Leaderboard

Folks who profess an interest in building “communities”—whether social progressives, or 3H officials—often have a surprising disregard for, and even contempt of, the little actions and traditions that actually forge communities and bind them together. More’s the pity. You arent going to build the Restored Gospel by running away from your founding beliefs and trying to blend in with your contemporaries. The ancient Israelites took fifteen hundred years to figure it out—but they finally did, and it’s a crying shame we can’t take some hints from them and figure out how to avoid the fleshpots of latter-day Babylon. Sorry to be so prickly here, but I just spent the last two hours analyzing police reports, victim statements, medical examiner reports—the works—from a case where a ten-year old and an eight-year-old gang-raped a five-year old, including sodomizing her with a power impact driver. The boys got the idea from their dads’ porn flicks. Accommodate the sensitivities of this miserable, self-worshipping, sex-obsessed, prophet-killing, baby-aborting culture? To Hades with that. They can accommodate us for once in their execrable lives, thank God that He has not yet poured the fulness of His wrath out on them, and consider the possibility that they ought to repent and get out of the house of horrors they’ve constructed for themselves. Has anyone considered that “Praise To The Man” is a giant and well-deserved middle finger, proudly and intentionally displayed to a modern wreck of westernized culture that refused and refuses to admit that the emperor has no clothes? If assimilation becomes our goal, we’re done. And we’ll deserve to be done. Politeness is all well and good, but in a big way we were sent to be offensive—not to hide in dark corners navel-gazing about why people don’t like us more.

I felt like this was deja vu -didn't we have this discussion a few months ago... There it is. I guess everyone has their hang-ups, but this one I can't begin to relate to. It's a great song and it's obviously not idol worship or deifying Brother Joseph. Didn't the Jews consider it blasphemous for Christ to say he was the son of God? Should we get rid of I am a Child of God while we're at it because Babylon doesn't get it?

6 Apr Saturday Morning Session Now Let Us Rejoice (verses 1 and 3) signon Press Forward, Saints There Is Sunshine in My Soul Today Redeemer of Israel (congregational hymn) Dearest Children, God Is Near You I Am a Child of God Rejoice, the Lord Is King! 7 Apr Sunday Morning Session Sing Praise to Him (verses 1 and 4) signon How Firm a Foundation I Feel My Savior’s Love Come, Ye Children of the Lord (congregational hymn) O Thou Rock of Our Salvation Come, Follow Me 7 Apr Sunday Afternoon Session Sweet Is the Work Come unto Jesus Hark, All Ye Nations! (congregational hymn) I Know That My Savior Loves Me I Need Thee Every Hour

Figured as much.... Which is why I said your answer was deflecting. As for your girl friend Members of the Church of Jesus Christ are not mindless brain washed drones. Which is why everyone is telling you to talk to her. The best we can do is tell you the standard teachings of the church. How much of it she has accepted, how much she personally values, that is not something we can answer for you.

I'm at a loss for a worthy response, other than to post site rule #1, again, as a response to something published by the organization who gave us this site rule: It's sort of a weird feeling, looking back on 20 years of arguing with church critics over this song, to hear the same arguments coming from believing members.

Sure; let’s quit saying/singing something that’s fundamentally true just because it makes Babylon uncomfortable. I’ll save that one in my “what-could-possibly-go-wrong-with-that?” file.

There are already many answers, and I have not read through the string. So...forgive any repetition. However, your post focuses mostly on the style of the church service. To put it too simply, you like it more demonstrative (louder music, perhaps a few amens to a passionately delivered teaching) and she likes it quieter and more reverent. However, the teachings of Baptist-like Christianity (really most all of historic Christianity) is quiet different from that of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. You and your fiance would do well to study the Bible and pray together. Determine what you both really believe. It will be one or the other. If she comes to agree with your classic Christian views, you can surely find a Christian church that fills both of your souls satisfactorily. If you come to believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God, and his revelations are true, then you will become a member. If you two are to marry, I strongly urge you to become united on your faith first.

