Please come back to church. I know that many of you struggle with caffeine addiction. I know that many of you have been offended by the way the church treats caffeine users. But the church has made many, many strides in this area: people who drink caffeinated soda are perfectly welcome, now.
There is going to be a special sacrament meeting in my home ward this Sunday. The bishop, who is very progressive and enlightened, has invited a person who drinks coffee to come and speak. This will be a wonderful experience and opportunity for you to show your support for people who use caffeine but still attend church. Please join us! We miss you! Please come back!
Thank ghawd! I lived through the nightmare years when coffeeholics were turned out into the streets by their families and rejected by what they thought were their friends, and many of whom terminated their lives! All because they gave in to coffee!
And at BYU, all those kids who were caught in-caffeino-flagrante and had to chose between being expelled (with the consequences listed above) or having electrodes hooked up to their 'tender mercies' and having the caffeineality shocked out of them! It's good to hear that your ward is addressing this!
My dad (fifth generation Mo,) used to tell me that it was normal for Mormons who drank coffee, drank alcohol even, up until the 1940's. Only then did the church clamp down on the WoW for temple goers.
My TBM grandparents imbibed and held temple recommends for a good part of their adult lives. They served a mission in their senior years.
Dad remembers waking up to the smell of coffee in the morning growing up on a farm. His mother drank two cups of wine a day for her heart, as prescribed by her doctor. And my grandfather would drink with his sons when they'd go on cattle roundups and sheep shearing trips. Grandpa was also the cook for the cattle hands on those trips. (He was a great cook!)
Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 06/06/2019 10:06AM by Amyjo.
all my life. I used to worry about it as a little kid. My grandparents (his parents) also drank coffee and alcohol. My dad's whole family drank alcohol at family parties. It was my uncle who served it and he eventually became a bishop and SP and then it stopped. My uncle found religion at about age 50. My aunt, who was always active mormon and served in many leadership positions, told me many times how much more fun my uncle was before he found religion. He was a total BORE after he found religion.
My grandfather served in WWI and came home with a chewing tobacco habit. He held several callings and was SS president when they released him because of his habit. He quit going to church then. He was one of the kindest men you would ever meet.
My mother's parents were too poor to pay tithing and they also had temple recommends.
Dave the Atheist Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > How many people were denied temple recommends > because they drank coffee ?
No idea. But obedience to the word of wisdom is required. It is specifically asked about in the interview.
Different, but related, question: How many people did or do not drink coffee because they believe doing so will make them unworthy of god's blessings and/or ineligible to obtain a temple recommend?
Aloysius Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Different, but related, question: How many people > did or do not drink coffee because they believe > doing so will make them unworthy of god's > blessings and/or ineligible to obtain a temple > recommend?
Great question. The Mormons in my life eschew coffee not because of trying it since they have never let it touch their lips but because they aren't supposed to like it.
I know that they don't dislike forms of coffee flavor since they've tried some candies and ice creams.
It is specifically a church-related preference to not like it.
until my sister got married about 30 years later. Then he did have a TR quite often. He didn't go all that much, but sometimes. He came to my wedding. As above, he was drinking coffee, alcohol, and chewing tobacco.
I had to steal my first package of Peet's Italian roast when the clerk wasn't looking because I couldn't take a chance that anyone would know. I knew it was wrong but something inside me just had to have it at any cost.
I hid it under my mattress and took it out after I had locked the door and everyone had gone to sleep. I had no way to brew it, so I could only stare at the package and then slowly open the top just a little and smell the aroma that made me feel so gooooood.
I would be so ashamed after that I would have to take a shower and brush my teeth and use Q-tips to rid my nostrils of the aroma. But I couldn't get the sin off and I would swear I would never do it again and pray and cry.
But the next night I just couldn't help myself. Such a vicious cycle.
Then a friend confessed that he was doing the same and that was that. We snuck out to a Starbucks and drank coffee together. There was no turning back. Finally we knew---we weren't the only ones. There were others like us. It was a wonderful freeing feeling. I longer felt ashamed.
I'm too far gone now as I will do anything for cappuccino and espresso, but perhaps the Mormons can help others before they are caught in this life destroying habit that makes people see you as abhorrent sinners.
It's even harder for kid's nowadays. Coffee, and the coffee lifestyle, are all over the place. They're glamorized in movies, tv, and music. You don't even have to leave home to get coffee now. Anybody--even children--can get coffee and graphic images of coffee on the internet with just a few clicks of a mouse.