NeuroTypical

If they're interested in God and mormons, invite them to learn more. If they're not, treat them like you believe in the principle of agency, accept their decision, and let them know that they would be welcome if they ever change their minds.

Here's a poll/thread on preparations to defend one's home and loved ones.

When I first heard this story, it helped me enjoy Lillith Crane on Cheers much more.

Yeah, we need to know the difference. Example 1: When I returned to church activity, I was asked to help set up chairs for something. I was so excited to help that I accidentally dumped a pile of chairs on my bishop and almost broke his leg. I was very sorry and spent the next week apologizing. Example 2: [Elgama's experience] You should put up with examples like mine, but not put up with the stuff that was happening to her daughter. LM

Artists always suffer.

Yeah, Standing Together Ministries pretty much rocks. And so do the counter-protesters at temple square who show up dressed as Satan with a "this guy is one of my best henchmen" sign stands next to the protestor. (I don't think many of these guys are actually evangelicals, more like college kids with too much free time. But they rock anyway.) LM

There are a few words that paint a thousand pictures! It shocks a lot of people to see a church full of imperfect, fallible, agenda-driven, error-prone people off doing things that really don't seem to be all that inspired. The concept of "we're trying our best" is useful to learn in these situations. If we allow it, the experience can help us be charitable. LM

I've fooled my Bishop with the church sign generator.

People have an understanding of who God is and how things are put together. Sometimes that understanding is very well researched and defined, sometimes it's vague and nebulous. Our view can differ pretty fundamentally from other's views. So, when confronted with new info that fundamentally contradicts what someone has always believed, a gut reaction is to say the new info is wrong. It's a human reaction, not limited to reactions against our church. No, it might indicate you need to develop your love of your fellow man and ability to be charitable in the face of opposion though. No. No faith can be proven right. All you can do is have a firm grip on what you believe, and why you believe it. It also helps to gain an understanding of common dumb beliefs people have, and why they are dumb.As you go through life, you'll encounter people who are off spreading church criticism, and people who have heard the church criticism and don't know what to think or how to respond. You will probably never, ever make a single dent in the first type of person. You can have a great impact on the second kind. If the second kind sees you off yelling at the first kind, it's sort of a turn off though... LM

Yes, yes, not particularly, and sure: I had a bad manager who made everyone's lives miserable. I was, beyond the shadow of a doubt, prompted directly to go and discuss it with her. It actually felt like the spirit had a finger in my back belt loop and was pulling me up out of my chair and pushing me towards her office. I needed that level of clarity, because I didn't really see how approacthing the topic with her would help. But I approached the topic with her. And it didn't help. It was a big embarassing mess, and then two months later, everyone got laid off. To this day, I don't really know why God wanted me to have that discussion. But I'm absolutely certain He did. I can only assume it helped the manager person somehow, because it didn't really do much for me, other than to give me a story to share whenever someone asks the question this thread asks. LM

More "juicy details", less charity and civility. Honest people will tell more truth, dishonest people will tell riskier lies, because there's less risk.

I'm not too brand loyal. Once every 6-7 years or so, we go to Costco/Sam's club and buy a big family tent. They always seem to have big ones for cheap. There are always new cool features. Once it was a skylight. Then a hanging pantry. Then a closet. I see they now have pet doors. LM

As an interesting thought exercise, try re-reading this thread while thinking about how to deal with child sexual predators. There are a surprising amount of posts that I believe still offer completely valid advice. (At least I found it surprising.) LM

I remember a story about an astrophysicist. He had incredibly vivid dreams where great mysteries of the universe were unfolded to him, and they made perfect sense. But within seconds of waking up, he'd forgotten all the details - he just remembered that they made absolute perfect sense and pulled everything together in marvelous simplicity. So he put a tape recorder by his bed, and planned to record his thoughts in the precious seconds after waking. He woke up, grabbed the recorder, and uttered a phrase he was sure would forward humanity's understanding of the universe by an order of magnitude. Then he went to work. When he came home, he rushed to the tape recorder to listen to what he had said. He heard his own voice, full of confident certainty, utter "The entire universe is suffused by the color of turpentine!" LM (I hear people who live in California like Hemi tend to keep this feeling with them throughout their waking hours.)

Hi Sitamoya - congratulations on living in the most beautiful place on Earth. I fear to visit there, because I may never leave! LM

LM's rule of thumb for internet relationships: Until you actually see the person in the flesh, assume they are a lying kidnapping pimply-14-yr-old-boy stalker molester alien multi-level-marketing-huckster brain inside a jar.

