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I don't ever think there was a time I have ever been so grateful I am not a BISHOP other than right now. Boy, this is a tough case. The human man in me (I'm married) says oh no, nooooooooo, no way, nope, nope, nope. Uh-uh, not happening. The Holy Spirit says to me love the sinner, hate the sin. So, I took some time to read Hosea again, thought to myself, wow, just wow. I have to admit, if I were Bishop, I'd be calling the stake president begging for him to tell me what to do about you, I'd be praying HUGE. I'd be praying for your poor husband's broken heart, I'd be praying for you, for you to truly be repentant, to become a better wife, faithful and not so given to be selfish, that you would be a better mother (if you have kids) for when you cheat on your souse, you cheat on your children too. I would be praying for the spirit of your marriage of which is deeply wounded and in many ways destroyed. I know heavenly father is a GOD OF RESTORATION AND RECONCILIATION. I also know you've got to be accountable too. I read your post over and over, lets just make sure you're sad and repentant because you regret doing what you've done and not just because you got caught. Ask yourself, had you not been caught, would you still be cheating? Yes, this is a tough one, and totally NOT an isolated incident, sadly. God be with you.

Same way anyone would know about it. Studio C.

How about that? I might have to give Book of Mormon Central a listen.

You are good man Vort, I mean that in all sincerity. Agreed.

True enough, your example shows an unadmirable mindset and an almost religious devotion that are almost polar opposite to what science claims to be. But can you provide me with a list, even a short list, of the inconsistencies and problems that riddle evolutionary theory? On a side note, this sort of half-baked garbage is what I have come to expect of high school teachers. Since having children go through high school, I have lost a great deal of respect for the average HS teacher. I already regaled you with my story about my daughter's high school teacher last year warning us that we would not longer be able to help the students, because the topics were Just Too Advanced; for example, they were then involved in the horribly complex and mind-taxing study of -- steel yourselves -- CONTINENTAL DRIFT! Some are dedicated and wonderful, I know, but far too many are faking it. It's enough to drive someone far enough into cynicism to (gasp!) pull their kids out of public schools and teach them themselves.

You sinned... and you have to live with the consequences of that sin. Part of those consequences are the reaction of your husband, his family and your family. You are under command to repent. They are under command to forgive. And like you are finding, and like some posters here have stated, forgiveness of this kind of sin can be very hard. If they can't forgive then then greater sin lies on them, per the scriptures. No matter how abominable yours was theirs will be greater in the eyes of the Lord if they do not forgive. You will have no control over how long, if ever, forgiveness from them might come. All you can do is repent thoroughly, completely, withholding nothing and then hand everything else over to the Lord

yjacket, seriously, chill. This is wrong in so many ways. The woman has admitted (anonymously) to her actions and has come here seeking a path forward. Heaping coals on her head isn't helpful. When the woman taken in adultery was dragged before Christ, she appeared not to have been willingly confessing. She wasn't there because her guilt drove her there, but because she was apparently dragged from her bed of adultery into a public place. Jesus first ignored, then shamed, her accusers, finally leaving only himself and her (and the rest of the crowd watching the drama unfold). At that point, Jesus did not rub her actions in her face. Quite the opposite: He said that he did not condemn her. We are given a space for repentance, before the condemnation of God comes upon us. God does not immediately condemn us for our missteps, even something as serious as adultery. Instead, he allows us to figure things out and repent. I suspect I am as disgusted by this adulterous sin as you are, but coming out in accusing condemnation toward the woman who sinned is not the way to go. Remember who has the title of Accuser. That's not someone we want to emulate. By the way, the idea that sex sin is the worst possible thing that anyone could ever do except for murder appears to be scripturally based solely upon a specific interpretation of the teachings of Alma (junior) to his son Corianton, found in Alma 39:2-5: But what are the actual antecedents to "these things"? In context, they are: (1) boasting in his own strength and wisdom; and, (2) forsaking his ministry by going after a harlot. In other words, his abominable actions were self-glorification and breaking his divine covenants of ministry. Insofar as adultery (or fornication in general) is a breaking of covenant, then I certainly agree that it is most abominable. But the idea that non-marital sexual activity per se is the worst thing anyone can ever do besides murder another person is absurd on its face. I can think of any number of things more spiritually damaging and damning than an unmarried couple having sex with each other -- and so can you. Years-long neglect to the needs of a child, or ongoing nastiness and hatefulness toward him. Long-term physical abuse. Beating someone so badly that you cause permanent, severe disability. Actively working to undermine the legitimate government of a people. Openly rebelling against God and seeking to lead his children astray. Anyway, believe what you like about that. But I think that your condemnation of the OP is over the top. I think that encouraging her to come clean and turn from her path of sin is a better option than explaining to her in gory detail how awful she is.