@AbramM, I need to be blunt here, and outline some of the complications of being in an inter-faith Protestant-LDS Christian marriage. I'm going to stress that such marriages can work (I'm extremely happily married) but they take a TON of work. Here's some points-- 1) There is no priest in my home. If I were to have married an LDS man, he would be a priest, and he would be able to bless and baptize our children. My Baptist husband is not a priest. So when there is a need for a baptism or formal blessing, I need to turn elsewhere. This does make my feel husband uncomfortable and less of a man. 2) LDS Christians believe marriage can be eternal, if sealed by God. My marriage is not and can never be as long as my husband is a Baptist. For now our marriage is just a legal agreement, not a covenant before God. 3) I take my daughter to church alone vast majority of the time. 4) We do visit each other's church regularly. Yes, he respectfully attend LDS Church even when he does not hold LDS beliefs and respectfully attend Baptist church even when I do not hold Baptists beliefs. 5) For a couple of specific examples of attending other places: we took pre-martial counseling at his church, got married by my bishop (at a friends house), had members of both faiths speak, last Christmas was at his church, last fall social party was at mine, etc. 6) My husband and I have different beliefs on some things. He needs to support & respect me in my faith, even when he disagrees with things. I likewise support & respect him, even when I disagree. Both faiths have areas where the other is considered to be apostates/heretics. 7) Finding common ground to teach our children can be complicated at points. We have much in common, but there are many areas of disagreement. In those area of disagreement, either is free to speak their view, and we explain things. We make it work, but it is work. 8 ) We both have to deal with his Baptist mother-in-law who repeatedly denies my relationship with God, calls me a brainwashed cultist, and lectures hubby on how "you need to man up and make your wife a Christian!". (After which we thenterminate the conversation because her behavior is unacceptable). These are some of the complications of being in an inter-faith marriage. Again, it can work- and we are EXTREMELY happily married, but it is tons of work. I refuse to make my husband choose between me and God. And he refuses to make me choose between him and God. It ONLY works because we do not force that decision and are willing to communicate and find our middle ground. @AbramM, if you are unwilling to communicate and find that middle ground, and instead insist "it's either my way or the highway", then your relationship is doomed for the highway. Your girlfriend is not a Protestant and any forced conversion as a condition of marriage will not last.

@AbramM, I would advise you and your fiancee to take Pre-marriage Councelling classes. Does your church offer these? Here's a list of questions that can be discussed with these classes. https://www.marriage.com/advice/pre-marriage/pre-marriage-counselling-questions-to-answer-before-saying-i-do/ M.

Fair... If she is willing to settle for something less then the LDS church. Totally possible if she doesn't believe it is God's restored church on the earth. You do not believe it and that is fine... But you do not know yet if she believes it. If she does not then your reasoning works. But we are trying to warn you and prepare you for the case that she does believe it (because that is what we teach). If she does then you are asking her to reject God's established church for a church that is not... Or in other words you are asking her to choose between God and you

By that logic it is totally fair for her to require you to become LDS... After we do not tell you to stop believing in God either As a christian you should be familiar with the concept of the Golden Rule. "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" Before you think it is OK to do anything to your girl friend make very sure you are OK if the tables are turned and it is being done to you

Of course I can. But I did not go to you seeking understanding... You came to us. As for not being sure that God exists... That is a personal thing between you and him and has always been. However when faced with a group that thinks and believes "differently" do not presume that they do not have the "best interest of humans" at heart. We simply disagree with what that best interest is.

The answer is simple.... If God exists (and has the attributes we claim). Then he knows for a fact what brings to pass the greatest well being of humans and tells us so all we have to do is follow his instructions... Without God we are blown from one thing to another trying to guess what is "the best for humans" Take health and diet how many people are really willing to do what it takes to live healthy? If you read the headlines science is all over the place and often contradictory. And that is for something as simple as physical health that should really be the low hanging fruit of "doing what is best". Then you have things like mental and emotional health which are much harder to understand. Then assuming God exists there are "eternal health" How to we even begin to evaluate what might be "Best" for eternal health? Thus following God is putting the well being of humans first, because we trust that God is the only one that can see clearly what that is.

