lostinwater

Drat! You can answer the unanswerable! Doesn't fit my narrative. i should have just quoted CS Lewis, rather than trying to put my own spin on it. “Can a mortal ask questions which God finds unanswerable? Quite easily, I should think. All nonsense questions are unanswerable. How many hours are in a mile? Is yellow square or round? Probably half the questions we ask - half our great theological and metaphysical problems - are like that.” - CS Lewis, A Grief Observed

A very hard question. i know that just telling one's self that prayers are answered even when they don't feel like they are doesn't have a lot of utility. i think having many/most of your prayers being questions you know the answer to helps. Otherwise, you have almost no point of reference. There are some prayers i always get answered. i've had some experiences that make me terrified of the dark - or anything spiritually dark - i'm physically unable to watch a horror movie. When i ask for a divine presence to come and protect me, i always feel like that one is answered immediately. Probably everyone has something like that. And then i guess i'd just be flexible with answers. My guess is a lot of the prayers we pray don't make sense. To God they are like "tell me how many liters of water are in my kilometer" or "let me know the best way to sweeten my tea with salt". Very difficult to "answer" those prayers with the traditional way. God might have to answer those prayers with feelings rather than action or answers that make sense. Music is often how God speaks to me. Words don't really convey meaning in the same way. And i'd definitely give God some airtime in our prayers, also. He has to have time to communicate with us, not just us to ask questions. But as others have said, you just start. Attempt to communicate in the deepest way you know how. The intent is, at least in my opinion, way more important than the method. If you're really trying, you're succeeding. And for what it's worth, very few are good at it - at least i'm not. So, welcome to the confusing, frustrating, and occasionally satisfying prayer club! i think we are planning a get-together in heaven where we ask for the reason why so many of prayers felt like they got ignored .

i don't know of a single American that wants North Korea or Iran to have really powerful military weapons. More of an issue of self-preservation vs personal freedom. North Korea really doesn't like us very much. During the Korean War, we were dropping several hundred tons of bombs (a day) on them, and essentially carpet-bombed/firebombed their entire country to destruction. About 20% of their population died. Below is a propaganda poster from North Korea. i don't read Korean, but that guy under the boot - that's Trump. i believe they feel similarly in Iran, but have a preference for burning things, there. Their reasons for dislike there are probably a lot more complicated. i think it has a fair amount to do with our support of Israel, and our CIA's secret (now public) involvement in a coup in the 1950s that help install a leader many people in Iran considered to be our puppet. The book "Ghost Wars" is pretty interesting - about how we fought much of the cold war against Sovet Union/communism in the middle east (prior to USSR's dissolution at least).

Thanks @dellme i'm just speaking to the experiences regarding which i am familiar. That's quite a lot of experiences from where i sit - but i definitely won't claim my perceptions are necessarily representative of the whole. Though regardless of whose match-stick of experiences represents the tree more fully, concepts of statistical relevance are profoundly irrelevant for those to whom this has occurred.

Thanks @Vort Sounds like we have seen different things. Amazing how two people spending time in the same church could have such different experiences. i guess the people who have positive experiences with their bishops are warned to stay away from apostates like me! And that anyone who has a negative experience is more prone to come to where they won't feel judged. Perhaps God and Jesus are using both of us - different as we are - to make sure everyone is taken care of!

i don't think asking questions constitutes sexual abuse of a child. However, - and i can only speak to the experiences of the people i know, but from what i have seen - a child/adolescent that admits (only after having been questioned explicitly regarding it, rather than bringing it up of their own free will), experiences a crushing amount of shame and guilt. Not the healthy kind - at least not in healthy amounts. And i've also found that it very often doesn't stay private. i know - it should - but from what i've seen, it's very frequent that it leaks out. And when that happens, i've never seen positive things result - not ever. And for those who know people it's happened like what i've detailed above for, i hope everyone can understand why what others say should have happened seems rather irrelevant compared to what actually did happen. Good intentions are great, but they need to be tempered by how those intentions actually affect people. Happy to concede there are other ways it can and does play out - just speaking to what i've seen.

My advice would be to do what makes the most sense (head and heart) to you - both about who to help, and also about how to help them . Nobody is going to know if you don't! At least they shouldn't, right? You sound like you really want to make a difference - the kind of difference that matters. That's a rare and a valuable thing. i sure am grateful there are good people out there like yourself.

Thanks. i guess it depends on the sin - i assume that would be the case for both you, and me. i hope so, at least. Sexual purity doesn't make that list for me. Like not even close. Actually, there are very, very, very few sins that would make that list for me. And like @MormonGator said, they'd only make the theoretical list. Actually having to make that choice real i suspect would shrink it even further.