Why does Canada get so much say in a US election?

You can not bury this, it will get worse, not better as time goes on. You have to face it for your own good and it won't be easy but it will be worth it. Excommunication, if it happens, is a chance to start over from the beginning. You get to be baptized again and washed clean of all of it. Your Bishop will do what he can to help your marriage survive this, and it is possible to move from here to a place where your marriage is better than it ever was. There is no chance for any kind of good outcome by trying to hide it, you just move the pain down the road and make it bigger at the same time. Please set up a time to talk with your Bishop right now. The steps of repenting are the same steps you will need to follow to repair your relationship with your marriage: 1. Recognize you have sinned (I think we have that covered) 2. Sincere regret. Your regret needs to be the same magnitude as the sin. Regret is what makes the difference between a change of heart and a change of mind. Your husband will need to see your regret when you confess and know it is real. Freeing yourself of that pain of that regret should help motivate you to do all the rest. 3. Full confession. Your husband can't forgive you of something he doesn't know about, you need to make a full confession so he has what he needs to forgive all the things you did. 4. Ask for forgiveness, beg for it. Don't think it is something you deserve and don't give up seeking it. 5. You need to make restitution, make up for what you did as best you can. You've done things that can't be undone but make up for it as best you can, and help others not make the same mistake. 6. Don't ever do it again. Don't get anywhere close to feeling tempted to do it. Figure out what in you or in your marriage helped make this happen and change things so you are. With your Bishop's help you can find your way to having a change of heart so you become a person who would never do this again, then you can be cleansed of all this and it will feel wonderful.

While i want vidangel to win on one hand, on the other i'd rather not support the creators of content for which vidangel is necessary. ........ Bleeping entertainment addictions >.<

@emilydc You know what you need to do. You are simply too afraid/selfish to do so. You need to get over it. Here are some possibilities you might face. First Option... You do a complete and total confession and begin to repent. Downsides it might cost you your marriage, and it might cost you your membership for awhile. But you save your eternal soul and take advantage of the Atonement to be clean again. Second Option... You continue to lie and get outted (as you fear might happen) Instead of going before your husband and bishop with a broken heart you get dragged before them. The odds of it costing you your marriage and your membership climb greatly and it take longer to dig out from under it (assuming you ever do) Third Option... You don't confess and you don't get caught until facing Christ on judgement day. He judges you fairly and justly. Since you did not repent and take advantage of his atonement. The following happens: your sealing to your husband is broken because of your sins (your marriage ends permanently), you are cast into Hell where your membership in Christ kingdom ends... In time Christ empties out Hell where you gain the Telestial Kingdom. If you are going to be afraid/selfish... then at least do it with an eternal perspective rather then a very short-sighted mortal one.