I guess I find that reasoning unconvincing. If my seven-year-old says something silly, that's one thing. Sydnee is a real, live adult, not a seven-year-old. I can understand and sympathize with naiveté, but not so much with stupidité. Virtue-signaling by any name still stinks as rank. When you're writing articles for mass consumption, you have to be ready and willing to face people who test your claims. Playing the "young 'un" card seems dirty pool—which, by the way, Sydnee didn't do. So let her answer (or not) for her own writing.

Repeat.

The song is "Praise to the man" not "Worship the man"; I didn't even read the article, but I think that historically, the protestant Christian community has a poor concept of regard for spiritual leaders. I would argue that this stems from their lack of ability to verify and validate a spiritual leader's credentials, which of course is because they lack truly valid credentials. Although we disagree, the Catholic community has a much greater understanding of this concept as they practice the veneration of saints.

I think you are right to want to get this resolved before marriage. Just based on what you’ve written here, I think the bigger issue (over finding a church you are both comfortable with) is that you are so committed to this and she, seemingly, is not. You need to sit down together and really communicate about this issue. Find out why she doesn’t seem to think this is important to figure out before marriage.

We have known for some time that we can use the gravitational power of large massive objects to multiply our energy for space travel. This is called the slingshot effect. One of the problems of space travel is the difficulty of storing energy enough to reach near light speed. Or perhaps warp speed for the Star Trek fans. One idea for space travel is that we gather energy from heavy objects – specifically stars so we do not have to launch with all the fuel we need. A recent idea has been proposed of using supermassive blackholes for energy for space travel. We would not need to be very close the blackholes to extract enormous amounts of energy. How this works is by using lasers pointed at binary super massive black holes orbiting each other such that the laser slingshots around the supermassive black holes and sent back to the point of origin. But the slingshot effect cannot increase the speed of light so what happens is that the energy of the light is dramatically increased. I reviewed the mathematics of using lasers to extract energy from black holes and the power is virtually unlimited. We could easily destroy ourselves with a laser made into a powerful death ray that could destroy our earth. One theory is that quasars are supermassive black holes and that the light from them is the byproduct energy of black holes devouring each other. As I have considered the power that could be extracted from massive singularities I theorize that such power could be intelligently used to create and continue to create our universe. This could be the source of dark energy and dark matter and the power which G-d(s) tap into to organize and create our expanding universe. This would mean that the creative energy is light and that through the separating of light from darkness (singularity of black holes) is the means by which G-d creates all things of this universe. Anyway something to think about. The Traveler

We can still check it out even if we just cross it off the list

Community of Christ is neither Protestant Christian nor LDS Christian, so I don't think it will make either of them happy.

@AbramM, I don't know how long you and your girlfriend have known each other, how long you dated or how long you have been engaged. If it has only been weeks then it's understandable that you were ignorant of your girlfriend's Church's history and beliefs. But if you have known each other for months and close to at least a year, then your ignorance regarding her faith is also on you. In that amount of time, you should have at least been interested enough to have asked your girlfriend questions about her faith and not just assumed. M.

