On the minor items, TBMs are 'rock solid' on what they are, what they mean...earrings/tattoos, appearance items, etc.


On the MAJOR items...they think there's sooooooooooooo much ambiguity & wiggle room!

Blacks & racism/priesthood; polygamy & temple stuff, eternal progression; what the atonement (compared to 'works') means to individuals.

Even such well-understood items as Repentance/Forgiveness...are 'Superdefined' beyond usefullness/description!

To hear TBMS tell it.... it's a teeter-totter.

Major items:

-Can repentance take place after death?
-How will ppl spend their time after death/resurrection?
-Sealings/Divorces/Re-marriages/
-when do 'spirits' come into (newborn) children?

-Lots of Commandments ('being commanded in all things'): 'good', or, few commandments,

-or-

let people make as many choices accrdng to own values?

the list seems endless, doesn't it?



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 09/20/2011 11:47PM by guynoirprivateeye.

Of course, church leaders do not know the answer to questions such as you posed in your “Major items” list. Being caught out by such questions could prove highly embarrassing to men who pretend to be God’s mouthpieces on earth. To evade the discomfort of being questioned on this, leaders’ waffling or claiming that “it will all be sorted out” in the afterlife is a convenient and useful copout.

In contrast, with the “minor items,” it is easy to tell who is worthy and who is not (one of pair earrings, worthy; two pair of earrings <gasp!> unworthy.) And determining “worthiness” and judging people are crucial to the hierarchy of Mormondom.

So the leaders can appear as confident experts with the minor, black-and-white, clear-cut issues. In contrast, they can scarcely hide their cluelessness with the major issues, all of which seem to come in shades of gray. Thus they keep the focus on the "rock solid" items, hoping the sheeple won't notice.

This is an excellent point.
Mormons are caught up in so many "minor comandments" or doctrines that are only important for appearance.

The "major comandments" or doctrines are all so convoluted and impossible to understand.

Didn't Jesus have a few discussions with the saduccies and pharisies (sp) about running their church on the same bullshit philosophy?

What profitith a man if he should gain the world but loose his soul?

i was just thinking along a similar vein recently: they can't even tell you what it's all "for"

other than 'becoming like god' (what does that even mean???) they don't know what the payoff is supposed to be

like you said, lots of details on the physical stuff (clothes, jewelry, money, beverages, etc.) but pretty much no details on... well, on the point of it all

I testify that this thread is true.

Thomas Monson hasn't issued a single prophecy, revelation, or "seen" anything worth sharing since he assumed the mantle of prophet. Surely he's not too busy to ask god to reveal the answers to ACTUAL IMPORTANT DOGMATIC QUESTIONS!

What else has he got to do? He doesn't work, he doesn't make the financial decisions, he doesn't write his own talks, he doesn't have chores around the house.

I think it would be great to compile a list of these types of questions and anytime a missionary approaches us we could hand them a copy of the list and say "when your so-called prophet answers these fundamental questions about your religion, then we can talk about the book of mormon."