I don't get how or why the Smart family is still active in the Mormon church after what happened.

After reading this part of Elizabeth Smart's testimony I had to say seriously, WTF?

"I was crying a lot so I didn't realize what was going on at first. And then I heard him say that he said, "By the power of the holy Melchizedek priesthood which I hold, I seal you to me here on this earth and what I seal on this earth will be sealed in the hereafter and I take you to be my wife.'"

Doesn't that sound a little too close to the REAL temple ceremony to anyone else?

I think it would be so disturbing for her and the family to go back to church and hear those things and participate in temple ordinances again. Not to mention how traumatizing it will be for her when she actually gets married in the temple.

If I was Elizabeth's parent I would distance myself and my family from all organized religion and focus on real healing and recovery. The poor girl is in for years of PTSD and horrible flashbacks.

Are you kidding? That would assume Ed Smart had Smarts or a conscience. His family is LDS celebrity & VIP's. LD$ is using him for PR. Send Elizabeth- Crazy or So Speeshul Spiritly. Notice how ED talks ALL the time. Today, Elizabeth's comments to the media were less than 2 minutes. Ed ran on for 35 minutes until the stations eventually cut away.(he's looking forward to getting back to scouting-another unsafe place for Utah kids) I'll bet he's still talking. He's always been pimping out his family. He'll do whatever the church tells him & pays him to do.

Sorry- Should be: Sending Elizabeth Craz- or so Speshul,on a mission overseas? What sane parent would do that? She already endured a "mission" and sealing in Cali for 9 months. No dad I know would allow his daughter to go through the circus Elizabeth did after they found her.

Stillanon Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Sorry- Should be: Sending Elizabeth Craz- or so
> Speshul,on a mission overseas? What sane parent
> would do that? She already endured a "mission" and
> sealing in Cali for 9 months. No dad I know would
> allow his daughter to go through the circus
> Elizabeth did after they found her.

Elizabeth is an adult. Maybe she choose to go on a mission.

"Elizabeth is an adult. Maybe she choose to go on a mission."

Yeah- a stunted adult in age only. No little girl should go through 9 months of captivity & rape turned loose again without extive counseling (not LDS brainwashing)
Typical response to the mission question when you know damn well 18 year olds in close mormon families can refuse a mission & still be respected by their relatives.

Stillanon Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "Elizabeth is an adult. Maybe she choose to go on
> a mission."
>
> Yeah- a stunted adult in age only. No little girl
> should go through 9 months of captivity & rape
> turned loose again without extive counseling (not
> LDS brainwashing)
> Typical response to the mission question when you
> know damn well 18 year olds in close mormon
> families can refuse a mission & still be respected
> by their relatives.

It depends on the family. I come from a TBM extended family and very few of my relatives, male of female went on missions.They did not lose respect from other family members.Girls, even in the most TBM families, do not get the pressure to go on missions that boys do. As far as whether Elizabeth is 'stunted'. How do you know?

Stillanon Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> "Elizabeth is an adult. Maybe she choose to go on
> a mission."
>
> Yeah- a stunted adult in age only. No little girl
> should go through 9 months of captivity & rape
> turned loose again without extive counseling (not
> LDS brainwashing)

She probably just wanted to get away from being "THE Elizabeth Smart" for a while and go where nobody would instantly know her. As insane as it sounds, the mission (as long as it is overseas) was probably a respite for her.

Additionally, I think emotionally, her life must have been on hold till the trial ended. Going on a mission is the only good way to excuse not being married at her age (in the LDS culture).

Finally, I think in interviews before her mission, she said she had a boyfriend. Maybe she's waiting for him to come home and rather than wait, she decided to serve a mission herself.

I can't discuss the source. But I know a friend of the family and professional indirectly involved. She did get very good therapy for what happened to her.

Which is obvious as most people could not tell the details of being raped as she did on the witness stand twice--at the competency hearing and the trial. She has had extraordinary support, private counseling (not with her parents who didn't even know all the details of the abuse until they heard her in court), and has become an amazing survivor.

She may be brainwashed to believe in the religion but we all were!!!!!

We don't know if someday she will find her way out--if all the experiences put together (including the temple and the mission) will finally rearrange her understanding. She's entitled to have her life and her process. Let her deal with one trauma at a time.

Really???, don't you think they had her pray about it???...the mission would help her heal and all that? They are celebrity as some put it and they like the attention. Elizabeth is of secondary concern. If she was first, they would stop this media blitz.