“The Church” doesn’t make changes. God asks the Church to make changes. So it is really a matter of whether one believes the Prophets and Apostles when they declare, “thus sayeth the Lord”. Nobody can prove anything one way or the other. Faith is something everyone has to figure out for themselves. You say that a child needs a Mother and a Father. Then you say you are ok with a child growing up without that need fulfilled. It’s different when a child grows up with a Single Parent or a child grows up without parents or a child grows up with turbulent parents. Nobody is saying, “When I grow up, I want to be a Single Mother”, or “I’m going to marry so I can become divorced or widowed”, or “I’m going to have children so I can leave them orphans”. But that’s exactly what gay marriage is doing - “I’m gonna have children so I can deprive them of a Mother and a Father”. So a person who marries and then leaves the spouse to fight a war... is lacking in love? A person who cares so much for his spouse he locks her in the house worried that if she gets out she’s going to get hit by a truck, attacked by the neighbor’s dog, molested by a sexual predator is Love? A person who desire to treat somebody with so much affection he goes and spends the entire night wining and dining until the night culminates in sex without marriage because it’s Love? So a couple where one is happy doing something that the other one doesn’t like and vice versa - can’t Love? No. None of those is Love. Love is that all encompassing desire to bring someone with you to Joy. Not just happiness but Joy. For Christians, Christ has set the example of what brings Joy. To will what God wills is perfect joy. So love is, therefore, bringing someone with you closer to Christ. Not just someone closer to Christ, or you closer to Christ... it’s both of you closer to Christ. So when some teenager says - I’m going to have sex with you because I love you... does not love you. Someone saying, I’m going to lock you in the house because I love you, is also lying. I’m gonna let you abuse me because I love you.. also lying. None of these lead to Joy. Especially when innocent children become victims of their profession of false Love. This is the same with homosexual relationships. They do not lead to Joy.

Link: https://www.lds.org/media-library/video/2011-03-01-joseph-smith-the-prophet-of-the-restoration?lang=eng

Perhaps you can devote just over an hour to watching: Joseph Smith Prophet of the Restoration. It's on YouTube and Amazon Prime. Better yet, watch it with your fiance, and then discuss it. Using a movie may open her up to sharing her faith.

Just the opposite. Joseph Smith taught that free will is correct. In fact, the church calls it agency, and believes that our ability to choose is so important that Adam & Eve pre-planned taking the forbidden fruit in a pre-existing state, before God created the heavens and the earth.

Pre-marriage counselling is a good thing. The fact that you don't want to communicate (share information, ask questions...) things with your girlfriend says that you are not ready to get married. You seem very immature when it comes to communication, which is very important in a marriage. Don't be afraid to talk with your girlfriend/fiancee. M.

.... pardon me, but how are you not already railroading that by insisting she attend Protestant church and teach Protestant beliefs to her children? (Note; I hav nothing against doing pre-martial counseling at any church, and do actually recommend that. Myself and Hubby very much enjoyed and profited from our pre-martial counseling at his Baptist church. My concern here is not the 10 weeks counseling but the lifelong marriage.)

I just have to mention that after all my critical comments lately: Even though I may not like many things that the church teaches, I still feel like especially members of your religion are some of the best people ever! Just had to throw that in here 😊 Did you never think of people from other religions who seem to be just as convinced as you are? I don't know how you can be so sure that this is the "right" religion when there are others who claim the same thing.

What other people do is what other people do. Our concern is what disciples of Christ do. Yes, we do encourage other people to become disciples of Christ, but that change must be initiated between God and that person.

Well whether you marry her or not, I tend to think you shouldn't. I doubt that you will be bachelor till the rapture.

Gay marriage and Black Priesthood are 2 unrelated scenarios. Gay marriage is an Eternal Principle, Black Priesthood is a dispensationary restriction. To see if you can look at homosexuality differently, I’m going to ask you a few questions: Do you believe that Gender is interchangeable? Do you believe that there is nothing about Motherhood intrinsic to female and there is nothing about being a Wife intrinsic to female? And similarly for Fatherhood and being a Husband to male? Do you believe that Sexual Attraction is always first for Love to follow? Define Love.

