Over the millennia there have been many religions that have died or just faded away. Thousands of religions have come and gone.

It helps if a religion bonds with a political entity, such as Christianity with the Roman Empire, or Buddhism with the Mauryan Empire under Ashoka.

But will Mormonism survive the ages?

"You can buy anything in this world for money". Straight out of the temple dialogue. Yes, they will survive, simply from the stand point that they can "buy" survival.

sunbeep Wrote:
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> "You can buy anything in this world for money".
> Straight out of the temple dialogue. Yes, they
> will survive, simply from the stand point that
> they can "buy" survival.

And how can they "buy" survival?

The mighty morg spent an awful lot of money on Proposition 8 in California to "buy" what they wanted.

Tons of money spent to defeat the gay movement just recently. Well, not defeat, but to obtain a decision favorable to the morg.

They are spending a ton of cash buying up property and owning real estate is always a good investment that usually appreciates in value.

With prudent lobbying, they can "buy" laws and ordinances which slant in their direction.

cinda Wrote:
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> sunbeep Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > "You can buy anything in this world for money".
> > Straight out of the temple dialogue. Yes, they
> > will survive, simply from the stand point that
> > they can "buy" survival.
>
> And how can they "buy" survival?

When the Mo organization needs anything it pays cash. Gov't access, supplies, even P.R.

Cash

Year by year Mormonism has become less relevant. It is clearly a nineteenth century relic stuck in the twenty-first century by mistake. It will die a long slow death as more and more individuals determine that it has nothing for them.

While it was the "religion" held in great esteem by my pioneer ancestors, Mormonism clearly has nothing of even the slightest interest to me.

The question should be "Will the Church survive the Q15?".

They could make the church relevant if they weren't so busy absolutely doing nothing of any value besides fortifying their empire. If the church were really true, God would call them home in one fell swoop.

Hey, Baby!

You bring up a good point! I think about this from time to time.

If the Q15 were not such irrelevant relics locked in the calcification of their own cluelessness, ignorance, homophobia, misogyny, racism and bigotry, they could easily and creatively reinvent Mormonism to appeal to people born after typewriters became useless.

Even with zero improvements, it will take decades for the Mormon Church to dwindle and perish in unbelief. It can survive for a long time living off its megapile of cash and assets, and its current inventory of mind control cult brainwashees and their captive bic production.

Because of their self-inflicted cog fog, The Brethren cannot see half past their own penises, let alone make strategically smart course corrections to keep their bizchurch pointing up and to the right.

TSCC will die eventually, but not in our lifetimes. Unless, of course, Jesus Comes Again before that and takes over.

Recall the doctrine that the Church will go away when it is no longer needed. Fortunately for most of us on RfM, that day already happened!

YeeHaw! Thank you, Jesus!

Sun beep

I don't think you can buy survival.

Zorastrianism was a great and powerful religion until it was exterminated by Islam.

Money is only money

You, in particular, may be pleased to learn that there are still some pockets of Zoroastrians in existence. There are a few small communities in Pakistan and India, principally around Bombay. I was friends in graduate school with a woman who was Zoroastrian (Parsi/Parsee) and whose grandfather had translated the Avesta. It is still available on Amazon.

According to my friend, the Parsi had their own walled cemetery because their religion required that bodies not be cremated but rather exposed to the elements. It was somewhat scandalous to the Hindus and Moslems in the area.

The origin of this group was flight from the Islamic conquest of Iran. Parsi tradition says the migration occurred in the 8th century but the first external reference only attests to the community's existence a few centuries later. Like most tiny religions, this one seems likely to die out over the next hundred years.

Strangely, the modern name for Bombay--phonetically moom-buy--is a banned word on RfM.

Each generation decides what's of value. It's like land speculation, Utah recreational land some years can be sold sky high and other years for a third what it once was. Sometimes people are unusually interested and other times nobody is buying. Of course Agents are always pushing for the highest price they think they can get so they can fleece their clients.

Mormonism runs the same as any other business.

As long as Freemasonry survives, COJCOLDS, one of her many children, will thrive.

The same goes for all her siblings: Watchtower, Mary Eddyism, Adventism and a dozen more.

