Jamie123

What I said about space-time wasn't supposed to be anything to do with the missionaries - I was just musing in response to what Sunday said about origins, and the relationship between ultimate origins and ultimate destinations: whether our existence necessarily needs to have a start and a finish. This is not my area at all, but this my idea of spacetime built up from reading many popular science books and magazines over the years. The x-axis represents space as we know it (though reduced to 1 dimension - though it could have any number) and the y-axis is an additional "space" dimension representing the flow of time. Objects in this frame of reference move up the y-axis at a speed c (the speed of light). Now of an object moves along the x-axis at velocity v then it must move more slowly up the y-axis, otherwise its resultant speed would be greater than the speed of light, and thus time would be different for a person riding on that object. (From that person's point of view of course the axes would be tilted so that he is stationary and we are moving.) I dashed off a quick diagram to demonstrate: I was just speculating as there are at least three dimensions in space, and possibly many more, some of these perhaps serve as multiple time dimensions too (as the y-axis is merely another dimension of space) and thus just as different trajectories in space are possible, why not different trajectories in time also? I'm not suggesting that this is really what relativity shows. My grasp of relativity is rather flaky anyway, and I am probably talking utter hogwash - I was just speculating. P.S. Just looking at this again something struck me - if the traveler were moving to our right almost (but not quite) the speed of light, then for all practical purposes his y-axis would become our x-axis and vice versa. Therefore he would experience as space what we experience as time and vice versa.... Interesting.

Well North Korea is a necrocracy - why not the US?

I remember reading that book back in the 1990s when I was a semi-regular LDS attender. I think it was intended as a leader's manual, but our particular ward was giving out copies to everyone. I kept it for a few years, until I started dating a rather conservatively Christian girl (not my current wife) who said the sight of it on my bookshelf - along with (horror of horrors) the Book of Mormon, Bahagavad Gita, I Ching and a Jehovah's Witness Bible commentary - made her cringe. So I returned it. It's quite interesting to see it again - thanks

I agree with you - I thought it was probably better to approach former missionaries rather than serving ones.

Would I be correct in thinking the LDS position is that "something" always existed, and that we were all included in that "something" - though in a much earlier stage of our development? Many Christians take it for granted that we came into existence at birth (or possibly at conception), but insist that we go on existing for all eternity thereafter. But if if our existence doesn't have an end-point, why should it need to have a start point? And If we do have a start-point, why should we not also have an end-point? I think a lot of us "need" the concept of soul-survival because we cannot imagine not existing. But if time and space are the same (as the theory of relativity requires), what's the difference between saying "I won't exist in the year 3,000" and "I don't currently exist in Tokyo or New York"? And another thing: why should time even be a single straight line? There are multiple directions in space - and time is just another manifestation of space - why should there not be multiple timelines? Perhaps at death we sort-of "turn a corner", and indeed do cease to exist in the timeline we previously followed. Ditto at birth.

A few years ago I took a course on The Enlightenment, for which I had to read David Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion. I was very impressed with this - I love the three-way interaction between Demea, Philo, and Cleanthes - how often two of them, however different, seem to be in alignment against the third. By comparison Plato's dialogues seem quite flat - with everyone just being a foil to Socrates' wisdom. Anyway, for a few years now I've been thinking of writing a book of my own along similar lines to Hume. Unlike Hume I will have many characters, though there will be three central protagonists who bear some comparison to Demea, Philo, and Cleanthes. All three of them are doctoral students who work in a physics or engineering lab, and who meet together for coffee and talk about their thoughts and ideas - especially about religion and the meaning of life. They are: David - a fundamentalist Christian, Biblical creationist and Thatcherite conservative. He roughly corresponds to Demea. Peter - a lapsed Catholic and atheist. Rather left-wing and anti-monarchistic. He corresponds roughly to Philo. James - a lapsed Anglican and agnostic. He corresponds very, very loosely to Cleanthes, but is more a depiction of myself as I was in the early 1990s. A lot of the debate will be about free will and agency and the nature of good and evil, and the relationship between science and religion. But at one point Peter and James (who are roommates) take the LDS missionary discussions. David refuses to attend these meetings (saying that the Mormons are "heretics"), but Peter and James nevertheless debate Mormon ideas with him - particularly on the nature of grace. The point is, I want to be as fair as possible in my depiction of the LDS missionaries, and not have them say or do things that real missionaries wouldn't. I know a lot of returned missionaries post here: It would be great if (assuming I get around to doing this) some of you guys could read over what I write and give me some feedback? I should stress that this is not going to be an anti-Mormon book. Although neither Peter nor James actually join the LDS Church (or at least not within the scope of the book), they go some way to defending Mormonism against David's criticisms.

As I understand it, Roman Catholics consider marriage one of the Seven Sacraments: Baptism Confirmation Communion (what the LDS call "sacrament") Holy Orders (priesthood) Marriage Unction (anointing) Reconciliation (confession/absolution/penance) To Anglicans it's debatable: High Anglicans (Anglo-Catholics) will say yes it is, but not one "generally necessary to salvation". Low Anglicans (Evangelicals) would say no: the only two sacraments are baptism and communion. Most other protestants would I believe say no.

