Being very discriminating can be a compliment referring to having good taste; not accepting less than the best.

Important to surround yourself with proper discrimination, then?


But the other side of the coin? How to deal with the judgementalists with an agenda? Like, say, many "very superior" Mormons.

People label you for a reason. If they don't know what you are, they don't know how to discriminate against you and that just won't do. They like you as a well defined package in transparent wrapping all tied up with a bow, categorized, and ready to be placed in the proper slot. And so many slots for Exmos to be shoved into. Heathens---the lot! No morals whatsoever. Right?

So what to do about the judgement? Keep 'em guessing? Be a moving target? Never take off more than one glove, like Gypsy Rose Lee? Cards to the chest! They aren't really sure what to do with you when you are a mystery.

However--Some of us had elements that could not be hidden. Sitting ducks. Mystery impossible. We were found out before the game had even begun. To avoid judgement there surfaced a big temptation then to try to prove "we are still good people even though we are not Mormons." We may say that we still have good values--again, "even though we are not Mormons"---thereby reinforcing their own conceit about such things as we demean ourselves by aiding their judgement as we claim to be "as good as them still."


"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." George Bernard Shaw




Like someone of a certain race taking advantage of being able to pass for another as happened in olden times, like gays who pride themselves on being able to pass for straight, and so many wanting to fit enough that they held themselves to another's standard that should have been no standard at all.


If you like a good tangle, then lay your cards on the table. But you better have all aces or a full flush. Even then, though, Mormons will always have the Joker who is wild tucked into the sleeve of their garments, the trump card, and they will play it---never knowing that you had already won long ago, cuz, like Leonard Cohen . . .

"I'm leaving the table. I'm out of the game. I don't know the people in your picture frame."

Unreasonable. It's a thing. A good thing.

"One of the advantages to being 'less than White' is that it is easier to stand out from the crowd when you're above average."

--Jose "Jeeves" Gonzalez, upon being presented the Silver Cross, for 10 years of drawing the perfect bath, by Judic West

You are the best, EOD. George Bernard has nothing on you and you are more fun by miles.

I hope the world is catching on to the sage quote by Judic West above.

Hey, no fair!

I was an EOD fan over a decade ago, back when I was barely older than Judic West!

I personally don't get the mentality when you have a founder and "prophet" who was such a complete horndog, and you claim to have high standards. Higher than what, pray tell? And that doesn't even address all of the other financial and legal shenanigans that church leaders have gotten up to.

Do all Horndogs go to Hell? Can a Horndog find salvation and still be a Horndog?


...asking for ziller...

Not just that.

The whole purpose of the second anointing is to free church leaders from normal moral rules. Many, if not most, of us know what that means in practice: church leaders can't be expected to live up to the standards that an 8-year old must to qualify for baptism.

Wait...what? What IS the second anointing? I have never heard of this.

I'd recommend looking it up. Tom Phillips has described it in the archives here and on John Dehlin's website. There are also others.

The 2A is another level of temple ceremony available only to the elite, meaning people at about the MP level. The recipient is granted the fulfillment of the conditional promises in the Endowment. S/he is guaranteed the forgiveness of all sins save the sin against the Holy Ghost.

Here's Tom Phillips:

https://www.exmormon.org/mormon/mormon508.htm

https://www.mormonstories.org/podcast/tom-phillips-and-the-second-anointing/


And a good book on the temple ceremonies in general and the 2A in particular:

https://www.amazon.com/Mysteries-Godliness-History-Mormon-Worship/dp/1560851767



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/19/2020 10:38PM by Lot's Wife.

I call it the 2nd Annoying...

Yes, but you proceeded to get the 3rd, 4th and 5th annoying.

In fact, I think you are the most annoying person I know!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/19/2020 11:07PM by Lot's Wife.

I'm blushing!

That's just The sun damage.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/20/2020 04:56AM by Lot's Wife.

Thank you for this. That was really illuminating to read that account.

It also gave me the heebie jeebies thinking of the implications.

Yes, it is fascinating. Just never mention “Second Anionting” at a competency hearing.

hahahahhhahhhhaaaaahahahahahah ha HA

My pleasure, GM. The implications truly are frightening. Whenever anyone interacts with a higher church leader, s/he should know that that leader is bound by no moral standards at all.

"Lying for the Lord" is the least of it.

because of my family. Maybe my dad brought with him the heretic parts of his family as my older sister tells me we Christensen's are heretics. I had no clue until I came to this board that Christensen's are a royal mormon family name. Really? Could have fooled me.

I did my best to be a really good mormon. Did I ever elevate in status? No. Even the single women and the wives of the counselors in the singles ward thought I didn't deserve my husband. They are still after him (yep, they are). They want me to just LET HIM GO! The bishop thought I was pretty hot. I have said I met 5 or 6 men at Thiokol who thought I was a great mormon girl and tried to find me a man. They are still my friends, those who are still alive. They are the ONLY mormons I've had in my life who didn't judge me.

When my ex left, I was blamed. The women were excited--even the married ones. They still can't help themselves, all the ladies in the neighborhood stop to talk to him and giggle. Oh hell! It is quite hilarious to watch.

Me, I revel in this life. I love that they judge me. Except my daughter. We've been doing better. For those who judge, I just get a big kick out of it. They just canceled my 45th class reunion. Last time we had a reunion, they asked me to give a synopsis of my life up to then (I never attend) and I said I've been married this many years to my husband, who is gay, and with my boyfriend for 10 years or so at the time.

Mormons treat me better now. Though there are those who are still trying to save me. I feel more like myself than I ever have and I'm 63.

High five. And I'm more myself at 70.

Wisdom is hard won--no way around that. I don't want a do over though.

The only reason to yearn for an after life is to finally have the youth that would allow you to put to work what you learned in your six, seven, or eight decades of this life?

If it weren't for double standards, Mormons wouldn't have any at all.


--quoth EOD (I think).



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/20/2020 02:59AM by kathleen.

Haha.

Why do "full term" premature babies at 6 1/2 months come to mind.

Haha.

Interesting how some of those "premature" babies can weigh 9.5 lbs.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/20/2020 02:57AM by kathleen.

Theft! Intellectual theft!!

EOD, was that you whom I plagiarized? I knew I heard that somewhere...

When someone tells me they have higher standards, I can't help but correct them.

You have DIFFERENT standards. Not necessarily higher.

Boyd emphasized the so-called higher mormon standards in his Little Factory talk. After all the cringe for which that address is justly ridiculed, he offered this up:

"Many in the world would, I'm sure, be amused by this counsel. Let them be amused. They live by another standard, a lower one. We live by the Lord's standard and continue to teach it."

Of course, mormons don't actually have higher standards, only arbitrary rules that they imagine to be standards. "No coffee" isn't a higher standard any more than the JW's "no birthdays."

" . . . mormons don't actually have higher standards, only arbitrary rules that they imagine to be standards."

Nailed it. Couldn't be said better.

But the mormon church does have 'hire' standards.

We'd both be out on our asses, D&D!

Mormons are the most superior brainwashed neurotic pod people on the planet.

Knowing Mormons have a superiority complex, it always makes me cringe when I see their Utah license plates with the slogan "life elevated". Ugh.

https://dmv.utah.gov/plates/arches

Higher standards? like not stepping on a crack to break your mother's back? or abstaining from coffee, tea and staining the doorstep of others with home teaching, asking for money saved from going without food for church leaders, etc,

Just because they follow arbitrary rules things that have no real effect on anything in the world or beyond, doesn't make for a superior moral code.