Here's what I think is so ridiculous about it. Sometimes we compare how the Mormon Church does things to how other churches do things. It seems to me that most churches would not want someone working for them in that kind of a capacity if that person needed a bunch of arbitrary rules & to be micomanaged in order to keep them focused on their ministry.

Which is evidence that the REAL purpose of “missions” is to “break” the missionary and turn them into life long obedient TBMs.
The MOST important aspect of being a missionary is unwavering obedience to the rules. Baptizing concerts is secondary.

Yep! There are more than a few missions where it is a given that if you baptism even one soul, you are a rock star. So one way to make rock star is to obey all the rules.

Which for 18-20 year old American youth is practically impossible! But the wanker MPs do what they can to get them to keep their noses to the grindstone.

So you're saying that mission rules are ends in themselves? LOL

Crazy thing is they aren't shy about that fact anymore.

They are getting pretty open about how "your most important convert is yourself"-- at least that's what my MP told us all the time.

I was always surprised by this statement because when I was a missionary, I felt so damn converted! For me, there was no way I would be out there if I didn't believe it.

Then I met all the missionaries who were doing it to avoid shame or get their parents off their backs-- what a wake up call.

"They really DO need to convert themselves out here... I'll focus on the other converts," is what I used to tell myself.

My friend from HS said point-blank he was doing it do qualify for a good wife. And he figured if he could "help people" at the same time, bully for him.

This is why women are sooooo special in the church. They are the currency with which to pay the missionary bribe.

And we Mormon women KNEW exactly what our purpose was! We started learning very early how to look, how to act, what to say, how to stay thin and attractive. "Mutual" (YW) was like a freaking finishing school. We were threatened with horror stories NOT to date anyone who was not a Mormon, and that we were to NEVER marry anyone but a returned missionary! I gave up two really wonderful, life-long boyfriends, who were Atheists, and I married a returned missionary con-man, who was only pretending to be wonderful. He beat me. I divorced him. The Mormon cult says I'm still sealed to that thug, along with two other eternal companions, who he also beat, and we'll all be together with our children (mine fathered by my second husband) in eternal polygamy.

What a sick, cheap bill-of goods to sell to innocent young women! All we're good for is to get the men into the Mormon polygamous heaven. I didn't like that deal at all.

Oh, and we had to be virgins.

Posted by: gettinreal ( )
Date: April 22, 2018 09:22PM

". . . Which is evidence that the REAL purpose of “missions” is to “break” the missionary and turn them into life long obedient TBMs."
=========================================================================

Fascinating.

(Appears to not be working.)

Probably less so today than in years past.
Many reasons for that to be true, but still, the real agenda behind missions remains.

As I mentioned above, the WHOLE THING is about conditioning unwavering obedience.

https://www.lds.org/manual/doctrines-of-the-gospel-student-manual/17-obedience?lang=eng

It is taught blatantly that obedience is of paramount importance.
Is this the sort of god you would want to spend eternity with??? Yet that is what Mormons believe their god requires.
Cult much??

Failure in a mission is not the fault of the church nor it's past nor it's draconian rules.

It is not the fault of the investigators who use the internet to check out the church and its claims.

Failure in a mission is placed firmly on the shoulders of an 18 year old that didn't follow some obscure rule.

As others have pointed out, "mission rules" aren't for making missionaries "successful." They're for "breaking" missionaries. For turning them into lifelong, bowing-head-saying-yes, temple-going tithe payers.

That said, I'll offer a counterpoint to your premise about "other churches."

A local friend has his teen son (18 years old) go on a summer two-month mission for a local evangelical church. They went to Costa Rica. On the "better than mormons" side, they spent about 75% of their time doing charity work (building schools & houses, helping run a clean fresh water line, etc.), and only about 25% of come to jesus selling. On the "just like mormons" side, the kids had the exact same kinds of rules as mormon missionaries did. Always had to be in pairs, absolutely no sexual activity (including holding hands, kissing would get you sent home in disgrace), can't be alone with the locals (especially of the other sex), scheduled daily prayers, etc. The list sounded just like the ones I had on a mission.

When it comes to using "missions" to indoctrinate youth into "desirable life-long habits," other churches are right up there with the mormons. Lots of 'em have figured it out.

I don't think the "breaking" is done by establishing a "habit" of obedience, I think it's to establish deep, hierarchical status-consciousness. A habit of finding self-worth in one's peer-ranking within the organization (or if you don't measure up, then a habit of continual striving after status), and creating an organization that creates future life-chances. You get your wife, your business contacts, your cred, all from the mission--if you live in Utah anyway.

Thus, the rules can get more ridiculous and draconian over time due to the arms-race nature of setting youth against each other to compete for status. It's a form of hazing. There never's got to be any real-world referent, like measurable effectiveness. That you do it, and are elevated--or can feel superior--simply for doing it more and harder than the next guy can be the entire point.

From the organization's standpoint, it's like an MLM. The manufacturer benefits from every sale, no matter how few sales per salesperson and no matter how disappointed the expectation of the person making the sale. It's set up so the salespeople are free. Exploiting them doesn't cost the organization anything.

