The first time I learned about the temple endowment involving passwords & secret handshakes I nearly laughed out loud - like gaining admittance to the neighborhood treehouse when we were 10 years old!

I remember looking around at the people as if clearly for the first time and hoping someone would say, "nah we're JOKING". But they didn't.

I knew it was time to find the nearest exit.

Girls would have come up with something different. Maybe symbols involving a make-believe telephone or special dolls you dress up and put celestial make-up on. Something like that.

Girls would have candlelight and flowers and singing. After you make your pledge of fidelity, they would give you a super-special sparkly jeweled pin so that the entire world would know that you are one of the elect.

Oh no, wait -- that's a sorority. It would still work pretty well, though.

And girls would give Heavenly Mother a big role in the temple movie. I was trying to think of who would have played her back in the day. Maybe Elizabeth Taylor. Girls would pick someone who could give Heavenly Father a run for his money.

Now if gays made up the temple ceremony...

Like one of those girl pattie cake songs "Say say oh play mate, come out and play with me. And bring your dollie lee. Climb up my apple tree ..."

...slide down my rain barrel into my cellar door. And we'll be jolly friends for ever more-more-more...

They should have a cheezy hand-made sign hung outside the temple reading "No Apostates Allowed!" ... and it should be misspelled and have one or more letters written backwards. lol.

I wanna make one of those and go hang it on the temple RIGHT NOW!

We'd require the initiate to jump rope and not get caught in the rope then pick up 5 jacks without dropping the little ball before they could ever go further on and learn the pattie cake song...

Oh pick meeee! Oh oh ohhhh!

That is priceless!

The first thing I said to my dad when we entered the Celestial room was, "Dad, why didn't you tell me that we belonged to a CULT!"

Some things you never forget. Getting naked and having to put on a white sheet with a hole in the middle/pancho where your goods pretty much hang out in public, getting lubed up by a strange old man, hoping he wouldn't touch my penis to bless my seed...

It must be real special if you have to jump through all kinds of hoops and pass an interview and everything just to get into the clubhouse. It's kind of like a real crappy private school that tries to boost its image by pretending to have long waiting lists and rigorous screening procedures to keep out those who aren't up to the school's standards--when it turns out half the faculty are there on false credentials and the president of the school has already embezzled half of the tuition payments that have been made.

It's so pathetic. There is a b s o l u t e l y nothing in the entire temple ceremony that can be justified as being more sacred than the ordinary old sacrament ritual performed in chapels all around the world and for which no special recommend is necessary.

They talk about how much they "learn" from the ceremony. But that is plainly nonsense. What's so sacred about the creation story in the temple film? It's basically just what is told in the Pearl of Great Price. What's so sacred about the handshakes? It's nothing but a real-life version of The Emperor's New Clothes. The Emperor was naked and so are the people who think they're so special for being allowed to go to the temple. The joke is on them.

They gush and go on about how special it all is. Don't they realize that we KNOW what goes on in the temple and we already KNOW that it's juvenile bullshit? They seem to think that they can fool us into thinking that they've got something real special in their hands. We've already seen what's in their hands. It's brown and smelly and we don't want any of it. ;o)

...when I looked around the room and thought, "This is so silly. Look at us."

Then I got thinking about an omniscient Elohim not simply KNOWING who was worthy for exaltation. Why the signs and tokens? Or, if he does already know, then what sort of deity would make you go through the stupid song and dance at the pearly gates? It was years later I realized, oh, it was just some guy (JS) playing super special secret club.

Mormons say it's sacred, not secret. I say, no, it's silly, not sacred. And that's why they try to keep it secret. The church needs to keep an aura of mystique and bullshit around it so all the little TBMs coming up through the indoctrination machine won't know what a clown show the temple is.

Juggalos vs Mormons

If I had to choose to belong to one of those groups, I'd be a Mormon. Or I'd kill myself. Yeah, probably the second thing.

The secret handshakes and passwords are gifts. That's why they call it the endowment. All you have to do to receive the gifts is promise to be perfectly obedient all the time, not screw anyone other than your spouse, give all your money & time to the church, and maybe even sacrifice your own life if necessary. What a gift, huh?

When I first started researching Mormonism, it was to clarify just what the necro-dunking meant.

I concluded, "That's nuts."

I learned the business where exalted Mormons (men only!) elevated to the Celestial Kingdom after death were given their own planets where they were God-Almighty.

I concluded, "That's REALLY nuts."

Then I found out that MEN RULED, and women were just vessels.

I thought, "Oh, come ON now!"

And then, THEN, I uncovered the business about temple ceremonies, magic undies, and the handshakes and passwords to get into Heaven.

I started laughing and really haven't stopped.

Really, REALLY: has anyone ever heard of a first-time templegoer cracking up and stating, "I'm OUTTA here, this is INSANITY."

My absolute conclusion to ALL of the Mormon nonsense is that MY CONCEPT of God is infinitely more POWERFUL than the pitiful Mormon Heavenly Father.


~VOW



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/12/2011 03:52PM by voweaver.