My cousin Vinny is an LDS ghost writer. He makes his living by writing the talks several of the GA's give as their own. We had lunch the other day and he told me three of the talks that will be given during April Conference are his.

The theme of the conference is going to be reclaiming those who have left the Church. My cousin Vinny said the GA's believe the ROI from returning members will be larger and longer sustaining than the church would get from new converts. A modest 2% to 5% return rate of previous active members will bring millions into the coffers of the Church.

Look for the talks about going after the 1 and how wonderful it was when an active member sought out and befriended a less active member who was offended and had quit attending.

My cousin Vinny is excited because he is expecting the opportunity to write talks on reclaiming the lost for Stake and Regional meetings this year. He is expecting to make close to $600,000 this year.

Expect your local Mormons to invite you back to church several times this year. After all you are week and were offended.

Will any of these speeches talk about encouraging the "yutes" of the church to stay?

Good analogy!!! I saw "My Cousin Vinny" a long time ago.

Master, I gotta tell ya--I'm already proven to be gullible.

But, is this really true? Paid ghost writers? Please tell me it's true. Please tell me it's tithing-money true!

Good luck getting past members back! People leave for dang good reasons and most of them would never consider going back - certainly not 2%-5% of the MILLIONS who have left.

I love watching the Church struggle like this. They so deserve it!

One major reason I went inactive from the Church was Home teaching and "re-activation". MY GOD!! Do those fools in Salt Lake City KNOW that if a person sees a film, HATES the film, they don't want to see that same film again? Can't they "get it"? When will they EVER "get it"???

Delightful leak but your Vinny is toast. His head will be severed and served on along with the Easter pig. Both will have the apple from the garden of Eden stuffed in their mouths. (You almost had me sucked into watching the gathering of the fossils and listening to their dribble. lol)

themaster Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> My cousin Vinny said the GA's believe the ROI from
> returning members will be larger and longer
> sustaining than the church would get from new
> converts.

This is a basic business principle. Just change "members" and "converts" to "customers" or "clients."

The problem, though, is that former customers/clients KNOW you. They've experienced you up close and personal. They know all the ways you suck. They have a list of reasons they don't do business with you anymore. And so the only way to win them back is to actually IMPROVE. You can't bullsh!t the ex-clients back, because your tendency for bullsh!t is one of the reasons they left. (This is a lot like personal relationships too, right?) ChurchCo will not change -- at least in a positive way. In fact, their arrogant idea that you are theirs to "reclaim" is just one more reason to stay away.

This is great...congrats to cousin vinny for grabbing a not so modest stipend from the trough...church might own ranches but they seem to know bugger all about selling hay...you might stiff a guy on two loads if the first one is cow candy and the second load is crap...but hell never buy athird load...EVER!...load a crap...at aconference center near you...stay tuned for scintillating updates...will bedbug turn into scripture right before your spirchal eyes...will joes mantle fall on nelson...will jeffrey chew some mormon ass or will he soft peddle and flagellate apostate taffy pullers instead....will the spit of righteous indignation fly past the second row...will an opposed hollerer finally get thrown off the balcony....whew i know where ill be conference days...not watching cuz i got way better things to do...like sipping ice tea on the deck watching my truck rust....rusting trucks and moism ...disappearing at about the same rate

Just a heads up/reminder to fraudulent, disingenuous, mormon brokers of false religion - this isn't the 1830's American frontier anymore! Suck it up tommy monson & company - the money tree is withering up as heretofore strong, vibrant branches that provided big bucks in the not too distant past are now dropping from the trunk in alarming numbers!

tommy, as you know so well, our 21st Century information age has/is eating your lunch! It's no secret for enlightened, former believers these days that you/your CULT operative cronies are living off fewer blindly obedient, ignorant worker bees! You can say a permanent goodbye to people who know the truth about your vile, false religion! By the way, you'll never ever steal another cent from me! It's quite clear at this point in time that many former believers are now informed/realize that mormonism is a well documented fraud with no respectable way out for the self-proclaimed profits of rock in the hat, convicted money digger, glass looker/swindler - jo smith jr.!

