https://www.lds.org/ensign/2015/03/when-doubts-and-questions-arise?lang=eng

Have the barf bag ready.

If anyone doubts LDS, Inc. is in trouble, you only have to read their own propaganda. For years we have had to rely on anecdotal evidence that people were leaving in droves, since LDS, Inc. hides its own data. Since last conference, they have done nothing but scream about people leaving. If I were a TBM, I'd be curious as to why this sudden emphasis on doubt and questioning. It would lead me to question what was going on.

I'm pretty sure most TBMs know now that their church is struggling. Between the cost cutting and now the alarmist reaction to defectors, it's obvious that the church is not growing like gang busters any more. I've heard a few of them public attack people leaving, but you know the minute they start to have doubts, they will be looking into the very things that got us to quit.

Excellent post! This is exactly what's happening.

It is AWFUL!! Full of guilt inducing claptrap... When your faith falls apart, it is all your own fault for not looking for answers with real intent...

That's basically the message...oh and obey.. obey and obey... even when it doesn't make sense to.. just obey and everything will be fine..

All written in 4rth grade style....

I couldn't even read it all the way through..


awful awful awful...



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/24/2015 10:59AM by Becca.

It is written in 4th grade style with a 4th grade example:
Some people also stumble over statements made by Church leaders that have turned out to be incorrect, not about doctrine but in their personal opinions. For example, President Joseph Fielding Smith (1876–1972) wrote in the first edition of his book Answers to Gospel Questions, “It is doubtful that man will ever be permitted to make any instrument or ship to travel through space and visit the moon or any distant planet.”4

Later, following the Apollo moon landings and the death of President David O. McKay, Joseph Fielding Smith became President of the Church. At a press conference, a reporter asked him about this statement. President Smith replied, “Well, I was wrong, wasn’t I?”

Of course they didn't mention Hinkley saying "I don't know that we teach that."

Or the huge difference between the 1st printing of the BOM and the 2nd printing...after God discovered 'grammar check'.

Could Tad's photo at the bottom of the article be more creepier? I guess ol' Tad feels he needs to jump on the doubt your doubts bandwagon and be relevant after he was relegated to the sunday school presidency.

I made it just halfway thru.

That was par for the golf course.


I never have read anything on LDS Inc. that has any meat to it.

"Likewise, if you seek an answer to a spiritual question from the Source of all knowledge, then you have to follow His rules to get the answer."

So basically, we have to follow "His" and by "His" they mean, "Our" rules in order to get an answer. And we all know that their rules do not include rational thought processes. How stupid.

Fake it till you make it!

When I came across the issues that shook my faith I did pray, heck I even fasted that I might find out the truth. No matter how hard I prayed and wished, the reality was the same: anti-mormon writers were using verifiable statements made by the church, published by the church, and denied by the church. And when I did follow his rules to find the answer, the answer was to leave the church. It wasn't the answer I wanted, but truth isn't always what we want to hear.

As I would soon learn, it does not matter if the church is true, or false. All that matters is that you faithfully continue to support and promote it, and that you do not tell anyone what you know.

exactly. I felt like the Joseph Smith quote (probably not quoting it 100% right), 'If anyone needed answers from God, I did.' and the 'teachers of religion understood the same sections of scripture so differently' stuff that he knew the bible couldn't answer his questions. It was painfully clear the church didn't have answers and that all the evidence was against the church. And those answers I needed from God to help make sense of the mess... well they didn't come, so I just kept researching. Because I figured, maybe this is the answer. And if no answer is forthcoming, I'd always learned, 'God helps those who help themselves', and 'Pray like everything depends on the Lord and work live everything depends on you'... And stuff like that.

Me too. I really thought that 'truth could stand the scrutiny.' I thought that I just needed to keep digging and keep praying and keep living the gospel and I would find a good explanation for the problems I was finding, instead I kept finding more problems. This was in the pre-internet days. It was devastating to me. TBMs who think we leave the church because it's to hard to live the gospel have no clue. It would have been much easier to put my head in the sand and keep pretending like some of my friends of family do.

I have a minister friend who said the Christian journals or magazines are reporting that people are leaving the churches, Protestant, in droves.

It is not the 'fringe' members who don't got to church much.

It is not the ones who were "offended because the congregation decided on to go with a color of carpet in the foyer they didn't like" or "someone hurt their feelings."

It is the stalwart ones he said. The ones who are the backbone of the church. The ones who have always been there, volunteering their time and money to keep the church going.
They are either going to their own little home study groups or joining soup kitchen ministries or hospital visit ministries or any small group/church that is out among the people serving the people, not just going to endless meetings.
And get this, the Christians are "tired of hearing the same thing over and over again from the pulpit from their pastors"!

The people are leaving active Christian church membership to go serve because that's what being a Christian is all about.

Then the pastor said something interesting.
"Did Jesus say after I'm gone form churches and meeting houses where you can gather together and decide what color the new carpet in the foyer is? or build a nice church camp where you can meet together on 'retreats' or a 'cultural hall' where you can eat together? No, Jesus said after I am gone you are to love one another as I have loved you.Jesus was out among the people, healing the sick, feeding the hungry, and comforting the sad who have lost all hope in living."


That is why Christians and their caring neighbors of other faiths or no declared religion are sharing meals in the park, visiting the friendless, raising money for shelters, volunteering for suicide helplines, coming up with service animals for the disabled, etc.


The stalwarts of other faiths are leaving their churches too!