Oh, and I forgot to say I can not stand Mr. Priesthood Smart's smile. Just sickening.

Because two members of my family do and the Smarts are very nice and in general, very decent people. They've been through something horrible. They've made bad choices and said dumb things. But maybe Ed talked a lot today to protect Elizabeth from having to talk more. Maybe he's stayed in the spotlight because he's trying to make a difference for abducted children. Maybe he respects Elizabeth's trying to return to her idea of normal - a mission might have been in her life plans if Brian David Mitchell had never existed. Elizabeth had enough of her personal choices, enough of her normality taken away. If she wanted to serve a mission, her dad or mom shouldn't have stopped her. Personally, I think a mission is crazy-stressful and a very bad idea for Elizabeth. The only idea worse was having another priesthood holder (i.e. Dad) take her control away again. And, I agree that the MP probably treats her with kid gloves.

Anyway, give the Smarts a break - You may not agree with their decisions but you also don't know how you'd act under that kind of pressure. The media can spin stuff to make a good story like you wouldn't believe. Unless you know them personally, don't be so hard on them.

Wouldn't you think any decent therapist or psychiatrist that she was seeing would discourage her from going on a "mission" or doing anything church-related for a while?

That just doesn't seem like good advice to me. Also, how could she in good conscience try to convert someone else to Joseph's Smith's teachings? She had to have studied some history, right? That's just really messed up.

Mrs. J Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Wouldn't you think any decent therapist or
> psychiatrist that she was seeing would discourage
> her from going on a "mission" or doing anything
> church-related for a while?

Why? Now, why do you suppose they would do that?

Because it's all a fake, it's this, it's that, it's the other?

Well now, WE know all of the above. But to expect a therapist to approach the situation from our point of view or extensive knowledge of Mormonism is, to be frank, just a tiny bit bonkers,imo. ;o))

and so wouldn't have a therapist, unless something has changed.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/10/2010 07:16PM by munchybotaz.

Therapists are not generally supposed to give advice to patients on what they should do in their lives. They offer support so that the individual makes their own decisions and empowers themselves. Her therapy was trauma related to heal from what happened, anyway.

It has been "awhile" since what happened. She is almost 22 years old. She was abducted at 14. 7 1/2 years ago.

Although a mission is stressful, it may also be healing for Elizabeth Smart. It allows her to continue her life as she would have without Michell's interference. It may also be important for her to prove she meets the standards of her community in spite of the violations Michell forced her to commit. I see the mission as a way for her to stand up to what he did to her, and I see the church selecting her as a sign they fully accept her.

I see Mormon clients now-and-then, by the way. I do not discourage them in their beliefs and practices and I try as much as I can to work within their frame. I wouldn't a agree with a therapist discouraging Elizabeth Smart from serving a mission, although it would certainly be something to explore so that she could be clear about what she is doing and what it would entail. I admire Smart for her courage and I want her to succeed in her life.

Can you imagine the horror she will feel when she actually gets married in the Temple for real, and on that most special day of her life the sealer starts using the same words that were used by Mitchell before he raped her.
What a horrible traumatic flashback.

They sent her to Paris. I'm sure she was hand-picked to go there due to her celebrity status and the trauma she's been through. (As they should.)

And like a PP said, girls aren't pressured like boys are to go on missions. I'm sure she was fine over there, and with her upcoming trial, and knowing who she is, her MP (unless he was totally evil) would handle her with kid gloves.

They probably see him as just a nutcase who took some ideas and corrupted them. Which is really what he is, except that the ideas were already corrupt.

I've heard more than one Morgbot say something to the effect that the church is true because the Mormon god saved Elizabeth when so many non-Mormon abducted children are never found. They can twist anything into a faith promoting experience.

Well, that certainly was disgusting. The Mormon god is a dead polygamist.

As in the parents of Brenda Wright LAFFERTY.

I know why the smarts dont get it, its because they arent very smart at all!

The Wrights, if they are like most MORmON parents, probably had mile wide grins on their faces as their daughter went through the temple to be endowed & married. That MORmON temple worship sure does make MORmONS feel giddy with spirituality & goodness.
its amazing what some secret handshakes & ritualistic odes to brutal blood letting can do! HOLINESS to the MORmON Lord!
...as in the gaping holes that can be made in a person to kill them according to LDS temple penalties. Now isnt that special!


The dad had a PhD! & just like most MORmONS, he still cant make the connection between the gaping hole in the neck of his daughter & grand daughter and the stupid ass LDS temple ceremony! after all there is no connection!!!!!!!!

