Handcarts and manufactured testimonies

[_Maxrep]

Max, don't worry, all is well. They will have medical supplies stashed away. They are trying to recreate the deprivations and hardships the pioneers suffered, with some degree of authenticity. One thing the youth can do to add to the authenticity and help themselves ahead of time, is to start taking walks to toughen up their feet and use some hand weights at the same time. Any strength training exercises would help as well.

The reason stated for the serving only of broth at dinner is that, "After such an exhausting trek, that is all their stomachs can handle". They are borrowing this line of thought from refugee camp survivors who's stomachs have shrunk and have atrophied intestinal tracts. Knowing a bit about sports physiology, they have completely missed the mark. Yes, I do understand what they are trying to recreate - just think they are a little over the top in the process.

The whole process seems so scripted.

Tear them down day one. They learn to work with their handcart team. They experience a strenuous activity completely outside their comfort zone.

Build them back up after a couple days of hunger. Once their tummies are full, sit them around a campfire for a testimony meeting(which also gets repeated the first Sunday upon their return).

Just like "Impact Training " seminars.

I think the lesson with the handcart companies is that sometimes both leaders and members make big mistakes. I don't think trying to tie a spiritual experience to such a catastrophe is appropriate.

[_moksha]

The reason stated for the serving only of broth at dinner is that, "After such an exhausting trek, that is all their stomachs can handle". They are borrowing this line of thought from refugee camp survivors who's stomachs have shrunk and have atrophied intestinal tracts. Knowing a bit about sports physiology, they have completely missed the mark. Yes, I do understand what they are trying to recreate - just think they are a little over the top in the process.

The whole process seems so scripted.

Tear them down day one. They learn to work with their handcart team. They experience a strenuous activity completely outside their comfort zone.

Build them back up after a couple days of hunger. Once their tummies are full, sit them around a campfire for a testimony meeting(which also gets repeated the first Sunday upon their return).

Just like "Impact Training " seminars.

I think the lesson with the handcart companies is that sometimes both leaders and members make big mistakes. I don't think trying to tie a spiritual experience to such a catastrophe is appropriate.

Perhaps you can write the final report months before the event happens.

[_Maxrep]

Perhaps you can write the final report months before the event happens.

I may not have been clear with the last sentence; "I think the lesson with the handcart companies is that sometimes both leaders and members make big mistakes. I don't think trying to tie a spiritual experience to such a catastrophe is appropriate."

My point was that the early pioneer handcart companies(1800's) were ill fated due to short sidedness and lack of inspiration. I wasn't refering to modern day reenactments. I don't know exactly how the stakes plans will turn out, but feel pretty confident about the testimony bearing to follow!

[_Runtu]

Our stake did that a couple of years ago in the summer heat in Oklahoma. My daughter got heat exhaustion, and several kids and leaders ended up in the ER from heatstroke. Both my son and daughter came home badly sunburned and covered with ticks. I vividly recall my daughter staying in bed for several days, too sunburned and exhausted to get up. My son's leader got heatstroke and ended up in the hospital. The funny thing was that after it was all over, the stake presidency recounted the leader's miraculous healing when he was given a blessing and was immediately able to get up and walk to a car to take him to the hospital. My son, who was holding the man's hand at the time, turned to me and said, "That is completely untrue. We had to carry him, and he was in really bad shape. Why would they make up a story like that?" He came home very disillusioned about the church. I was still a believer at the time, and I didn't know what to tell him.

[_harmony]

I agree with Maxrep. That the church encourages this type of folly (in the wake of the real folly when it actually was happening) is so lame. Many many of those people died; we don't need to subject our youth (or their leaders) to the same conditions in order to prove a point (and the point is: the members were stupid and their leaders were completely asinine. They deliberately risked those people's lives, with no thought for their safety and welfare. Any other church would have hung them; we put them up on pedestals as examples of heroic attributes.). Parents should be smart, and refuse to allow their children to participate. But... wait a minute. This is the same mindset that handed over teenage girls to a 30-something "prophet" in payment for him granting them eternal exaltation. ARGH! Blind stupidity is alive and well in the LDS church. Why don't we just nail our children up on crosses? Surely that's the ultimate example to follow?

[_Sethbag]

A great many human beings have suffered deprivation, hardship, sickness, and death. Doing so does not imply that God is revealing truth to anyone. As the title of this thread implies, this is trying to manufacture a testimony. If they can appreciate that our pioneer ancestors waded through lots of crap, they'll believe that the Book of Abraham really was true after all, and that Joseph Smith's boinking of Fanny Alger really was approved by God, not to mention the dozens of other women? Huh?

So what if they reenacted the Trail of Tears forced mass migration of Indians at the hands of the US Government. What testimony will that strengthen?

What if they organize a recreation of the Bataan Death March. Will that help the kids realize the church was true?

[_Gazelam]

Seth:

So what if they reenacted the Trail of Tears forced mass migration of Indians at the hands of the US Government. What testimony will that strengthen?

Manifest Destiny

[_harmony]

Seth:

So what if they reenacted the Trail of Tears forced mass migration of Indians at the hands of the US Government. What testimony will that strengthen?

Manifest Destiny

Your ignorance is showing.