Just_A_Guy

Senior Moderator
  • Posts

    15560
  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    260

Posts posted by Just_A_Guy

  1. On 7/15/2023 at 12:29 PM, Carborendum said:

    For the past several years, I've wondered how to shut those things off.  I never know anything about these people anyway.  They're in a far part of the state where I wouldn't know a tree from a cactus.

    But this morning all of our phones woke us up this morning due to an amber alert.  I got up and looked at it.  I sat and wondered... even if it is no one that I'm familiar with, would there be anything I could do about it?  I knelt and prayed.

    Many of them, in my experience, wind up being the result of children who were taken by a parent who wasn’t supposed to have them—either a parent with joint custody who failed to return a child to an ex-spouse at the appointed time, or a child in DCFS custody whose parent somehow managed to finagle the child into their care and then took off with the child.

    For professional reasons, I’m glad the Amber Alert tools are available.  But as a citizen/former layperson . . . I dunno.  I grew up sort of envisioning Amber Alerts as being intended to retrieve children who were kidnapped for the express purpose of maiming, violating, and/or killing them and where such harm was imminent if the child were not recovered immediately.  I’m not sure how I feel about the system being used for less-immediate threats—especially when the core issue is basically a custody spitting match between divorced parents.  

  2. On 7/11/2023 at 12:35 AM, SteelerFan said:

    [1] Do any of the women that have commented if favour of the first wife have any actual personal experience with their husband being sealed to two or more women at the same time? [2]And for the men, would you be ok with your wife being sealed to another man while still being sealed to you? It seems as if the second wife has been demonised as someone who needs repentance, humility, understanding, is selfish, etc., all the while, the first wife is laughing her guts out all innocent and in her element. Please answer the question with a yes or no. Please. Conjecture absolutely not necessary for these particular questions. Thank you.

    1.  I’m not a woman (obviously!), but I would respectfully push back against the ideas  that a) a universal policy is inherently wrong just because it hits a particular subset of people in a particularly visceral way, or b) that people who are not directly effected by a policy are unable to weigh in on the objective pros, cons, real-world effects, and theoretical rationales behind said policy.

    2.  I’d be fine knowing my wife were still administratively sealed to a prior spouse, if I were confident that from both an emotional and theological standpoint, the bond between my wife and her ex was well and truly “over”.  

  3. 11 hours ago, Carborendum said:

    I found the improper grammar in the lawyer's threat-letter to be amusing. 

    I wonder how often some spelling/grammar error occurs in legal documents.  I imagine it's not very often.

    At the trial court level, it’s fairly common (at least by government attorneys and solo practitioners).  Appellate filings, and filings from big firms generally, are edited much more closely.  

  4. 4 hours ago, Carborendum said:

    The reason for such discrepancy is not only the estimation of how many are not reported.  It also is difficult to determine where to draw the line.

    EXAMPLE:

    Is "forced marriage" considered "trafficking"?  Many nations traditionally still adhere to arranged marriages and that would include girls that would be considered a minor in most countries.  But is that "trafficking"?

    So, yes, the numbers vary.  Estimates, definitions, method of gathering the statistics.  I tend to believe all the numbers we hear from large organizations are pretty accurate... based on the methodology they're using.

    I wonder, really, do we want to know the real number?  What if it were overwhelmingly large?

    Right now we're looking at the worldwide annual number of children alone could be as high as 1% of the US population.  That's roughly 3% of the US children population.  That's crazy.

    And what is sadder is who pays for this stuff.  We have among the lowest number of people/places that cater to pedophiles.  But we have the highest worldwide pedophiles that travel to these distant countries to abuse these kids.

    I've tried not to weigh in too much on this, because I have mixed feelings about Ballard specifically and about the way awareness of human trafficking is being raised more generally.  But I will at least say this . . . 

