bytebear

I kind of figured "and it came to pass" was glyphed as ¶ (the pilcrow, or paragraph).

I find the idea that the Earth had a baptism of water to be a beautiful doctrine.

I've done LA to Logan, and hit as many temples as I could. LA, Newport Beach, San Diego, Redlands, Las Vegas, St George, etc.

As to the creeds being an abomination, my take is this. I believe the Lord warned against wolves entering in with the sheep, and as such, they began to deceive the church members and after time introduced ideas not in accordance with doctrine. The creeds themselves are abominable for two reasons. 1) they canonized doctrine without authority. No apostle nor prophet wrote them. and 2) they contain canonized concepts that are simply false (not all, but some). And so the Lord looks upon them as incorrect teachings, canonized without His authority.

Here is what our official Topical Guide lists as Bible verses to reference. https://www.lds.org/scriptures/tg/apostasy-of-the-early-christian-church?lang=eng&letter=A changed the ordinance, broken the everlasting covenant, Isa. 24:5. this people draw near me with their mouth, Isa. 29:13. darkness shall cover the earth, Isa. 60:2. a famine … of hearing the words of the Lord, Amos 8:11. his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, Matt. 13:25. saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many, Matt. 24:5. shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, Matt. 24:24. his disciples went back, and walked no more with him, John 6:66. shall grievous wolves enter in among you, Acts 20:29. there be divisions among you, 1 Cor. 11:18. I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him, Gal. 1:6. who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey, Gal. 3:1. shall not come, except there come a falling away first, 2 Thes. 2:3. some having swerved have turned aside, 1 Tim. 1:6. giving heed to seducing spirits, 1 Tim. 4:1. all they which are in Asia be turned away from me, 2 Tim. 1:15. Who concerning the truth have erred, 2 Tim. 2:18. Having a form of godliness, but denying the power, 2 Tim. 3:5. turn away their ears from the truth … unto fables, 2 Tim. 4:4. profess that they know God; but in works they deny him, Titus 1:16. From whence come wars and fightings among you, James 4:1. false prophets also among the people, 2 Pet. 2:1. being led away with the error of the wicked, 2 Pet. 3:17. now are there many antichrists, 1 Jn. 2:18. many false prophets are gone out into the world, 1 Jn. 4:1. certain men crept in … denying the only Lord God, Jude 1:4. which say they are apostles, and are not, Rev. 2:2. thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, Rev. 3:16. to make war with the saints, Rev. 13:7.

In computer science, the null is the undefined, the unknown value. 0 is a known quantity. Null means no quantity has been defined, or cannot be determined.

As one who has non-member family, I wish the church would do more social activities. They have gone to a few activities, like we had a big stake wide picnic with a live band, games and activities, for Pioneer Day, and it was great. But those are few and far between. Shy non-members need members to reach out more socially, and not just as a "project" but as good neighbors.

Your body is a temple. And it truly is. And we should respect it as such. I think if one of our temples were sold, or lost to another church, we would want the space and building to be treated with dignity and reverence. I see the same with any human body.

I think there is more to think about. The 8 witnesses were physical witnesses. They handed the plates but no angels, no visions. The 3 witnesses were spiritual witnesses with angelic visions. I believe that the Lord often has a spiritual (Melchizedek) aspect and a temporal (Aaronic) aspect. Also, three witnesses may also have been required in a similar way that Peter, James and John were special witnesses of Christ. Maybe it required 3. All speculation of course.

I have an issue when something like this is chalked up to race. When I was in my mid 20s, I was driving home in a massive rain storm. It was pitch black, and I suddenly saw an overturned car in front of me. I looked around and saw a gas station to my left, so I pulled in ,and then BAM, my back window shattered. Then a cop started yelling at me, and after pulling into the station, and talking to him, he told me to stay put. He went and talked to another cop, who came back with a traffic ticket. When I went to court, I was sitting with all the other traffic ticket people, and then I was called to another court. The DA decided to upgrade my traffic ticket to a felony. Took $3000, a lawyer and a plea to reduce it to a traffic ticket (again). Basically the cop was covering up his breaking my window (the broken window wasn't even in the original complaint, and the DA was unaware of it). I was pretty much railroaded to protect his career. If I were black, I would probably think it was racially motivated. So, when I hear people say these types of things are based on race, I remember my experience, and think, no, it's just people doing wrong things, and race probably doesn't factor in at all.