Emily - this isn't a "make me" thing - you need to go to your bishop and tell him everything. I don't know if you'll be excommunicated or not. I don't know if you've destroyed your marriage or not. But I do know this: these things you've done have hurt your soul. The things you continue to do by lying, are poisoning your soul. There is only one way out of this, that's to acknowledge the truth, turn towards Christ, and avail yourself of his redeeming sacrifice. There is something driving you to this behavior and the lying. You need to figure out what that is so you can address whatever is motivating you here. The best way to do that, is start with complete and total honest transparency with the right people. That means, starting with your bishop. Give the executive secretary a call today. Tell him you need an hour or two with the bishop. Tell him to make it the last appointment of the day, so you can go over if you need to. Your Bishop will help you, even though you've lied to him already.

This drives me nuts. As if it's more important to focus on image over living right. I can see their logic but it's flawed -- a church which teaches that heavenly rewards are more valuable than earthly, with members who think the world will perceive the church as failing if they don't emphasize their earthly rewards? NightSG - our first place was 425 square feet, but of course had everything we needed. The worst part was that the combination kitchen/dining room/living room was too small to have a full-sized dishwasher. First-world problems...

I watched an interview the other day with an individual from Texas that was not going to cast his electrical vote for Trump. He said he had a moral obligation not to vote for Trump because Trump did not get a majority vote from the national voting public. I did not think the news guy asked the proper question. I would have asked this Texas guy if he felt morally obligated to trash (refuse to represent) those citizens he was elected to represent in Texas. As an electoral delegate for Texas – I thought his moral obligation was to represent those that elected him to represent them???? I realize that in Texas there is no legal binding requirement for the electoral representatives but where does someone get the idea that there is no moral obligation to represent the citizens of tje state that elected them? The Traveler

That's very true, and goes well with my earlier comments about Evolution Theory. The Scientific Method is a great system but it's not foolproof.

....

No offense taken! Yes, these are huge real problems, several which I have personal soapboxes about. The scientific community is working on trying to addressing them... it's a long and clumsy process.

An atheist says the sky is blue. A theist scientist says the sky is blue. That doesn't make the blue sky observation atheistic. It is simply a scientific observation devoid of theism. An atheist says the sky is green. A theist scientist says the sky is blue. That doesn't make the blue sky observation theistic. It is simply a scientific observation. A theist says the sky is green. A theist scientist says the sky is blue. That doesn't make the blue sky observation athiestic just because it goes against some other theist's claims. It remains simply a scientific observation. As far as Behe. He is a scientist. His ID claims were deemed lacking in scientific validity. That doesn't mean that his ID conclusions are false. It simply means that the scientific community agree that his method used to support ID does not meet scientific process standards. So, it's like the scientist that concludes that the sky is blue and came to that conclusion by putting blue shaded glasses on. The conclusion may be sound but the process is faulty science.

Because it's embarrassing. It purports to argue about science without using actual science or even logic. It gets by almost purely on assertion.

Honestly, I can't see any reason to pursue this conversation. Rob wants to call names and make assertions. Okay by me. Nope.

No, they are not incompatible. I myself am a very religious LDS person. In my small department we have a man who's an Evangelical presiding elder at his church, Lutheran Sunday School teacher, Evangelical women's group leader, devoted Presbyterian, another LDS man, a devoted Catholic woman, and those are just the people I can think of off the top of my head. These are all men and women devoted to God while researching evolution. I'm not an atheist, you have been told this repeatedly and can even see it under my name. Please cease these blind slanderous remarks. Evaluating the quality of science has to do with the QUALITY of the scientific method applied, not with whatever the conclusion was. For example, the previous site you linked was completely devoid of any actual science being done. No science = a junk site.

I did not miss your point. You simply are trying to redefine it in every post. You have never made any mention of Tillerson's lifestyle, therefore, that is not part of any of your objections about him. Your objection is very simple - he's the CEO of Exxon. His success in life that earned him the top executive spot in Exxon is what you are against pointing to his "power" as the root of evil. It is so bad that you feel obliged to smear his character by falsely assigning him to criminal activity.

I get reviewed and tested by my peers all the time, though I'm not really a scientist. And I'm actively working on devolving on a professional level.

Reference for this assertion? It differs greatly from my experience working professionally with evolutionary scientists.