    From what I understand, at least within the United States, the sorts of scenarios we envision with The Sound of Freedom and Ballard's work generally, are statistically a relatively small proportion of the total "human trafficking" that occurs here.  By and large, human trafficking victims aren't abducted by sinister men driving nondescript windowless vans; they aren't kept chained up in squalid motel rooms or storage sheds with half a dozen other victims; they aren't even necessarily homeless or runaways.  The far more common scenario is for children to be trafficked by their own parents--most frequently by a single mom trading access to her daughter to a dealer in exchange for drugs; or to a landlord in exchange for a month of free rent; or to a boyfriend and/or his friends in exchange for what passes (in the mother's tortured, addled mind) for affection or emotional support.  In a large proportion (probably a majority, as I understand it) of human trafficking cases, bringing the children home is darned near the worst thing you can do.  

    I wish well for Ballard, his organization, and his movie.  It's desperately important that we have a cultural renaissance regarding the importance of childhood innocence.  There are theories being bandied about, and becoming increasingly mainstream, that tend to justify the exploitation of children and erode the institutions that have traditionally stood between children and the adults who wish to sexualize them.  Those theories need to be exposed for what they are, and Ballard is one of the leaders of the charge on that issue--which I think is why he generates a lot of the pushback that he gets (though certainly not all--he does strike me as a bit of a poser; and I have methodological issues with some of the historical theories he has published).  I do worry, though, that he sort of sucks all the air out of the room in any discussions regarding the allocation of anti-trafficking resources.  Even if Ballard were 100% successful and effective against the specific subsets of trafficking he targets--we would still have a major child trafficking problem in this country.  

  5. This discussion reminds me that nine years ago, I wrote this:

    [quote]Let's be blunt:  One in three Americans (not American adults, but Americans) currently has an STD.  Due to overuse of antibiotics, we're losing our ability to control/manage the symptoms of a couple of the biggies (Gonorrhea, for example).  Combine that with the fact that we have a culture--and even, arguably, a political party--that takes it for granted that people have a right to consequence-free sex.

    What do you do when you want (and have been told you have a natural right to) disease-free sex, but all your prospective partners have diseases that can't be medically controlled?  Simple--you find the people who aren't having sex right now and are relatively disease-free, and try to get them onto the sexual market.  It may take a while to attain legal droit de signeur over adult abstainers/monogamists (I'm being a bit facetious here) (I think); but opening up the teenaged market can be done--is being done--with relative ease.

    Few of the movers and shakers in our society will realize that that's what the end game is--and even fewer will admit it--but watch and see.  That will be the net effect of the legal, scientific, and social "advancements" over the next few decades.  You'll see it with the publication of medical studies showing that sexual intercourse by children is a part of healthy physical development.  You'll see it with a general social and legal softening of social standards regarding sexual relationships between adults and minors (have you noticed the recent prevalence of news stories involving affairs between young and improbably beautiful female teachers and sixteen- or seventeen-year-old male students?).  You'll see it with a marginalization of individuals and institutions that continue to publicly encourage abstinence.  And--yes--you'll see it with a deliberate attempt to limit or undermine conservative parents' abilities to influence their children's sexual mores. [/Quote]

  6. 13 hours ago, Godless said:

    I haven't seen the movie and don't intend to, but I know that a lot of the controversy around it has to do with Jim Caviezel's ties to Qanon, a group notorious for spreading lies, conspiracy theories, and misinformation about human sex trafficking. Child sex trafficking is a very serious issue. No one is denying that. But some people (like myself) would prefer not to support anything that might serve to legitimize Qanon rubbish.

    If we didn’t watch movies because we disapproved of the ideologies of some of the principal actors, directors, or producers, we’d never watch anything.

    I note that a number of Harvey Weinstein films are still enjoying some degree of popularity . . .

  7. 10 hours ago, SteelerFan said:

    2. IF the ex wife IS using the sealing as a control mechanism over the couple, then this is simply wrong and twisted. Rewarded for her bad behaviour.