We have a handful of part-member families in my ward. The spouses tended to be like your spouse. A few years of getting to know us, with nobody trying to kidnap their kids, or gore them with our horns, and they've changed their critical stance. Give it a few years. You already know we're not as bad as she thinks we are - give her some time to come to understand that herself. LM

I guess it depends on how you define 'ready'. People tend to be all over the map on this one. Does ready mean a basement full of food storage? Is it spiritual readiness to live the law of consecration? Some folks are expecting a call-out from the prophet to go live in the Rocky mountains for a year. Some folks figure they'll be taking up arms against the food rioters or commies or zombies or whatever. I guess I define 'ready', as prepared to drop dead and meet my maker, and prepared to do the will of my Lord and Savior if He has stuff for me to do. At this point in my progression, I'd have to say I'm more ready for the first thing than I am for the second. There's always work to do on me. LM I don't think that many people are truly ready. Just able to make the changes necessary

I've never heard the term before. Got link to more info?

Hi addicthelp, So, what was your poison? Or is your learning all academic?

So, you do realize that video was produced by a bunch of antimormon evangelicals, right? You discount scientists and PhD's, but you accept blindly the word of a piece put together by the attack dogs at "living hope ministries"? Tell me, do you also take the word of Athiest-produced videos telling me about the falsehoods of the Bible? LM p.s. - I see you indicate you're from the UK. Do you have anything to do with the Reachout Trust countercult folks? I went the rounds with a poster on their forum a few years back on this subject. I did so well there, they deleted the whole thread. I could send it to you if you like. The jury's been out on this video for a few years, it might help you come to grips...

Well yes, but he didn't say "my choice was poor". He said "I apologize for the impact of this controversy", and "I would like to publically apologize to all of our families for the obvious disruption". Look at who he's apologizing for - it's not his actions. He is apologizing for the actions of others. It really is a manipulative, backhandad, crappy way of saying "I'm sorry you idiots got all offended". He did not say his choice was poor. He said "In this situation, I may have moved too quickly in drawing the line of when to take preventative action." First, "may have" is not the same as "I moved too quickly". Second, he's not admitting the possibility of being wrong, he's only saying he might have been wrong in his choice of timing. This is not, in any way, any sort of apology. It's the standard double-speak nonsense from someone attempting to sooth irate people by saying nothing, that will be interpreted as saying something. So, should he ever actually produces something like "I was wrong, I'm sorry", then I'm more than happy to drop him from the list of items I'm ticked off about in this story. LM

Ok. So perhaps you could explain to us how we interpret DNA from your perspective? The links I provided you are written by folks who have done quite a bit of research on the issue. PhD's in various fields. One is a genuine DNA scientist who earns a living by doing DNA stuff. Perhaps you could start by giving us your credentials. Have any published papers on the subject of DNA we could look at?I mean, I hear that you fundamentally disagree with what seem to us rational, scientific, correct opinions. Before we just drop our faith and accept your opinion, shouldn't we know a bit about why you believe what you do? LM

Well, a satisfactory answer involves unlearning a few falsehoods you've accepted as truth, so here goes. The answer lies in the question "what does Jewish DNA look like?" That question is answered as follows:There is no such thing as "Jewish DNA". The Jews, although they tend to be homogenous through the millenia, still have a lot of diversity in their genes. So that's a falsehood you need to unlearn in order to ever move forward in this area. No such thing as "Jewish DNA". There are Cohen markers, lots of haplotypes [sp?], etc - but no, you can't tell someone is Jewish by their DNA. Another falsehood involves thinking that DNA science can help prove or disprove the BoM. It really can't. Here's a big stack of articles you might want to persue, to help you understand what DNA is and isn't, and what the BoM claims are and aren't. LM

Oh man - that's quite an apology there. "I apologize for the impact of this controversy on our school and our community."? ??!? BTW, the "I'm sorry all you people got upset"-style apology was also Justin Timberlake's apology when he ripped Janet Jackson's top of in front of everyone during the Superbowl. That's not an apology, that's an underhanded way of saying the upset people have the problem. "I may have moved too quickly in drawing the line of when to take preventative action." This is not an apology - this is admission of the chance that perhaps he might have maybe been possibility wrong. Maybe. Big difference than, oh, say Mel Gibson's "I'm deeply ashamed of my actions and I want to change myself into something better" style apology after his drunken rant about Jews. At the end of the day, this is about the restrictions on free speech schools can place on the little minds who are required by law to attend. It's about who is at fault when there's a problem. It's about who deserves tolerance, and who needs to just shut up and sit down and smile. The right answer would have been either to send both the offenders and the offended home - or send neither of them home and let them work it out. That's what non-hypocritical tolerance looks like. LM