The major theme (repeated three times) at a local stake youth fireside last week .... Pay your tithing.

I guess that's better than "don't play with your little factory".

On a positive note, when I asked my kid what he thought about the meeting, he said "it was boring; it was like extra church".

and being very disapointed by;

a.) It WAS just an "extra church".
b.) There was no Fire to be beside. I had visions of singing songs and making smores, and generally having a good time by a fireplace or campfire.

Sitting in a hard chair listening to yet another lecture about "suggestive lyrics in modern music" was not what I had in mind!

Back in the early 70's I used the fireside as a way to get out on Sunday night with my freinds. The church was where we met up. Went to coffee instead.

It was lame back then and it appears it hasn't changed.

If they are so cash poor, maybe they can have Monson threaten to go sit in hte top of the temple till he raises said millions or dies.

Didn't Oral Roberts do something like that in oklahoma?

My non-mormon friend attended a non-temple wedding officiated by the bishop of the groom's family. What words of wisdom did the bishop choose to impart to the newlyweds during the ceremony.......Love? Honor? Cherish?

Nope. Not even 'get ye to the temple'.

His lecture was, yes, tithing.

The non-mormons present were shocked and the bride as pissed.

Money, money, money. I don't think they care much anymore about giving of your time and talent. They want your money even if you're dead, your children's money, your dead relatives money, your friends money, any money that may come your way, they want it! They will pound you to death even after your dead for your money.

I added up living relatives that are paying tithing to the church.It added up to close to 200 people. That's just in my family. I have no idea what they pay, but there are some well to do relatives. I would guess it's in the millions every year. That money could be put to much better use. Wouldn't it be great if that money was put into a fund so everyone in the family could get a college education?

Good God :O
They're not even TRYING anymore. Youth fireside? Tithing. Funeral? Tithing. Wedding? Tithing. Whatever-the-hell-event-it-is-and-it-doesn't-matter-anymore-because-it-all-sucks?
Tithing.
I might not be able to resist the urge to kick a bishop in the nuts if I happened to be in that setting.

I felt similarly to jonl while growing up, and always had visions of roasting marshmellows and hot dogs on sticks around a firepit while everyone swapped stories and chuckled the night away. I was always looking forward to smores galore once I was old enough to go to them. I figured that they kept the smores and goodies quiet so that us little kids wouldn't complain that we couldn't go. Funny how, even as a little kid, the culture of keeping secrets was always something that I knew was going on! I knew that my parents and older siblings kept church-related secrets away from me. You could sense when people were being evasive about stuff and sometimes in meetings would outright say that it "wasn't appropriate to discuss at that time".

Our stake center, at the time, had a huge firepit and I thought that was where they were held. The stake center also had two swimming pools because the property originally had been a recreation center owned by Aerojet Corporation.

This same property is now where the Sacramento temple has been built. They don't have the pools anymore and the firepit is gone. The stake center building is still there and is pretty much the same other than getting a facelift to match the temple architecture.

As far as your stake youth fireside theme goes... given the sad state of the economy, the possibility of a Mormon president, and the idea that some people outside the Morg have that Mormons are not very patriotic, they should have hosted a really nationalist rally type event like... "Don't Let Our Jobs Go a Packering Overseas, Grease the Wheels of Your Little Factory and Bring Manufacturing Back to America!"

One year I was a camp counselor. My cohort in crime and I got up at three in the morning and heisted the chocolate bars. Our girls loved us! They even bore testimonies about how inspired we were. Oh to be the chocolate God.

We also got up and toilet papered the entire camp (even our tent) except for the hose bags playing camp godesses. Those girls were in so much trouble the next day! He he.

I went to one fireside when I was about 15 ...pretty soon I realized it wasn't a good place to pick up chicks, as I felt like an outsider even then...