    3. What of the free agency of the man? He desires not to stay sealed to a woman who asked for the divorce in the first place, but is forced to stay 'on the books' so to speak with her anyway? I think the first wife is at a minimum being controlling and selfish. If she is doing this for manipulative purposes, very prideful as well. Why should she be 'rewarded' for this type of behaviour?

    4. I agree with his statement that he wouldn't be sealed to a woman who is still sealed to another man. So why should she be told to forgo her feelings, be humble and do something most men would not agree to do? All the while the initiator of the divorce is rewarded for possibly playing a very manipulative game with the new couple. Why should the new couple have to be dealing with the situation anyway? The first wife initiated and wanted the divorce in the first place. 

    5. Why not grant the cancellation and let the new couple start with a fresh clean slate as the ex wife doesn't want to be married to the man anyway?

    Welcome aboard!  A few thoughts:

    2.  Wife #1 is only able to control Husband and Wife #2 because Wife #2 is willing to be controlled. 

    3-5:  Two thoughts here that tie into all of these:

    a) The sealing covenant establishes/ enhances three specialized relationships, not just one.  There is the relationship between husband and wife; but there is also the relationship between the husband  and God; and the relationship between the wife and God.  While the vicissitudes of human relationships may cause the husband-wife bond to decay or evaporate over time (both in terms of the shared emotional attachment, and the sealing ratification of the Holy Spirit of Promise), the relationships between each covenant-keeping party and God Himself can remain intact and the covenant-keeping party has the assurance that, at an appropriate time, they can receive all the temporal and eternal blessings of the New and Everlasting Covenant of Marriage with a worthy partner.

    The Church’s policies decree that generally speaking, while a divorced man can get a “clearance” to move on and be sealed to a new wife, he simply does not get to unilaterally shut his ex-wife out of that covenant with her Heavenly Father by going to the First Presidency and accusing her of covenant-breaking in order to subject her to a full “cancellation”.  (Women, by contrast, generally *do* get to do this to their ex-husbands if or when they wish to be sealed again; probably a vestige of plural marriage and a recognition that eternal polyandry is not a thing in our doctrine.)

    b)  Why do women get a privilege that men don’t?  I surmise that the following considerations play a role:

    —Men hold priesthood.  Where much is given, much is expected.

    —Due to western economic and social norms, single men are i) typically expected to take the lead in courtship and ii) often, and unlike women, are considered *more* desirable marriage partners as they enter midlife and become more established in their careers and general living situation.

    —LDS prophets and apostles from at least Brigham Young onwards have recognized the terrible risk a young woman takes when she hitches her fortunes to a young man who is, at that stage of his life, something of an unknown quantity.  From Turner’s biography of Brigham Young, p 242:  “[Young informed a man requesting a divorce] ‘that when a man married a wife he took her for better or for worse, and had no right to ill use her, and if she [pooped] in bed and laid in it until noon, he must bare it.’ . . . Similarly, Young told another man that ‘if you have drawn a red hot iron between your legs and scorched yourself bear it without grunting.’”

    Under the circumstances, we elders (and the women foolish enough to love us) should probably just be grateful that the Church permits men to divorce and remarry at all. 

  8. A worker at a local temple claims that President Nelson had said something to the effect of “they’re not really dead”—I think trying to emphasize that they are still conscious and that they and the living share common interests.

    I did baptisms and confirmations last Saturday morning.  I caught myself a few times, but the confirmation recorder told me that they had been told that either way is acceptable.

  9. One other possibility, with the caveat that I haven’t read the new opinion and it’s been 15 years since I read the old affirmative action cases:  

    The old precedents allowed for affirmative action in the name of diversity, but not for the sake of righting past discrimination.  Rather, the schools were arguing that they needed affirmative action to build an intellectually diverse class of students, in order to provide a more meaningful educational experience by fostering cross-cultural or cross-racial interactions for all of their students.  SCOTUS basically said “fine, if you can make a straight-faced argument that this serves an honest-to-gosh educational purpose, we aren’t going to tell you how you can or can’t provide your students with the kind of educational experience you, the university, think they need.”

