Yesterday my MIL and FIL came over for dinner. They are lovely people but very much backwoods Mormons - the sort who actually believe the most ridiculous faith building rumors. Just because a Mormon said so, and because they "felt the spirit" then the story must be truth. So here is last night's tale:

There are currently a lot of Mormons living in secret in Iran and Iraq. They have to hide there religion, to the point of praying to Allah 6 times a day like good Muslims. But they are there and faithful to the gospel and Joseph Smith. But shhh - my MIL assured me she is not supposed to know this information. It's totally confidential and someone in the know told her on the sly.

That some dude found a rock in a well and it told him to write a book, start a religion, marry a bunch of other dudes wives then make everyone feel bad about being human. jk.

On my mish in the MTC we were told to pray and make deals with God to get baptisms. Then some apostle found out about this and sent out a letter tellling everyone to stop bargaining with God cause God doesn't make deals with no one.

What about the deal with the angel with the flaming sword threatening Joseph that if he didn't commit adultery, he would
"lose his position and be slain?"

Isn't that a deal?


Or is it only deals with the current President that count...HEY WAIT A MINUTE! That explains everything! Tommy Monson must have made a deal with God! God would make sure that Tommy became the prophet and Tommy agreed to build him a huge mall with his favorite store included, Neiman Marcus (Jesus likes nice stuff and he can afford it since he retired).

And if he didn't have it up and running by 2011...


Anagrammy

And what about when god was going to destroy a city and Abraham begged for it to be saved if he could find 50 good people. Then 40. Then 30.

Bargaining with god is very acceptable in Judaism.

Hahaha. That's a good one.

In the Brazil Sao Paulo Temple, one night, the temple President went home after a long day of work in the Lord's House. When he looked through this window, he noticed that the temple's lights were on - but how could that be??!! He had just turned them off! He's preparing to go back to the temple and take care of the issue when he received a phone call from an Apostle, who says the following words: "Don't go back there. The owner is in the house."

OHHHH YEAAAHHHH!

Way back in the mists of time, 1980, it was, I stopped by Saint George, Utah, to stay with an old Mormon widow who was a friend of my wife's.

The old Mormon lady told me that she had lived across the street from the Toronto temple some time ago. She knew the temple president personally. One night, she awoke at two a.m. and saw that the second storey temple lights were lit.

Thinking there was a break-in, she phoned the president. He assured her that all was well. It was Jesus in there, going over the records. Her face lit up. I was across the street from the Lord, she exclaimed.

At the time I thought that the temple president had just lied to her. What a jerk, I thought.

But over the years I realized that the entire event had happened inside of her head.

I don't know which disturbs me more, the lie or the delusion.

What records? Seriously. Does Jesus need to use familysearch.org to see if temple work has been done?

My Dad tells a story that's very similar and also about the Saint George Temple. it must be true if we've both heard it from different sources. Right? Wrong.



Don Bagley Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Way back in the mists of time, 1980, it was, I
> stopped by Saint George, Utah, to stay with an old
> Mormon widow who was a friend of my wife's.
>
> The old Mormon lady told me that she had lived
> across the street from the Toronto temple some
> time ago. She knew the temple president
> personally. One night, she awoke at two a.m. and
> saw that the second storey temple lights were
> lit.
>
> Thinking there was a break-in, she phoned the
> president. He assured her that all was well. It
> was Jesus in there, going over the records. Her
> face lit up. I was across the street from the
> Lord, she exclaimed.
>
> At the time I thought that the temple president
> had just lied to her. What a jerk, I thought.
>
> But over the years I realized that the entire
> event had happened inside of her head.
>
> I don't know which disturbs me more, the lie or
> the delusion.

I can't tell you how many different sources told me about Santa Claus. The only difference is the sources that told me about Santa didn't really believe the way Mormons believe.

Because the Toronto temple is a single storey structure. It has a basement with font & all, but it is a one story affair.

So to have the lights on the second story lit is truly amazing.

Sombody is a bulb short of a chandelier.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/29/2012 02:45AM by Levi.

Levi, you've got my head spinning like a washing machine with an unbalanced load! I remember distinctly that it was the Toronto Temple, and it was the second floor.

Either the temple has an invisible second floor with access for Jesus only, or I was hornswoggled by an Angela Lansbury look-alike in a paisley recliner.

To many to list,,,

CA girl Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> There are currently a lot of Mormons living in
> secret in Iran and Iraq.
...
> But shhh
> - my MIL assured me she is not supposed to know
> this information. It's totally confidential and
> someone in the know told her on the sly.

I would have choked on my food if someone said this. There may be some but, really, define "a lot".

What really got me is the way she leaned over, gestured and lowered her voice like she really had gotten that information from an important church insider and she wasn't supposed to let anyone know. I happen to know she is not in contact with any real church insiders (or she'd have bragged about it before now) so the info had to be from some random bishop or fireside speaker.

How about the time Brigham Young's face resembled Joseph Smith's. I don't remember the story well, but if memory serves correctly, I believe after Jose Smit (intentional) died...errr..was martyred, the church was in a bit of a conundrum in "Who will lead the church?" Apparently Breed'm Young was in the running and people in the audience listening/watching him speak saw his face turn into Jose's and that sort of settled the argument for some.