Is that because of what you talked about with her today, or what you read in this thread from people who don't know her from a fly on the wall? If it is in any way brought up by what you read in this thread that turned you against her, I'd probably think again about how I was treating her and try to listen more to what she actually stated she believes. There are many different beliefs out there (and you'll find there are even a great deal of disagreements on what some would consider doctrine as set in the church). A prime example is what you brought up about Baptism. We believe that Baptism is necessary to enter Heaven as it was taught by Jesus (unless a man is baptized by water and by the spirit he can in nowise enter the Kingdom of Heaven). John 3:5 This is why many disagree with the idea that no baptism is necessary and that, in fact, it is absolutely necessary. HOWEVER, you have tossed into that variations on this. For example, Mormons do not actually believe one needs to be baptized in this life in order to enter the kingdom of heaven, even though that is also our doctrine that one needs to be. A prime example of this is regarding children under the age of 8. We do not feel they should be baptized, and that there is no need for them to be baptized. Any child that dies thus, would go to heaven. Why? My take on it (and as this will show, we have many different interpretations of the same idea) The church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints believes that we must follow the commandments as given by Jesus Christ. We believe that he commanded those that would follow him to be baptized. It is not necessary for one to be baptized in this life, necessarily, but it IS necessary for one who has accepted Jesus Christ to follow his commandments. Thus, one who is "saved" as you might put it, would seek to follow those commandments and thus would seek to follow the example that Jesus Christ himself set. Jesus himself was baptized, and thus one who would follow Jesus and his example would also choose to be baptized. If one says they follow Jesus, and have accepted him, but then refuse to follow him...that shows rebellion against the Lord and a desire to do the opposite of his word. However, in the end, we are only responsible for our own actions. Those actions basically boil down to a single choice. We can either accept the Good and the Lord and his ways, or we can reject them and choose evil. We can only know our own choices. Even then, it is NOT up to us whether we are saved or not. It is up to the Lord. In this, the Lord is the one who sets the conditions and he can save whoever he wants to save. If he wants to say someone goes to heaven regardless of what they did or knew, who are we to argue with him. We are completely reliant upon him and his grace to save us. He can save who he wishes. It is up to us and our OWN actions on what we need to decide. We NEED to follow his commandments once we have chosen to follow him. This shows who we are following. Just like someone who loves the color red will probably want to have it exhibited somewhere that they can see it, the same would apply to Christians. Those that hate the color red, on the otherhand, would probably do what they could to do away with it or not have it in their presence. Our actions do NOT define what we believe, but the exhibit who we are and what we actually believe. This is what Baptism also exhibits. It shows we love the Lord. It shows our love for him. Because we love him we wish to emulate and do as he did. However, it is not the act that saves us, it is the Lord himself and his grace upon us. You'll find that there may be many that are members of our church that would heavily disagree with my thoughts above. Hence, what I said, it is important to disregard what preconceptions you may have gotten from this thread and actually LISTEN to what she said. Perhaps last night something else happened, but it seemed to me that, even with you saying you were going to talk to her, that you had gotten some preconceived notions from this thread and may have had them in your head rather than actually sitting down and seeing what she, herself, might actually feel and think. Obviously, she may be a very strong member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, in which case, all your thoughts may be correct. ON the otherhand, there are many that really are not all that involved, or really don't delve into the teachings of the Church, or many others who may not even have a testimony of the church even if they have gone to it all their lives that have VERY different beliefs and opinions than anything you saw in this thread. What I'm saying is do not let a single forum topic or single night of discussion suddenly dissolve a relationship that you said was on the edge of marriage. I would find it unfortunate that something that hopefully was so strong, would be so easily destroyed in such a short time.

All have sinned and come short of the Glory of God. Those Sentinel Natives included.

When I returned to college back in 2015 I did a paper on prostitution. Based on the data I collected, I have to question NCOSEs validity. I'm not confident in their work.

Pretty sure this violates some site rules. If people (and here I'm speaking not of Fether, but of the book's author) can't get their point across without filthy language, their point is not worth getting across.

I believe I refrained commenting on the first thread because I didn't want to come across as anti-Snell, having so recently taken him to task over another article. But David has outdone himself with this one. I agree with every critical comment made in this thread, and think we could easily add dozens more. Brother @dsnell, you are welcome to your opinions. Really, you are. I understand holding unpopular opinions; I myself have some opinions that are less than orthodox. But I don't write public columns about them to explain myself to others, hoping perhaps to persuade them to join me in my jihad. Might I counsel you to stop with the ark-steadying and the seeking for praise because of your superior perceptions. You're allowed to dislike a hymn, even a popular hymn. But when you publicly air your grievance, don't be surprised when people respond, not with pitchforks, but with personal distaste. You are soiling something sacred.

