NeuroTypical

Maybe I'm nuts, but what's wrong with experiencing fears and stress? Isn't that what happens to normal people in situations of massive change and uncertainty?From my perspective, maybe you just sit there and hug each other as you both experience fears and stress. Enjoy the time you have, and count down the days until you leave.

Hi and welcome to the forums. First, not all mormons get married young. I got married at 26. Second, mormons are not stranger to divorce. We do emphasize family and marriage, and place a great importance on making a marriage work, but in every congregation there will be divorced people. We all try to do the best we can. Third, becomming a mormon to land a better husband is a horrible idea. Such plans tend to backfire. Such marriages tend to be stressed, as couples fight about paying tithing and living church standards, etc. And when children come, they turn into pawns, as the believing member wants the children to be active in church, go on missions, get married in the temple, etc. Such marriages will sometimes fail, which is not fair to the children. You should become a mormon only if you believe God wants you to be one.

Jeffmk, welcome! I don't know what you are - you are certainly the first beer drinker I've met who likes BYUTV. I can't stand it myself. (BYUTV, I mean.) But whatever you are, you're hardly alone with these thoughts and doubts. I'm a fan of doubt. It keeps us from being gullible - from buying every story from every snake oil salesman that comes down the way. But doubt must be resolved, or it festers. I used to be in your situation. I bet all on the promise in the BoM - the one that says if I did A, B, C, and D, I would get an unmistakable confirmation. It came. You might consider doing something similar. But anyway, welcome!

Put 1000 couples in a room who don't want to go much further than rubbing each other's "lower stomachs", and how many pregnancies do you think will happen? Skip, it isn't about figuring out exactly how close you can come before screwing up. It's about having respect for a potential future bride. Sounds like you're hoping you can disrespect her a little more before you have to stop.

I've always wondered - what's your success rate, and how do you calculate it?

I always wonder about statistics like that, regardless of what they're made about.Is there some sort of searchable "everything every Pope has ever done in two millenia" database? Or does each Pope have some sort of pontiff-wide report card where the "washed a woman's feet" box has gone unchecked until now? (Please understand, this isn't anything specific to Popes or Catholicism or even religion in general. This is just me wanting a better source for reference.)

I'll pass along your kind words. The author has gone into hiding, after one of their posts caused a moderator of one of the kinder LDS boards out there to state that she hated the author and all his/her ilk "with a white hot passion". And another post caused someone to seriously consider reporting the author to the authorities.As the tone of the blog suggests, the author has enough crap going on already, without having to deal with a bunch of indignant indignation from people who's only involvement in things came from reading about them.

Apparently this is a very, very old argument. Everything I know about WvB comes from from the '50's or '60's.

Aimee's Sunshine Blog for Violent Chicks

Just FYI, someone passed some law about federal tax software - you can get it for free if you know where to click. The companies burdened with this law aren't happy, and don't make it simple, but I've used H&R Block freefile for the last 2 years without issue. (3 years ago they suckered me into paying for state filing through underhanded clicking tricks - I'll never see that $14 again!) Anyway, you can find a list of the free programs and companies forced to offer them at irs.gov.

A nation exists because the people living in them believe it exists. Change the belief, you change the nation. You can disagree about everything else, but if you all agree where the border is, then the nation exists. Every nation has three things - a political structure, an economy, and a military. If you're missing one or more of those, you're not a nation, you're a smaller part of some other nation.

Thanks for the opinions and experiences (or lack thereof) everyone! Most likely a false rumor.

Hi ahueveltje! Any special meaning behind your screenname?

Hi and welcome darkside.

busfeliz, counseling is good. Maybe it'll help him understand there's a gap between who he says he is, and who he acts like he is. But more importantly, maybe it'll help you understand that you can't make him do or be something he doesn't want to do or be. That can be heartbreaking, but unfortunately that's how it works.

I have a new YW heading to camp this summer, and my wife heard from one of the youth that drug testing may be happening at the camp. Does anyone have any experience with something like this? I've never heard of such a thing happening. Maybe on a troubled-girl-working-with-her-bishop-privately level, but that's it.

Oh man. A former-member buddy reminded me about that song as we were arguing on Facebook the other day.

