDS have misinterpreted over the years: "we are saved by grace after all we can do". Well, according to King Anti-Nephi-Lehi, the only thing the converted Lamanites could do is repent. Understanding the atonement means we cannot delimit God's power, mercy, justice, or love. We like to scare people into keeping commandments, but that is exactly why Jesus condemned the Pharisees. We cannot be sure all the reasons a person commits a sin. We also cannot be sure to what level an individual has repented and believed on Christ's atonement. What I do know is that Christ is willing to forgive me time and time again, as long as I am willing to believe and repent. I therefore must believe that Christ will do the same for all of God's children. I know that if one of my children were to murder someone (even as a Mormon), then fully repent, I would claim that child as my own, allow him/her into my home, etc. If I can do this, who is a feeble mortal, then I believe a perfectly loving Father can do the same. If the Prodigal Son can waste his entire inheritance, fully repent, and gain a place at the Father's table again AS A CHILD and not a servant, then how can I think otherwise?

The other week after Sacrament, I saw our bishop standing in his office with the door open doing nothing. A few minutes later I walked past again and he was still standing their doing nothing. I called out to him that the ward must be running extremely well if he had nothing to do. He explained that there was nothing he could do because his counsellors, clerk and exec sec were all away.

The LDS Godhead, if I understand correctly, is such that the ministrations of the Holy Spirit, while offered in perfect agreement with the will of the Son and Father, would be without their actual presence. This is a subtlety that could be slight and infinite at the same time. I guess the simple answer to your question, JAG, is that if YOU know there's a huge difference between the lowest and highest kingdoms. My theological ignorance of the totality of that difference doesn't preclude me from understanding that King David's being limited to the Telestial is a severe boundary, indeed. After all, what competent LDS member would be satisfied with any of their loved ones ending up there?

Yes I know ..... Bishop still has to approve ....needs to know what's going on in Ward

When I withdrew myself from the church, I felt that distancing from people was the main part of it. Both now and then I like being on my own. When I was part of the church, the LDS members and friends I had seemed to know that & knew how to keep their distance. There was on the one hand no 'pressure' of any kind to stay with the Church. But there was also a keen sense that these people really cared about my decisions & wished that I would change my mind. I don't know how they did that complicated balancing act, but it was genuine, and I value it to this day. Incidentally, when I still lived in my former ward, I happened to see an LDS friend by chance while driving. He gave me a tentative wave as his car passed in front of me. It is one of my regrets(& sins of omission) that I did not wave back.

JAG, maybe my nine years here has created spiritual greed. However, if I get the levels right, neither the Father, nor the Son, are in the Telestial Kingdom. Though better than here, I'd tend to agree with Bro. McConkie.

Guardians of the Galaxy

I think sometimes, as Mormons, we're too quick to dismiss any form of "salvation" that doesn't include exaltation (and yeah, I think McConkie did fall into this trap sometimes in his public discourse). But Mormon theology teaches that the Telestial (including, one presumes, David) will--after a period of punishment--still inherit an afterlife that pretty closely tracks the orthodox Christian view of heaven (at least, as I understand it). So, exaltation or not, there's still plenty to hope for. :)

I think Paul makes the point that to violate any element of the law is essentially the same as violating the entire law--I don't remember off the top of my head if he compares it to murder or not. It's certainly a valid point in the context of Paul's larger argument--that it's impossible to obey perfectly and therefore impossible to save ourselves, and therefore we all need Christ's saving power. But I think those who cite Paul's words for the proposition that God doesn't think that torture, murder, or rape are any worse than stealing a fifty-cent stick of gum, are stretching things mightily.

