Lstinthwrld

Like I said its one of the thing I am trying to work out.

I actually agree with you very much on this. To over simplify the teaching of eternal progression, Gods progression is tied up with ours. So even if we progress to God hood we can never reach the level I.E nature of The Heavenly Father. So we can never be his equal. If we can never be His equal we will never be a God in the same sense He is A God. No matter how advanced we get He will always be God. Do I understand this right?

Exactly the way I feel. Look I really am not trying to be argumentative. But maybe I am being unfair to you guys. I am kind of using you all as a sounding board to i guess sort of work out my own beliefs. I am sorry I dont want to offend but I do feel a certain sense of urgency to do this. Have patience with me PLEASE!

Here you are actually presenting two different views. If all three are one god as the d&c reference would suggest where does the three distinct beings come in? Your personal belief and the modern teaching of the church is that they are three different individuals both scriptural accounts you give don't promote the belief you present.

Sorry dont mean to sound disrespectful. And no I don't understand this concept. As far as christianity goes it is a uniquely mormon one. It is one of the issues I personally have with it.

Easy. Prove it happened.

Man I am right there with you. I have had the privilege to be able to study with the missionaries I have. I have run into one or two that were very by the training center book on what they can and wont talk about. My relationship with them was short. You are 100000000000000000% right about how both sides of that coin affect people spiritually.

bytebear wrote "And you admit that laity is not privy to some clergy oriented ritual, but there is no separation of laity and clergy in the LDS church. All men are part of the clergy, and as such, they go into the temple as priests, and women go in as priestesses. This is exactly the same as in other churches, it's just done on a universal scale." What I stated here is that while the laity and the general public may not understand the rite they are not barred or excluded from attending it. Not even a non member average Joe walking in off of the street for the first time would be turned away. Sorry I wasn't clear on this point.

Actually you will notice I said CHRISTIAN religions. are we talking Christianity here or eastern religions? Christianity right? And I believe the issue in my OP is a direct result of a church authority with obviously less than adequate education. So i'm right there with ya so far. As far as my facts about ages and when kids start 'seminary' OK I will through ya bone there ya got me I was wrong. Like I said yeah the church was very aggressive about removing the information from the net. But by all means don't take my word for it. Go look it up for yourself.

As far as the clergy issue you are saying mormons don't have stations such as deacon and priest etc. that members have to reach before they go to temple. How about all the kids that go to 'seminary' two hours a day from twelve on?

Ok so if its not secret then I can go to the salt lake city temple and watch a wedding/sealing or the ordinances? I can answer this one. I as a non mormon or even a mormon but lacking a recommends can not attend. This is unlike any other branch of Christianity. While some other christian sects my have rituals that only clergy participate in they do not limit the access of the uninitiated or the laity. So in this respect the mormon church is indeed unique. The church actually ran quite the campaign to get the leaked details of the temple ordinances off of the net to the extent that they sued some and bullied others about it. To my knowledge there is only one site that still has them up. You can look into this for yourself the documentation is public as some of them were legal proceedings.

Ok I understand your post now. I just googled CARM. Maybe they should remember Jesus' core teaching of love thy neighbor as you would love thyself. This CARM site is just an exercise in ignorance. What about this thread would make you believe I am here in any type of an antimormon role?

Meaning?

I do understand. You said there is nothing we are told not to talk about and in fact there is. That's the only thing I was saying. When you have people looking in at something like this I.E. a religion with self perpetuated "secret" rituals it sets of warning bells. We have had anti cult beliefs hammered in our heads for a while now but especially hard since the whole Jones town thing and a part of that hammering has been 'what are the warning signs of a cult?' One of those signs are secret rituals that no one can talk about under threat of punishment. When people learn of these things (members and nonmembers alike) and ask questions and get answers like those stated above you get problems. For reasons just like this one. Before it starts let me stop it by saying I don't believe the LDS church is a cult or in any way invalidated by its practices. I believe the LDS church has as much claim to validity as any of the other christian faiths. So please take the above example as just that and not a statement of my beliefs.

temple ordinances.

No he answered it. Then he suggested I take it to the community at large and see what they thought.

You are right and I understand this point about the bishop. But you are told not to talk about certain things.

Thank you! Now go back and reread my posts and apply this statement of yours.

Nope don't have his phone #

Don't you find this stance a little absolutist and indeed arrogant?

Good point and you are right in those aspects. Thank you.

Come on! Where are you getting this from? You can find the answers to anything (especially religion) if look hard enough at research and available sources. Do you really think I haven't done that? One of my friends fathers was a member of you're quorum of 70 do you think I haven't asked him some of these questions. As a matter of fact he was the one who suggested I present the questions to the community at large. Please enough with the conspiracy theories.

Sorry not trying to involve a bus. I was just making a vague reference to the doctirinal differences that's all. The charismatic/evangelical movement seems to be pretty litereal where others like Eastern Orthodoxy/Catholicism seem to take a little more on allegory and share a little more with the mormon theology thats all. Not trying to offend.

Ok so let's be clear here. Are you saying the Holu Ghost as the mormons understand it is the only way to the truth?

Wow I really screwed this reply up. Sorry I hope everyone can understand it.