Here's an interesting cross post from another forum, in relation to this article. It's a Hasidic Jewish apologist saying basically all of the same things.

http://www.baismedrash.com/2011/05/apikorsus-is-the-new-black-part-1/

"Difference between Apikores [apostate] and a 'questioner' Questioner has questions. Apikores has answers. Moshol: This one pole holds up this whole building. A questioner may ask: 'I don’t see how one pole can hold up the whole building'. But he knows the somehow, it does. An Apikores says: 'The pole cannot hold up the whole building because I do not see how it can'. We accept questioners with open arms. Apikorsim are not questioners. Questioning is not Apikorsus; the arrogant attitude that there is no answer to the questions, is."


He also talks about having simple faith, not needing answers to all questions, building up our confidence, and avoiding bad influences. It's all the same stuff I learned in church.

The questioner takes your answer at face value. The apostate wants a demonstration to gain a fuller understanding.

When the teacher refuses to demonstrate, the apostate reasonably concludes that the teacher is lying, because he cannot back up his response with factual evidence.

Instead of dismissing the critical questioner, satisfy his curiosity. Show him how the tentpole works. You will win a strong minded supporter if you do, or gain a powerful enemy if you do not.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/24/2015 09:44PM by axeldc.

For some reason Tad's use of the word "alleged" right in front of "scientific" made me a little sad for him.

Just the opening tells me what the article is about. "Searching for answers in the Lord's way." So we can search for answers, but only in the churches preapproved way. Which probably just means praying for it. Don't actually do any research or anything to know the truth about this or that, just pray for it. God will give you the knowledge if he feels like it.

For a church that hates masturbation, they intellectually do quite a bit of it.

This is how the techniques in the article can be applied.

Question: " Have the MORmON leaders EVER had a bona fide revelation" ?

Doubt: "It does not look like it!"

Confirmation: "Research shows that LDS leaders have NEVER had a real revelation, AND that they have messed up a lot, no need to pray on this issue when the facts have already spoken. The truth will make a person free of MORmONISM "

Right at the beginning:

"Questions, when asked with a sincere desire to increase one’s understanding and faith, are to be encouraged."

That's not seeking truth, it's seeking justification. I went looking for answers to prop up my faith. I gained understanding that crushed every bit of faith I had in TSCC and its doctrine. I was more focused on learning the truth, whatever that was, than twisting my brain in knots trying to make the sick truth somehow bolster my faith. The folks at FAIR helped me see that I did not want a lifetime of mental acrobatics and delusion for myself or my children.

What the f does being an engineer have to do with any of this?

I hate how often engineers bring up the fact that they are engineers.

If he really was a network engineer, he would need better troubleshooting skills than simply following rules that apply only when you assume the network is running well.

Because we're intellectual bad-asses!

The average westerners day starts, ends, and is made possible by stuff an engineer designed.

Leonardo Devinci
James Watt
Archimedes
Henry Ford
Alexander Bell

I have no clue how this relates to op's link :)

LDS, INC., you are so failing your people.

You know that, right?
You are not helping them resolve their issues.
Doubting has it's place in the human psyche. It can be very useful.

You need to address, in an *intellectual* manner, and not an emotional manner, your people's doubts.

"Questions are a critical part of our eternal growth..." So quit asking questions.

Always speaking from both sides of the mouth.

Great post, thank you!

I love that the church is reeling from so many people discovering the truth and getting out. It is pretty obvious that serious damage is being done to the membership numbers, since they seem to talk about doubts and faith 75% of the time lately. Hopefully the ship will continue to sink and good people will continue to jump overboard.

Found on a TSCC oriented site. To me it's a mock, which I think it was meant to be. Whoever posted it may have been too thick to get that, though. Probbly didn't realize it's based on a beer commercial!


http://lds.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/uchtdorf-meme-12.jpg



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/24/2015 06:32PM by rationalist01.

I've decided to doubt doubting my doubts.

I've been doubtin for some time that doubting doubts is good. A healthy dose of skepticism keeps one from being duped by everyone from used car salespersons to peddlers of weird religions!

A key point as I saw it was:

"when people doubt their beliefs, they often suspend their commitment to commandments"

. . . in other words, they stop paying tithing.

And then God can't pay his bills, I guess.

(From an earlier post)

From the Article:

"A sincere questioner continues to be obedient while searching for answers. By contrast, I have seen that when people doubt their beliefs, they often suspend their commitment to commandments and covenants while waiting for answers. The doubter’s posture is generally to withhold obedience or limit it, pending resolution of the doubts."

Ok then -- Are these the SAME instructions that our missionaries should be passing on to their investigators as well?

EXAMPLE:

"Brother Brown, as a 'sincere questioner', we truly feel that you should continue to be obedient to your Catholic faith and all your catholic covenants while we teach you about Mormonism. Don't suspend your faith in the Pope as you read about Joseph Smith! Don't give up your deep feelings about your Catholic heritage while waiting for an answer about our church!"


..... Methinks Mormons speak with forked tongues .....

And here would be a better topic: "When Sincere Questioning Becomes Doubt"............. Because let's be honest, nobody goes straight from full belief, 'obedience', and 'covenant keeping to DOUBT. Although the manipulative wording of this article would definitely have one believe that, once again, it's a person's failure to continue to 'obey' and 'keep covenants' that leads them into this terrible predicament.

From the article, "What matters is not letting that uneasiness turn us from our covenants during our search for answers. I have learned from personal experience that we cannot turn our back on God and then expect Him to answer our questions on our terms."
So, this article would have one believe that not keeping the church organization's covenants is the same as turning one's back on God, whereas in reality, if you maintain a belief in a God, not keeping church covenants is NOT the same as turning your back on God, and if there really is a God, I don't think that would sever one's relationship with this God...

The manipulation just blows me away.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/25/2015 12:15AM by dogeatdog.

notice the focus is on 'Spiritual Questions', NOT FACTUAL ONES (or Answers).

disgusting & pathetic

If the truth and questioning are so important, why does the Church usually take no stand on issues;i.e. answer the questions, teh CES letter, et al.