WillowTheWhisp

I've now read a little more and it seems to me that the site has been created purely to grind an axe which could possibly be of the author's own making. He apparently couldn't live up to the missionary requirements due to his medical condition - why didn't he point that out to his Mission President? However, I find it a little odd that any medical condition can be worsened by getting enough sleep at night. That complaint does seem rather odd. I've known disabled missionaries who have not only coped with but thoroughly enjoyed their missions.

So far I've just read one page and already been put off the site by reference to going to the temple to 'be initiated in the secret ceremony of the endowment' - I wonder if it gets worse or better?

I used to get a bit weepy passing on clothes they had grown out of but I think it all came into perspective when my husband died and I started to look at things in a far wider way.

One of the most fun nights we had was when I taught the sisters how to make corn dollies. We had hysterics because most of them didn't turn out right but the sisters just laughed at their own. Another similar silly fun night was when we made the hot wheater bottles with lavender in. One sister hadn't sewn hers up properly at the bottom and all the wheat fell out. She was 'blaming' the person who was pouring it in saying 'you're missing the hole!' then she held it up and we saw it all streaming out of the bottom. She was helpless laughing.

We have the quarterly enrichment meetings and all sorts of other mini enrichment meetings and a pursuit of excellence 'university' thing which I personally opted out of because IMO the directive about reducing to quarterly meetings was to reduce the commitment to attend too many meetings and all the periphera in order for us to concentrate on the important things in life such as family relationships and fellowshipping individuals without too many church meetings getting in our way. Unfortunately we seem to be having more meetings rather than less, but as they are optional I just opted out of all but the necessary ones unless it's something I really want to join in on. We have the enrichments on Wednesday evenings which is a bad evening for me too because I have a class that evening.

How sad that church members can do this amongst themselves. There is only one source of contention and whilst Latter-day Saints are arguing amongst themselves he must be rubbing his hands with glee.

It sounds like you are well on the road already. Remember how Jesus spoke to the woman accused of adultery. He did not condone the sin but he loved and encouraged the sinner to sin no more.

That's a point. Was it intended to have one but it would have cause a problem with the flight paths over head or is that an urban myth?

In my mind a personage is the whole personality and essence and everything which goes to make up a person. It's definitely not the same thing as a person but hard to explain. I suppose I think of a person as being a physical body but a personage as being a great deal more.

I really do think it's a terrible shame that more mothers do not stay home to look after their children. I have done/do. My girls are now 16 and 13. We've never been rich. We've never had loads of holidays. We don't have a fancy home or all the latest technology. Some of their friends who had all these things have spent more time here in our home than in their own. Incidentally, I wasn't aware that anyone had complained about the talk or been offended. Perhaps those who have not been fortunate enough to have children missed the bit in her talk where she said: To me it seemed that what she was focusing on was prioritising and that tied in very well with Dallin H. Oakes 'Good, Better, Best' talk which I'm doing a lesson on this Sunday. If you are a mother who has to work out of necessity, then prioritising some time to spend with your children can also be possible. For a while I was a single parent when my first husband died so I know there are times when it isn't easy too - but the main point which came across to me was that she was telling us to get an eternal perspective on things so that we KNOW what's important.

Nice bamboo.

Surprisingly, people often conveniently overlook the polygamy practised in the Bible. It isn't something newly invented by Latter-day Saints. Distinct persons, one being? I just can't get my head round the idea of a multipersonal being'.It sounds schizophrenic or just one step away from the Catholic church's different personages of Mary with 'Our Lady of Lourdes', 'Our Lady of Fatima', 'Our Lady of Walsingham' etc and praying to different ones for different purposes.

But if we live in a democratic country where the majority wish to change the law then we cannot insist they do not do so. We can voice our opinion but if there are more people with the oposite opinion the it is us who should go along with that. It's not about God's laws. It's about human laws.

Yes, that's what I'm trying to say, and that although we may not approve of how they wish to live we don't have the right to say they shouldn't live the way they choose as long as it is not affecting us or anyone else.

But some laws are unfair. Because we believe homosexuality is wrong, some people don't and some countries have laws to make homosexual 'marriages' equal to heterosexual ones. Do we have the right to say that they are wrong just because we believe that they are wrong?

If we have laws about it.

Hi Cate211 I'm fairly new here too but been LDS for donkey's years.