I suppose that when one puts a lot of time into apologetics, one gets used to taking McConkie's statements about pretty much anything with a grain of salt. But, given the section of D&C to which Anddenex cites as well as near-unanimity by prior GAs on this matter all the way back to Joseph Smith in conjunction with the lack of an explicit contradiction by the current GAs, I'm disinclined to set the idea aside just yet. To say that a "murderer" (again, using God's definition rather than man's definition for that term) will not have the privilege of spending eternity creating new worlds, populating the same, and using his absolute discretion to determine when the mortal existences of each one of those created beings will end; is not to say that this murderer is not still far better off with Christ than without Him, or to deny that the murderer has still been "saved" from an infinitely more horrific fate. We know, from the Book of Mormon, that there are some sins with eternal repercussions--procrastination of repentance, for one (Hel 13:38 and Alma 34:33), and counting on God's mercy to excuse sin and complacency, for another (2 Ne 28:8, 21-22). We obviously can't save ourselves--but apparently, we're more than capable of sending ourselves to Hell. Having established, then, that that there are at least some sins that permanently close the door to exaltation--why can't murder be one of those sins? Is the murderer standing at the bar of the Third District Court in Salt Lake, any less penitent than the procrastinator or the libertine will be when standing at the Bar of the Supreme Court at the final judgment? I think not. Rather, it is the show of penitence that moves us with compassion and the hope that full restoration will be possible; and since we can already see the fruits of repentance in the imprisoned murderer it is him that we pity and it is for him that we hope the Plan of Salvation offers a loophole for exaltation. That's a noble, even divine, desire--to a point. On the other hand--"compassion" was a major selling point of Lucifer's offer to save everyone. It was a beautiful idea, with the only problem being that it just plain wouldn't work. And in this case, when we get too Universalist in our eschatology, we can't help but deny any absolute nexus between what we do in the here-and-now and the qualitative reward we receive in the hereafter--which in turn fundamentally nullifies the importance of proclaiming the Gospel, temple work, "hastening", "rescue", Christlike living, and pretty much every other initiative or injunction we've received from our Church leaders past and present. We also make elements of the Plan of Salvation redundant (if you're going to give the recalcitrant multiple chances at an earth life until they attain exaltation, then no need for perdition, Telestial, Terrestrial, or the lower levels of the Celestial kingdoms. If perdition, Telestial, Terrestrial, or the lower levels of the Celestial kingdoms are just training ground for exaltation, no need for an earth life.) The power and genius of the Atonement is that it satisfies both justice and mercy; not that it strong-arms the one into submission to the other.

Disfellowshipment is not permanent. Furthermore, afaik, generally no one is aware of the disfellowshipment except the member and the bishop (plus maybe anyone else who might need to know incidentally, e.g. the stake president, the other bishopric members, the executive secretary -- never having been a bishop, I don't know who these other people might be, or even if there are any others besides the stake president).

We do it because God loves torturing certain men, who clearly needed a major attitude adjustment.

Curry is so good with his ball handling skills!

The choosing of a husband or wife is a deeply personal and sacred thing. It is personal, and your gf will receive personal revelation about it, not your leader, and especially not in that manner. This leader has no stewardship over your girlfriend to say such things. It is completely inappropriate, and I would go as far to say that it is not of God. You should bring this matter to the attention of those who have stewardship over this leader. It is very serious. Evil spirits are real.

In the various passages of scripture that list the various spiritual gifts, (eg Moroni 10: 8-19 and Doctrine and Covenants 46: 13-26) none of them make mention of a gift of communicating with spirits. I'm not sure if anyone has the ability to communicate with spirits in the way you have described, and I think Average Joe has it right.I would be more inclined to believe that your girlfriend has the ability to communicate with spirits if that's what she was told in a Patriarchal blessing. If it comes from any other source, I'd tend to be sceptical.

When in doubt turn to the scriptures, like Leviticus 19:31 New American Standard Bible 'Do not turn to mediums or spiritists; do not seek them out to be defiled by them. I am the LORD your God. King James Bible Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek after wizards, to be defiled by them: I am the LORD your God. ​And remember, God is not the author of confusion, Satan is.

Psshh...you just read my last paragraph and then stated it differently

umm...since your gonna be picking up cheese cake anyways, I like cheese cake too!

