Vort

You have not offended at all. Please forgive my suspicions. I did not read Vanhin's post introducing you as someone he invited here, which pretty much explains things.

Nonsense. I have never been tested for an STD in my life, nor do I see the necessity of ever being so tested.

This is demonstrably false. For example, one study (15 years old) found that 18% of homosexuals in SF are HIV-positive; heterosexual HIV-positive rates are a small fraction of that. Another, more recent, study found that homosexual men had a higher rate of infection with rectal gonorrhea than bisexual men. Why, exactly, would any Latter-day Saints be offended at fellow Saints pointing out the obvious -- that homosexual activity brings disease and destruction on those who practice it and on the societies that champion it?

Ah, I see. Thank you.

thekabalist, a few questions for you: Are you actually a kabbalist? If so, you will likely find precious little overlap between Mormonism and Jewish (or any other type of) mysticism. Are you actually a Jew? If so, I'm amazed that you have come onto an LDS list and provided a bunch of information that just happens to appeal to Latter-day Saints and seems to offer support for LDS doctrines. Are you actually a Latter-day Saint masquerading as a Jewish Kabbalist in order to try to point out areas of commonality between traditional Judaism or ancient Hebrew and LDS beliefs? If so, shame on you for practicing deception. Nothing good can come of such things. Please stop.In case you happen to be legit and are confused or taken aback by my last point, let me assure you that such things have happened before. I know (slightly) someone who, in a fictional online persona, pretended for several years to be a practicing Baptist minister who had gained a testimony of the Book of Mormon and used it to preach to his congregation. You may not think that someone who believed LDS doctrine to be literally gospel truth would stoop to lies and deception, but you would be wrong.

Another etymology: Abinadi = ben Adi, son of Adi (עֲדִי) (compare Arabic "ibn Adi"). Might also be ibn Nadi or ben Nadi.

We men have our strengths. They are real, and they are important. But we lean heavily on our wives for our emotional foundation; it seems to take most of us a long time, perhaps a lifetime or longer, to develop that emotional strength to stand alone. I don't bother being ashamed of it, since it's just a reality of life for many of us. (But shame on those women who would take advantage!)

Maybe I was being too picky. In fact, I agree with your last sentence.

Is prayer a form or worship, or is it not? Is Jesus God, or is he not? Did Jesus pray to the Father, or did he not? Given the obvious answers to the above questions (assuming you believe the Bible), how can you argue that God does not worship?

Joseph Smith translated an ancient record into modern English. He didn't use "G-d", "L-rd", or any other such term. He used "God", "Lord", "Jesus", "Savior", "Jehovah", and so forth. I, for one, seek to emulate the example of the Prophet of our dispensation, as well as those who have followed. To my knowledge, not a single one of them has followed this "delete-the-vowel" system.

No. There is no such tenet. Lots of things that sound reasonable are not "fair to assume". This is one of them.

Yes, I agree, it does sound Trinitarian. But please realize that Abinadi taught this in the Americas 150 years before Christ's birth, while the doctrine of the Trinity was developed and formalized in Europe three hundred years AFTER Christ's birth. So Abinadi didn't have any Trinitarian doctrine floating around that he had to combat. If we accept the name of Christ, we become his children, sons and daughters (e.g. Mosiah 5:7). It is through him that we are "born again" (e.g. Alma 7:13-14) -- that is, born unto eternal life, with Christ as our Father. This is much more than simply a word game. This is central to what the Atonement is. In accepting Christ's atonement, we become heirs to all he has -- what Paul calls "joint-heirs" in Romans, since Christ also inherits all that the Father hath (e.g. Matthew 28:18). So Jesus really does become "the Eternal Father" in a real and important sense. That doesn't mean he is identical with the Father, just that he can share that title in some sense.

mm, as HPGL, what did you do with the elders who had been asked or invited to attend your group?

I married someone who was among the most physically beautiful women I had ever known. It has been 23 years since we met, and I still look at her sleeping when I wake up in the morning and marvel at her beauty. Can't explain it. Can't justify it. Don't know what it means for all those golden-hearted women who, for whatever reason, are not considered attractive. But when things have looked darkest in my marriage and life has been Just Plain Hard, I would be lying if I said that my wife's physical beauty didn't act as a balm for anger and wounded feelings. Is this just Vort's callow immaturity shining through? Perhaps, but in any case, there you have it. (And btw, I never thought of myself as one who had an inordinate desire for physical beauty. Funny how things work out.)