    It *might* be that Roberts is thinking “okay, educational/racial diversity might be important to turn out humanities scholars and I’ll defer to private/state-run entities to weigh that principal on their own, but the object of the federal military service academies is to win wars and we reserve the right to look at the academy’s educational methods to see if ‘diversity’ actually serves that purpose.”

  10. 14 hours ago, Godless said:

    Personally, I'd love to see Indy outside of his original mortal timeline. Unless there's something in the canon that I'm missing, isn't he basically immortal after drinking from the holy grail? Forget aliens. I want to see Indy try to foil modern technology and weaponry. I want to see him punch a neo-Nazi in the face at a Starbucks. There's so much entertainment potential being wasted here.

    I figured that for the immortality to work, you had to stay in the cave.

    For me, one “Indy got old” movie was a novelty—Crystal Skull could have been done better, but IMHO it wasn’t terrible.  Two “Indy got old” movies just feels like a worn-out gimmick.  

  11. 1 hour ago, MichaelAnthony said:

    I am not exactly certain why I am writing this but I do have a story that I feel compelled to share. I was born in NYC but at a young age my family  moved to Utah. I spent ages 13-30 in Utah, primarily Provo. I did all the things, I joined the army at 17, went on a mission later and then graduated from BYU. I got married and sealed in the Temple, served EQ secretary, taught on Sundays. I had a very quintessential Mormon life. At around 29 however things got wonky. My wife had an extramarital affair with another woman. At that moment I felt like a "sucker" and decided I'd seek out my own adventure. In what might seem like a manic episode I left the church formally, divorced and at 30 moved to NYC to pursue my dream of drama school. I church hoped for a bit but then ditched that for pleasures of the flesh. It was a great time, I indulged in alcohol for the first time in my life, was in constant excitement and best part is I met a woman who also shared my hedonistic desires. We get married then COVID happens. She gets introspective one day and decides to revert back to the church she was raised in. I have never seen a 180 like this in anyone. The church is evangelical in nature and very contentious critical and in my opinion uses a lot of shame and guilt. 

    The cautionary part of this story boils down to when you leave the bounds of the church for the world there is no guarantee where you will end up. I married again for superficial purposes and ended up in fairly weak marriage in a church environment I didn't truly choose because the waves of life and even Satan will take you in any direction if you don't already have one.  Is the church true? Maybe I am a relativist but the joy I felt in the church, the priesthood power experienced and the immense love of Christ feels real to me. I am no longer a member of the church as I withdrew my records in 2019. The saddest part is that the priesthood lineage I got as a young man, my callings, temple endowment are all gone. Due to lawsuits that had taken place in the 2000's when you request your name withdrawn from the church you can not have records restored. The only way back would be rebaptism as essentially a new member. Feels sad like I cut off my "Mormon lineage". I still love the church and miss it dearly now. 

    Thank you to anyone who is reading this as I realize it's quite long.

    Whether as a “new member” or a “restored member” . . . come on back.  It’s not easy (as you well know); but it’s even better than you remember it.  🙂

  12. 18 hours ago, Carborendum said:

    https://trackbill.com/bill/california-senate-bill-729-health-care-coverage-treatment-for-infertility-and-fertility-services/2373757/

    The language of the bill simply states that insurance companies are required to cover surrogacy and in-vitro fertilization as fertility treatments for gay couples.  Because of the language regarding surrogacy, this has a disturbing implication.  A woman who "offers services" as a surrogate will now be required to offer those services indiscriminately.

    IOW, this has the potential for surrogate mothers to be forced into renting out their wombs.  And the left thinks that Christians are closer to Gilead than LGBT?