My apologies. Battle of the Undead 0/5

Stringsofcoins, Please do not get married. You do not understand women, children, or marriage. Remain alone, where you can pretend to be safe from all the hurt and pain. For indeed: However, know this:

Last June...June 20th to be precise at about 5:30 A.M, I had a massive heart attack and went into cardiac arrest in the E.R. The doctor and medical team were able to bring me back after a couple minutes or so....thankfully. As I lay on the table in horrible pain, I felt my spirit leaving my body. I told my wife I was sorry and was dying and then looked around the room and said I am going...and off I went. I also saw...me....as I "rushed" back into my body. For the next several minutes my wife said I kept asking what had happened to the music and as they rolled me to the cath lab, I was very much at peace and thought only of the music. Thankfully the cardiologist, who was working frantically, was able to open the blocked artery. He told me I had maybe 10 minutes left to live after they revived me. My spirit left my body. DId it go to Paradise? Dunno. I think somewhere in between as it wasn't my time.

It's easy to get cynical about marriage when it doesn't work out for some people close to you, but each failed marriage is the result of one or both spouses not acting as Christ would want them to. There are a great many good marriages within the church, more so than failed ones. My wife and I have been married for 26 years, neither one of us has come anywhere close to cheating on each other in all that time. We've had areas that were rough spots but there was never a time we were not close or our marriage not strong. In the past 20 years we have been in this ward I can count on one had the number of marriages that have fallen apart, and the only one that I know of where the wife cheated was one where the husband was emotionally abusive and drove her away with he behavior. There are no guarantees, but if you are committed to living the gospel and marry somebody who is committed to living the gospel and keep your marriage as a priority in your life you have a far greater chance of success in marriage. Those who follow after the ways of the world are going to find it hard to have a successful marriage. A man does gain a lot from the love and companionship of a wife, I would never want to go back to being single. There is also great joy in having and raising children. God did not make a mistake in instituting marriage and family, but the blessings of those things only come to those who qualify for them by obedience to God. As for gay marriage, I think the fight to keep gay marriage illegal is lost, and that is why the church has turned their attention more to fighting to protect freedom of religion, but there is no 'fight' when it comes to the immorality of gay marriage. The church is never going to endorse it and members who go down that path will find themselves outside the church. The church has never taken the position that marriage and divorce are based on feelings alone. Marriage is a covenant with God, and divorce is only acceptable in God's eyes in cases of abuse, abandonment, infidelity etc, not simply because one of them feels like divorcing. While the church won't sit in judgement of a divorcing couple and assign blame, that couple will have to answer to God at judgment day for their actions It's been a long time since I watched Fireproof. It is not produced by the church, I think it is from some evangelical filmmakers. It most certainly does not glorify adultery, in fact I don't think she actually sleeps with another man. If I recall right, they just have conflict/temptation and she says she wants a divorce. It is a story of a man fighting to save his marriage from falling apart and succeeding at it. The message is that if you work at making your marriage good and follow Christ you can heal even a very broken marriage. Your attitude is leading you to cut off your nose to spite your face. A strategy of avoiding failure will not lead to happiness. Instead shed your angry and cynical mindset and pursue success. Other people's failures and weaknesses are their own issues, you are your own person. Get your head right and open your eyes. Somewhere out there is a beautiful daughter of God who you can have a wonderful marriage with. Make yourself into the kind of man she can have a wonderful marriage with first, then keep your eyes open for her. When you find her and marry her, make your marriage and family your priority and do your part to make it work, dont' sit there and expect it to work all on it's own with no effort from you.

Here in California no fault divorce has been the rule since about 1971. And as Just a Guy states there the law here is roughly the same. Remember when you are out there and hear some guy lamenting about his divorce you are hearing less than 1/2 the story. The kids could also tell you a lot that he won't tell as well. At the peak, the divorce rate here was 50% of marriages. I think it's less than that now. That means that there are out there millions, and I have known dozens of happily married men and women. It takes two to make it work. Not one. And it can work for you if you believe that. If you believe what you say in your post you won't be able to do it or make it work. It's known as the self fulfilling prophecy. dc

