Were you ever told that you were a “choice spirit” who was “held back until the very end” so that you could prepare the world for the second coming of Christ?

I remember a Ward Council meeting I attended about 20 years ago. I was very TBM at the time. A missionary who was assigned to our ward said (rather smugly) “I am a member of the chosen generation that was held back until the very end.” I said “Elder, this is going to be a bit like when you found out that Santa Claus wasn’t real, but I think you’re old enough to know the truth: every generation is told that.” If that missionary remained active, and followed the usual path for Mormons, he probably has teenage children of his own now. I wonder if they’re being told that they are special spirits who were held back until the end.

The idea of being among the chosen few helped to keep the youth in line in two ways: it stroked their egos (“I am a truly unique and valiant spirit who proved myself in the pre-earthly existence”) and it instilled fear and anxiety (“the second coming is near-I need to avoid sin and do all I can to prepare the world”). As a teenager in the 1970s, the fear of the second coming was frequently on my mind.

I haven’t attended church for years, but it seemed to me that talk of “the Lord’s return is nigh” had cooled considerably once the year 2000 had come and gone. In 2011 Boyd K. Packer even told the youth that they could look forward to "getting married, having a family, seeing your children and grandchildren, maybe even great-grandchildren." There is no way that a GA would have said that when I was young.

For those of you who still attend, or have attended recently, has “the second coming is near” become a “boy who cried wolf” kind of thing, or is it still taught?

Yes I was told that--in the 1950's. And the 60's. And the 70's.

Most who have been told that passed their sell-by date, clearly.

Like the early "saints" who were told that the second coming was in the late 1800's by the very prophet Joseph Smith and that they were the chosen ones.

On Feb 14 1835, The very Joseph prophesied," The coming of the lord which is nigh--even 56 years --should wrap it up." hardy har har har.

Is there anything more useless than a Mormon prophesy?


Let's face it. Saying that this is the end of times and the youth are the most choice of all gives the G.A.s something special to say to the youth when otherwise they don't have much in the way of enticements. Cuz the only other thing they have to say beside pay your tithing is don't do this fun thing and don't do that fun thing and please don't use your brain--that is our job.

I don't have first hand information but I would put good money on the fact that the kids are still being told the same old drivel.

"The White Ribbon" (2009)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KJKvvvxY74

Another story about young people being set apart as the favored and "chosen" ones.


One of my other favorite examples is from a classic 1930s science fiction story called "Tumithak Of The Corridors" where humans have been forced to live underground after an alien invasion. One group of humans who live near the surface called the "Esthettes" who are pampered and think they are favored by the aliens -- whom they worship as gods -- only to find out that they are truly favored...as food.

Edit: Are you standard, choice, or prime?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/17/2022 12:13PM by caffiend.

Or is that, "Institutionalized?"

Anyway, consider me Salisbury Steak.

Try the Celestial Seasoning, it's to die for.

That also sounds to me like "The Time Machine" (1895) by H.G. Wells, wherein the time traveler visiting England's remote future discovers that the Eloi--surface-dwelling people with very childlike minds and small, soft, beautiful bodies, who spend their lives playing and gamboling innocently in the sunshine and the meadow--have their counterparts in the Morlocks, bestialized subterranean humanoids who keep the machines going that make the idyllic Eloi lifestyle possible: so they can eat them.

(Wells, who was something of a democratic socialist, intended a parable about the fates of the "idle rich" of his own Gilded Age era, and the wretched industrial-revolution working class that made all of their wealth and endless leisure possible.)

"56 years" would have been a safe prediction to make!

American demographers and statisticians have done exhaustive studies to work out the population dynamics of our early Republic from the diverse and disorganized sets of vital statistics that archivists have brought to light.

For the youngest group of adult-ish Saints in Bro. Joseph's 1835 audience, the cohort born from 1810-19 and therefore aged 15-25 in that year, life expectancy at birth had been less than 40 years. Those still above the ground in 1835 were survivors of a harrowing world of epidemic or endemic diseases, and the accident of an agricultural society with little "modern" medicine available, hazards that resulted in child mortality worse than that of the poorest societies today.

These hardy and lucky young Saints of 1835 had attained to a remaining average life expectancy of only 39-40 more years. Well short of 56! In other words, by the promised year, even that year revelated by the Prophet--1891--all of them could confidently expect to be long in their graves already, and almost all of them were; for life expectancies changed but little during the entire 19th century.

And when Bro. Joseph's mighty prophecy had failed to come true, not many would remember it, and new stories about the radiant future could replace it, and it came to pass that this was done over and over again.