Hey Slamjet! 2012 called - they want their style back! In case anyone wants to appear cool to their teenagers, here's something from this year:

My family scrimped and saved for 5 years to be able to go to Disneyland before our kids were parents themselves. We traded Christmas for the trip, and carefully planned and budgeted to skid through by the financial seat of our pants. The kids spent 6 months anticipating and giggling, I spent 6 months worried that something would go wrong and we'd have some financial or medical disaster that ruined the trip. But even if something had happened, you wouldn't have found us whining to a reporter about whatever company had messed up. As luck would have it, it was a great trip. There was only one real thing to whine about, and it only resulted in a 1 hour delay, a minor footnote in the family Disney travelogue:

I've heard more than a few Catholics express StephenVH's opinion. Current: "God wants celebrate priesthood? Ok." Possible future: "God is ok with a married priesthood now? Ok." Sounds like a perfectly tenable position to hold. Especially from the point of view of a Mormon, with our history of God instituting, then ending, the practice of polygamy. There doesn't seem to be an issue here. Not with Catholic adherents, not with people who study Catholicism.

There is an often overlooked third path. It's the path of apathetic lack of thought, reason, or argumentation. This third path isn't born of any sort of belief system or agenda, other than the desire to satisfy perceived short-term wants. In other words, there are a bunch of people out there who think the church should allow gay marriage (or pants on women, or beards on BYU students, or what have you), because being nice is more better than being mean. The brain cells just don't rub together to form anything more complex than that. This is why arguments from these people seem to be so goofy and asenine - because since they're human, they want to love and be loved. Which means when someone calls them on whatever dumb idea they just pushed, they try to defend it, because appearing smart and right is a way be loved. Anyway, I know this is a third path, because I used to be one of these people until about halfway through my teen years, and I was friends with many like me. I can't begin to convey the large numbers of people who attempted to ascribe some sort of deeper thought or meaning or reasoning or agenda to my beliefs and actions. All were strawmen, attempting to uncover, define, and argue with things that simply weren't there. As I keep abreast of current culture, I find this third path is still well-peopled. If you understand that picture, you've plumbed every depth that mindset has to offer. No further agenda-seeking necessary. [To clarify - I'm not saying everyone who isn't on one of Vort's first two sides is on this path. Consider what I'm talking about to be a 4th or 5th path if you wish.]

Gah! Yeah, I have experience with an employer doing something similar to what jerome describes. I've been wondering about such things sliding to what CVS pharmacy is doing. It doesn't make me happy to hear a company is starting to make it mandatory. Because less freedom and more government meddling (or corporate requirements based on making govt meddling bearable) is a step or two away. Slippery-slope fallacies are fallacies. I'm not putting forth any sort of logical argument for consideration. But the end of this particular slippery-slope story, we're doing our required morning calesthenics in our living rooms under the watchful eye of a government monitor.

*shrug* Don't care about the gender of the people speaking into general conference microphones.

Oh, that was me. And again, I used to be fully on BW's side of things. But after looking at the data and evidence before me, I've converted to the "electronic gizmos can become addictions" camp. Because they can. And they are. Especially with our youth. Unless someone like BW or me is there forcing some other sort of interaction out of our youth, the default behavior is drooling turnip people. Well, you can't blame that on me, because I never made such an equating, nor made such an assumption.I read your examples about how you preserve a learning/productive environment in your classes with electronics. Awesome! Gizmos certainly aren't going anywhere - they are all but required these days as productivity tools, so kudos for teaching our youth how to use them, and finding lighthearted ways to keep them from abusing them, and demanding good things from them. If you or someone like you were running Young Women's camp, I'd be happy. But since there probably isn't, I'm happy with the 'no gizmos' rule.

The church makes reasonable effort to contact the person, wanting to give them every opportunity to take part in the proceedings, give evidence, work with the church, etc. So yes, someone can, if they just refuse to be contacted. There are a lot of LDS money-making schemers incarcerated in Utah. For whatever reason, some of Utah/LDS culture just tends to fall for smooth-talking people who flash their temple recommend, and say they used to be a zone leader, and they were made High Priest at age 29, and they've got the most foolproof investment vehicle you'll ever encounter! Lots of elderly fraud.