Friend, it's one thing to be cautious (and even, at a certain point in time, a little discouraged); but your post above goes further than that. It flirts with downright animus towards women. In spite of what your friends and men's rights websites may tell you--divorce is just as emotionally and economically catastrophic for women as it is for men. In fact, in most cases, more so--even when it is actually the woman who initiates the divorce. (I practice divorce law, so I'm not shooting in the blind here.)While it can be particularly galling for a male to have to pay spousal support, the simple fact is that a woman who puts her career on hold for 10-15 years while raising my children, deserves some help getting back on her feet if our marriage dissolves--regardless of the reason for the marriage's dissolution. State laws and divorce court judges are (slowly) adjusting to the idea of working mothers, and though things vary from state to state--speaking generally, from a legal standpoint with regard to alimony and child custody, men are probably better off in family court now than they have been at any time in the past thirty years.Children are not marital property to be divided along with the house, the boat, and the 401(k). Child custody awards center around doing what's best for the children (promoting stability and, to the extent possible, maintaining the status quo), not as an affirmation that the long-suffering, cuckolded spouse was actually Right™. That means that, barring actual unfitness (drug use, etc--and no, adultery per se is not parental unfitness), the person who has done the bulk of the child-rearing during the marriage will wind up with primary custody of the children. The simple fact is that--even outside of Mormonism, and even in the most progressive relationships--it is extremely rare to have a father who is more involved with the children than their mother is. (Oh, and if an addict of a mother gets the kids over a completely clean and otherwise decent and law abiding father--either someone's lying, didn't bother to get a lawyer, or had a lawyer who fouled up colossally. Drug use is fairly easy to prove using a follicle test--which, contrary to what you read on the interwebs, is not easy to beat--and courts do not like giving custody to unrehabilitated drug addicts.)Mormonism perhaps could have been more socially/politically involved as no-fault divorce gained traction--but then again, there were social and tactical/strategic reasons why it may have been in its interest to stay out of that fight (some of us, I understand, were kind of worn out over that whole ERA unpleasantness). But secular movements aside, I would strongly disagree with your suggestion that Mormonism has reduced the theology of marriage to preoccupied with feelings or "love" at the expense of commitment.I've not seen Fireproof, but every synopsis/review I've read doesn't describe that movie as glorifying the wife's cheating any more than it glorifies the husband's porn use.These men in your ward with the miserable marriages? I'm going to issue you a challenge: Print your opening post to this thread and show it to each of those men, one by one, within the next week. Ask them for their comments. In fact, invite them to register at LDS.net and add their thoughts. I'll bet that more than one of them will be utterly horrified that that's what you took away from their comments.As for the rest of your divorced acquaintances--take their stories with a grain of salt. I've met an awful lot of women with abusive, deadbeat ex-husbands, and a lot of men with shrewish, mentally ill harpies as ex-wives. Strangely, though--I rarely meet women who admit to have been the sort of women their ex-husbands complain about, or men who confess that they've been just what their ex-wives believe them to be. Contrary to your average sitcom or Lifetime Channel melodrama, being involved in an affair or being an absentee-father, porn-addict of a husband isn't really something most people discuss with their best friend at the mall or on a fishing trip.Not everyone in a skirt is a predator/man-eater in waiting. There are numerous spectacular, single women both in and out of the Church who do want a lifelong, equitable commitment to a good man and are more than willing to pull their own weight in such a relationship. I've been married for almost thirteen years now, and I'd do it over again in a heartbeat.

The term new and everlasting covenant is used frequently throughout the Doctrine and Covenants. President Joseph Fielding Smith gave the following definition of it: “The new and everlasting covenant is the fulness of the gospel. It is composed of ‘All covenants, contracts, bonds, obligations, oaths, vows, performances, connections, associations, or expectations’ that are sealed upon members of the Church by the Holy Spirit of promise, or the Holy Ghost, by the authority of the President of the Church who holds the keys. The President of the Church holds the keys of the Melchizedek Priesthood. He delegates authority to others and authorizes them to perform the sacred ordinances of the priesthood. “Marriage for eternity is a new and everlasting covenant. Baptism is also a new and everlasting covenant, and likewise ordination to the priesthood, and every other covenant is everlasting and a part of the new and everlasting covenant which embraces all things.” (Answers to Gospel Questions, 1:65.)