Oh, this was one of my fav's on my mission. So, in Pentecostal churches it's quite common to "speak in tongues" (if you've never heard it, it's just a bunch of foaming at the mouth, rolling on the ground, jibberish). Well, some missionaries went to check out this church and during the service, a member stands up and begins to speak in tongues. One of the polynesian missionaries says they have to go. When the comp asks why they had to leave, the missionary said that the person speaking in tongues was speaking his native language and was praising the devil. Ooooohhhhh, scary!!!

I just heard one about two weeks ago. A lady is in one of the Idaho temples, not sure which one. It is getting late, most people are gone, just a few people left. She hears a choir singing. But how can that be? Practically everyone is gone! She asks the lady next to her if she can hear the beautiful choir. Nope. Can't hear anything. The lady swears that there is a beautiful choir singing in the temple but no one else can hear it.

She figures it must be the angels singing.

Why only she could hear it, I don't know. I guess she was more in tune.

Well, in fairness, there are some forms of brain damage that can cause you to hear music that no one else can. Of course the story is just made up, but I would bring that point up if someone ever mentioned it. I would then act all concerned and insist that they schedule an MRI, all the while knowing that they know full well that they just made it up.

Or maybe she had some dental work done that caused her to tune in to a local radio station, like KBYU. She was pretty old so brain damage makes some sense. I'm not sure how old she is exactly but she has a brother who is 90.

OTOH I would suspect she made it up for attention.

It can be a prodrome to seizures or other neurological events...

"I found my lost keys in the first place I looked after praying about them."

This may not be as exciting as some of the other responses, but I hear rediculous stuff like this way too much. Do these people really believe the Almighty gives a crap?

I actually say a prayer to Thor, when I can't find stuff. Helps focus my mind.

"Oh might Thor, whose movie I still need to see, and who kicked butt in the Avenger movie, please help me find my lost car keys. In Odin's name, Amen." I know, I should reverse Odin and Thor's names to make it more official.

I haven't heard any faith-promoting rumors lately, but the last time I talked to my mother, she told me the ugliest rumors in the family that I did not need to hear. I warned one of my brothers about it, because it involved him. I prefer the gullibility-promoting religious stories. They seem to give people an outlet for lording secrets over other people.

That was the reason, rumored to be straight from Henry D Moyle, as to why LDs Inc bought the Deseret Ranch near Orlando, back in the late 1950s. Incidentally, it was one of the purchases that nearly bankrupted LDS Inc. Moyle got put out to pasture, and LDS Inc stopped making annual financial reports because of the trouble it caused at the time. But I digress.

Most of my Mo relatives live near there, and still claim that LDS Inc continues to buy ranches to keep up with church growth, and to have an acre of land and a cow for Saints in Australia, and South America, and Canada. They obviously can't ALL walk to Florida now, can they?

o_O

Wait, a GA almost bankrupted the church by making a major financial investment, based on archaic business strategies? Glad that doesn't happen anymore.

Someone doing baptisms for the dead thought they were finished but noticed a shadow behind a curtain that would not go away. One of the cards with names on them was accidentally stuck to the last card. When the last card name was baptised for, the shadow walked away.

My contact with Mormons is limited since I resigned, live outside the zion curtain and I have no mo’s in my world – so I don’t get to hear these.

But when I was still going to church there was this one.

This visitor got up during F&T meeting and told of how he is a big shot with some company and has to travel to Saudi Arabia all of the time. Some of the saints in SA had said how much they would like an Ensign, and some other religious literature (which is NOT allowed in SA). So the next time he came he brought a suitcase full. When he was going through customs the inspector was opening EVERY suitcase and carefully going through stuff, and this guy knew he was about to be busted. But just as it was his turn the agents changed, and the new one was someone who knew him and had seen him lots. So he just asked him if he had anything he shouldn’t have and the guy said ‘no’ and went on his way to distribute his contraband literature to the mo’s.

His point was how wonderful God is to look out for his chosen ones, blah, blah, blah.

I, on the other hand, was outraged. One: those people knew when they went to SA what the rules are. SO tough turnips – they live with their choice. And Second – what I wanted to say to him was that he had just taught me that it was okay to lie and take advantage of friendship and trust if it was for the Lord.

Granted, this wasn’t a rumor, but . . . . just wanted to share.

As a person who served two, two year contracts as a commercial paramedic in the Kingdom and who lost a brand new Apple PowerBook because it had 'religious stuff' on it, I can attest to the fact bringing anything 'Christian' into the Kingdom is a big deal.

After they took my PowerBook, they kept me in a holding room for 3 days. I think I'd still be there if my employer hadn't come and vouched for me...

There is no way anyone could get by them with a suitcase full of any religious material, unless they had it in a diplomatic pouch...

I've only heard this one... which I guess is pretty common? I don't know.

Basically there was this serial rapist/murderer in an area that some sister missionaries were in. When they got to his door, he quickly made up some excuse as to why he couldn't talk to them and slammed the door in their faces.

Later, he was caught by the police and confessed. When they asked him why he didn't attack the sisters, he replied that he wanted to, but he was afraid of the three big guys standing behind them.

I wonder if it was the same angels with the flaming swords that "made" Joseph Smith have sex with those underage girls....