eddified

This is confusing. You mean you are grabbing a plate of food at your Mom's house and then taking it home to eat it ?

My family has far more boys.

I really liked this comment. I think it really helps to know how people really feel in their trials, esp. the ones I haven't experienced. Thank you so much for being willing to bare your soul like this.

As for priesthood blessings & ordinations, your home teachers can really step up and fill these roles. If the home teachers don't fulfill their responsibilities, then the bishop and his counselors will usually be more than happy to fill these roles.

I agree with what @JohnsonJones has said above. I do NOT feel it is wrong to get help from the government when needed. However, I feel that it is wrong to unhealthily rely on the government (or any other welfare-giving entity!) This is what leads to unhealthy dependence on the government. The encouragement of unhealthy dependence is what is wrong with the government welfare programs. The reason dependence on government welfare is so widespread, is partly because the government does a very poor job of managing welfare. Unhealthy dependence on the government is detrimental to one's spiritual health. (I leave it as an exercise to the reader to find articles on lds.org on why this is so). Notice I am making a distinction between healthy dependence, and unhealthy dependence. The church welfare programs are administered in a more personal way with the long-term goal being self-sufficiency. This helps avoid unhealthy welfare dependence. Summary: unhealthy dependence on welfare of any kind is bad, while receiving welfare is not in and of itself evil. The example @JohnsonJones gave about helping children through college, can be an extremely beneficial thing (I figure that helping one through college is healthy dependence since the recipient of the welfare must still work for the education -- ie you can't give someone an education, but you can financially pay for it.. the recipient must still work to receive the education, there is no way around that.)

Keep in mind that even if he loses faith, he's still your husband. So you can still choose to see the good in him. You can still be happy in your marriage. Recognize that this is your husband's faith crisis, not yours. While you can help him, you shouldn't have to worry about the end result -- just take comfort in knowing that Jesus knows your pains, and take comfort in knowing that your husband isn't leaving you -- you can still have a fulfilling and happy relationship with your husband. The people that I've known who have left the church because they disagreed with its truth claims have largely stayed good people. They still see good in the church and still agree with many of its values ("love they neighbor", "be a good father", "stay loyal to your spouse" etc.) Yes, it will be harder to take the children to church, since often the one who leaves the church decides that they won't attend anymore -- towing the kids to church all by yourself can be a difficult thing, but it could definitely be worse. Overall, please try to support your husband, and don't let his religious beliefs (or lack thereof) turn into a wedge that drives you apart. It sounds like he still loves you very much. "Count your blessings, name them one by one..." Pray for strength, God knows your situation. I have a strong conviction that you can feel relief from this stress if you lay your burden on the Savior.

Oh goody, I've been upgraded to a "pal"!! Can the letter be just this one sentence repeated 1500 times? "I will exhibit tough love at all times like MormonGator"

I'll settle for just the dinner.

I really agree with this. But I still wonder about the "condemning" part. Yes we should condemn sin. How do we do that without condemning people? To the woman caught in adultery, Jesus said "Neither do I condemn thee." He didn't give a discourse about sexual purity to the woman. But He did tell her not to sin.

I was horrified to learn that this happens in northern Utah. My wife's aunt and uncle took on foster children for many years. Recently they found out that one of their foster children (only 9 years old) had been sold to a pedo group by his own mother, and not just once, but many times! This child's mom "needed" the money to fuel her drug habit. It's around us, it's real, and it's especially horrifying for parents of young children such as me.

I've also done things which the Spirit told me not to. It's hard to always obey the Spirit. So please don't be too hard on yourself about that mistake. It's time to stop regretting the past and look forward to the future with faith. I will pray for you.

Hmm sounds like the jeers of the great and spacious building got to him.

Ha, I would love to sing it at a nice quick tempo, that would be great! The thing that bothers me about the church membership (not the leadership or the teachings of the church -- I'm only talking about the culture of the church here) is the tendency to forget about Christ's Grace and attempting to be perfect right now. Perfection and relying on good works alone without relying on His Grace and Mercy, I think, are a big problem. Don't get me wrong, we should strive to do good works, but when you fall short, don't get down on yourself. Christ loves you and I think He cheers the saints from the sidelines even after they've made mistakes.

There are lots of false things on the internet, but it's usually mixed with truth to make it even more enticing. Satan knows it is more enticing if truth and falsehood are mixed together. There are a few things I can think of that helps turn people away from the church. 1) Forgetting that church members doing horrible things doesn't mean the Restored Gospel is invalid. Yes, church members have done some horrible things (Mountain Meadows Massacre comes to mind.) This doesn't invalidate the Gospel. People are sinners and sometimes egregiously so. 2) Misunderstanding what really happened (due to Satan's lies mixed with the truth.) 3) Tough situations that even LDS Apologists have a hard time explaining. In these cases it can come down to "we really don't know the truth of what happened", or "we really don't understand why the authority figure did this," -- and the apologists can offer some possible reasons/explanations but the real answer is "we don't know". In these cases it takes faith to just shelve it and leave it be. It takes faith to just say, "I'm OK not knowing this, I will trust in the Lord." -- And perhaps such faith is lacking in these individuals -- they just can't fathom the thought that they should have to wait and pray for answers. In today's culture, we want all of the answers now! Instant answers via Google probably has something to do with it.