Really? Doctrine is to be run through a Cost/Benefit analysis? Psasst... 3H... you really really need to ponder the quality of your articles. I don’t believe you are so desperate for articles as to just publish anything out there.

I'm not being rude when I say this but I don't care what people think about me. My concern is with what God thinks of me and I know where I stand with God.

Maybe you should have a discussion with your fiancee about her Church's beliefs, so that you understand where the posters commenting on this thread are coming from. M.

Right from the CFM manual:

LDS Christians are Christians, but they are not Protestants. Just like Orthodox and Catholics are Christians but not Protestants. Assemblies of God and Methodist (both Protestant) beliefs also are very different in some areas.

I should have added a P.S. - I was devout Catholic who got married to an inactive LDS... fully expected him to become Catholic as he was attending Catholic Church service with me... I got baptized LDS 4 years later, sealed to my husband in the temple a year after that.

I think this is the best reason. In addition, when you're sure to be killed, then as long as you aren't emotionally attached to your women and children, you risk nothing by putting them forward to see if your enemy will spare them instead of slaughter them. And even if you DO care about your women and children, it might still be worth a shot, when the alternative is that you and they both end up suffering cruel death and/or slavery.

Hi @AbramM ! I'm an LDS Christian extremely happily married to a Baptist/evangelical dude. I also very regularly attend non-LDS-Christian churches (cause I'm a nerd that way). When it comes to being married and raising a family, most important question to ask here is not about "which pew shall our butts warm Sunday morning", but rather it is "what Truths shall we teach our children and practice in our homes?" LDS Christians and Protestant Christians are both Christians and agree on the most important things (Christ, His atonement), but have different beliefs on other things (such as LDS believing in eternal marriage, priesthood power, and continuing revelation). For example, LDS Christians believe that a marriage covenant (when sealed by priesthood power and both parties embrace Christ) is for eternity-- you shall be husband & wife forever and your children sealed to you. Protestant denominations declare that all marriages & other bonds are dissolved upon death. Your marriage would not yet be sealed with that eternal priesthood power. Shall you teach your children the eternal or temporary importance of these bonds? Another example: shall you teach your children that the Heavens are open (mommy's view), that they are closed (daddy's view), or that mommy & daddy have different beliefs on this? Shall a child be baptized right when they are born (as is the practice for some Protestants) or shall they have to accept the Gospel & be of age first (LDS Christians and some Protestant views)? Which books of scripture shall you teach your family out of (LDS cannon includes more that 66 book Protestant Bible)? Focus on the most important things first (what Truths shall we teach our children) and reach a common ground. Don't worry about all the stuff that totally does not matter (like music and sermon style).

Mores, you’re making the civil case—one I very much agree with; and in a remarkably articulate way. But as it pertains to the theological case, I don’t think you even need to concede as much as you have. Theologically, marriage is all about rearing up righteous offspring—if not in this life, then in the next. It’s not that marriage is a hoop to jump through to get into to the highest degree of Heaven. It’s that the highest degree of Heaven is by definition a state of existence in which you are eternally creating new lives and teaching and guiding those lives into spiritual maturity—and just by the nature of what that task involves (and I mean this more in a spiritual than a physical or mechanical sense), you need an eternal partner in a heterosexual union. Many progressives bellyache about the idea of God being a man and complain that women just can identify with a deity that is solely male—but then demand that the Restored Gospel tweak its theology to allow for male-male couples to attain exaltation and basically (to put things crudely) become joint gods who will raise an infinite number of females who will never know what it is to have a Heavenly Mother. To me, the idea of gay sex is frankly far less offensive than the culmination of misunderstandings, skewed values, ignorance of or willful blindness to human nature, sloppy logic, and drawing of botched inference upon botched inference in which LGBTQ advocates generally, and LDS LGBTQ advocates in particular, base their arguments and worldview. In other words—gay marriage in and of itself is merely one of many, many things that are both morally wrong and sociologically counterproductive; but given modern social conditions it also happens to represent the culmination (so far) of every idiotic deconstructionist dogma that’s come into play since the early 19th century.