I was told that stuff about being in the "choice" generation because of our behavior in the spirit world, and they also included the odds about being born in the USA, and how "special" we were to live here.

The end of the world has been scheduled to come for hundreds of years; that train is a bit late.

Ahhhh...but what happens when you aren't "special" any more?


Now you know why I'm saying religion and ethno-nationalism are
linked and leading us towards civil war.

Saturday's Warrior.

What a load of...

Apparently I was. Proof is being born BIC. Right?

The important thing to know is anyone can be a choice human being but you got to work at it. Thinking that you were born that way will set you back big time.

Oh, not only was I a choice spirit, but in the dear old Pre-Ex I was the "Spirit of Choice" for all the sisters at our other-dimensional stake dances, if you catch my drift.... Good times!

Photos or it didn't happen... hahahah.

I used to be chosen. Then I went inactive and, to my great surprise, I suddenly stopped being chosen and instead became an agent of Satan. The funny thing is, I don't remember feeling any different.

I was told that right in my Patriarchal Blessing™, delivered by none other than Eldred G Smith, the last Church Patriarch. That must make me extra-choice, eligible for double-secret probation, or something like that.

Wow. I would say with that you deserve the "Double Stuffed Oreo" Award.

Every generation is a choice generation. This from ETB, 35 years ago:

"For nearly six thousand years, God has held you in reserve to make your appearance in the final days before the second coming of the Lord. Some individuals will fall away; but the kingdom of God will remain intact to welcome the return of its head — even Jesus Christ. While our generation will be comparable in wickedness to the days of Noah, when the Lord cleansed the earth by flood, there is a major difference this time. It is that God has saved for the final inning some of His strongest children, who will help bear off the kingdom triumphantly. That is where you come in, for you are the generation that must be prepared to meet your God." ("In His Steps," given at a CES devotional in Anaheim on 2/8/1987; quoted in "Teachings of Ezra Taft Benson," pp. 104-105.)

So, if the people who were youths in 1987 had been held in reserve to make their appearance in the final days….what about the young people in the church today? Are they even more special, having been reserved even longer? How about the kids who haven’t been born yet?

I was told that during my entire mormon life.

I was also told that I was a "savior on Mt Zion" because I brought my ex-husband into the church. That was a huge blessing and responsibility for both of us.

He asked to be exed 20+ years ago, as he officially came out of the closet, divorcing his second wife. I think that he told a bishop or two that he was gay (he didn't tell me), because they kept telling me to pray more, study more, and to seduce him better.

This is the first time I've seen the phrase...but then again I wasn't paying attention in church

We were told this repeatedly when I was at the Language Training Mission (Now MTC) in Provo. We were also told that many of us gathered in the Stadium would be serving missions when the second coming happens. (To which my companion whispered "Holy F..K" under his breath. ) I think the sign of the times was Jimmy Carter being president and George Burns being cast as God in a John Denver family movie, but I forget.

I was reminded over and over that I was a marginal spirit, especially by the bishopric and ym leaders who constantly herded me into worthiness meetings.

Apparently, the stake patriarchal get the memo when I received my patriarch blessing. I am pretty sure it is the very first line.

How could my inspired leaders like Brother Blowhard and Bishop Steel be wrong?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/18/2022 09:47AM by messygoop.

Did you not get the standard cut and paste patriarchal blessing?

According to mormon royalty traits, we are the fringe element, my family and I. Christensen as we might be.

My sister and I were just talking about this stuff last weekend.

I was told in my PB that I was a choice spirit, too, or whatever the term is. My daughter has my PB. I threw it away. She retrieved it. She even ordered my mother's PB. Mine is much longer than my daughter's, so maybe I'm the choice one? My "husband" must be one of the choice ones. I was told I was a special spirit and it was my job to save him, remember. I was told that MANY TIMES. I obviously wasn't a choice spirit as he is still gay or since they don't have to change to straight now, he is still "sinning." I joined him in sinning (with a different guy than he chooses from).

I remember reading a Dialog article about women leaving their husbands in the early days of the church to be sealed to GAs as they were promised the CK if they were married to a GA. AND the article talked about the second coming being close at hand. OH, I SEE! So I wasn't anything special? I never thought I was. Mormons made sure I didn't feel that way.

But I've said before that they had said enough to make me believe the end would come around 2000 and I would be 42. So I hoped that it would end as my life as such a mess at the time. I was alone here with my dog on new year's eve and I sat on the couch and counted down to midnight HOPING it would end. I knew it wouldn't, but I could hope, couldn't I?

And here I am 22 years later. I am an adulteress, an apostate, and I'm lazy.