paulsifer42

You sure are quick to call people fools... interesting. It blatantly says it is not a sin. So, either the Apostles who put that site/quote together are being truthful, which debunks your argument (as we know that if changing that was our choice, but we didn't do it, it would be considered a sin), or they're lying to make the discussion with people who have same-sex attraction easier. Which are you choosing?

Why didn't I go get this quote a while ago? " Where the Church stands:The experience of same-sex attraction is a complex reality for many people. The attraction itself is not a sin, but acting on it is. Even though individuals do not choose to have such attractions, they do choose how to respond to them. With love and understanding, the Church reaches out to all God’s children, including our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters." http://mormonsandgays.org/

I thought you might like that.

But seriously, it seems like you read extremely well, because you're reading more than what their words are saying. I'm distinguishing between 'desires' and 'fundamental desires'. The first being what we want when we think about what we want out of life, etc. (so we can fundamentally change them), the latter are our knee jerk desires. A good example I can think of is a buddy of mine who used to drink and quit when he got married because 'alcohol may not hurt a marriage, but it'll certainly never help one'. He's told me that even to this day (he's been dry for more than twenty-five years) when he smells a certain drink, he wants one. His knee-jerk desire is to have one, but his desire for what he wants out of life doesn't change, and that desire is what wins out. This is the kind of change of desire it sounds to me like these quotes are talking about.

*sigh* Attacking me really assists the conversation along well. I'm done.

If probably be agnostic.

I saw in none of these that the fundamental desires, such as sexual attraction, of our bodies could be removed. They were all about changing our actions and thoughts. Sorry.

I'm afraid I do not share your hope. I want to be human, and to me, party of being human is feeling the spectrum of emotions associated with that humanity. My hope is to text to those emotions as Christ would, as I believe he felt the same spectrum.

We do take His name, but every Joe on the street isn't thinking, "Hey, that guy represents God/some church." When I'm attacked now (not that I'm attacked often) people aren't attacking me because I represent the church, they are attacking Paul, because they don't like Paul. As a missionary, because of the garb, people don't see you, they see God/the church/Jesus. So, when they attack you, they are trying to attack what you represent. Does that make sense?

I didn't take it personally, I was just trying to give a little insight. If you felt attacked, I'm sorry, it was meant to be a lighthearted way of helping you receive that insight while pushing past it. I have every intention of continuing to discuss this peacefully, but if you feel the need to walk away you are more than welcome.

Oh, you insulted everyone who admits they can't condition themselves away from all negative emotions and I tried my best to keep the conversation going (while helping you see how you were offensive in a teasing manner); you can't do the same? :)

Watch this. I don't know how you'd watch this and not have the desire to change.

I don't think I'd ask him to wait. You don't want any kind of "what might have been" type stuff floating around in your marriage, as in, "who might I have met had I dated while she was away." Before I went on my mission I dated a girl pretty seriously. I believed then (and still do now) that if I'd married her then we would have made a fine couple. Probably would have been very happy. But, when I was out preaching the gospel, she was doing, well... other stuff. When I came home I didn't even call her. We'd grown apart. If I married her instead of going, we would have grown together and been happy (albeit, I don't think we would have been super-strict Gospel followers); instead, I went on a mission, came home, and married someone different who was in a similar place to me. It's that old saying, "If you love something, let it go. If it comes back to you it's yours, if it doesn't, it was never meant to be." Have him write. Write him back. Tell him to send you candy. Then come home and try dating again. If he's grown as you have, he's yours. If not, it was never meant to be.

In your experience, did you actually test this? As in, was there actually a time when you were seriously, deliberately wronged and you literally felt no anger? I'm genuinely curious. I don't take much stock in what Priests/Monks do, mostly because they stop representing themselves. The reason that makes a difference is because I pretty much rid myself of anger on my mission, but it was because I wasn't representing myself, I was representing God. So, when someone abused me, they weren't wronging me, they were wronging what I stood for. It was pretty easy not to be angry.

I am overwhelmed by your incredible amount of sympathy for others; very grown-up of you. I agree that we can condition ourselves to feel certain things in certain situations by applying reward/punishment during those situations, but when someone wrongs us, we will always feel anger. We can't condition ourselves away from that. That's what I mean by natural feelings/emotions. We aren't going to get rid of being angry at someone intentionally wronging us. Now, what we do after feeling that anger is very controllable, and in that way we should be like the savior and deal with that anger appropriately depending on the situation (instead of acting like children). But I don't think we need to feel guilty for the emotion that undoubtedly follows being intentionally wronged.