It's rather clear these days that mormon leaders are nothing more than corporate criminals who know they don't talk to GOD! Yup, if anyone knows it - they do! Yes tommy, you false profit/former task master to many apostates - your so-called religion is nothing more than a premeditated, GOD CON fraud for profit! If I/so many other victims had known the bizarre process/creepy methodology employed to invent the book of mormon using plagiarized material via a so-called, holy rock in the hat translation that is absolutely juvenile, ignorant/ absurd, we would have rejected the fraud early on!

Wizardry, magic/the Occult forever - jeez - how low-life of religious charlatan, sexual predator/career criminal jo smith jr.! Utterly disturbing, obsessive criminality with intent to defraud, are bell weather traits of the CON, yes, we can say that leaders of mormonism are addicts of corruption who, under the false pretense of God's one true church on earth, plunder human kind each/every day! There will be a critical point in the not too distant future when the corporate sole/false profit will have to shut it down/scurry off with all the assets! Little People beware! mormon CULT Articles of Incorporation allow for this! Members get nothing - Zonk! As Always, tnurg (GRUNT)

I think re-activation is a great idea. It's like luring a customer back to your restaurant after they almost died of food poisoning.

My cousin Vinny, like the movie?

If you understand that the church is a business(a person is baptized into a system), then what the GAs are presenting is a counteroffer. Some will take it,and stay for awhile. I think the statistics are 80% that take a counteroffer(inclusion, callings, keeping family together, etc.) will leave within a year. I guess they are banking on 20% staying and paying.

I can believe the GA's employ ghost writers (and why not), I can believe the theme is returning the lost sheep, but I am sceptical about the GA's discussing their motives and numbers with your cousin Vinny the ghost writer.

Noooooo leave the one alone please

LOL. A reoccurring theme.

My cousin Vinny? They must be going for the yutes.

I know I will become "The One" from the matrix and destroy the morg for all mankind and we will never get a knock on the door again. Ooooh man I'm tired I should go for a drive this is not good news but thanks for posting this and giving us the heads up.

"Yes sir, for sure, the church is full of bull."

We all know that this latest reactivation program is going to flop.

Remember the "Every Member a Missionary" one?

The predictable failure of a string of "inspired" and "God-given" programs while on my mission helped open my eye. Most were so lame and outside the realm of reality that even 20-year-old me could see those "marvelous" programs -- not matter how diligently we executed them -- were doomed and would be replaced in a few months with an equally doomed program. "Man, it's like the leaders are just pulling this stuff out of their butts."

My guesses for April General Conference are:

- Danger of pornography
- Pay tithing
- Attened the temple
- Bad influence of the internet
- Go on a mission (especially as senior missionaries)
- Depression and Anxiety are on the rise within the membership
- High suicide rate in Utah.
- Don't delay child bearing listen to the holy ghost.

Would they ever expose the true suicide rate in Utah?

No wonder conference is so boring! The same guy writes a bunch of the talks? I wonder if there are like six or seven ghost writers, and they together are responsible for writing all the talks in all the sessions.

They could employ any other good writer for between 5% and 10% of that at most.

Ditto for me...

The $600,000 is based on what he will receive for the books he has written and a GA put their name on it. He gets paid very well for each talk. He has to custom write each talk for the GA giving it and no talk can sound similar (like the same person wrote it).

My cousin Vinny is working on the October talks.

Does he have to try to get inside the GA's head to write the talks? I'm trying to imagine him getting ready to write Bednar's address…

How does he channel his inner a-hole? Wear shark-eye contact lenses? Yell at his wife? Kick the dog? March around Costco with his arm held to the square, calling all the other shoppers to repentance?

You know, for a church that is "true" why are there only 15 million members?

Not going to Conference (or watching the videos) is one of my top two or three things to not do.

