lostinwater

Very interesting. Thanks for posting. INFJ. Would be interesting to see trends in personality types over time. Though in trying to find plots of the increasing/decreasing prevalence of various personality types over time , i found only articles writing off Meyer briggs as a farce/fad. i know my brother classifies as a INFJ also. But who can resist their personality analysis page - it certainly offers a boost to a person's ego - regardless of classification.

Thanks. i guess depending on the circumstance, could be true. But i'd never kill someone else based on a prompting in the way that Nephi supposedly did Laban. i'd call that murder - but that is just my opinion, and that opinion is worth less than you paid for it .

Thanks. i have wondered similar things. i'm pretty confident that in the Laban/Nephi situation, i'd have assumed a very different source for that prompting. But i have a harder time explaining the genocide in the bible, or recommending how a person should act while fighting in a war and you and 10 of your fellows capturing a single wounded enemy soldier and having to decide whether you kill him or risk having him tell his army about your plans/position. i guess every situation is different. But just the idea of murdering someone else (or several people) based on a prompting and justified by a greater-good religious argument not shared by broader society - i'd be real leery about getting behind that. i mean, how many tortured souls are there in our prison system who've thought exactly the same thing? i'd rather explain to God why i didn't than trying to explain my misguided faith to my victim. i honestly don't know if other people actually get prompting so strong that make them not automatically discard it as a possibility. If other people do, it explains why they stayed in the church and i've largely left. That would be one whale of a prompting.

Thanks for posting this. Just my opinion - and in the interests of full disclosure, i am less active - as in mostly inactive. But i feel there is a healthy middle ground between total acceptance and total derision. i hate this idea that those are the only two choices. It just creates this sense of separation, alienation, and persecution that i feel is the wrongful justification of so much spite, hatred, cruelty, and misunderstanding. People will disagree - and that's fine - but i know i could never quite make sense of a lot of things. Call it a lack of faith, or not asking for answers in the right way - but there are some things that just feel wrong to me. But i don't think things like this (ie that you are unwilling/unable to change your view on, even after earnest soul searching) mean you can't participate in the things that are good for you - though i recommend a lot of self introspection and honesty in determining what is good for you in the church and what is not. i think generally we can distinguish between the things we don't like but know we need and the things that are toxic to our emotional well-being - and that's what i mean. Religion i think is meant to draw people to God and Jesus, not be an end in and of itself - so to the extent your religion of choice accomplishes that, i think you are doing what Jesus would want you to.

Glad to have your perspective back on the forums! Hope you feel better.

i think a lot of people use the term 'transgender' to describe gender dysphoria coupled with a socially disruptive demeanor and very brazen sexual lifestyle. It's easier to toss everyone who believes their soul does not match the gender of their body into one giant room and stick a sign that says 'Warning, Keep Out! Dirty, Evil, Malicious, Transgender People Inside' on it. Certainly understandable, but sad nonetheless. Gender dysphoria as you've described it seems like their attempt at separating an assumed lifestyle with the actual feelings of conflict.

Thanks for the question. So i'll preface this with admitting that i am currently somewhere between child B and C. i don't want to pretend that what i say is coming from any place other than that. Some interesting links for you to read. Personally, when i was more like child A, i found that question simple until it was applied to people whose hearts i felt i knew. It was one of those things i just couldn't square that pushed me towards where i am at now. http://mormonmessenger.com/progression-between-kingdoms-lds/ https://www.lds.org/ensign/2014/03/faithful-parents-and-wayward-children-sustaining-hope-while-overcoming-misunderstanding?lang=eng For me, my personal view, from where i am now, is captured pretty well in book you might read by Howard Storm called 'My Descent Into Death' - where he talks about his experience in a very terrible place during his near death experience, and what it took for him to get out. There are also some youtube videos by him also. And of course, CS Lewis' classic, 'The Great Divorce'.

Thanks. Apologies. i should have been clearer. i didn't mean pain specific to the divorce, or it's possibility. Just something she might have been dealing with that was completely unrelated.

Just a thought for consideration. Are you absolutely certain the weight gain is as a result of something you are doing or not doing? It may be because she is experiencing a tsunami of pain for some unrelated reason and dealing with it the best way she knows how to. Not meant to be a criticism of either you or your wife - i hope it's not interpreted as such - but i know i often assume i am the cause of good or bad things, and then find myself surprised again and again when it turns out not to be the case.

Thank-you @Scott for posting this, and for your goodness.

of course, i am certain your comment about @MormonGator was completely in jest, and that the only reason for not stating so was it was so blatantly obvious, it didn't feel like it needed to be said. i think there could be widespread agreement he is one of the kindest people on this forum, and no doubt an equal gem to his ward.

Thanks. First 27 years in the church. But, you are right, i can't speak for everyone - i'll preface comments like these with 'my perception of XX' in the future.

Thanks. There's usually at least some truth in most criticisms. Is that really how my words struck you? If yes, i apologize - please know that wasn't my intention.