The rebungnified "worshipful" Lodge, spawner of cults, has invested a fortune in these Church-fronts and are not about to allow such cash-cows to expire.

They had their chance, and would have faded away. But then fate intervened, and Joseph Smith got shot. That made him into a martyr, and the church took off. Then most of the church wandered in the wilderness under a dictator, and built up a solid base and put down better roots, and threatened members with death. Then after almost going bankrupt, they decided that would never happen again, and diversified financially. Mel Brooks called it "moichandisin'." Now they are a business empire, strong on several fronts, and even if they lose all their members, the board of trustees and Corporation of the President will forever be safe. Someone predicted here that the Mormon church may become like Amana over the years, but instead of the former church selling appliances, they will sell investment opportunities and real estate, and in future may be the only entity to turn to if you need to purchase water rights in the West.

This is the first time I have heard about water rights and seems odd given the intrusion of the federal government on water issues here in the routinely moist South. Can you educate me on this?

Gatorman
2-0

I only know that water rights trading is one of the business activities that the LDS church engages in, I believe all over the region. In 2006, for instance, Las Vegas paid the LDS church millions for local water rights own by the Mormons. Naturally, it would be known as "something Reserve," or would be a part of "something Reserve"--Agricultural Reserve, Inc., maybe, or Suburban Land Reserve, Inc., or Property Reserve, Inc., to name only three of their for-profit "Reserve" businesses.

I just tried to look it up. I found an article on the Las Vegas deal, and this is an important line from it: "Officials with the Salt Lake City-based church declined comment on land holdings and water rights in the region."

Mike T. Wrote:
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... Then after almost going
> bankrupt, they decided that would never happen
> again, and diversified financially. Mel Brooks
> called it "moichandisin'." Now they are a business
> empire...

Watch how Brooks teaches this tactic in Technicolor brilliance:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxYVeJhwPdQ

A remnant of it may survive. It won't be recognizable to us as what we were familiar with (if you grew up in it.)

It's already morphing and adapting to the changing times, by buckling down by the hardliners, as the rest molt and break away.

It's going through "growing pains" as it downsizes because it's losing relevancy in the world as a religion. The only thing holding it together are its financial holdings, and the core membership who won't leave until carried off in a hearse.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 09/14/2016 01:58PM by Amyjo.

My vote is that Mormonism of some form or another is not going away. Those in authority and those soon to be in authority love the money, the attention, the adoration and the power and are not about to give this up.

These men have continually showed that they will bend to the rules of society and the government when they are forced to in order to survive. I think this is part and parcel for who they really are. The corporation is a bully, out to get and be all that it can, but when a showdown occurs and they are caught red-handed being the bully, they back down.

There will always be one cult or another, to satisfy the cultists, which is most of us.

The world is full of scams people want to buy into.

Try pointing out the scams and usually get into a fight. Like taking booze from a drunk.

If history is any guide, there is always the opportunity to engage in more militant activities. Since the LDS already has a record of those kinds of endeavors, leadership could research various causal factors to determine the likelihood of future success.

But the end result - unless they want to go full Sharia - is to suffer the kinds of losses conventional Xians have experienced in Europe. However, the problem with all faith based systems - secular or ecclesiastical - is that public enemy #1 of belief: IQ.

As gene therapy comes on line over the coming decade (make no mistake, military labs around the globe have been focusing research on intelligence & strength ie size/power + limb regeneration, organ cultivation, etc), there is a real opportunity to move the baseline 1 std deviation. That is, from around 100 to 115.

Now, consider the worst nightmare of both political and religious leaders: a large mass of people completely cognizant & aware of the canards, techniques, and messages of persuasion. Or, as George C Scott uttered in Patton: "Rommel, you magnificent bastard, I read your book!"

Imagine the fun & games that would ensue if people, armed with a degree of reason & logic exhibited like many contributors on this board, not only refrained from criticizing church leadership, but did them one better? That is, they could both walk the walk, and talk the talk in perfect irony and sarcasm?

A church may be able to suffer its fools, but it's vulnerable to satire, especially if the audience at large is in on the joke. To get back to my original question, watch medical policy as it pertains to gene therapy.

The tell will be whether there are attempts to suppress, or recognizing the ultimate futility, decide to (re)invent another means of control.