Jeffrey Holland is one of my favorite people to not listen to, although I also enjoy not listening to David Bednar and Dallin Oaks. Next month I'm especially interested in not hearing what Neil Andersen and Todd Christofferson have to say. Not seeing Thomas Monson is always a treat, especially sitting next to neither Henry Eyring nor Dieter Uchtdorf. And then there's not hearing the choir, not watching the voting, not praying--there's so much to not do, it's hard to know where to start.

Not singing along with the hymns is a special treat, as is not watching the women's section.

Yep, April Conference is gonna be jam-packed with things to avoid, that's for sure!

This is EXTREMELY clever and witty! Thank you for a great big belly laugh ("loud laughter" for those in the know).

Unless they go to a two hour block ain't nobody coming back. Even better, 45 minutes like the Great and Abominable.

Thanks for the heads up so that we know to avoid the TBMs who will feel the spirit and be inspired to harass the non-believers.

I guess itd be easier for them to re educate one of us if they caught us off balance, than to generate the whole lifestyle song & dance among strangers.

That's right- "hit em when they're up hit em when they're down" (some song line from somewhere)

if they find you weak or vulnerable, overwrought and frought with frustration about life's ironies or paradoxes, life's difficulties or injustices BAM gotcha again! especially if you haven't dealt with shame guilt triggers cued by lds lines.

Thanks for the warning, I'll be careful with my brother. Getting an invitation after this conference would be disingenuous or sincere only to his bishop or stake confidents' praise, rather than actually enjoying an event with my husband or me. thanks again for telling me- I won't change my plans for camping just to meet with him, or spending time in our old trailer just to do a day trip with him instead.

Here's how I envision a conference talk being written:

The GA decides (or is assigned) a topic. The GA looks up a few
scriptures on the topic. The GA then asks someone in the
historical department to find some faith-promoting stories from
Church history to illustrate the topic. The GA gives an outline
with the chosen scriptures and historical stories to the "ghost
writer" who fashions them into a talk. The GA then goes over the
talk and adds or subtracts to it, often with personal anecdotes.

I think the cat got out of the bag awhile back, but most TBMs didn't notice when a GA (I think it was a lowly Seventy) said "Normally we choose our own subjects to speak on, but today I have been assigned to deliver a message on ______." This was some 25-30 years ago. It would seem to me that this was a mild acknowledgment that they weren't preparing their own talks. It would make sense that they want their program to be exceptionally scripted for ZERO surprises. I think the era of not writing their own talks began during the Hinkster era.

We can only hope that a GA will go senile and spill the beans. I would just settle for someone getting up there and going off on a wild tangent while losing his mind.

I thought only people in New York City and parts of Jersey had cousins named Vinny.

Im curious to know what my cousin Vinny is paid per General Conference Talk? Is the rate lower for a regional or stake conference address?

Instead of indicating who he is writing for, and more than simply providing a general topic which we can all make a guess and state a similar claim, are you able to provide a statement or two from each talk? Hard to simply take your word for it without any proof.

I believe there are people who will do some of the writing, but to write an entire talk is a bit of a stretch. Some talks simply get recycled - and I would guess so thinking about how many hundreds of talks they have given over their decades of service.

Anyway, interesting for sure. And even if its not true, its interesting to think about.

Who needs to prepare one when these things are just pulled out of their assess anyway?

Every one of us knows how to find a mormon church and go there if we get the slightest interest. The fact that we don't do that means we're not interested. Been there, done that.

Oh no, we're all gonna end up on milk cartons!!

That conference should be called "tracking down people who want nothing to do with TSCC and harassing the $h** out of them."

The amount of money my cousin Vinny is paid for conference talks depends on several factors - is it for one of the big 15? How long it the talk? Which session of conference. My cousin Vinny does not like to write talks for the women (RS) speakers. The pay is much less for the women speakers.

How well the talk is given and received has a lot to do with the final amount my cousin Vinny is paid. Is it quoted often makes a huge difference.

Just stop already...

This is such BS...sorry to spoil your fun.

The grass is indeed greener on the other side of the meadow, and this little lost sheep is perfectly content here. :)

I have trouble believing the 600k figure. Perhaps it is a typo. 60k ghost writing is a bit more realistic.