    I was really hard to find statistics on surrogacy.  They list a whole bunch of numbers that can't be used for meaningful calculation.  I could not find out how many surrogates are commercial (someone who decides to do this professionally, gets paid) vs. personal (i.e. a friend or family member who was willing to help out.)

    One thing is for certain, when insurance is forced into covering something, either the costs go way up, or people have to be forced into doing something against their will.

    This is interesting. When California legalizes prostitution, will it also require prostitutes to offer their services to clients irrespective of gender?

  13. 23 hours ago, Godless said:

    The way I see it, LGBTQ norms are evolving.
     

    . . . . 

    MAPs are not an accepted part of the greater LGBTQ community, and they never will be.  [Emphasis added]

    On what basis do you reconcile these two statements?

    When every other previously-universal “moral” value is up for negotiation, why not that one?

    I don’t want to fall into the trap/cliché of arguing that anyone who advocates for LGBTQ rights is a closet pedophile (although recent-ish events in Virginia do lend themselves to the concern that a significant and powerful minority of LGBTQ advocates may indeed believe that self-proclaimed transgender youth should be granted droit du signeur over cisgender minor girls).  But, I do think it’s fair to ask:  having thoroughly eviscerated the framework on which the former set of sexual norms were based, what new framework are LGBTQ advocates proposing we follow?  And if they aren’t proposing a new framework, then why shouldn’t the pedophiles get their way?  

  14. 21 hours ago, Carborendum said:

    Our ward has eight families with five or more children (some of them are adults who live elsewhere.)  And one family from our neighboring ward had 12 children. They moved out recently.  And every single one of these families were fairly wealthy.  Why is this an exception to the rule?

    Child labor?  

     

    ;)

  15. 54 minutes ago, JohnsonJones said:

    Europe is in a situation that the United States and Canada are quickly approaching (But the US and Canada don't have as many areas to support the family as Europe at this point when they reach the point Europe is at).

    It is too expensive to live in Europe.  What I mean is housing, food, and other areas can be VERY expensive in many parts of Europe.  Young people look at that, see they can barely support themselves, and wonder how in the world they will support a family. 

    The United States is quickly following that path.  Housing costs have rapidly outpaced the rise in wages (even though the past few years wages have shot up, the cost of buying a house has gotten higher much more quickly.  My own house is worth around double to 2.5X what it was worth 4 years ago.  No one's wage goes up that quickly on average).  Food costs are rising rapidly. 

    Even before the current generation the US population was only being able to increase due to immigration.  More and more young people are looking at the costs of life after college (and I suppose those who choose to go directly to the workforce or choose another path are also faced with this) and realizing that they may never be able to even afford a home, much less afford a family.

    Our society has gotten too greedy and placed money and riches over that of making a society where families can flourish.  Houses should be a place to live...not an investment.  That entire...investment schemes that started in the 70s and 80s have poisoned the well (IMO).  

    Capitalism could keep such things in check...IF we had actual Capitalism at work here.  The problem is we placed money and riches over that of our economics and well-being.  We still have Capitalism in some places, but we also have a Lot of Corporatism and unrestrained Monopolistic economics instead.  They can be part of Capitalism, but normally are not seen as a HEALTHY Capitalistic society.  We need to promote the Capitalism that older generations promoted, and put boundaries on the Monopolies and Corporatism that seem to have become unrestrained over the past few decades. 

    I don't agree with Trump...at all...but he was right in one aspect if you look at it from a certain point of view.  As a Child and young man, I didn't feel the United States had such Corporate involvement in society and politics.  It was far more restrained.  Even as late as the 90s, Microsoft and other companies that wanted to be Monopolies were aggressively handled by the Federal Government to push them back.  Things Microsoft gets away with now (integrated everything in their OS, so powerful THEY dictate to the customer rather than having to change to be what the customer wants, etc) were seen as a collective evil, even a few decades ago.  We need a change back to a more healthy economic period for workers and employers when it was Capitalism where small businesses and individuals could flourish rather than having the Googles and Amazon's drive out other competition.  Competition is good.  I feel the 50s and 60s were a time when, economically, it was good for our families.  Capitalism actually worked well then.  We need a reset to go back then so that FAMILIES can actually afford a home.

