Large numbers of members apostatizing - says Marlin K Jensen

[_Buffalo]

The Keystone to Mormonism.

If you read the Bible it tells us not to believe men but to check everything out for our self. I do not see where what I do is wrong. I think I am following a good plan. One in which the number of errors in my beliefs might be small.

I am very honest to everyone I meet about what I do. I have not had one person in the church tell me I am wrong. I have told my Bishop that no matter what I hear I will check it out. I have told them I trust no man.

Psa 146:3 Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help.

Joh 5:39 Search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.

2Ti 3:12 Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution.
2Ti 3:13 But evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived.
2Ti 3:14 But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them;
2Ti 3:15 And that from a child thou hast known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.
2Ti 3:16 All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
2Ti 3:17 That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.

Act 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the Scriptures daily whether those things were so.

When your faith puts you on the opposite side of intelligence and logic, you know you're in big trouble.

[_RockSlider]

Franktalk,

Born in 57 here, thanks for sharing that about yourself

Born in 45 here. Totally unrelated question. Do you have the reference to Joseph Smith declaring that there were no redheads in the celestial?

Never heard that one before .... geeze I hope not! Didn't you ever see Liz's picture with red hair?

Of course there is that whole South Park "Ginger" episode (red heads have no soul).

[_bcuzbcuz]

Never heard that one before .... geeze I hope not! Didn't you ever see Liz's picture with red hair?

Of course there is that whole South Park "Ginger" episode (red heads have no soul).

LOL No, I hadn't seen the South Park "ginger" episode. I'm pretty sure I read in Church History. I had an extensive set of thick bound volumes back in the late 1970's that never managed to make it across the Atlantic when I moved back to Sweden. Are any of these volumes available on line?

What am I saying? I don't want to wade through such mind bending stuff all over again.

[_Roger Morrison]

Very interesting OPs, re an always timely topic: Apostasy. Skipped a lot of reading to get to # 15, so I might have missed some good stuff.
It isn't hard for me to understand current apostasy and the concern it is to the Corporation. It's also interesting, if not amusing, to see corporate officers and staff attempts to quell the flow in rather ineffective ways.
Warm, fuzzy stories and apologetics have very little appeal to maturing thinking people that might have believed the myths and legends that hooked them in earlier years. But this IS the 21st century with more literate and better informed people.
The Ensign and LDS webs just don't cut it when it comes to serious DISCUSSION. Not sit & listen classes.
Further, a poster above said something to the effect "...if you read the Bible..." With all due respect Poster, if a person is reading the Bible with the idea it is "God's word," they are seriously misinformed at best, or illusioned at worst. in my opinion, that is. OTOH, if they get something out of it, so-be-it. . .

IF LDSism is truly serious in their commitment to "Restoration" they should step up to the docket and tell the truth: The Bible and their Quad, THE standard-works, are books written by mortal men! (Women weren't in the Club) They all contain some good & some bad thinking, speculation, mythology, legend, untruths, fiction, inspiration & consternation. . .

The untruth that has for centuries been held up as Divine Truth will eventually be exposed for what it was, and is. I won't go into that. Of which much has been written and spoken about that the seeker can avail themselves of. Apostasy, like evolution cannot be stopped! Truth WILL prevail!

[_Franktalk]

Apostasy, like evolution cannot be stopped! Truth WILL prevail!

The problem is what is truth? My truth comes from the spirit world which I can not show you. The truth of this world means nothing to me.

Imagine if you would that an alien came to you one night. And you were alone so no one witnessed what happened. You could see some kind of strange ship but it was like smoke and did not appear like anything you had ever seen before. A being came from the ship and spoke directly to your mind without sound. Images flashed before your eyes and you could see where the alien came from and the path the ship took to get to the earth. Then they left without leaving a trace of evidence of their visit. Now ask yourself if a person like myself who walks in the spirit would in some way resemble you trying to convince the world that aliens had landed.

If this happened to you no one would believe you. People would say to you where is the evidence. They would show you radar images showing no ship ever came into the atmosphere. They would show you pictures of the stars close to where you said the aliens came from. They would say there is no evidence of any planets in that area. They would say that no radio signals have ever been detected coming from that area so there can be no life there. Blah, blah, blah.

Welcome to my world.

[_Tobin]

The problem is what is truth? My truth comes from the spirit world which I can not show you. The truth of this world means nothing to me.

Imagine if you would that an alien came to you one night. And you were alone so no one witnessed what happened. You could see some kind of strange ship but it was like smoke and did not appear like anything you had ever seen before. A being came from the ship and spoke directly to your mind without sound. Images flashed before your eyes and you could see where the alien came from and the path the ship took to get to the earth. Then they left without leaving a trace of evidence of their visit. Now ask yourself if a person like myself who walks in the spirit would in some way resemble you trying to convince the world that aliens had landed.

If this happened to you no one would believe you. People would say to you where is the evidence. They would show you radar images showing no ship ever came into the atmosphere. They would show you pictures of the stars close to where you said the aliens came from. They would say there is no evidence of any planets in that area. They would say that no radio signals have ever been detected coming from that area so there can be no life there. Blah, blah, blah.

Welcome to my world.

Exactly. The truth is what God tells you is true. Go with that and you'll be fine. I think that is the point of Mormonism anyway.

[_Themis]

The problem is what is truth?