According to neurological research, emotions (feelings) come before thoughts. As in, we feel something, then we choose what to do with it. In other words, we literally cannot control what we feel, only what we decide to do after the feeling occurs. Unless you don't want to believe the research, then you can continue to differ with me in this area.

I think this is where we fundamentally differ. I don't believe it's wrong to have feelings (so long as you don't dwell on what's wrong, or do anything wrong), any feelings. My experience, and my study lead me to believe God would expect me to feel guilt for something outside of my control. Obviously we believe (experiences added to perspective) differently, and it doesn't seem like the experience of our conversation is changing anything, not are we able to change each other's perspective. I'll think on what you said and perhaps my beliefs will change.

I'm going to take this paragraph by paragraph, as I don't know how to break it up with it clearly outlining what are your quotes. You've shown my point in your response: 'it may not be our fault', no fault, means no sin. Of course, part of this comes back to the problem of definition (as you spoke of later in this thread), but the issue with laying a blanket, "anything that makes us different from God is sin" drives people to think they are doing worse than they are. We are naturally going to notice things and feel things, we don't need to ask forgiveness for noticing, as it is not our fault. Sin implies a need to ask forgiveness. Which leads us right into the next paragraph where I am misrepresented. Sitting and stewing in a rage falls under the second thing I said was evil: unnaturally thinking about something. It is natural and understandable that we get angry, sitting and stewing goes beyond that. So, no, you're not good if you sit and stew about something. You'll notice that each of those feelings goes beyond a more basic one, ie. it takes work to go from the basic to the next. Noticing can become lust, wanting becomes greed/envy, and being upset leads to being angry/vengeful. The first in this list is not evil, it's taking those feelings and moving them to something worse that is. And, let's not pretend Christ had no feelings, when he did, and not all of them pleasant ones. It was how he acted on those feelings that mattered. "Evil is Evil" makes it sound like you've taken nothing more into account than the thought or feeling. And your example only shows that something being 'natural' does matter, and because it comes naturally we should not automatically judge it as evil, but should look on what someone does with those inclinations (not that we should be doing the judging anyway). Jesus was tempted by the natural man, if we are to be like Jesus, then we are to be tempted by the natural man. You'll notice Jesus didn't go racing to ask forgiveness when the idea of turning some rocks into bread appealed to him, because he didn't act on it, just as we don't need to go racing for forgiveness because we find someone of our own gender attractive.

Because a natural desire implies that the desire is going to be there by no fault of our own. I would argue that, at least by my definition, for something to be evil it requires either an action (possibly acting on a natural desire), or some kind of unnatural premeditation. "They are evil because they are evil" is too simple to encompass all of the desires (natural or otherwise), actions, reasons, etc. That I've encountered in my life. The post given to answer yours did speak to this, just not as directly.

It's there any other kind of doll collection? I submit that there is not. :)

Mirkwood didn't have that idea. He knew my stance, but could see how some might misinterpret what I was saying. It seemed like you misinterpreted, which made me believe you hadn't read the thread. If you wanted to say it annoys you how people want to make laws of that ilk, you didn't need to pretend not to know what I meant, you could have just made an original post. I agree with you though. Lots of politicians and citizens in America are getting way out of hand with what they want some with gun laws.

Movies, Video Games, Books.

Mirkwood, agreed. Kapikui, I was responding to Bytor's response to my post saying that I keep mine with a lock going through the handle. As you can see, he insinuated that I was doing something wrong, because I'd locked my gun up. As you've pointed out, in what seems to be inflammatorily at me, in my situation, it would be irresponsible to keep my gun not locked up. I'm living with my in-laws right now where I have no control over what children come into my house, where they go, or what they are allowed to touch, I also don't feel I'm comfortably proficient with it yet. I thought what Bytor said was a little offensive. As I've stated in other posts on this thread, people need to be sensitive and honest about what they are doing with their gun, and that different situations are unique, so how guns are stored will vary based on situation. He essentially said I was doing it wrong, because I didn't do it his way. My post was meant to show him my thoughts on people making blanket statements like that when they knew very little about the situation. You may want to consider reading through this whole thread. Some good things have been written.

An irresponsable gun owner is a danger...

That's what I use, and I keep the key far, far away from it.