There's all of GBH's "We're Not Weird" pleas wiped out. I'm guessing MoDo will be taken off Tommy's Christmas card list.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/19/opinion/dowd-anne-frank-a-mormon.html

"it’s based on the belief that if humans can become like God, and God has the whole universe, then maybe Mormons will get to run a bit of that universe." - R. Bushman

Romney is rightly being held accountable for narrowly arguing for Mormon inclusion in the Christian club instead of for real tolerance for all beliefs (and non-beliefs).

Dowd's column really brought home how big a problem it is for Mitt that the first word most voters think of when they hear his name is "Mormon"... Considering Romney's resources, it's really an amazing thing that he hasn't been able to shift perception onto more favorable ground... Dowd mentions this WaPo/Pew poll in her column and the graphic at the link is simply bad, bad news for Romney:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/behind-the-numbers/post/top-gop-candidates-in-a-word/2011/10/04/gIQAfcY2uL_blog.html

My prediction is that evangelical and lds enmity is only gonna get worse after 2012, no matter which way the election goes. Too bad it couldn't have happened sooner, but the big break-up is coming in the next couple years.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/19/2011 01:47AM by chinoblanco.

chinoblanco Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> Dowd's column really brought home how big a
> problem it is for Mitt that the first word most
> voters think of when they hear his name is
> "Mormon"... Considering Romney's resources, it's
> really an amazing thing that he hasn't been able
> to shift perception onto more favorable ground...
> Dowd mentions this WaPo/Pew poll in her column and
> the graphic at the link is simply bad, bad news
> for Romney:
>
> http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/behind-the-num
> bers/post/top-gop-candidates-in-a-word/2011/10/04/
> gIQAfcY2uL_blog.html


This isn't true. Dowd has it wrong. And she isn't the only one.

See the actual "One-Word Descriptions..." by the Pew Research Centre:

http://www.people-press.org/2011/10/18/top-one-word-reaction-to-cain-is-a-number-9-9-9/?src=prc-headline

Note at the bottom of the results box:

"PEW RESEARCH CENTER/WASHINGTON POST Oct 13-16, 2011. Figures show actual numbers of respondents who offered each response; *these numbers are not percentages*"

So, that 60 is out of 1007 respondents, which a little less that 6% of respondents answered "Mormon" when asked about Romney.

this particular clip is not in the as televised Ap 1996 CBS 60 minutes piece on Mormonism. dont believe that? then watch it carefully, youll see.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xphnhNopWUo

Kent Jackson, the associate dean of religion at Brigham Young University, says that while Mormons are Christians, “Mormonism is not part of the Christian family tree.”

What the heck does that mean?

What a stupid statement. YOU either are a Christian group or you are not. They don't know Christianity enough to understand. They place their faith in JS....Christians KNOW our faith is in JC. IT has been said no one gets to heaven except thru Joe. Now that just doesn't fly with Christians and never will.

It means that Mormonism didn't break off from an existing branch of Christianity, so it is literally not on the same family tree. It's analogous to the case of Esperanto; it would not be an insult to say that Esperanto is not part of any larger language family, because it was invented independently.

The only problem I see is that in fact Mormonism DID break off from an existing part of the tree: namely, the Burned-Over District religious revivals. I don't know who was involved there that it is most closely related to.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/19/2011 08:59AM by silverlightx.

Kent Jackson, the associate dean of religion at Brigham Young University, says that while Mormons are Christians, “Mormonism is not part of the Christian family tree.”

http://news.yahoo.com/mitt-mormonism-psychology-religious-preference-210829257.html

Here's the original Forbes link:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddisalvo/2011/10/18/mitt-mormonism-and-the-psychology-of-religious-preference/



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/19/2011 07:26AM by dr5.