I'm not LDS, so you may want to take anything I say with a pinch of salt, but this is my experience has told me. Firstly pornography and masturbation go hand in hand. (They're not called "w**k mags" for nothing!) Looking at porn will lead towards masturbation. It may not lead to masturbation straight away - you may be able to resist the urge (for a while) but the drive will be there, and sooner or later you you will probably yield to it. So you can find yourself in one of three categories: You can keep away from porn and masturbation entirely and for life. You can indulge - then have an "awakening conscience" moment, destroy your stash and delete your online accounts. You think you've beaten it. But then comes Temptation. Temptation is, as Ignatius of Loyola once said (**political incorrectness alert**) "like a nagging wife" - it gets inside you and niggles at you and never gives you a moment's peace. Eventually you decide - in a weak moment - to have a "day trip back to the pigs" (a lovely expression coined by Adrian Plass). "Just a quick never-to-be-repeated peek," you think. "No harm will come of it! I can always repent!" But the trouble with "a day trip back to the pigs" is that it turns quickly into a weekend break, then a week's vacation and finally a two-month sabbatical. Then (hopefully) comes the "awakening conscience" again, and the cycle repeats. You can indulge wholeheartedly and to hell with the consequences. Now the problem with this is that sooner or later you will lose interest in "ordinary" porn and will crave something more extreme and more shocking. You will sink deeper and deeper, seeking ever more perverse material. Even real sex with your partner will lose its savour. (There is a scatological British comic called Viz, which used to feature a strip called "Morris Day the Sexual Pervert"; the protagonist was always pushing aside his very attractive wife in order to indulge in his own bizarre perversions alone. It was intended as ridiculous humour, but it had more than a grain of truth in it.) Eventually nothing will satisfy you at all - you'll be like the man with the lizard on his shoulder in C.S. Lewis' "The Great Divorce" (if you don't know the book, read it!) - not even lustful but desperately craving lust - and at the same time hating every moment of it. Now I'm not saying that getting yourself into Category 3 will necessarily turn you into a violent child-raping monster. (There is a world of difference between indulging in violent sexual fantasy and acting it out for real, and I fear that criminalizing the viewing of extreme porn, as has happened in the UK, punishes the families - who often are the real victims - as much as the porn-viewers themselves. But that's not relevant to what I'm saying here.) I suspect there are many people in this situation who seem to all outward appearance quite normal, but who are inside treading the borders of hell; both longing for salvation and hating the thought of it. The trick is to get out of Category 2 and into Category 1, before the cycle descends into Category 3. One approach (and this ought to be the simplest thing in the world, but for some reason isn't) is to immerse yourself in scripture. Read it every day - several times a day. Don't content yourself with those little books that reproduce carefully chosen passages of non-challenging scripture, together with bland "explanations" of what they (supposedly) "mean". Read the entire Bible cover to cover - OT and NT concurrently - and at the same time (maybe a half hour set aside in the mornings) concentrate on particular books, especially the four Gospels. Try to read it prayerfully. Read it even (especially!) when you don't feel like reading it. Even if you don't understand the point of what you're reading - and you're certainly not alone there - some parts of the Bible are very strange! Scripture is anathemic to pornography - if you have both in your life they'll fight like cats till one is gone. (This includes erotic scripture like Song of Songs - that's the "real thing", of which pornography is a twisted counterfeit.) And pray too - again even when it seems pointless, and you feel no one is listening, keep at it. It may sound trite, but "Satan trembles when he sees the weakest Christian on his knees". Another thing: close all your porn accounts online. If the sites don't have a "close account" feature, then write an unmemorizably complicated sequence of characters on a piece pf paper, change your password to that, then tear up the paper. If you have an e-mail account to recover your password, go through the same procedure with that too. Now if the fit takes you, you will need to create a new account, and a new e-mail, which these days requires a complicated procedure involving your cellphone. So if later on you decide a "pig-day-trip" is in order, you will be faced with a complicated rigmarole of procedures, at some point during which you will hopefully (and by God's grace) see reason. Yet another thing: take Communion (Sacrament, Eucharist, Mass, Lord's Table...whatever you call it in your denomination.) Don't shy away from it because you feel "unworthy". I have made that mistake many times, and for far stupider reasons than either masturbation or pornography. If you know you are a sinner, know you need God's forgiveness, desire God's forgiveness, are willing to follow Him - though you might doubt your resolve to go through with it - then as far as that goes you are worthy. That's what it's there for - so that your sinful body may become purified through Christ's body. As for "telling other people", I have at times in the past confessed masturbation to my priest at confession, but I've always been a half-hearted Anglo-Catholic; deep down I'm a protestant, and I believe we all have a "direct line" to God. (The "Priesthood of All Believers" and all that.) But communion with other members of the Church help us to know we are not alone in our struggles. (BTW I'm talking here about the "Universal Church" here - not any denomination - but I'm straying into an area where most LDS would probably disagree with other Christians - so I'll say no more.)