There are things i would give my life for. Maybe the idea of giving one's own life for God is what you're really getting at. i hope so. But i simply cannot fathom how a parent would willingly exchange the life of their child for that child's sexual purity (however the parent defines that). That is entirely beyond my comprehension.

i know you said your book list was packed for 5 years. But i just finished "Suicide of the West" by Jonah Goldberg. It really addresses a lot of the points you bring up - i thought of you and the points you bring up several times when listening to it. The concept of an "invisible hand" that steers societies comprised of people pursuing basically selfish ends vs a "visible hand" that attempts to bless people and creates long-term chaos, because it can never fully understand the ramifications of what it attempts to do. As someone who leans to the left on many social issues, it was enough to really get me to question some of the ideas i hold. Or at least admit that my good intentions might often be doing more harm than good.

i read a book recently about an old Jewish man who observed that as long as you plagiarize enough times from enough unique sources, it transforms plagiarism into research! Along the lines of national days....actually, this week is National Peace Officer's Week. In the hope of somewhat atoning for the extreme side of the gun control movement, i want to personally thank @mirkwood and @Just_A_Guy - and any other law/peace officers i am not aware of - for all the times they've bravely had to use firearms to help keep all the snowflakes like me who are floating around out there safe.

You are far too kind! i suspect that sentiment may not be shared. And even if it was, i'd have to truthfully admit that i just stole those points from someone else!

Thanks. Stop as in eliminate? No. Reduce? Absolutely i don't think most people who do this sort of thing are consistently hell-bent, year after year, to get a gun through any illegal means possible and go in and murder children at a school, shoot up their workplace, kill their wife., etc.,. i think making things 20-30% harder would put it past the reach of quite a few for the time it needed to. And again, i recognize the right people have to own guns. Anyone who says i am for the elimination of all guns has every right to say/believe that, but i'd have to disagree. Anyways, will leave it there. Just my (imperfect) thoughts.

Thank-you Sir. Makes sense. i guess i just don't consider it an unreasonable argument that having dozens of school-age kids getting murdered by madmen who walk into schools with assault rifles is evidence that the perfect balance has not quite been achieved. And don't mistake - i was raised in as pro-gun a household as you'll find. i also think there are plenty who want to take the restrictions too far also.

Aren't we all in favor of some kind of restrictions? What those restrictions look like ranges an awful lot, but i'm struggling to think of anyone who supports removing every restriction about who can own a gun, what kind of gun that can be, and/or where that gun can be taken.

Just a reminder - to myself as much as anyone else. Not everyone who thinks we should have additional restrictions on who can possess a firearm thinks that nobody should have a firearm and the 2nd amendment should be abolished. Also, not everyone who thinks they should have the right to own a firearm thinks that anyone should be able to get a firearm. OK - this one i'm not so sure about.... But i hope you guys can affirm my hopes in this regard. Anyways, good rhetoric is cut and dry. The crafting of good and effective policies about gun ownership/control --- not so much.

Will let others argue as to whether or not it's official - not really vested in that myself. But that school shooting is a sad thing indeed.

@Luke i'd agree with you - there is not much in the realm of religious belief that can be empirically proved or perceived. i sometimes think the whole system was designed to require constant choice. That life is intentionally filled with events that lead us up to that silent wall we all pound our fists on for answers. Maybe our pounding and not knowing and having to choose to hope is what deepens our souls. Though at the same time, i guess the agnostics could and do argue that our pounding and not hearing an answer is an indication that there is no meaning to anything at all. There's plenty that seems too perfect and deeply good to be a matter of chance (i mean you can explain some things with evolution - but can you explain the pureness of the love of a child with evolution?), and plenty more that seems too horrifically senseless to allow any other belief aside from total randomness. Think of the most pointless application of the most debauched thought a person is capable of, and it's likely occurred at least several dozen times in the past 1000 years. i think it's better to choose to hope though. Because, i mean, what's the alternative? Whether it's lights out, hot flames, or endless joy at the end, i think hoping makes the time before that point better, regardless of which it ends up being. And please don't mistake what i am saying for something like Pascal's Wager - i feel like i've had enough personal experiences to justify believing in God, and at least attempting to make my actions reflect those beliefs (though sadly failing more often than not). i guess i'm just saying i doubt plenty too - but the lack of utility of those doubts has so far gotten me through the troughs of the waves. It just seems better to continue on my raft that (very) occasionally appears like a self-imposed delusion than it is to willfully swim towards the bottom in search of the horrific truth we fear might be there. On the question of not having fullness of joy knowing one of your children is suffering - i think everyone will be saved who wants to be saved. Some will have a rockier path than others, but in the end, everyone who will allow God's Love to change and save them, will be. How long is eternity in hell, when there is no time? Maybe it's just long enough to have the dross burned off of you. And yes, i agree, heaven as portrayed seems horribly boring. i read a lot of near death experiences. One person said that joy in heaven is different there than it is here. Joy is not something you extract from a novel experience. It is something that just comes. It's there, all around - no extraction necessary. Anyways, this speculation on my part obviously isn't Mormon doctrine - but i'm sure you know that already. Regardless, i hope you find the peace you are looking for.