    When I was a child and young man a single working father without a college degree (or even any degree) could provide a home, food, the decency of life, and other measures on their own salary.  Today, many of those graduating from college won't even be able to afford a place to live.  It's hard to talk about having a family when faced with the present day situation many of our kids are graduating into. 

    My time is limited to give much of a response, but I think there’s a broader malaise in much of the first world beyond the simple aggregation of wealth:  speaking generally, people seem to have given up on any hope of a significantly better future (both collectively and individually) and have decided to cash out whatever spiritual, moral, and (yes) material inheritances left for them by their ancestors are available for liquidation in the here-and-now.

  16. 1 hour ago, JohnsonJones said:

    I cannot say I know how an office works for Private Practice for a surgeon or for a doctor, but I know a tiny bit about how a Law Office might go and make parallels.

    In Private Practice, when you own your own business, couldn't you either pair with another doctor (or several doctors), hire a Physician's assistant, or hire a Nurse-Practitioner?   In the instance where you take a vacation (or...go to a conference for work or other work related item),  you would then have others that could fill the gaps while you are away, handle emergencies that pop up, and keep the office running while you are away.  You may or may not make money (Depending on how you run the office, or how you situate it to run), or you may have no loss of income in that situation. 

     

    But statistically, women use PTO (and sick days) far more than men do.  Which means that statistically, @mikbone only benefits from such an arrangement if the staff he hires are overwhelmingly male (because for any woman he hires, he’ll wind up covering for her much more often then she covers for him).  But of course, by law he’s not allowed to discriminate in that way.

    ”Equal pay for equal work” is an important concept.  But the asterisk to it is that in most fields, we’ve got to overcome a lot of culture—and a *huge* amount of evolutionary psychology and physiology—before we even get to truly “equal work”.  (I suspect that recent talk of the “emotional work” done by women, especially in the domestic sphere, is at least in part a reaction to the dawning realization that generally speaking there is in fact not an equality of material productivity between the sexes—at least, not as “productivity” has been traditionally understood.)

  17. 6 hours ago, Godless said:

    That's not quite how it works. I can't speak for other states (though my understanding is that we based our bill off of what they're doing), but our plan is paid out by the state and funded by a pool of fees collected from employers, who are allowed to recoup a portion of the fees from employee paychecks. The bill had quite a bit of support from both large and small businesses because research shows that this way of handling family medical leave is less costly to employers than paying for their employees' paid leave directly.

    Hmm . . .

    The program will operate similarly to unemployment insurance. It will be funded by a new 0.7% payroll tax on employers that will take effect in 2026. Employers can deduct half of their premiums from workers' wages. 

    So, half comes from the paying customers, and half comes from the employees themselves?

    Business groups fought to block the proposal, warning that it would impose heavy costs and regulatory burdens on employers and aggravate their staffing problems. But it was hailed by supporters who said it would bring equality and fairness to the workplace. . . .

    But John Reynolds, state director for the National Federation of Independent Business in Minnesota, called it a “deeply flawed proposal that will cost much more than expected and make it harder for small businesses to keep their doors open.”

    Doug Loon, president and CEO of the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce, said the program could become the largest mandate on employers in state history.

    “This massive policy will bring fundamental changes to every employer and employee in the state — from $1.5 billion or more in annual payroll taxes, unwarranted shifts in benefits, to state approved leave for employees," Loon said in a statement.

    Sounds like there wasn’t exactly a consensus of ringing endorsement from the business community.

    To clarify, I think PTO is great if the employer feels it’s do-able.  But it looks like fundamentally, to the extent that this program works out mathematically to be a “benefit” at all to the employees—the cost is indeed being borne by the consumers.