Thanks a lot Maureen. That's not the song I'm thinking of, but I do love Joni Mitchell

Thanks very much Seashore - I appreciate it. This is most perplexing - I recall the song being played on the radio nearly all the time, and now it seems to have disappeared without a trace. (Or maybe I only heard it once or twice and it caught my imagination - its very strange.)

Hmmm....good thinking, but I fear this was much later than the song I'm thinking of. I can definitely remember pondering the lyrics during recess in infant school which (I'm showing my age here) places it around 1972. I was wondering what it would be like if things were "the other way round": if hot was cold and up was down - if fleas were enormous and elephants were tiny. If you were standing on the ground above you, looking down into the sky. If you were to drive a car to a land where things were "the other way round" would the road have to turn upside down? Etc. etc. It may even have been 1971, as (now I think about it) it was before they started building the new wing of the school; in those days there was a climbing frame with the sports field behind it, which they dug up some time in '72 to build new classrooms. Thanks anyway

Can anyone remember a pop song from around 1972 that had the following chorus: The lyric might possibly have been "another way round". The "round and round" bit was sung in a monotone. I've trawled the Internet and followed many false leads. It definitely wasn't any of the following: "The Other Way Round" by Gabin "The Other Way Around" by The Heathens "The Other Way Round" by Michael Holm "It's Just the Other Way Around" by Marie Osmond Can anyone put me out of my misery?

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She goes by a double-barreled name of her husband's name and McConkie. My wife also took my surname when we got married, which meant the length of her signature more than doubled!

Quite right! A colleague of mine did slip on a banana skin a few months back and injured her tailbone, but I've never done it myself. I met Rebecca McConkie a couple of years ago at the LDS temple at Newchapel. She and her husband were joint directors of the visitor center. I had quite a long chat with them - they are a really lovely couple.

Actually no - I did did once step on a rake, but it struck me on my left cheek (quite a blow too!) rather than my nose.

My best guess would be 3. I'm guessing that either (i) you had a parachute or (ii) the plane was on the ground. (Old joke: "Oh, look at the people down there! They look just like ants!" "Those are ants, stupid! We're still on the ground!")

There are actually very few verbal utterances I'd not tolerate in my own house. It pretty much comes down to two things: (i) If you must swear like a sailor I'd rather you did it in while my 12-year-old daughter isn't in earshot. (ii) No snarky comments to my wife, particularly on the subject of housekeeping. Having said that though, I must have peed on a few carpets myself over the years. For example a few years back we used to go occasionally to our local Evangelical Church to make a change from our usual Anglicanism. On one occasion they were having an exhibition called "The Christmas Journey" where visitors walk between different displays and tableaux, each with a different message, leading up to the great "Miracle of Christmas". The first of these displays dealt with "The Creation" in which a lady told us in a cheery voice how "Christians believe that the world was created in six days". I wanted to tell her "I don't" but she probably doesn't consider me to be a Proper ChristianTM so that would have been pretty pointless. I nevertheless couldn't resist coughing in a way to sound like "Darwin" - which I'm pretty sure she noticed but ignored me. When I got back to my wife at the coffee area - she hadn't yet seen the display - I told her: "When you get in there don't say anything about Charles Darwin! I mentioned him once but I think I got away with it!" She told me crossly not to get us thrown out.

#1 I have actually slipped on a banana skin #2 I have actually stepped on a rake and had the handle hit me on the nose #3 I have met and talked with the daughter of Bruce R. McConkie

What about innuendos and naughty double-entendres - do they count as carpet-peeing?

Than you very much Vort - that's very nice of you to say I always enjoy your posts too! Thank you.

I was looking for information on Solomon's temple and came upon this documentary: So the "real" start of the end-times will begin with the rebuilding of the Jewish Temple? (43:10) It puts me in mind of the "Left Behind" books. Not that I think those are anything but trashy pulp-fiction cashing in on end-times hysteria. (If only I could have back some of the many hours I wasted reading that garbage.) But it makes you think...

I remember how surprised I was 23 years ago (!!!) to see fart humour in the scene from "The Lion King" where Pumba explains why he is an outcast. (We don't find out why Timon is an outcast until the 3rd movie - which I thought started well but was otherwise dreadful.) I found that bit hilarious because (i) I was (and still am) very immature, and (ii) the unexpected shock-value of seeing flatulance humour in a Disney movie. Vort's quite right though - its nothing out of the ordinary anymore. Hakuna Matata!

According to this website, Herod's temple did have a "sea". http://www.bible-history.com/jewishtemple/JEWISH_TEMPLEThe_Court_of_the_Priests.htm

Oh Danny Boy, oh Danny Boy, oh boy, oh boy...