That's really sad. i guess an advertising industry desperate for the revenue of the ad clicks associated with sensationalized stories will parrot back almost anything you send them without checking sources. Change and reconciliation should be encouraged - not something you try and humiliate someone else with.

Thank-you Sir. i see where you are coming from, and can respect that. i won't comment on any of your other points (largely because i'm certain i'd say something wrong about them that would provide a abundance of choice about which rabbit hole of misunderstanding to jump into) - only on the one i originally made. i view the idea that the loss of a child's life is preferable to the present/perceived absence of that child's chastity as being wrong. That's a pretty fundamental idea to me - and since i highly doubt i'd be able to convince anyone who disagrees or justifies something like that that they are wrong and i am right, i won't try. And that's just a general statement - not any attempt at accusation on my part.

i've seen some very good people be profoundly and almost irreversibly damaged by reading that book. i'd like to say a whole lot about it, but out of respect for the forum, will just let it speak for itself. Another quote from it. "There is no true Latter-day Saint who would not rather bury a son or a daughter than to have him or her lose his or her chastity- realizing that chastity is of more value than anything else in all the world."

@2ndRateMind i think one has to be really careful in how you tell someone that their beliefs don't make sense to you. Not many people are able to divorce themselves from their beliefs (me included) - and so when you call into question one, you almost may as well be intentionally insulting the other. You're likely to have swords turned on you very quickly. If one is looking for a war, the drawn swords means mission accomplished. i don't sense that this is your goal though.

Probably by any number of definitions, Mormon church leadership is not a diverse group. i won't disagree there. But is there an evil/dark plan by Salt Lake to intentionally exclude from minorities from leadership? i really don't think so. The church was started by white men in a standard deviation or two of the middle class, and it's sort of stayed that way. It would make for more exciting newspapers, but sadly, most things are neither as perfect, nor as evil, as we're led/lead ourselves to believe.

i don't have children - so my advice plays second (or lower) fiddle. Others have given you far better advice than i am capable of regarding discipline. But on the hating God part - i don't think that's a problem you can solve by forcing them to come to church. Maybe they need to be forced to come to church for the discipline/obedience part. But i just wouldn't assume that's going to fix the anger at God problem. From what i've seen, it usually makes it worse. i read somewhere that God can take our anger as well as our gratitude - and does a pretty good job of dealing with/optimizing both. We get into a lot of trouble trying to hold onto either one. If you can find some way for him to release (as in express) that anger towards God verbally - maybe that would help to avoid him acting that anger out in much more destructive ways. Maybe if you can get them involved in some community service. Not out of a spirit of "stop being so selfish, you little brat" - but more just because helping others deal with their suffering somehow gives meaning to ours. And it seems like suffering without meaning is maybe what we all really hate more than just the fact that we've suffered. And like others have said - it's pretty exceptional you care this much. Gratitude to you for that.

Thanks for posting this @mara i've never been sealed (proxy excepted), but have gone through the temple. i'm inactive now - so that's a thing of the past. But my feelings about the temple were that i felt good on occasion - the best part for me was waiting for the session to start. And occasionally in the celestial room. There are very few times when we allow ourselves to just stop and focus on the divine - however you define that. The idea of the kingdom of God being within you is one i find very interesting. i sort of think i got in touch better with that when i was in an environment of peace and free from distractions - one that places like the temple provides. A lot of the time, i felt confused, awkward, and a bit weird though, too. Anyways, as someone with a transgender friend - all i can say is that if acceptance of your bisexual identity if fundamental to your emotional health, then a life inside the Mormon Church has a good chance of being an exquisitely painful experience. And from what i've seen, it's not the healthy amount of pain/trial that leads to personal growth. It's the crushing kind that leads to more bad than good. There are some very dark corners of the LGBTQ community. Rejection plays a role in their creation - but a lot of other things too. i know a lot of people who went to those corners after they felt rejected by a church and threw the Baby (God) out with the bathwater (religion). There are some very good corners too, don't get me wrong. Some of the kindest people i know inhabit them. There's a guy called Mark Yarhouse that talks about some of these issues. He approaches the whole issue in a very compassionate way. It's worth a listen if you have a chance. i know i'll probably get eaten alive for this post. That's OK - as long as it provides some benefit to you. Please take care of yourself.