Or be one of it's contributors

I have 2 brothers and 1 sister. Between the 4 of us, 2 have houses bigger than 3800 sq ft. And it's not me. When I was in the process of purchasing a house, my mother told me this 2900 sq ft house (currently housing 6 people, 3 dogs, 4 chickens, 2 birds, 4 snakes, 2 turtles, and fish - will go up to 17 people for 6 weeks this summer) is too small. But that said, all 4 of us paid about the same amount of money for all our houses of varying sizes. As a matter of fact, my brother's 5000 sq ft house with 7 bedrooms and 6 bathrooms housing no less than 12 people at any point in time is cheaper than my house. Interestingly, my first house was 1200 sq ft with 2 bedrooms and housed 2 adults, a baby, 2 dobermans, 2 cats, and a parrot and has housed 6 adults for over 6 months at one point including my mother. My husband and I slept on a hammock in the master bedroom. And we were just as comfortable as my house now. It wouldn't have worked for us now though because my 2 teen-aged kids feel like there are 10 of them with the racket they and their friends make. But yeah, like anything else, it's not the house that is important. It is the home. Getting a ginormous house while incurring a lot of debt will hurt the home in the same manner that a tiny house incurring a lot of debt will.

Well I can give you an example that sort of represents the mentality I'm taking issue with. A close friend of mine is a high school Biology teacher and this occasionally comes up. (Go figure.) I once confronted him about the Ernst Haeckel embryonic drawings that were supposed to demonstrate the common origin of species by showing them as being nigh identical during part of the embryonic stage. Despite the fact that these drawings are widely known to have been made up as opposed to being actual illustrations of observed embryos, the drawings continue to find their way into biology textbooks. I asked him why, if Evolution is so obvious, so well researched and so utterly reliable, why is it necessary to use falsified data to teach it? His answer was that while it's true that there are flaws in Evolution Theory, it's still taught because "It's the best we've got." Mind, you, he believes with his whole heart in Evolution Theory, so he's not conceding that it's wrong when he says this. He believes it so completely that when debating it he says that Evolution is obviously true because he can observe squirrels in his yard... where else could they have come from? So when someone says "It's the best we've got" that's far from a ringing endorsement. It's taught as fact despite its problems by the very people who are supposed to be the objective, open minded thinkers that are supposed to be the last line of defense against junk science. It is treated now not as a scientific theory, but as religious dogma.

In the scientific community, this is true, but only in the sense that appealing to God as an explanation for some phenomenon is not acceptable. Do you understand why this is the case?

The Watchful Driver (not to be confused with The Walking Dead)

Rob, this is the crux of the matter. And it simply is not so. I admit that many individuals who call themselves "scientists" have this attitude, but it is not implicit in science itself. In reality, there are many scientists who are also theists. Read my post above on the "God of the gaps" if you want to understand why I think this issue arises so often.

There, I fixed that for you.

Oh, that, well, after you've seen it a hundred times, you just sort of look right past it.