JUST ASK A MORmON!

Everything about the trial has everything to do with the Mormon religion. Is the Smart family so dense that they couldn't see the correlation? Maybe the Smart family isn't so Smart.

I am a believer but I am not so dense that I cannot see the abuse that can take place. The Smart family is in denial and in a sense, what has the trial proved? This kidnapper guy actually came out ahead in "smarts" compared to the slavery that the Smart family will subject themselves to the Mormon religion.

don't they have a seer stone in the vault which, when operated by a prophet of God, finds lost objects?

So why didn't Ed So Smart appeal to the prophet if he's such a diehard believer? Why didn't he just ask the man who is in the know to use his special revelatory powers to reveal the secret location of his daughter--only a mile from home at first, and then in a foreign country? NO...locked underground 1,000 miles away? No...in Sandy, for the love, hidden under a VEIL!!!

And what about the amazing powers the Mormons claim to have more light so that for them, the chosen, annointed, speshul peeple, the VEIL is so thin you can see through it....blah, blah.

Anagrammy

I wonder what she is going to do when she finds out the truth about Joe Smith and all the tricks he used to sleep with teenagers. Joe used every trick in the book: promises of celestial glory, family redemption, flaming swords, fake revelations, fake scriptures..literally everything he could think of. He would do/say anything to sleep with one more girl/woman.

The only real difference is mitchell used a knife. Joe was a better, more pursuasive speaker, and got what he wanted without violence. Either way, they are both perv's.

Had he been living 160 years ago, every morgbot would probably be following Crazy Beard guy today, rather then Joey Jr.

This whole thing has always seemed weird to me. Like it was Ed's way of getting the limelight. It's amazing to me that Elizabeth can quote word for word what was said 7 1/2 years ago, right after the most traumatic event thinkable. Sounds a little fishy to me...

anon Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> This whole thing has always seemed weird to me.
> Like it was Ed's way of getting the limelight.
> It's amazing to me that Elizabeth can quote word
> for word what was said 7 1/2 years ago, right
> after the most traumatic event thinkable. Sounds
> a little fishy to me...

Two points:

She was interviewed shortly after being recovered, when what happened was fresh. I assume she would have reviewed transcripts in preparation for the trial. My step-father was an arson investigator and the legal process stretched out over about 7 years and he was asked to testify each of those years. To prepare each time he reviewed his testimony.

Second, often the problem with trauma is not that the victim forgets; it is she can't help but remember.

anon, that has been my feeling all along. Something is fishy here.

I think that it is very easy for outsiders to judge her, her life, and her family, without having been directly involved.
Also, don't forget that the media many times slants the events/facts toward their purpose.

I can tell that most of you know nothing abouth The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from the ignorant comments that you have made. Many of you need to disengage from the lies told at internet sites and seek out correct information from the church itself.

I think some of these comments are way out of line, espcially since most of us don't know the Smarts. Elizabeth was gone 9 months so she must have had a baby. Huh? Ed is a glory hound. We know this, how? Maybe he is trying to give back. The Smarts are forcing Elizabeth to go on a mission or whatever. And how do you know that? Were you there? Leave this poor family alone and stop being so judgmental.

Keith, I believe you are on the wrong board. Go back to where you belong and give praise to your Mormons there.

Maybe he likes the Smarts IN SPITE OF the fact they are Mormons. The fact someone is Mormon doesn't make them bad - although I admit it probably increases the chances. If you don't know the Smarts, you can't say Keith is off base in his feelings about them. Believing crap without checking the facts kept me in Mormonism as a slave for way too long. I don't just believe what people hype any more. And as I mentioned earlier in the thread, people who know the Smarts personally seem to have a much better opinion of them than people who believe what the media spins out to make a story. Maybe first hand sources should be listened to before decisions and judgments are made. Judging without really investigating a subject is just so....MORMON.

I haven't heard a single bad thing about the Smarts from people who actually know them. That means more to me than people who saw Ed on TV and think he is weird and have a bad feeling. Sorry, but that isn't proof of anything. I really think we could do with less judgmentalism here. All Mormons are not bad. In fact most of my family and friends are Mormons and they are good people. Sure there are bad Mormons. There are bad people in every group and the judgmental people here sound a lot like the worst Mormons.Something to think about.

Perhaps he is defending the church, but you seem to be making a lot of assumptions about the Smarts based only on the fact that you don't like them or the Mormon church. Just a thought.Do you have any inside information?This is for Honestone, BTW



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/07/2011 05:27PM by bona dea.