  18. On 6/9/2023 at 2:47 PM, Godless said:

    If you die tomorrow, your employer will replace you before you're in the ground. I definitely appreciate a good work ethic, I like to think that I have a good one, but no job is worth working yourself into the ground for no other reason than "work ethic". Work-life balance is important, and a combination of good pay and plentiful PTO can go along way to help achieve that.

    This is certainly important for an employer to keep in mind; although as a basis of policy one should probably also bear in mind that employers aren’t necessarily required to show a heck of a lot of altruism or loyalty to their bosses, either.

    On 6/9/2023 at 4:25 PM, Godless said:

    Another note on this topic: Minnesota recently passed a law mandating Paid Family Medical Leave, making it the 13th state to do so. 

    American politicians’ plan for a better life for the citizenry:

    1.  Require employers to pay people *not* to work.

    2.  Wonder why goods and services are suddenly getting so expensive.  

  19. On 6/1/2023 at 9:01 AM, Backroads said:

    I spent a bit of the morning pondering on the parent/career thing. I know this may wax controversial, but at least in my area and circles I've seen an uptick in more family-friendly work positions. Love or hate the idea of working from home, I honestly think it works great for some people and companies, and I think communities are responding to that with more child-trading and whatnot. 

    Which is all to say, you don't necessarily have to ditch your child at daycare for twelve hours.

    I think these are good trends (when done voluntarily by employers).  But I’m not sure it necessarily addresses the root causes.  Many European countries have been bending over backwards to accommodate working mothers for decades, but I understand their birthdates are still plummeting.

  20. If the LDS leadership feel that the commitment pattern is appropriate for missionary work (or was appropriate at some point in the past, even if it has now outlived its usefulness), then naturally I bow to their inspiration and authority.

    But in my professional life (which in part involves persuading people to make difficult and drastic lifestyle changes when they are predisposed to strongly dislike me), I never [consciously] use it.  I suppose I use what pattern proponents would say are elements of it—kindness, empathy, unflinching honesty and realism, trying to be nonjudgmental, listening and restating/reflecting back to ensure clarity, etc.  But I don’t generally go into negotiations thinking “how can I get this person to do x?”; my mindset is more like “what is this person willing to do, and is there a chance I’ve come into the case with any incorrect preconceptions, and can we leave this conversation feeling a little less adversarial than when the conversation began?”

  21. 1 hour ago, Godless said:

    Interestingly enough, there are people who feel this way about supervisors/coworkers who are very religious and like to broadcast it. Obviously, that's their prerogative, just as it's your prerogative to seek employment in an environment that you consider a safe space for conservative Christians.

    Maybe there are regional differences.  But my understanding is that in many areas of the country (including Utah, as I understand it), a supervisor broadcasting his religious beliefs would be understood as “creating a hostile work environment” and would be shut down in fairly short order—and could be subject to regulatory and civil liability if he didn’t.

    People who disagree with me bringing their “whole selves” to work, wouldn’t be nearly as much of a sore spot if the people who agree with me hadn’t already been warned on pain of firing, public shaming, and/or lawsuit to keep their mouths shut.

  22. I agree with @zil2.  The requirement for a legal adoption prior to performing the sealing ordinance is a modern Church administrative policy, but that doesn't nullify the ordinance itself. 

    But there's something more important at play here.  God only honors the sealing ordinance (or any other priesthood ordinance) if, in addition to the proper formalities being observed by the proper authority, the Holy Spirit of Promise gives its ratifying seal of approval (D&C 132:7); which is conditional upon the parties' worthiness and their ongoing living in harmony with the covenants that pertain to the ordinance.  

    Do you think the Holy Spirit ratified your sealing to your mother's husband?

    I don't know anyone in your family, but based on what you say here . . . I'd be inclined to answer "no".