Which is why I specifically mentioned that I was not singling you out. I didn't think you were saying that, so hopefully it didn't sound like I did think so. To extend your comparison: Your child may produce only childish scrawls, but he uses his hands, fingers, and eyes to coordinate his efforts. He tries to represent something meaningful to himself on paper. He is doing basically exactly the same thing that a great artist does, just not as well (yet). I have never quite understood why some people, LDS and otherwise, get all bent out of shape at the mere suggestion that sexual relationships of some sort might possibly apply to God. I believe it's unwise to dwell at length on such topics, or even to talk openly about them; but even so, I can find nothing offensive or evil in the basic idea. If our lives here are but a pale reflection of the Eternal Life of the Father, well, they are still a reflection. We may understand only in part; we may have only imperfect approximations here. But the ultimate reality still bears resemblance to our lives here and now. Surely, when we inherit all that the Father hath and see more fully our eternal lives, we will be as surprised and delighted with the familiarity of things as we will be with their strangeness. Sex is good. We say it, and we think we believe it, but somewhere in our brains, many of us still harbor ideas of the dark strangeness and "ickiness" of sex. At some point -- and sooner is better than later -- we should quit thinking as children, put off childish things, and recognize sex for the divine blessing it truly is. And when we have reached that point, I doubt any of us will be repulsed at the idea that our Father's life might follow a very similar pattern. Even if we don't believe the idea to be true, it won't hold any horror or disgust for us, as it obviously does now among many.

Did you realize you left the "i" out of your username?

Live long and prosper. And it's not just coincidence.

The New Testament makes it perfectly clear that Christ (God) worships the Father. Thus, God does indeed worship. To extend this idea to the Father and draw conclusions based on that extension is completely unwarranted. At that point, it's pure space doctrine. Better to leave such fringe ideas strictly alone and stick with the important revealed truths.

Been there, done that, have the Florentine bus ticket. Ouch. Quit it.

Why, thank you, Beefche.

Are you as mature as this woman?

Please explain how my comments could be seen as in any way "skeptical". Also, your example suggests that Elder Featherstone was given his calling as a GA as a sort of reward for passing the test placed before him by obeying his unrighteous bishop. Do you believe that the Lord uses Church and Priesthood positions to reward the faithful?

Old math joke. (Old, but very clever.) "oct "means octal and "dec" means decimal, so dec 25 just means plain old 25 -- that is, 2 tens and 5 ones. Counting in octal means base eight, so oct 31 means 3 eights and 1 one -- which is also 25. Thus, oct 31 = dec 25, proving that Halloween is really Christmas.

I generally stay away from the "God and sex" threads, since I see little good that ever comes from them. But I confess I have never understood why human sexuality is so often viewed contemptuously, as "a pitiful and lower form". At best, this is like claiming that human language is "just a pitiful and lower form" of the way God speaks. Perhaps this is true in a very literal sense, but I don't view the divine gift of language as a fallen, debased, ugly thing, even if many of its users make it so. (To be clear, I am not pointing fingers at anyone, least of all Ammonite. Rather, I am using her post as a springboard for discussion.) Are we not taught that the procreative power is of God, and that the exercise of that power is among the most sublime experiences available to us in mortality? Sure, I can see why the world thinks of sex as degraded. For them, it is. It's all fornication and self-pleasuring and pornographic movies. They refer to sex as "doing the nasty". They truly revel in the idea of perverting sex to a degraded thing. So of course they (that is, those of the world) will think of sex as nasty, ugly, and degraded. That's how they like it. But we are of the covenant. We have received divine guidance. We have, or should have, a clearer vision of the true nature of things. I can think of no excuse we could provide to justify thinking of sex as anything less than a wonderful, even miraculous, gift from God to his married children. Why would any Saint even suggest that the sexual union of a married couple was somehow pitiful or debased, or that sexual congress between a husband and wife was anything less than a taste of the celestial glory? My guess is that there would be a whole lot more joy and a whole lot less heartache among the Saints if they (including, perhaps especially, the sisters) would quit viewing sex through the worldly, evil lens of "doing the nasty" and start viewing it as God intended. (Disclosure: In this, I don't speak from personal experience. My wife does not share the attitude of sex as bestial perversion, thank heavens. But my conversations with and observations of the Saints suggest a much different reality for most members.)

Why not? A fornicator is actively sinning, just as much as a thief.