I appreciate and partially agree with the distinction you draw. But in the spirit of openness, I think it only fair to point out that this problem you mention is one that theists have brought upon themselves by constantly insisting on the "God of the gaps" every time there's an unknown in science (which is to say, all the time). Suppose you and I are trying to understand gravity. We each propose a theory for gravity. Your theory: Things always tend to go downward. What goes up must necessarily come down. Gravity is that downward tendency. My theory: Invisible gravity fairies pull things downward. So far, our theories look pretty much the same, at least functionally. I'd say mine is even better than yours; after all, I'm at least proposing some sort of mechanism for gravity, not just saying "There it is." But we keep looking at things and thinking about things. After some years of observation, we modify our theories: Your theory: "Up" and "down" don't seem to have any universal meaning. All matter just appears to attract all other matter. That's gravity. My theory: Gravity fairies, dude. At this point, I will argue against your silly theory. All matter just "magically" attracts all other matter? Hah! Then why aren't things all just one big ball of sameness? Why don't we two come flying together because of our mutual attraction? My elegant theory of gravity fairies easily explains all observations, without resorting to such absurdities. But your theory is gaining ground, and despite its flaws, it has the benefit of not resorting to some invisible and untestable reason. In fact, various people in various places have done experiments that seem to lend credence to your theory. So some years later, after more observations, we again modify our theories: Your theory: Gravity is an intrinsic property of all matter, and involves a distortion in the "spacetime" in which all matter exists. These distortions lead always to an attraction between material objects and never a repulsion, as if you had iron balls on a vast rubber sheet. My theory: Spacetime distortions are GRAVITY FAIRIES!! Why won't you open your eyes to the obvious?! More years, more observations, more confirmation of your ideas then follow. There are also refutations of parts of your ideas, but you keep modifying your theory to at least try to keep up with the observations. Eventually, we find ourselves here: Your theory: Gravity is an exchange of particles (which I will call "gravitons") between material bodies, which exchange draws the physical bodies closer together. My theory: "Gravitons", eh? I'd say those sound an awful lot like, hmm, well, let's see, what could it be? Oh, that's right, GRAVITY FAIRIES!!!! At some point, reasonable people are simply going to get tired of me always shouting about gravity fairies any time there's an as-yet-unexplained phenomenon in your theory. I believe this is precisely what happens when religious folks are always always ALWAYS shouting "God of the gaps!" for every hole in a scientific theory.

Obviously. You say this like it's a bad thing. But particle physicists are most happy dealing with elementary particles that originally "poofed" into existence rather than deal with how that existence got started. A particle physicist does not have to understand or even believe the "Big Bang" theory in order to do science; he just needs to look at the particles. Same with evolutionary scientists. For most of them, the specifics of biogenesis are not relevant to what they're doing. All they care about is that DNA exists and that it acts in certain predictable, quantifiable ways.

True; however, they are two different independent studies, and are classed differently also. Evolution: the study of the change of alleles within organic "existing" life. Abiogenesis: the study of how life began -- non-existent life (a note to remember, life can begin without a change in alleles). This is where the "theory of evolution" and the "theory of abiogenesis" are fundamentally different, and I believe it is wisdom that we do not conflate different studies of science. Remember, the origin of life doesn't require any "change" among alleles within organic life. The moment "offspring" were born is when the "theory of evolution" begins, as long as their is a change of alleles, if not, evolution did not take place (As to my understanding, binary fission is not evolution, as there is no change in alleles from a clone of oneself). Similar principles may apply, but this doesn't make them the same study (even if they are encompassed within the same field of "evolutionary biology"). The theory of abiogenesis stems (speaking from my last reads which were a while ago) from the notion that all organic (even non-organic) life is made from elements (mainly compound elements). E.g. Hydrogen and Oxygen combined create H2O. Our bone structure is the combination of elements combined. This is my current understanding of "abiogenesis" which is a different idea of "evolution" than the "theory of evolution" regarding life and its changes.

Dear Emily, i feel for you. If you think that you can only tell your husband in a letter, do so. Do so now. There is a lot to be said for getting started. Phone or email the bishops secretary to make an appointment. 'Once begun is almost done'. Good luck on your journey. I have met a number of people in the church who have told me that they went through some sort of church discipline including excommunication. Some are very strong in the church now and vey happy. You can do this!

Because they are really the ones behind the Russian hack into US politics and controlling the election. The Traveler

Aka.....relaxing

Evolution is a theory of the origin of different species, not the origin of life.

The most poisonous thing you can do for your relationship with God and your husband is to continue on living the lie you're doing right now. Honesty is the first step of repentance and repairing relationships with God and your husband.

Another one we sang this Sunday that I completely forgot about! "Did You Think to Pray?" Very lovely and a great message!

I don't recall "be relaxed" in any commandments or principles of the gospel. Maybe I missed something in Sunday School.

