FutureCoastGuardsmen

I have a question, can you pray to both the Heavenly Father and the Heavenly Mother at the same time? Just a question.

Well, how exactly does it do that I'm just wondering?

The only thing I want government to do is enforce the federal law, balance the budget, and defend the country from work pro-actively against outside threats, and uphold the constitution. The only thing I want business to do is make a product, try to make a good dollar off of it, and use that to contribute to a functioning laissez faire free market. Nothing more, nothing less.

Why is that? Lol? It'll make me a great Admiral.

ENTJ. The Executive.

And if you recall, our same patriots, or "insurgents" took down an insurgency themselves after winning the war. See: Whiskey Rebellion.

That's the only problem I've ever had with it. I feel we should make a declaration of it. But anyways, when you say people talked about calling WWII a "War on Nazism" or possibly a "War on Fascism", is that not what they were? Also, we didn't actually declare war on an ideology. We declared it on an entity - the international terrorist network. People often forget these groups all work together in someway, and they all have their goals of killing people in name of an ideology. Most lower level members of these groups may not know it, but quite often, their leaders, no matter how out in the wilderness the region is, are getting money, weapons, or working with some other group. And that group gets financial support from a banker who is employed by another group. And that group gets military assistance from a terrorist state somewhere. And that terrorist state works uses its intelligence agency to gather knowledge of enemy activities and passes it on to group #1. It's all a ring you see, and we have declared war against that ring. We are fine with them having an ideology; we are not ok with them killing for it.

Winston Churchill once described American diplomacy as “a bull who carries his own china shop around with him.” This is a true statement, it's more accurate than anything I have ever read in my life. But honestly, why change the name? Is this not a war? I mean what if the "Big War" (WWII) was changed to "Happy Kisses and Hugs Tea Cup Party for Unicorns and Pixie Dust" by Roosevelt? I can't believe this happened.

The latter is what I fear most likely to happen. You see my mother was raised Catholic (as I stated before), and she told me that she converted because didn't like the Catholic ritual of confession. She told me it seemed like (and I'm not trying to knock on Catholics or anything) most Catholics she knew were very sinful, and that they really didn't care about it either. They would use confession as an excuse to sin essentially. This could have been because of the town she was living in, or because of the time era. It could have been any reason really, but I'm not trying to attack Catholics or anything. And the thing is now, I feel my mother is set in her ways. And I'm just her 16 year old son.... well I mean I love my mother of course. And she truly cares for me, and she has been through much for my sake and has fought many battles for me when I was littler. And I love her for that. But I don't want to ruin anything in our relationship or make her feel stressed by this (she has severe headache problems sometimes). Ha, well thank you, and yes I am 16. I'm just.... well I guess I'm just very well read and I have luckily the Lord has given me the gift of writing. Novels are one of my hobbies you know. Psychological and techno military and military history ones, those are my favorite. My top three favorites of fiction are Heart of Darkness by Conrad, Flight Of The Intruder by Coontz, and Gunbird Driver by Ballentine.

Hi there, my name is Maverick. I am 16 years old, and I'm a freshman currently. Let me tell you a little about my life, right now I'm a Sea Cadet who aspires to attend the Coast Guard Academy and become a helicopter pilot for the USCG. My family heritage is rooted in military service, my grandpa was a -52 mech in the AF, my father was a Forward Air Controller in the AF, and brother is currently serving as an ET in the Coast Guard. I consider myself a patriot in the classical sense, I believe in the constitution, and that America is a free and unique nation. I want to save lives when I grow up, stop those who would harm us, and protect the American people. My religious history is some what awkward for me to explain for some reason. You see, I am currently a non-denominational Christian. But I've been reading the Book of Mormon recently (at my own whim, no missionary came up to me). You see, my family is going through a lot of hard times right now, we've lost our beloved family pet, the economy is deepening into a dark place, and the world seems sure fire ready to blow itself up. My father and mother have constant health issues, and I'm starting to get stomach sickness due to nervousness from the whole ordeal. I really feel I'm not in touch with god, and in my current spiritual state, it wasn't getting any better. Then I met a vice principal at my old school, he was a Mormon, and he was also the most well liked and well received in the opinion of the students there of any school official I had ever seen. Very charismatic man, very understanding, helped you through your problems, always willing to listen and always managed to make everyone laugh. I thought at the time I met him, that he was an uncommon miracle in society, and he had actually made the school a little bit better each day he was there - something before thought to be impossible. Anyways, skipping ahead, when I started to feel bad about how everything was going in life, I sunk into a deep depression that I thought I could never come out of. I was striving for something to get me out, I then remembered my vice principal, and how his personality and mind set was... and then I remembered he was LDS. So I thought, "why not? Why not just read it and see what you think Mav?" So, I went and found myself a copy of the Book of Mormon. I've been reading for some months now, since July of 08 actually. I have prayed on it. I have pondered on it. I have had the nervousness and sadness lifted from me while reading it. I have started to feel God around me more. I have prayed, and asked the Lord if what I read is true, if it is indeed his word that he wants me to believe in. And he did come to me, and he let me know that it is indeed his word and that every line of the book is true. Bottom line, I believe this to be the word of our Lord, who sent Christ down from above to atone man and pay for his sins, and that the gathering of Israel and in the restoration of the Ten Tribes in Zion. These new beliefs and the book have made my personal life better and have made me feel closer to the Lord and feel his warmth around me the more I incorporate them into my day-to-day life, relationships, and soul. I want to share this with my family, I want them to read the Book of Mormon and see what I have seen. But the thing is I am somewhat hesitant to share this with anyone in my family. My mother was raised catholic, but became non-denominational after the age of 18 (she didn’t like the Catholic Church very much). So I was raised non-denominational, and I feel she is reluctant to believe in anything else besides the Old and New Testaments. Which I respect and understand, but I wish could muster up the courage to ask her. The more I pray, and the more I come on to her about it, I feel I can openly tell her about my feelings on it. My father is another story entirely. I’ll explain his situation some other time. But as of now I still feel reluctant to tell my parents or anyone in family for that matter. So my question is to you guys, what should I do? I am at a loss with myself again on this. When should I convert? Should I just wait until I am 18 and out of the house to convert… or something else? I really don’t know what to do, I want to believe in the Book of Mormon, and abide by the word of God and love God. But because of my family, I feel held back from it.