It sound to me as if you are too needy. You are too desperate. Unfortunately this is a turn off for many people. Of course, if you could find someone who is just as needy as you are, it might work out. In this you probably would need to look at those who may not be the most attractive girl out there, or she may not be the girl that is the cutest one you know. Instead, you'd probably have to start looking at if the girl has a great attitude, or is a nice person before you consider their looks or attractiveness. You start to look at the girl for who she is first, rather then the exterior appearance. My thought is that you should stop worrying about it as strongly as you are. Instead, focus on being a complete and whole person first. To me, it sounds as if you suffer from depression or depressive moods. Because you suffer from this it could be that you feel that finding someone will solve this (and this may be unconscious or in your subconscious even rather than a conscious thought). You are in love with the idea of being in love. You feel that if you just could have this issue you can have so much resolved in your life and things would become so much greater. In truth, it solves nothing. If you are NOT already happy with yourself, you will NOT be happy with someone else. You will have a brief period of Euphoria and then you will be just as unhappy as before, except now you will be making someone else unhappy as well. Instead, focus on being happy with your life and what you have currently. This does not mean you should stop going to Young Single Adult dances or activities. You should continue to do so and continue to ask girls out on dates. You should not obsess about it. Resolve to do something great with your life or pick up an awesome hobby. Find something that can make you content with your life. I am probably an introvert to a degree. I LOVE books. I LOVE history. I focused on that. I was blessed to find the most beautiful girl and get married to her. Not all are that blessed. Even when I am not around her I still have things that I enjoy. I still love history and I love working in history. When I travel for research, I LOVE doing that. That does not mean I love her any less, or that I do not miss her, but that I am happy with what I am doing and my life. If she were gone tomorrow (I expect I will die first, so only hypothetical) I do not think I would have difficulties as I would still have my library of books to read and a LOT of history to still explore. You need to be a complete person and be satisfied with yourself. You still need to strive for marriage, but don't make it such an obsession that it makes you depressed or unhappy. Do the things necessary to try to find a spouse, but also focus on the good things in life. Be happy with yourself so that you can make someone else happy, rather than expecting someone else to be the one to make you happy. I'm sorry that you are feeling so down, unfortunately, the only one that can bring you up at this point is probably you.

"1. Amazon After a recent backlash against the company, this one may not come as a huge surprise. The company prohibits the sale of explicit pornography, but NCOSE argues that many of the products found on the site, including on Amazon Prime and the Kindle e-reader, promote child pornography and sexual commodification of women." lol

@askandanswer, here’s an alternate (and neutral, AFAIK) presentation of Young’s February 1852 remarks: https://archive.org/details/CR100317B0001F0017/page/n1 In that speech Young goes over the tale of Cain and Abel and reiterates his view that Cain’s posterity isn’t supposed to have the priesthood until Abel has posterity who can have it, at which time “Then Cain's seed will be had in rememberance, and the time come when that curse should be wiped off.” A little further on Young states regarding the “curse”: “who can help it, men cannot. the angels cannot, and all the powers of earth and hell cannot take it off, but thus saith the Eternal I am, what I am, I take it off at my pleasure, and not one partical of power can that posterity of Cain have, until the time comes the says he will have it taken away. That time will come when they will have the privilege of all we have the privelege of and more.”

The first link isn’t playing nice with my iPhone; but in the second—the money quote is in the sixth paragraph: “. . . they cannot wash away God’s mark; yet, the Canaanite [i.e. descendant of Cain, as Young considered blacks to be] may believe the Gospel, repent, and be baptized, and receive the spirit of the Lord, and if he continue faithful, until Abel’s race is satisfied with his blessings, then may the race of Cain receive a fullness of the priesthood, and become satisfied with blessings, and the two become as one again, when Cain has paid the uttermost farthing”. Young did anticipate blacks eventually receiving the priesthood; he just thought it couldn’t happen until Abel had been resurrected and had seed who could bear the priesthood. In other words, Young thought it could only happen in the Millennium.

I'm Asian. We don't take it easy on our young'uns. Ain't got no time for that. They're old enough to do lots of damage.