I accept neither idea. Even if you want to interpret Genesis, Moses, Abraham, and the endowment presentation as a literal mechanical account of the order of creation, it's clear that man came last, not first. As for Noah's flood, the ancients who wrote that account (probably handed down from what I assume was Moses' original) did not understand the spherical nature of the earth. There are many instances in scripture of the narrator saying that thus-and-such occurrence covered 'the whole earth", when what is clearly meant is that it covered the entire area under discussion, not the whole globe -- a concept with which the ancients would most likely not have understood. In short, I see no reason to believe that Genesis' particular usage of "the whole earth" regarding Noah's flood should be interpreted to mean the entire planet. That is a markedly anachronistic interpretation. like saying that the division of the earth in Peleg's time refers to continental drift. Just does not make sense in context.

Like this one, that looks shockingly like @MormonGator wandering the compound...

They do not reject intelligent design; they reject Intelligent Design. intelligent design: "God is the Creator and stands behind all that happens." (Note that this is not at all incompatible with organic evolution.) Intelligent Design: "There is no possible way the eye could have evolved incrementally. Ergo, organic evolution is a false idea." Intelligent Design has nothing directly to do with religion; it is a pseudoscientific effort to discount evolutionary theory, mostly by handwaving arguments.

Zarahemla, I think if you weren't stressing about being a "good Mormon" you would find something else to stress out about. My son-in-law was a former Buddhist (he's Korean). He joined the church over 5 years ago. He is much happier as a "Mormon". Why? Because he knows the answers to "Why am I here?, Where do I come from? and Where will I go after death?" Knowing the Plan of Happiness brings us so much joy. For instance, we know if an infant, that has not been baptized before they die, will be saved in the Celestial Kingdom. Do you know how many people in the world sorrow because a child died before being baptized and believe that child is going to hell? I don't know the number, but I know it's significant. I taught some of them during my mission. Learning that their beloved child is not going to end up in hell, but is saved, is a wonderful blessing. And brings so much relief to people. Obeying the commandments brings peace. Disobeying brings sorrow. We are given the commandments to help us find joy in life, not to repress us. We just had a family incident occur over Christmas because of the consequences of a former sin. My grandson's father has another child from a past girlfriend, and he has been trying to establish visitation rights with his daughter. It has been a mess with accusations being hurled between him and his past girlfriend. His little girl and my grandson are in the middle of it, and there were a lot of tears spilled. There is so much pain and sorrow over the consequences of not following the law of chastity. My heart breaks for both my grandson and his half-sister. They have only met several times. My life is happier when I know I'm following the Lord's will. It's not more stressed. We all fall short. We always will. But, we don't need to stress about it. We repent, and then we try to do better. Should we just give up? There will always be guilt and stress when we know we are not following the commandments. We can't get away from that. Even if we don't have the gospel in our lives, people still have the Light of Christ, and their conscience will prick at them when they make a wrong choice. The 10 Commandments are basic laws to follow. When we follow them we are happier. And, what exactly more do Mormons have to follow? IMO, we only have the Word of Wisdom extra. No coffee, tea, alcohol, cigarettes, or drugs. That isn't that hard unless you're already addicted. Other Christian religions have the Law of Chastity too. Mormons aren't the only religion that teaches no sex before marriage. Other religions teach people to be a good person too. So, please stop stressing and stop blaming the church for the stress.

According to Nibley, assuming I understood him correctly, the pre-Dome of the Rock temple perched atop a steep path. (This was supposed to have been flattened out to accomodate the present massive Islamic structure.) Climbing this path was no mean feat, especially for the aged. To assist them, a handrail of sorts was installed, by which they could hold on and pull themselves up to the temple. This handrail was a rod -- specifically, an iron rod. Interesting if true, and very meaningful to Lehi's vision.

English. But I am attempting to search for the underlying Hebrew whenever possible. I think the numerous word-plays cannot be a coincidence. This book was written by someone with great knowledge in Hebrew.