...active gay couple who are married. We are still 20 years away, but gay couples have one of the most desirable financial demographics for targeting. In less than 10 years TSCC has gone from shocking the gay out and spending millions to fight gay marriage to the very carefully promoted view that it is out of marriage sex that is the real problem, not homosexuality. So once gay marriage is legal nationwide, god will speak and tell TSCC that the world is ready for the doctrine of polyamory again, except this time gay is OK!!! I know this seems impossible, but who would have thought 10 years ago an openly gay person could hold the priesthood?

And who would have thought that the four versions of the first vision would be printed on a church website, or the church talking about the stone in the hat?

It's all about the money. Always has been. Always will be.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/22/2013 01:09PM by icanseethelight.

It's possible, I think members will have to forget about the Proclamation first. That could be 10 years.

Today's proclamation will be yesterday's manifesto... who will bother to read it. Water under the Brethren's bridge...

Yes, it's always about money *because* money is another word for what the Church, and everyone else, is *really* after: power.

The power to define what's good and virtuous, and bad and "sinful."

The power to tell people how to live.

The power to force a majority to labor so that a minority can be affluent.

The power to create stars.

The power to garner praise.

The power to write myths--stories--that help everyone to create meaning (but that also entails goals, usually won against an oppressor, and hence the need for gays, for example).

The power to control, dominate, and exploit...

You,

Steve

They have to protect the "temporal salvation" of the cult.

I can see them someday accepting gay marriage, but really, how sad for all the gay guys since they'll still be prisoners of the crazy religion.

The proclamation isn't any kind of deterrent. They will quietly change a word here and there that radically changes the meaning. They won't mention that they did that. They won't talk about it, they will just do it. Just like they have with scriptures,history, and talks the apostles and prophet give.

And, correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think the Proclamation on the Family even specifically talks about gays. It just reinforces a "man" and "woman" roles and the family. They've had plenty of "official" statements in the past which they don't believe in or practice anymore. Look at polygamy or racist teachings and policies which they've been able to gradually phase out.

The old people will die off and the younger generation are going to be open and accepting of the change. Even today younger Mormons are talking like they like gays and want them to be accepted. Many support legal marriage for them (like Steve Young).

"solemnly proclaim that marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God" ~Proclamation

Yeah they could change the wording a little bit and it'd all be good. Just scrub out between "a man and a woman" and you're good to go.

"solemnly proclaim that marriage is ordained of God" ~Proclamation 2020 edition

Or even more simply, without changing anything and "explaining" that "marriage between man and woman is ordained of god, but that doesn't say anything about same-gender marriages. As long as there's no sex, God's okay with that one too."

"...marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God" doesn't specifically forbid same sex marriage.

If the church says "tithing is a commandment given by God" it doesn't necessarily mean that its the ONLY commandment of God. Its just ONE of the MANY commandments of God.

They can spin it that way and then gradually ignore the proclamation. It will be tossed into the dust bin of history just like much of their other teachings and practices.

"Look its in the past. But this is now!" You'll hear some future prophet say.

And TSCC's involvement in Prop 8 will be anti-mormon lies....

Those darn anti-mormons!!!! GRRRR!

Yes, websites that will include information like that should feel "very dark" to you.

It's common for cults to "evolve" into mainstream religions. This confuses and alienates older believers, and may lead to schisms. But it happens. The culture-accommodating leadership will sometimes just ignore the dated doctrines, but "progressive revelation" gives tmcc added flexibility.

I think the move will be motivated more by the desire to appear legitimate. I see significant softening in Christian Science on the prohibitions against medicine. Of course, CS "care" is only occasionally effective.

But the more I think about it and see how the church is about its own survival as a corporate entity above all else...and how the church reversed its main irreversible practices of polygamy and racism (which, despite a mantra of denial were in fact core doctrines at the heart of Mormonism...which is a marriage racket...ie it was VERY important for Mormons to NOT racially intermarry well into my own lifetime in the church)...the more I think the last main pillar of prejudice is unstable: sexism.

The church is anchored to the morality of ambient culture even though they deny it. The trite cliché of "in the world not of the world" is a farce, because the church from its beginning has been the product of itself being a product in the common marketplace. All along, the church had to sell. Homophobia still sells, and that's why the church is still sticking with it. There are enough homophobes in society that it's still a debate whether "gay rights" are self-evident truths or not. Ambient society is moving to, but has not arrived at, the same almost universal realization that gays are equal, just as it did with race (more or less).

But, apparently an age of universal recognition of gay rights is evolving. When it does, the church's anti-gay teachings will be just as untenable as were its racist teachings to more and more people until only a very few extremists are holding out. The church will HAVE to adopt gay rights to be tenable to its own members, like it did with race.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/22/2013 06:39PM by amos2.

And you have to remember that "the church" is not some unchanging homogeneous entity, like God. Its leaders are constantly changing and thus the beliefs and perceptions of the gospel are going to change too. The 18 year old missionaries you see today that have no clue about temple changes or blacks and the priesthood are going to be the future leaders. They are going to run it according to their own beliefs and perceptions and not according to what the beliefs and perceptions of men who lived 50 years ago.

Yep. They'll accept gays and even the oldtimers will claim they never were against gay marriage. Anything to the contrary, like Nancy said will be lies and persecution against the mormons.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/22/2013 08:21PM by Devoted Exmo.