Mike

Ouch, that hurt so good.

I don't think we should remove it completely. I think it can have a non-hurtful place in humor. For example I might say something like this, "People say I act like I don't care. ...I's not an act."

I don't doubt that revelation is real. And I have no particular reason to doubt the story nor other similar stories taken on a case basis. But I don't doubt that two people from different cultures and counties can come to the same religious conclusions about how to live their lives and worship God either (even if revelation wasn't involved).

Have you checked out Stewart Falls? (approximately 1 hr 35 minute drive for you).

When I read your question I personally didn't think of it as being in poor taste because I think it's more normal than anything else. Some people love gossip, it's true. But even the Lord's Apostles exhibited a kind of curiosity, or bewilderment or whatever one may choose to call it. I'm a bit confused about why the official statement said what was *not* the reason for his excommunication as opposed to what was. Maybe someone can enlighten me--it's an honest question. (I do get it that there are some as was pointed out by someone quoted in the media release I think that there are those who would love to learn that an LDS general authority had "lost" his faith.)

@clbent04 Hmmm, I still don't comprehend the utility in assigning a population percentage, and thus I'm unable to take the Lord's statement as having to do with numbers. I think the mark (in contrasting a strait gate and a narrow way with a wide gate and a broad way) is for me to take advantage of the gift of repentance and renew my covenant when I take the Sacrament. And I feel impelled toward believing that it may be looking beyond the mark to do otherwise.

I kinda hope you're right. But I think I'd better not let that make me complacent about my own situation.

I think, yes, that is what one should probably take away from the the verse if one were laboring under a tendency to want to reduce the plan of salvation and of exaltation to numbers. I think the verse is meant more for you and for me to take it personally in terms of our behavior.

How far are you willing to drive before you turn around to head home?

Speaking of endings, I also came to notice how often 'special' was used when girls wanted to break it off, hahaha.

When I was a teen I wondered why so many things (like meetings, lessons, experiences, feelings, each boyfriend or girlfriend after the last one..., etc.) were "special".

The story sounds familiar to me, and it also sounds like a variation on many others. What do you sense is the take away of the story?

I babysit three grandsons a couple days a week. On one of the days I take the 3-year old to pre-school for a couple hours and then pick him up. The other day I noticed he looked like he was beginning to feel not well. The next day they called from the pre-school to tell my son that one of the other kids had come down with hand-foot-mouth disease. My son has a trip planned to take his family to Yellow Stone in two days. So, he and my daughter-in-law are watchfully waiting to see whether a rash develops. Does it ever seem to you that such things happen more than just randomly, hahaha, and that’s how it often seems to go?

I can relate to your feeling of some things making sense and some other things not so much. In my own life some of what I had placed into one box later seemed to have become more appropriately assigned to the other box, and vice versa. Maybe you can relate too. I suppose that with time (and what happens to us) we become compelled to change some of our perceptions.

That qualification is acceptable to me. I think my point remains, though, my friend. The same choices and the same process are the only way you and I can ever know. In the mean time I think we should treat our friends of whatever religion with as much respect as we can muster for the joy they find. It's not for us to tear them away from the good they accomplish based upon how the Holy Spirit moves upon them. Nor is it for us to evaluate them in order to decide our own fates, I believe. You and I each have our own paths to discover. If we follow that pursuit with sincerity rather than with an eye toward defeating others, then I suppose we're doing it correctly. And if we do find the truth, then of course it behooves us to share it in joy and love (as opposed to anything like "I-told-you-so").

Who can say? I cannot. But I think it doesn't matter. Fervency of feeling is not a criterion for truth. I need not belabor the fact with examples, I think. It really boils down to you (and I) having only one choice to make and from there to let the consequence(s) follow. The choice is to find out from God, Himself by asking Him continually until such time as He either deems us ready for His answer, or until such time as (we) become so prepared that He cannot keep the truth obscured from our minds (spirits, hearts, whatever). Until that answer is received then we have one other choice, i.e. whether or not to live by faith. Anything else is essentially tantamount to us kicking against the pricks as it were.

Are you unable then to accept the possibility that God does just that; and that God's judgement is that had they been allowed (or rather had God intervened changing who knows how many other lives in the process) to live out their lives they would have become such people?

@Vort and @Just_A_Guy Thank you. That makes sense to me.

@clbent04 I wonder if you would clarify something about your thinking. You appear to feel that little children who die before the age of 8 should not go to the Celestial Kingdom. What fate for them is more acceptable to you?

I would like to think that you and I are allied. But what you wrote isn't clear to me. Our church embraces truth, I think. If a teaching is not false, then it is true. If a teaching is true, then our church would want it taught. Isn't this so?

If what you assert is true, then it must also be true that one coming from some other religion would be unable to evaluate the question without bias. Thus, comparing religions is not the right method.

Well, if that's the case for us puny humans (and I suppose it is) then how much more must it be the case for God to know who will do what, and so on. Don't you think so, too?

Oh, I don't know. But does it matter? Even LDS question doctrine from time-to-time. And frankly many of us do even question God from time-to-time. It's all part of the way the world goes around...but I suppose that's fodder for a different thread.

I think I understand what you're saying here. (And if it matters, I don't think that you saying so means that you are questioning God.)

Personally, my reasons for wondering about the doctrine were never related to whether little children can sin, or not. It just always lead my mind down strange paths and rabbit holes.