I think the "men on the moon" story was a joke that was take seriously only by anti-Mormons.

Corporate penny counters looked at the numbers, and decided that it would be better financially to broadcast this closure and make a very prominent statement. They are looking at their bottom line, nothing more. Never assume a company is just "being nice" because they aren't. They run the numbers through a series of scenarios and this one happened to rise to the top.

I take it the subject changed from garments?

The church had massive growth in Latin America, but poor retention, and even worse, poor leadership, so they specifically slowed down the conversion rate and focused on nurturing leadership instead. They have learned from that, and are being far more cautious in Africa and other booming areas, so they aren't booming like they have in the past. They need to create leaders as much as just converts.

I was going to suggest the Getty Center. Definitely a thing to do in LA. So much better than the standard tourist stuff. Also the Huntington Library and botanical gardens in Pasadena are spectacular.

A couple things to consider. The church has much more strict requirements to serve a mission. 30 years ago, when I was on my mission, there were missionaries who really shouldn't have been there, for emotional reasons, or because they had fairly sinful pasts. One missionary was an alcoholic and the mission president would check on him personally. Back then, the idea was if you were a wayward child a mission would straighten you up. That just isn't the case. So, yes, a lot more missionaries either don't go or return home early. That coupled with a casualness of sexuality, where kids are far more prone to get into trouble before age 19 (now 18). Probably another reason they lowered the age, honestly.

One of my best friends had OCD, really bad, and had a ton of quirks. He sadly passed away about 4 years ago. After dealing with him for so long, I can handle any one's quirks. So I feel like I am immune to such behaviors. It reminds me of how a social group I would hang out with, dinner parties, movie nights etc. It was large enough that people would come and go over the years. One guy showed up, and he was a bit socially awkward, and kind of odd, and of course, you wanted to avoid him. Well, I eventually got to know him and found out he has Asberger's syndrome, which explains the quirkiness, and he ended up being a great friend. So, my advice is this. Grin and bear it, and maybe get to know people you normally would avoid. Most people just want to be listened to, and to have a friend. So be a friend, even when it's uncomfortable. And you will learn to adapt to annoying people, and maybe make a friend or two in the process.

Well, McConkie has also been known to say things that weren't doctrinally sound.

Why do people live unhealthy lifestyles, even though they know what to do to be healthy?

We continue to have the same personality, and temperament in the next life. If you are resistant to repentance now, you will be in the next life, and so we will be free to chose but I think people who have chosen in this life will not be suddenly persuaded, just because they are spirits.

If you can't resist the temptation now, how can you trust each other for 50+ more years? Because there will be times when temptations come around.

I think most politicians also believe in the 2nd amendment, but they swing toward what ever position will get them more votes. Very few actually want to get rid of guns, honestly. But they sure will use it as a contention point if they think it will bring out voters for them.

Like so many things related to the great plan of God, there is a spiritual and a physical aspect (physical death/spiritual death, spiritual creation/physical creation). It makes perfect sense to me that there would be a spiritual atonement in the garden, and a physical one on the cross.

One thing I note is that the church didn't select these men because of their cultural and ethnicity, nor were they picked on the color of their skin or their ancestry. They were chosen by the Lord to fill a very real global need as the church expands into South America and Asia. They were the right people for the right job. Just read their resumes, and see what their strengths are, and it's pretty clear why they are where they are. And it has nothing to do with ethnic diversity within the hierarchy.

I think it's funny that every conference the news covers the "several hundred" sometimes even reported as a thousand protestors who march to Temple Square, and officially resign from the church. I swear, they must have resigned 10 or 20 times by now.