Fair criticism. i should have been clearer. i actually believe most of what the church teaches. But i don't automatically accept what it says now as being equivalent to the Voice of God. And when i say the average member doesn't know these things - i can only say that i spent the first 27 years of my life immersed in it and never once heard anything about multiple versions of the book of mormon. But, that could have been just me. Regardless, it's a pretty small thing. i've never even compared the various versions, but they seem like mostly cosmetic changes. What i mean when i say average members don't know a lot of early church history - are things about Joseph's personal life - not just polygamy - but like some of the things written to the girls who initially didn't want to marry him - or involvement in some things i identify as occult. i know i am on a fine line here, and want to respect forum rules - so won't say any more. But there are some things that i am convinced are accurate that i find deeply disturbing. That wasn't really why i left though - because every religion has those things, whether they acknowledge them or not. And i'm not sure i've completely left anyways. i still attend some meetings/classes - but my whole view of them is so different than it was before. Honestly though, i wonder how my life's history would read if it was scrutinized like Joseph's and the early leaders of the church are. It certainly wouldn't be all roses. What i wish the church didn't do is sacrifice all emotional and spiritual balance on the altar of their perfection and eternal importance. They make themselves so important and intertwine themselves with someone's self worth and relationship to God so deep that when a person begins to read some disturbing things - they often feel totally betrayed and lied to and either turn in total hatred against the church, or just throw their relationship to God and Jesus away with it - which is so tragic. However, i can hardly expect the church to denigrate itself merely to satisfy me. i know the same culture that has hurt so many people i care about helps a lot of other people, and i just hope that God and Jesus will sort out everything in the end.

+1 @Blossom76 - if it makes a difference, i don't think it is out of malice. Early church history and the book of mormon's origins are very tender topics - it's where most people who are out to land a punch on the mormon church start hitting - and so anything that even remotely calls anything about it into question often triggers an offensive posture. It must be defended at all hazards, because if it goes, then the whole thing crumbles to the dust - threatening to take the identity and relationship with God and Jesus of a member with it. It doesn't help that a ton of little problems (flaws of the men who wrote it, if you prefer) are often not known by the average member, and completely surprise them when they hear them. At least such it was for me while i was active.

+1 Every religion cherry picks. And really, not just every religion. Every single person cherry picks. You'll find people condemning things they disagree with by quoting Leviticus as they eat bacon at a barbecue without any perception of the irony involved. The history books are full of despotic regimes and genocides that more or less came about because someone was successful in convincing people that extreme allegiance to their cause of choice justified the numbing of one's conscience/society's most essential laws. The reminds me a quote from the 1954 movie, 'A Man For All Seasons'. William Roper: “So now you'd give the Devil the benefit of law!" Sir Thomas More: “Yes. What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get to the Devil?" Roper: “I'd cut down every law in England to do that!" More: “Oh? And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you -- where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat. This country’s planted thick with laws from coast to coast -- man’s laws, not God’s -- and if you cut them down -- and you're just the man to do it -- do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of the law, for my own safety’s sake." – Robert Bolt, A Man for All Seasons (1954) Every person/organization has their own definition as to what the devil is.

Well, that's case and point for why i really struggle reading the Old Testament - but you are right, it's there. As i read that, i wonder if the ox was stung by a bee, bolted, tipped the ark over, and it crushed Uzzah - and the people were so superstitious that they believed it was God.

Thanks. i hear what you are saying. George MacDonald said what i want to say better than i could ever say it. perhaps this is really what you are recommending to me - and i'm just too stupid to see it . This, in fact, is a distinct possibility. "Neither let thy cowardly conscience receive any word as light because another call it light, while it looks to thee dark. Say either the thing is not what it seems, or God never said or did it. But of all evils, to misinterpret what God does, and then say the thing, as interpreted, must be right because God does it, is of the devil. Do not try to believe anything that affects thee as darkness. Even if thou mistake and refuse something true thereby, thou wilt do less wrong to Christ by such a refusal than thou wouldst by accepting as His what thou canst see only as darkness." - George MacDonald

Thanks. i guess i want to emphasize the 'legitimately commanded by God' part of that comment. But, point is well taken. We do ask lots of questions after a crime like - as well we should.

Thank-you. Good points. i'd like to think that some things that happened in the OT are wrong in a way that transcend cultures over time. i can't call the deliberate ending of the lives of children anything else - i just can't. Who knows, i guess (assuming that some of the things that happened in the OT are for the best) God could be a darned if He does, darned if He doesn't. For example, if God commanded someone to kill the Nazi Party leadership in 1935, it would have been a mini genocide whose saving positive consequences were never known, but then if He doesn't, He didn't prevent the genocide of the Jews. Anyways, your suggestion that i should not throw the baby out with the bath water is valid, and i appreciate the reminder.

So this is not meant to incite argument. But does this mean that when we hear of one person killing another person, we first need to query the person who killed to see if it was legitimately commanded by God before we make up our minds as to whether or not it was bad? Maybe it does - honestly, though, the whole thing just feels sick. Full disclosure, i have no acceptable answers to the questions i am asking. Honestly, it's things like these that made me stop reading/skip large sections of the Old Testament - they confuse my conscience so much, maybe it is better for me to ignore them for now.

Thanks. i guess i mean premeditation. Deciding, when your blood/anger is not 'hot', to murder someone, and then doing it.

i am glad i am not alone in this. Maybe if God asked me to sacrifice my own life - but to take the life of another - i could never be sure. The implications of being wrong.... Maybe others could know well enough - but i couldn't. And anyways, i doubt God's hands are tied should i choose not to be the one to make the 'hit'.

i have thought a lot about this. Would i take the life of another when my blood was 'cold'. i guess my answer would be no - i hope it would be no at least. i suppose a lot of that is based on the assumption that any prompting to do so even in the slightest resembles what i've experienced to this point in my life. Even if it weren't and i was more sure than i have ever been about anything else, i still feel like i hope i would refuse. Not looking to argue the point - but i have seen inferences to things like that pop up in other threads, and want to see how other people deal with questions like this. If your answer is yes, i would be interested to know what intensity or form of prompting it would require to justify it - if you feel that is relevant.

Very interesting and well researched. Thank-you for sharing.