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/truth

My truth comes from the spirit world which I can not show you.

What you believe the truth to be.

The truth of this world means nothing to me.

This an excuse to ignore uncomfortable evidence that conflicts with what meaning you think you have learned from spiritual expereinces. I don't think it is a good idea to try and separate truths out into worldly and spiritual. There really is no separation. A truth proposition is either correct or incorrect.

Imagine if you would that an alien came to you one night. And you were alone so no one witnessed what happened. You could see some kind of strange ship but it was like smoke and did not appear like anything you had ever seen before. A being came from the ship and spoke directly to your mind without sound. Images flashed before your eyes and you could see where the alien came from and the path the ship took to get to the earth. Then they left without leaving a trace of evidence of their visit. Now ask yourself if a person like myself who walks in the spirit would in some way resemble you trying to convince the world that aliens had landed.

A lot of people do claim this kind of expereince. Many other claims a variety of other experiences with divine type beings. There really is no consensus on what they mean though. The only pattern I see is that most tend to interpret them according to their already held beliefs, or past beliefs.

If this happened to you no one would believe you. People would say to you where is the evidence.

There are a number of people who would not, but then they tend to have similar beliefs to the person claiming the experience. They probability would tend to question other expereinces that do not agree with their beliefs.

They would show you radar images showing no ship ever came into the atmosphere. They would show you pictures of the stars close to where you said the aliens came from. They would say there is no evidence of any planets in that area. They would say that no radio signals have ever been detected coming from that area so there can be no life there. Blah, blah, blah.

Welcome to my world.

Is there a reason people should not ask for verification of other peoples claims? Is there something about it that is beyond question? Should we not maybe even question our own, especially if other evidence does not support what we believe is the meaning behind the expereince.

[_Roger Morrison]

Apostasy, like evolution cannot be stopped! Truth WILL prevail!

The problem is what is truth? My truth comes from the spirit world which I can not show you. The truth of this world means nothing to me.
Hi Frank! Thanks for responding. You ask a very common, generally unanswerable question, that I don't see as a problem. . .

Imagine if you would that an alien came to you one night. And you were alone so no one witnessed what happened. You could see some kind of strange ship but it was like smoke and did not appear like anything you had ever seen before. A being came from the ship and spoke directly to your mind without sound. Images flashed before your eyes and you could see where the alien came from and the path the ship took to get to the earth. Then they left without leaving a trace of evidence of their visit. Now ask yourself if a person like myself who walks in the spirit would in some way resemble you trying to convince the world that aliens had landed.

[color=#BF0000Can't imagine it Frank. I don't see the relevance to the the apostatizing topic. I think people leave Mormonism and Theism, in general, because they become aware of its untruth and walk away from its make-believe world. Those comfortable in make-believe of course are discomforted by those leaving the club and struggle with the reality of a particular truth and ask, "what is truth?" Seeming to think they have befuddled the other party and have won \ ended the discussion, LOL!! [/color]
If this happened to you no one would believe you. People would say to you where is the evidence. They would show you radar images showing no ship ever came into the atmosphere. They would show you pictures of the stars close to where you said the aliens came from. They would say there is no evidence of any planets in that area. They would say that no radio signals have ever been detected coming from that area so there can be no life there. Blah, blah, blah.

Welcome to my world.

Thanks for your hospitality Frank! But your world is not my world. As a pragmatic guy depending on the sciences, as well as being a creative innovative inventor, I find it interesting that the Mormon Church has some officers who recognize that they are probably losing the better minds of their mass.

Which I think is unfortunate. LDSism, as churches go, is probably one of the better ones. They have some good programs and many devoted members straining to be obedient to their leaders at all levels. Unfortunately, it is the well intended leadership, at all levels, that is sabotaging the ship. . . in my opinion...
Credit to the people who are trying to bail it out. Maybe mutiny would work??

[_Drifting]

The problem is what is truth? My truth comes from the spirit world which I can not show you. The truth of this world means nothing to me.

Imagine if you would that an alien came to you one night. And you were alone so no one witnessed what happened. You could see some kind of strange ship but it was like smoke and did not appear like anything you had ever seen before. A being came from the ship and spoke directly to your mind without sound. Images flashed before your eyes and you could see where the alien came from and the path the ship took to get to the earth. Then they left without leaving a trace of evidence of their visit. Now ask yourself if a person like myself who walks in the spirit would in some way resemble you trying to convince the world that aliens had landed.

If this happened to you no one would believe you. People would say to you where is the evidence. They would show you radar images showing no ship ever came into the atmosphere. They would show you pictures of the stars close to where you said the aliens came from. They would say there is no evidence of any planets in that area. They would say that no radio signals have ever been detected coming from that area so there can be no life there. Blah, blah, blah.

Welcome to my world.

Exactly. The truth is what God tells you is true. Go with that and you'll be fine. I think that is the point of Mormonism anyway.

Except when God tells you things that aren't consistent with what the Church teaches. Then He's lying.

[_Tobin]

Exactly. The truth is what God tells you is true. Go with that and you'll be fine. I think that is the point of Mormonism anyway.

Except when God tells you things that aren't consistent with what the Church teaches. Then He's lying.

Yes, because we all know the founder of the Mormon church did exactly that and Mormonism is just the flavor of the month of Catholicism/Puritanism/mixed with pop rocks and rainbow sprinkles.