The type of men who tend to rise in Mormon leadership are solid believers in systems, rules and conformity, because most of them had careers in fields where that was necessary or at least where it worked for them. Learn the system, work the system, don't deviate from the system.

Also, mission systems and rules are there so leaders can blame lack of success on the missionaries. It's not that they're hustling a bad product, it's that they didn't follow each and every rule with exactness.

Posted by: olderelder ( )
Date: April 23, 2018 11:17AM

"The type of men who tend to rise in Mormon leadership are solid believers in systems, rules and conformity, . . ."
=====================================================================================

Precisely.

So there is a stack of followers on the navigation bridge -- and no captain amongst them.
Innovation and free thinking, being such threats, have been thoroughly eradicated. Kind of a "reverse Darwin" i.e. survival of the un-fittest.

So facing crisis (and from indications the corporation IS in crisis) all they can think to do is "double down" on what isn't working. Priceless.


See why inbreeding is so-not-good?



(Edit: correct the autocorrect) :-\



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/23/2018 11:57AM by zenjamin.

Let's just say that if I were in charge of 70,000 really young people all over the world I would make them follow a bunch of rules too.

The absurdity to me of the whole teen-missionary program of the MormonCult is the absurdity they think youth of this age know enough about life and religion, etc. to be out in some god-forsaken place on their own seeking converts. If the cult knew or cared about teens of this age they would realize, WITHOUT A SHADOW OF A DOUBT, that this time of life for youth is a time for discovering and trying out new ideas and plain, JUST HAVING FUN.

Oh, but wait....the MormonCult does not even think one iota about what is good for the mishie, only what is good for the organization.

presleynfactsrock Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> If the cult
> knew or cared about teens of this age they would
> realize, WITHOUT A SHADOW OF A DOUBT, that this
> time of life for youth is a time for discovering
> and trying out new ideas and plain, JUST HAVING
> FUN.

Oh, they know. They know it very well. And that's exactly why they send them on missions.

They don't *want* them discovering or trying out new ideas. They want them blinded to new ideas, and only hearing the ideas their church brought them up with.

They know very well that these "formative years" are when humans figure out, to a great extent, who they are, what they believe (or not), what their life is going to be. They want them to believe they're mormons, that they believe mormonism, that their life is going to be mormonism. So they wrap them up in full-time selling of mormonism, encase them with kids in the same boat, and put them under the strict thumb of mission leaders who keep them covered in mormonism. There's no time or space for new ideas, for discovery, or for fun. They're making mormons, not making rational, confident, self-actualized human beings.

I think give the church a pass by saying "if they knew anything..." They know.

When I was a missionary I moved to an area where my companion had a "Golden Investigator" she was about 20 and lived with two moslem guys who were brothers from a very remote village in a country in southeast asia. She had met them while hitchiking around the world. She wanted to join the church but we told her the brothers would have to move out, no sex, or she could marry one of them. She couldn't decide which one she wanted to marry. The brothers were very chill, perhaps the chillest guys I have ever met.We were supposed to supply her with deeply spiritual counseling. We were supposed to have long sessions with them getting them both to convert, instead my zone leader and I used to play guitar with them when we went on switches, we told the girl that she would be happier not being a Mormon. So maybe we made the right call.

Just think about the grand wisdom of church leaders having young people telling domestic abuse victims about they can be together forever. Very appealing, eh?

Thought I’d share a couple of old things from an old London South Mission newsletter. Firstly obeying the letter of the micro managed rules for missionaries is not nearly enough. Secondly that not getting baptisms is directly the fault of the missionaries themselves for not having enough desire, for not being obedient and for not having faith. This is the MP’s considered message to young people in his care who as an act of their faith have volunteered to serve for no financial reimbursement whatsoever. Pres Blaine Jensens‘s attitude is quite disgusting but sadly typical, but if you can put up with that…

That Liahona newsletter from 1990

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1gHJqDYNjTphGw-oHhDRTktBBQ9QPArBx

Wow, what a mind-fuck.

First he says the Lord "does the rest" and produces baptisms.
Then he says "we're not getting the number of baptisms...the Lord expects us to get."

But that's not "the Lord's" fault. No. It's the missionaries. They don't want it enough. If only they wanted it enough, the Lord would take care of the rest.

Ugh.

Man, that newsletter is a mess...the writing, the grammar, the design, the logic...all of it. The most impressive thing about it was the MP’s well practiced signature. Truly the signature of a future GA, he told himself as he practiced it diligently over the years!

I went on my mission it was because that's what you did. I was raised
in Utah and all my friends did it for the same reason. Only one
of my high school friends is still a member. It breaks my heart
to see 18 year old kids (that's what they are - kids) take on this kind of responsibility when they probably don't even know
how to jerk off yet! The church is truly shooting it's self in the foot. (yea!) More young people are leaving than staying.
Really, did any of you on this board understand life, love and the pursuit of happiness at that age?? Now these kids come home at age 20 and still have no idea what they are supposed to do in life other than be Mormon. It's sick and it's sad.

add on post to previous rant:
Think about how much these kids would learn about live if they
did their missions in service to others instead of trying to
convert people. Think how great you would feel about your self and how much self confidence you would have after spending a year or two building houses in South America or working on claim water
projects in Africa or anything constructive. It's such a wast of
youth?