Many Enlightenment thinkers thought religion would go away. Hasn't happened yet although the church is in decline in Europe. There is a decline in America, too, but less than Europe.

The Mormon Church has a prophet, so they are equipped to adapt. All it takes is a revelation or two.

My vote is that the Church survives but changes.

There is a small problem with the Church surviving.

It is what kind of "revelation" do The Brethren receive automatically without even trying?

Their Holy Ghost reveals to The Brethren precisely which prospective new Apostles, Seventies, Area Reps, and other GA's are sporting the same "like mind" and the same "color of heart" as The Brethren themselves.

This sixth sense automatically keeps all applicants with even a residual shred of WWJD intact from ever being promoted to the Elite Ranks of LDS Inc.

The Brethren regularly demonstrate in public their excellent marksmanship at shooting themselves in the feet over and over, and without even realizing when they do it.

Every time this happens, another round of disgusted TBMs take off their garments and burn their temple recommends.

This can go on for a long time, no doubt, but not forever.

Lots wife cites the example of the Parsis who live in the state Of Maharashtra. There are a few million followers left of the world religion of Zorastrianism. Once there were perhaps hundreds of millions of followers until they were exterminated by Islam.

Where is Zorastrianism today?

Postscript:

The state of Maharashtra in northern India.

Brian,

I think your numbers are off. At 1,000 BCE, when Zoroastrianism may have begun, there were a bit more than 100 million people in the world. In 600 CE, near the birth of Islam, there were just over 200 million humans alive. At 1,000 CE, by which time Zoroastrianism was in decline, the total was about 300 million. That makes it hard to believe the Zoroastrian number ever approached 100 million. 10-40 million might be more probable; and it would represent a huge proportion of global humanity through at least the time of Mohammed.

As for today's Zoroastrians, I believe the numbers are somewhere below 200,000. If the number were really in the millions, the community could survive. But the actual numbers are far below that--well below the level that demographers think necessary to sustain the religion and the ethnicity.

That said, you are right to bring them up. Their influence over Judaism and Christianity (and Islam) was immense. If you read through the Old Testament books chronologically, everything seems reasonably stable (Hebrew tradition) until you get to about 600 BCE, after which point things go crazy. The Book of Job has Satan entering the presence of God, bantering with him, and then betting on a human's loyalty. From about the same date the prophets start speaking of a final judgment, the burning of the wicked, a resurrection and a millennium, ideas that had not been present in the Hebrew canon before. And now God lives in fire like the sun and the earth will be perfected as an orb of fire on which the saved will live.

All of these ideas are Zoroastrian. The Book of Job was lifted almost exactly from the Avesta; and the followers of Zarathustra/Zoroaster worshipped a god of fire (Ahura Mazda), believed in a good/evil-heaven/hell dichotomy of the world, looked forward to a final judgment and a resurrection and a millennial or paradisiacal existence. The Jewish ruling elite learned of these ideas when in Babylonian Captivity, where they intermingled with Persian Zoroastrians who were also Babylonian captives. They took the Persian notions and combined them with older Hebrew ideas and myths to produce Exilic Judaism, which accompanied them back to Jerusalem.

You can imagine how hard it was to shove that down the throats of the poorer Jews who had stayed in Palestine and were still worshipping, for the most part, in fertility cults. The result was a cultural war in which the returning elite tried to force everyone to accept their Yahweh cult but did not really succeed. The new Judaism remained an elite religion through Jesus's time as, in fact, Zoroastrianism had probably been even in its homeland of Persia.

But putting that aside, it is clear that without the Zoroastrian influence, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam would look nothing like what we are used to. The Bible itself would have been vastly different.

Wait, there is a given number that demographers say needs to be maintained for something not to die? What is it? How close is Mormonism to that number?

Very interesting, Lot's Wife, thank you.

Tom in Paris

Lots wife
Thank you for population figures. The few million figure came from the government of India's internal figures. Obviously the government is not so accurate. What a surprise!

I have seen the towers of silence in Shivaji park above the city
That we cannot name. To western sensibilities the towers of silence are shocking. There are pictures on the internet that can be accessed.

What is with the city that cannot be named?