My belief in evolution MAGNIFIES my awe and wonder at our existence. I treasure our ancestry. The fact that we came from an exploding star truly fills my spirit with a wonder I can't describe. The fact that we came from animals gives me a sense of humility and gratitude that I can't articulate in words.
Agreed and I've felt the same way.
I'm frustrated becaues this point doesn't seem to be heard. It is NOT sex that is the problem... it is the idea that the God of the universe is not more advanced than us, new to the scene primates.
I thought I stated that I agreed with this. I was just stating from a contemporary LDS perspective that family, sex, and a primate looking body were things that God shared with his lower creation man. Perhaps it seems perverse to some that God had sex with Mary. It seemed a little odd to me when I first heard it. My rape comment was just me trying to illustrate the point that just because something seems odd, perverse, or doesn't quite fit our ideal doesn't mean that it didn't happen or wasn't true.
I fully respect your view that God could be something different, and given the scientific evidence available it is just a much or more plausible than my own. Whether He's presented that way to make it comprehensible to us, or really is I don't know.
God could have created man like play-do out of mud had He/She preferred to do so, yet He seems to have chosen a very natural and passive way in evolution. This way involved as little supernatural power and dramatic events as possible.
Now you're point that I fail to understand that man is not the end of evolution is well taken. I had never considered this and was speaking from an LDS perspective. I'd have to do a lot more thinking to come up with something like that because I have no idea what the implications would be on all of my current beliefs. This idea would force me to reconsider the resurrection, family unit, and who we are completely, and you would seem to know more about this than I do, but as of now in my understanding such views seem completely out of sync with LDS philosophy. Once you figure it all out and if you perhaps turn out to be right, as evolution turned out to be right, you can show us how it all fits. Yet the idea of a God in something other than a primate form leaves a plethora of unanswered questions right now as well.
I still hold that from an LDS perspective the most likely fit is that God had sex with Mary. Who would the other children had by Mary and Joseph be sealed to? We already face similar questions in temple divorces where the parties remarry and are sealed to someone else. How do we know God didn't become Mary's wife before they had sex? We don't know if she was sealed to Joseph in the temple, do we? I thought the story said she was just betrothed to Joseph when she got pregnant. It just seems to out of character for the God that I have learned about in Mormonism to do anything other than the least complicated and noninvasive way of doing something. I say noninvasive as opposed to the use of supernatural powers and things that don't really follow or go beyond our common biology to effect earthly events as being invasive.
The question is, will we adapt thereby allowing the continuation of our species or will we try to hold onto archaic ideas and die?
If anything what's killing us is that people aren't dying fast enough. But yes, I agree, you have a point on this.