My vote...ignorance.

I've met so many that pride themselves on the ability to look the other way when evidence contrary to their position is presented. They almost take pride in the fact that they can ignore actual history and science.

What do you think they are most proud of that they shouldn't be?

Yup.

Conversely, I've had more than a few TBMs tell family members that it was our "pride" that was keeping us from having testimonies.

Perhaps it is their own pride that keeps them from getting a true and verifiable testimony of the church. Their stiffneckedness keeps them in line for fear of what the neighbors would say.

I think you are being very disrespectful. Ignorance is a virtue and many of those people have worked very hard to maintain it. It's not as easy as you think.

Voluntary ignorance.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/04/2011 04:18PM by mav.

a Temple Recommend

if you don't have one, you're branded as UNWORTHY.
nothing even comes close

= sign of a true blue kool-aid drinker.

Whatever the hell their definition is... and most of them are very good at it too.

After the "pride" talk that was given in the 90's, people in my ward took great pride in never telling their kids they were proud of them. They would brag about it in testimony meetings.

Now how STUPID is that?

ChurchCo leaders CAN'T have ANY KIND OF BALANCE in their talks, can they?

It's ALL Black/White, 100% THIS, -100% THAT

control & manipulation, Plain & Simple

However, I also agree with other posters' suggestions.

For whatever reason Mormons are big on sacrifice--the more you can deny yourself of any joy, the more righteous you supposedly are. It's all about "how much higher can I live the law?" If some TV shows are bad, then having no television at all must be good. Everything gets taken to an extreme. That is why they honor and reverence the memories of those handcart-pulling, burying-their-kids-in-the-frozen-ground pioneers. That's why you covenant in the temple to give "your time, talents, energy, and everything the Lord has blessed you with, or anything he MAY bless you with to the building up of the kingdom of god."

In other words, the more you can show that you're denying yourself of "all ungodliness" the better off you are.

That right there is some serious brainwashing.

extremism....a favorite.

I often thought the church should be called the church of food storage. So many people put all their time, talents,money, and sanity into hoarding food.Then they would proudly testify of the truthfulness of it. So much deprivation in the name of food storage. Truly the God of some.

Cept its not "...and everything he may bless you with to the building up of the kingdom of god" it is in fact: "...to building up the church of jesus christ of Latter Day Saints." That was a big difference in my mind and was probably my first shelf item. The way they emphasized the wording was especially bizarre to me, it was to THIS CHURCH rather than the "kingdom of god" which i would have expected and agreed with at the time. I don't know it was just strange to me and never felt right.

In our ward its Adversity. "Embrace Adversity"

I have made a career out of avoiding it, cheating it, deflecting it, tweaking adversity to fit my own purposes.

What good does it do anyone to seek out difficult situations just so HF can "teach us something"

What a dreary life.

All those RS lessons on how to be poor. Provident living is what they called it. I know how to be poor. How about how to be rich? If that makes me miserable so be it. much rather be miserable and rich.

Once had a bishop that told me i needed to learn how to be happy with less money. He then tried to get me to commit to paying into one of the funds every week. Thanks but no thanks.

Appearances

They don't care if they actually are sacrificing or are worthy of a temple recommend or if they are really humble or even if they are all that obedient. But they better d@#n well appear so. Case in point: Julie Beck's lame talk on Mother's Who Know. Mormons better appear clean cut and wholesome and happy as heck. They better appear to have high ideals whether they have them or not and as already mentioned, their humility is really a form of pride - but they act humble. Their massive food storage gives the appearance of righteous preparation. Their "good works" are assigned busywork that they do whether it comes from the heart or not - whether they are accomplishing anything or not. They must appear charitable.

IMO, this is why they FREAK when we leave - because we are letting down appearances and saying loudly that what they appear to be isn't good enough for us.

Every member a toilet bowl cleaner

Before I met the Mormon missionaries, I once was visited by some Jehovah's Witnesses.

My computer was playing synth music by Kraftwerk. I was shocked when the JW 'missionary' said "Ah, Kraftwerk! They're good! From Germany, no?"

And differentiate this from when an LDS missionary came and had absolutely no clue on popular culture (even American one).I could see how annoyed the more liberal-minded of them too got while I desperately tried to find some cultural references we could connect to. The poor lad didn't even know there were American Indians on the US east coast :/