My Mom told me yesterday that a family friend fell and ended up in the hospital for a couple of days. She cut her face but didn't break anything. It might have been caused by a seizure so she's not allowed to drive for a month.

My Mom was wondering what she could do for her friend. I told her when she's cooking to prepare extra and take it to her. Or if she's going to be out running errands give her a call and see if she wants to go along.

Mom's response: "She's in the other ward, and I don't know what the Relief Society has planned." REALLY????

I told her that in the New Testament where Jesus commands us to love one another he didn't say we could only serve the people in our own wards. He didn't put limits on love and service.

I really hate the control that "The Church" has over people's lives, or rather the control people give up for the church. It seems obvious to me that you do what you think is right, and not worry about what "The Church" or the handbook of instructions has to say about it.

Controlling cult ...

Oh my gosh, Bezoar, you have triggered a memory long buried in my soul. I was guilty of this very thing!

Back in the late 70's, I lived in a ward in the Bay area. My DH was the bishop. He was 28 and I was 26. We had 3 young children. I was home one morning when the phone rang and the man asked for some kind of help.( Bishop's home phone numbers were listed in the yellow pages of the phone book back then.) He was not a member. He'd kicked off some missionaries from his porch and was feeling bad about doing that. When I asked him where he lived, I realized he wasn't in our ward boundaries and tried to pawn him off to the bishop in that ward boundary. Wow..he lit into me something good. He asked me why I wouldn't help him just because he didn't have the right address. He told me about his service in Viet Nam and I soon realized he was suicidal. I was scared out of my mind. I was able to convince him to let me try to locate my cousin who had served in the Navy during Vietnam have him call this man. He agreed. I was able to get in touch with the suicide line folks and they took over from there. I also finally reached my cousin and he agreed to call him, too. I don't know whatever happened to that man, but I never forgot how awful I felt for trying to get him to the "correct" bishop.

gemini: Despite your initial (programmed by the church) impulse to send the man to the "right" source for help, your natural inclination to feel for your fellow human came shining through and you did all the right things to get him the best and most appropriate help. You were young (and a programmed Mormon!) and yet came up with the best approach, a most thoughtful one too. It's one of the most difficult types of calls to deal with.

I can identify with the first impulse being what "the church" inculcates into us but at times our natural selves win out - and the world doesn't crash to an end! Maybe at times like that the hold the church (any church/cult) has on us loosens just a bit.

Well done, anyway, for how you handled that tough situation.

One of the things I love about my wife, despite our differences regarding the church, is that she has never waited for direction from her ward's bishop or RS president.

When she hears that a neighbor or friend, be they Mormon or not, is laid up, she's immediately on the phone offering to bring over food or asking whatever else may be needed.

I remember her getting a call from the RS president asking whether my wife would be willing to help out a member of the ward who was recovering from a shoulder operation. My wife explained to the RS pres that she had already been bringing meals to the laid up member for over a week.

Good fodder for a Mormon joke!

Ward member is broken down on the side of the road. Former home teacher from the ward before boundaries were aligned stops to help. Walks over to broken down member and hands him his cell phone so he can call his home teachers.

Mormons...

This actually happened to me in the '90s.

I was traveling, several states away from home and ran into car trouble. I called the local ward's bishop at home for help (had to do some serious digging), and he berated me for not having enough money to fix the problem myself, and told me that I shouldn't be contacting him directly, but make an appointment through his secretary on Sunday.

It was Tuesday.

He hung up on me.

My mom ended up wiring money to me, and I stayed in a hotel for the week while the car was getting fixed. I attended their ward on Sunday and set an appointment to meet with the bishop.. he promptly told me as soon as I started talking that this was my "home ward's" problem.

Just another item on the shelf.

Snickers Wrote:

> an appointment through his secretary on Sunday.

Gosh. So much for the support of a world-wide church with local wards everywhere. I hope you got an AAA towing membership after that (have had one all my life, cheap, and they always come when called, no lectures).

Thanks for the illustrative story, Snick!

What a pompous arse. Definitely not someone that should be preaching Christianity.

Why am I not surprised?

The Mormon church rarely comes through on anything it promises or implies.
Problem is, most Mormons don't find this out until they actually need help.

The smart thing to do is to put money aside for a rainy day instead of giving it away to this so-called church.

Mormons want to look like they’re helping without the hassle of actually helping.

Mormons generally usually don't know what to do (in a 'situation').

That's why they have "leaders".

Someone to consult.
Forget about God?
Self? Instinct? Genius!
Love everybody. Always.

Genimi, you did the right thing by referring someone suicidal to the suicide hotline.

The same "Mormon control" issues came up when my TBM neighbor broke her wrist in a fall, early one morning. For many years, her children had played happily with my children, and she and I had had been "friends". I left the cult 10 years ago, and she hasn't spoken one word to me, since! I left quietly, without confrontation or controversy, and I now attend a neighborhood Christian church, and have always been polite.

My TBM daughter and her TBM husband and children have been living in my house, and they are astonished at how nasty the Mormons are to me, after all those years of faithful attendance, service, and tithe-paying. They are not happy with Mormonism, in general, and their friends in their age group are leaving in droves. It's my hope that DD and SIL will follow, but they are still active. In the meantime, I'm forbidden to talk to any of them about Mormonism.

My daughter and I there to help contact the neighbor's husband and daughter, etc, and my daughter drove her to the hospital. Later that day, we made a nice dinner for the neighbor and husband, and while my daughter was taking it over to them, she ran into the RS president, who was also taking them dinner. My daughter (she's a sweetheart) said the neighbors could heat our dinner for tomorrow night, or for lunch, or something.

The RS president said, "No, your dinner isn't needed. All the meals are arranged through the Relief Society, and your dinner would just complicate things. Just take it back home. It you want, there will be a sign-up sheet for meals on Sunday."

I had no response when my daughter told me this. I said, "Are you going to sign up, to take her dinner another night?"

She said, "No, I won't be doing that."

Yup; with mormons & mormonism, it's all about the org;

anything outside of that is frowned upon if not Verboten.

the Mormons have become the modern-day version of the rule-obsessed Pharisees...and they don't even notice how obvious it is.

Proper channels. Chain of command. Obedience to silly rules is important because obedience is all important. Drink a gallon of aspartame-laden diet Sprite every day to wash down 5 cheeseburgers. No problem. Take a sip of weak green tea and your chances of being with an eternal family are jeopardized because...because rules. Rules is rules and rules rule in Mormondumb.

If you have to check with your church to see if you have clearance to help someone, to love someone, you may not even be human anymore.

A 'church' obsessed with control & putting the org First in ppl's lives will Insist that they only attend at one time at one location, only answer to one set of leaders.

If the Reason for this was mostly for real help to the members, that would override the control aspect, but it clearly doesn't in Morland...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/08/2019 05:41PM by GNPE.