It sounds like you have some fasting and praying to do. One thought I had is that you should do what is best for you, which would mean moving out. On the other hand, it sounds like you are doing so much for your younger siblings. This is one of those situations where it's not exactly clear to an outsider like me what you should do. Maybe you already know what to do, but you are just having a hard time doing the right thing. In which case I offer you encouragement. All hardships come to an end sooner or later. Sometimes we just need to feel that we are doing the right thing, and just need to keep doing it even though it is hard. Other times perhaps a change is needed. This is for you to decide through fasting and prayer. It does sound like you are in a very tough position. The Savior knows you and your circumstances and He is mindful of it. He loves you and your mom and your siblings with a pure love. Sometimes loving someone means doing things that your loved one will not like. Such as refusing to support negative behaviors. Other times it just means keeping quiet. So again there is no hard and fast answer to this. I have confidence that you can make it through this, with the help of God.

@VortIt sounds like you are unaware that there are other explanations that explain cosmic background radiation, redshift etc. But there are. There are other, God-centered explanations. It doesn't surprise me at all that you believe what you are taught -- and creationist explanations of these phenomena are not taught in schools. It doesn't surprise me that you seem uneducated in them. I also am uneducated in them -- I went to public schools etc. But they are there. You sound as if the Big Bang is the only sensible explanation, but this is just not so. Did I characterize people that believe in evolution? If I did I apologize, but I'm pretty sure I didn't say anything to malign anyone. I agree that there are good people on both sides. I judge ideas as I see them, but I am much more careful about judging people, as you suggest. "Organic evolution is more or less the "grand unified theory" of biology. In light of evolutionary theory, everything in biology starts to make sense and fall into a recognizable pattern. Without evolutionary theory, biology is pretty much just a very large collection of unconnected observations." - This sounds very much like what they teach in school, and that you are very unaware of other explanations. I encourage you to learn more about Creationism & Intelligent Design. It really sounds like you could use some knowledge in these areas.

I would also say that if you want to call the Big Bang science, that's fair -- it can just be part of your (and the world's) definition of science. However, it's not part of my definition of science. I'm just trying to point out that it is of a different nature than observational, repeatable, testable science. From Moroni 10: I would just like to point out that the theory of evolution tends to do the opposite of testifying of Christ and acknowledging that He exists. It tends to explain away the need for a God, and by so doing, lead people away from belief in God. This verse right here was my turning point for determining that the theory of evolution is wrong. The scientific evidence against the theory of evolution is just icing on the cake. But theological issues were what ultimately swayed me. I know I'm in the minority and therefore "anti-science". So be it. I won't be believing the theories of men when it tends to contradict the revealed word.

No one has tested the hypothesis that a universe can suddenly appear as a single point. It is just an explanation for some observable phenomena such as Cosmic background radiation. I have no issues with phenomena which the scientists can make predictions about. If you can test a Big Bang in your basement, great! Please let me know if you succeed. In other words no one has observed a Big Bang occur. Consider however that all these naturalistic explanations (evolution, Big Bang) are coming from people whose very creed is that only naturalistic explanations will be allowed. This means that of course the explanations they come up with will not involve God -- they purposely made it that way, it's part of their rules. Do you want to put your faith in modern science which has sworn off God? I find that a highly untenable position to be in. There are many scientific reasons not to accept evolution. One resource is www.scienceagainstevolution.info which only uses science and logic to refute evolution. (It does not make religious claims against evolution)

I may have used the term "forensics" incorrectly. I'm not going to argue it was a good usage of the term. However, did it get the point across? It seems that it did. The point being - evolutionary thought and big bang are ideas which offer untestable explanations for the phenomena we see. So they're not so much fields of hard science as they are fields of philosophical inquiry.

Can you please tell me how you believe evolutionary theory to be useful?

Big Bang and evolution are forensic sciences. This means they are sciences in the sense that we can use logic and math etc but cannot use the scientific method (observe, hypothesize, & test, in a cycle over and over again). Forensic sciences are not verifiable. You can't go out and do a test that will definitively show the hypothesis (big bang, evolution etc) to be true. You CAN do this for gravity for example. You can't for forensic sciences. Evolutionists are a creative bunch. Read the scholarly articles and you will find lots of "could have", "probably", etc. The theory of evolution is not falsifiable because it is a belief system. Any evidence you find will be fit, ad-hoc, into the evolutionary framework of belief. Evolutionary science has not produced any useful predictions. Observational science can be used to make useful predictions. In short, evolutionary thought has proven to be useless save turning believers into atheists (which it is very good at). Take a long, hard look at the fruits of evolutionary theory: disbelief in God. I don't have anything against other people believing in the establishment's forensic sciences. I just don't give them much credence myself.

I googled that and didn't really see what you are talking about, can you elaborate?

I think pride has a lot to do with it. How many times have people done things they knew were wrong, because of pride? ... <eddified raises his hand>

It's very relevant. The original post references the idea that we as a society are too fixated on equality. I would say that our society is moving more and more towards socialism. Consider socialism and fixation on equality (in @wenglund's sense as seen in all of his posts on this topic [not just the fisrt]) .... are they linked? Sure seems like it to me. If our society continues to make equality the main goal, then it will become more socialized, IMO.