"Richard Bushman, a Mormon who is a professor emeritus of history at Columbia University, said that after “the Jewish dust-up,” Mormons “backed away” from “going to extravagant lengths to collect the names of every last person who ever lived and baptize them — even George Washington.” Now they will do it for Mormons who bring a relative or ancestor’s name into the temple, he said."
------

Okay, at the ordinary human level, this makes sense. It's rude to have proxies stand in for other people's relatives and ancestors who never had any connection with Mormonism and pretend to baptize them into Church membership. It's a nice gesture to back off when people say that they don't like it.

The tricky part, however, is that they only did it in the first place because, as they claimed, that's what God told them to do. If they really believed that why would they back down when some politically influential group starts hammering them in the court of public opinion.

It's like polygamy, the discrimination against black people, the bloody oaths in the temple and so on. When they were doing it, it was because "God commanded it." But then they run into resistance from outsiders and, if the resistance looks like it's going to make life inconvenient, they just dump the thing that God had supposedly commanded them to do.

Makes you think that the Mormon leaders don't really believe their own claims about authority and being God's spokesmen and all that. They are just corporate executives after all--only pretending to be God's spokesmen.

I am a nevermo and my dad and his parents never had ANY connection to Mormonism. NONE....I know my convert daughter gave their names to her MIL who quickly asked for them after my daughter converted. So since they had NO connection to Mormonism.....nothing should have been done in their name, PERIOD. Mormons can make up any story they wish to claim that this person had a connection to the LDS faith, but it is all a lie. These people had their own religion and were happy in it. WE all know this is rude and disrespectful. But when can we ever say Mormons respect others.

CoraJudd put up a thread about that one, which at last count had attracted almost 2,100 comments. I may have to revise my prediciton of 2,200 by tonight upwards...

Lots of the faithful are getting history lessons, that's fersher...

MoDo eh? I think I like that one... This is honestly the first column of hers I've clicked on in nearly a year... She reminds me of some of those old Hollywood gossip columnists, perhaps with a Vassar education...

"As for those planets that devout Mormon couples might get after death, Jackson says that’s a canard."

I had to look up the meaning of "canard":a false or unfounded report, a groundless rumor.

So the associate dean of religion at BYU now says that it's not true that good Mormons will get their own planet after they die? I was baptised into the church less than 10 years ago and I was taught that as doctrine!

Now THAT is BIG news!!! I was taught that, too. Holy Crap! Do morgbots know this stuff is being said about their precious beliefs by their precious "academics"??? That the ground is shifting beneath their feet this very minute? I am aghast at the blatant lies! And where are the bold repudiations from the GAs?

Hopefully, this is some sorta train wreck down the line. It's so convoluted, though, that I *almost* don't want to watch. Sheesh.

There are some very effective reader's comments attached to the article.

Comments are currently closed - but it is still possible to vote on each entry.

As much as we all think this Mormon issue is going to hurt Romney, I think it will end up helping him.

Most American's are: (1) stupid, but (2) want to be viewed as "fair". Because of those two characteristics they will not look into Mormonism enough to figure out how $%ucked up it is and they will buy into the easy to assimilate idea that "we shouldn't judge someone based on their religion". Even though in THIS day and age, we definitely should examine a candidate's religious views.

I mean, it actually MATTERS. George W. Bush was a born again Christian. I can't help but think his views of Christianity, the rupture (err...rapture), and Muslims (non-believers), probably played into his cavalier attitude towards invading Muslim countries who played no significant role in 911. I fear that a born again or Mormon may view the end of the world as inevitible and actually CAUSE the end of the world (or produce a really screwed up one in the aftermath...).

Religious views are like superstitions. They matter. They affect how we view the world. They affect what decisions we make.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/19/2011 12:38PM by elcid.

When stuff like this comes out:
"The Mormons even baptized Anne Frank."

more people will see just how wierd mormonism is



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/19/2011 02:10PM by Susan I/S.

That the article implies they quit doing the baptisms of Holocaust victims and the like.

What I have heard and read is that they did not stop. They just said they would.

Well they did Obama's mom. (But not his dad--wonder why??!!)

'Mormon lore'- Something that sounds stupid that we believe, but don't want all of you to think we are stupid, so we basically say it's an old wive's tale instead of manning up and telling the truth.