A good lawsuit for damages needs two things: negligence and damages.
Once both are present, one with one party and the other with the suing party, then you have a chance for a favorable verdict.
One issue that immediately arises: is Brother Jones an agent of the church when he backs into the ladder Brother Brown is on, knocking it over, resulting in a broken arm and two months off the job for Bro. Brown.
You know darn well Utah must by now have law on the books that essentially holds the mormon church harmless for one member's negligence resulting in another member's harm.
I remember about 25-30 years ago, a framed piece of paper next to the cultural hall that outlined the limits of church insurance. Nobody every read it--heck, I never looked at it, until one day I got curious and read it.
There was some list of things that I vaguely remember, but one was basically, "loss of eye/eyesight $5000" (I remember that one) and there were other things...getting to the point of I think "loss of life" and it was only worth something like $20,000.
It suddenly occurred to me that losing your life or a limb wasn't worth much to the LDS church. And even then it took another 25 years to get out.
And would you even begin to get enough to pay an attorney? Cause if you lose, and remember you're going up against the second-best lawyers in Utah, you'd not even get an award for legal fees.
I wish that people would try to sue more often, over a variety of issues, if they can possibly afford it in case they lose. That way, the church gets to spend lots of money trying to defend themselves. I would love to see big-wigs (Q-15 especially) not only sued, but criminalized over children deprived of their needs because their low income parents are taught that their families will suffer if they don't pay a full tithe no matter how poor. I wish the governments of Africa would sue the Mormon church, or at least boot them out of their countries for demanding that destitute parents tithe. For claiming that their poverty will go away if they tithe to a bloatedly wealthy church instead of feeding their hungry children. They must do this in Latin America, too. And the Phillipines. Do they offer evidence that families are getting out of poverty this way? They could afford to follow some (volunteer) families over the years and see if it works.
Please don't laugh at me. I just wish somebody could do something!
...and in this case, you also have bishops and stake presidents reminding you that suing the lard's church is an act of satan, not an act of a faithful member. You should just trust the church to "do the right thing." Even if it doesn't.
Remember, criticizing the leaders -- even if the criticism is valid -- is considered evil in the church. Suing them even more so. You'll lose your TR, and your planet with millions of resurrected wives in the CK for sure!
I know a Ward Physical Facilities rep. (I was close friends with his sons) that was killed performing routine maintenance in a church building. He had his 10 year old son (I think he was about 10 at that time) with him to help. His father died in front of his son in the attic of a church building.
The church spent a lot more money trying to prove to the courts that they were NOT liable, than they spent trying to help the bereaved family.
The family never sued, because good Mormon widows don't sue the church.....
This was over 30 years ago so things may be different, but I doubt it. This incident I relate was just after I was released as the Elders Quorom President. My former first counselor was a father of four young children. There was a stake farm activity of cutting trees on the following Saturday after my release. I decided to spend time on that Saturday with my 4 year old son walking in the park and throwing sticks in the river which he loved doing instead of going to the stake farm. I got a call later in the afternoon that my former counselor was killed at the stake farm by a chain saw that had kicked back. He was not wearing any protective gear.
This man had served as a missionary and was deeply dedicated to the church. His widow was offered $20,000 by the church. He had probably paid more than that in tithes before being killed. I believe she sued, but I do not know the financial outcome. It was a needless tragedy. The $20K offer to the young widow was absurd. It bothered me deeply. It should of been enough to get me to leave, but I persisted in belief for a few more years.
Did the church ever stress the wearing of protective gear? That should have been a number one priority with church leaders. Anyway, I hope the widow did sue.
Why is the church still running these farms and expecting volunteer labor? Isn't the Great Depression long over? There are plenty of other ways to get food resources without expecting people to expend so much time and energy and even put their well-being at risk, when they have more important things in their lives to do. Like spending time with their children.
Why were we all insane enough to stay in the church as long as we did, handing over our money and free labor and family time? To find out that it is all fake anyway.
Josephina Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Why were we all insane enough to stay in the > church as long as we did, handing over our money > and free labor and family time? To find out that > it is all fake anyway.
As a teen, our regular "service activity" was to head out to the "country" (ironically, the place where I now live), to a mormon-family-owned chicken ranch. The boys would clean the pens and shovel chicken shit, the girls would candle eggs & pack them.
This ranch wasn't church-owned. It was a commercial egg ranch that made a profit (it still is). But because it gave a small part (10%?) of the eggs to "church welfare," it got free child labor, from all over the stake, all in the glorious name of Elohim.
It was a major step for me when I finally said, "No, I won't go shovel chicken shit for free." It was me starting to recognize the scam I was raised in.
That is so sad how poor Heavenly Father had to lose $20K and all the future tithes that this man would've paid if he hadn't been killed by that chain saw. Its so very important in this true church of ours to accumulate as much tithes as possible so that Heavenly Father can have more funds at his disposal for his sacred purposes.
As a secondary thought I remember to express condolences to his widow and their 4 young children. I guess it would be good if we were to have done some ministering to her to help her/kids be more active in the Church so they too could do free labor, pay tithing, and have lots more kids and be reminded constantly that the way for them to see her dear husband again was by being totally obedient so that these feelings of guilt will whip them into shape in being totally busy and unquestionably loyal.
With that in mind I better stop writing now as I have plenty of responsibilities to keep me super busy. We got chapel toilets to scrub so Heavenly Father can save money. We have trees to chop down at the Stake tree farm so Heavenly Father can save money. It can be exhausting. I hope I'm not too tired and unable to properly control the chain saw & get myself killed because of lack of training due to tight Stake budgets for proper training/guidance for chain saws operations. But who needs training/guidance for such things anyway because we got the Holy Ghost and Priesthood power. And most importantly of all, we have got to be obedient unquestionably.