But by not allowing them to do their own thing, even if we think it is wrong, is that not forcing our standards upon people who don't wish to live by them? I'm a non-smoker but I don't go along with all the rules there are here which prevent smokers from smoking in places where they would like to meet together to do so. That is now illegal here in the UK, but if they are not harming any non-smokers I think they should be allowed to do as they wish. I don't like to be in a smoky atmosphere so I would simply choose not to go there. I just feel that sometimes we take away other people's rights to live their own lives the way they want to.

An endowed (or for that matter even a non-endowed) member of the Church may not condone homosexuality but on the other hand surely it is against LDS teaching to enforce our own values onto other people? That means that they should have the freedom to make their own choices even if those choices are ones which we would not approve of.

It's a quaint old fashioned English phrase. It took her by surprise because she thought she'd got past being able to.

Some friends of ours also had a lovely experience. They had given away all their baby things as they thought their family was complete. They hadn't had a baby for seven years. Then suddenly she fell pregnant again but they had no nursery furniture and would have struggled to pay for it. Again well meaning people suggested they hold off paying tithing and use the money to buy a cot and other things for the baby. They chose to pay their tithing. A few weeks before the baby was born they were still thinking that they'd be using an empty drawer as a baby bed. Then an elderly couple who were planning to marry bought a new house. They bought the show house on a new estate which was sold fully furnished. One of the rooms had been furnished as a child's nursery and they naturally had no need of those things so our friends received gifts of all the furniture they would need for their baby's room.

One experience I vividly remember because it also showed how in tune our Bishop was. My late husband and I were struggling for money at the time and we seemed to just get one large expense on top of another. We had our tithing cheque written out when the car broke down and we just didn't have any money left to get it fixed. A mechanic friend of ours looked at it and got it on the road again for us for the Sunday morning so we could get to church but he told us the things that it would need to keep it road worthy and get it through its MOT test (that is a legal requirement to keep a car on the road) - the cost was just a little less than the amount of the tithing cheque. We had the tempting option of not paying the tithing that week and getting the car fixed. A friend tried to justify that we would be better getting the car fixed by reminding us of all the good things we did for the church with that car and how it would be depriving the Lord if we didn't get it fixed. We used to take people to church and take other people's kids to Youth etc (we didn't have any children of our own then. My husband was WML and he used to ferry missionaries to and from their new locations. However we prayed about it and we felt it was a test of our faith in paying our tithing so the cheque went into my husband's briefcase that Sunday morning and was handed over to a member of the Bishopric the minute we set foot through the door - just to make sure we avoided further temptation. As we were walking past him to make our way into the chapel the Bishop leant over the balcony and called to us to go up to his office. He handed us an envelope saying that he had no idea why but when he was praying that morning he felt a strong urging to give that to us. When we looked inside the envelope there was a cheque for the exact amount we needed to get the car fixed.

I have had some Bishops who say that tithing should be paid on everything, and some who say that tithing need not be paid on Social Security benefits. Income Support is supposed to be the very basic needed in order to exist. If SS discovered that you were paying 10% of that to the church they might argue that you only nee3ded 90% in order to survive and only pay you that amount. You could counter that with the argument that the church would feed you if you ran out of food. It seems there is no 'correct' answer so I figure the answer has to come directly from the Lord. If you pray about it and feel uneasy about not paying tithing then maybe he's telling you to pay - but if you pray about it and feel happy with a decision not to pay then I would take that as the Lord giving his seal of approval to the decision. I don't know where that would leave you when it comes to a Temple Recommend, unless you can say truthfully that you are paying a full tithing because you pay it on anything else you may receive. I once had someone argue that I didn't deserve my Temple Recommend because I wasn't attending all my church meetings - I wasn't going to any Sunday meetings at the time due to illness. Yes I wouldn't have been able to go to the temple either but I still felt the need for a current valid recommend.

25 YAs for dinner?

I should imagine it would be downright impossible for every LDS student to attend an LDS university. We certainly wouldn't be told we could no longer be part of the church. Education choices are left entirely up to each individual. The only thing the church does is encourage people to get an education. It sounds as if the church you describe is afraid of young people learning from outside sources and discovering that they are more appealing. I've had people from other churches visit me and try to get me to read their literature, which I am more than happy to do but when I offer them a Book of Mormon they tell me they are not permitted to read anything not published by their own church.