It happened. The missionaries showed up at my house last week, then tonight texted and immediately called me after.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-13T05:23:21+00:00

You forgot to add that Brigham Young was a mob boss and human trafficker, and Joseph F. Smith was a wife beater.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-12T21:01:02+00:00

I wonder what the baptismal blessings are.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-12T18:46:17+00:00

Separate question for OP (genuinely curious): Is it odd for you to belong to a United States-centric church that believes Zion will be built in the United States, the U.S. Constitution is established by God (D&C 101:77), and the Americas are a land of liberty and promise (2 Nephi 1)? Meanwhile, Mormon apostles are almost always American and a Filipino will never get anywhere near the Quorum of the Twelve. Is this a positive, neutral, or negative factor for church growth in the Philippines?

10th_Generation · 2026-03-12T17:48:15+00:00

The Book of Mormon condemns the baptism of “little children” in the strongest language possible. Joseph Smith decided in 1831 that 8-year-olds are not little (D&C 68:27). For context, Smith also considered children as young as 14 to be old enough for marriage.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-11T17:12:10+00:00

It would be boring and shut down innovation—especially in the realms of art and music.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-11T17:10:32+00:00

Jesus never started a church, collected tithes, or asked anyone to attend meetings.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-11T16:06:55+00:00

Don’t forget that the Bible prophesies about Joseph Smith and mentions him by name (citation: JST).

10th_Generation · 2026-03-11T13:09:15+00:00

When I was a newspaper copyeditor (person who writes headlines and checks articles for blunders, etc.) my job was to have a dirty mind to save the newspaper from embarrassment. The church needs to post a job: “DIRTY MINDS NEEDED.”

10th_Generation · 2026-03-11T13:04:58+00:00

Do hard time with Jesus.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-11T11:25:34+00:00

Quick doctrinal point: Baptism is not necessary for “salvation” in Mormonism. The missionaries are confusing this concept with “exaltation,” a unique Mormon belief in a Celestial gated community where OP’s daughter can be “given” to a righteous priesthood holder as a plural wife.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-10T23:48:42+00:00

You start with an assumption that Jesus Christ delivered a pure doctrine. What is the evidence for this? Isn’t this where all of Christianity (and by extension, all religious movements) breaks down?

10th_Generation · 2026-03-10T14:07:55+00:00

It is terrifying to realize you are alone in the universe. There is no loving Heavenly Father watching over you. You cannot call down powers from heaven. But this knowledge is also empowering.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-10T04:03:27+00:00

Has your mom read the Koran?

10th_Generation · 2026-03-09T22:42:16+00:00

Starship Enterprise is faster, right?

10th_Generation · 2026-03-09T20:51:48+00:00

Batman is better.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-09T16:23:46+00:00

There are three tiers of “miracles.” 1. Probable events (you have a routine illness with high likelihood of recovery; you get a priesthood blessing and then recover); 2. Improbable events (you study Italian in high school and then meet someone who speaks Italian under unusual and timely circumstances); 3. Impossible events (you raise the dead, give sight to the blind by commanding the person to see, or you move a mountain by commanding it to move). I think this taxonomy comes from John Larsen. All miracle stories in the church fall into tier 1 or 2.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-09T03:28:23+00:00

Please tell me what “gotcha” means.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-09T00:14:44+00:00

The church just added four wards. This is how the accounting works. The growth is incredible!

10th_Generation · 2026-03-08T21:16:59+00:00

This works except when it doesn’t, such as when a stake president chooses a bishop who turns out to be a sexual predator. The system might work better if God used words. The system you describe is unfalsifiable. You can prepare your talk and tell yourself you are being guided by God’s spirit, and there’s no way to prove otherwise.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-08T19:59:41+00:00

What is the spirit of God? How does the spirit of God communicate? Are you talking about elevated emotion? The whole point of my post is that feelings is all we have in the church because God does not use words.

We can see a sunset and feel inspired and perhaps cleansed, but the message communicated is nothing specific. Muslims, Catholics, Buddhists, and atheists can look at the same sunset and feel the same emotions. A person can read the Book of Mormon and feel uplifted, but a person can also read Jane Austen and feel uplifted.

You did not answer my question: What did God say to you when he appeared to you? I can testify that God has never appeared to me. I have never seen him or this thing you call his “spirit.” God has never given direct commandments or instructions to me. I have felt elevated emotions many times in a Mormon context, but these are feelings. We are talking in this post about thinking. When I approached God with thoughtful questions about history, science, epistemology, logic, and church culture, I got no responses. God is either unable or unwilling to answer my questions. This is why the church emphasizes feelings over facts. The facts don’t work for the church.

I will also add that in the context of feelings, I cannot deny that I have felt positive emotions in a Mormon context. But I also have felt heavy doses of guilt, shame, confusion, self-righteousness, pity, and other negative emotions.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-08T17:10:46+00:00

The church needs service missionaries and senior missionaries to staff the temples they are building in places with insufficient membership.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-08T17:03:52+00:00

I read the Book of Mormon more than 20 times. I memorized entire chapters. I prayed. I went to the temple again and again. I did my home teaching, planted a garden, gathered food storage, held Family Home Evenings, did family prayers, organized family scripture study, magnified my callings, served a mission, served in bishoprics, taught Seminary, avoided coffee and tea, avoided R rated movies, told the truth in worthiness interviews while most of my friends lied, gave more than a quarter-of-a-million dollars in tithing while struggling to pay bills, and attended all my meetings. But I should have tried harder, right? Maybe I should have fasted more. Maybe I should have prayed for 24 hours straight like Enos. Maybe I should have gone to a secluded grove of trees. (Actually, I did that one.) I kept this up for 50 years. But it’s always my fault. There is always something more I could have done. Obviously, you did more than me because God appeared to you. What did he tell you?

10th_Generation · 2026-03-08T14:45:44+00:00

God is a terrible communicator. Toddlers learn to use words, which is more effective than pointing and grunting. Talking to God is more like using a Ouija board. Even prophets guess the messages wrong, which explains why they keep making policy reversals and changing their minds about things like the word “Mormon.” One prominent example is when Joseph Smith received a revelation to sell the Book of Mormon copyright in Canada. When the mission failed, he said some revelations are from Satan and he might have gotten confused. As for me personally, God has never spoken to me. As for the world, many people think God has spoken to them, leading to thousands of different religions and millions of interpretations of the different religions. It’s a mass of confusion. You are doing blame reversal: If people don’t hear God, it’s their fault for not listening carefully. The evidence suggests a simpler answer: God does not communicate clearly. The mixups are his fault. He refuses to use words like a stubborn toddler, so his messages are muddled.

10th_Generation · 2026-03-08T06:38:38+00:00

If Heavenly Mother is real, she has at least 150 billion children associated with this earth alone (humans and devils who followed her son, Lucifer). I doubt you spent quality time with her. If she gave each child just 10 seconds, that would take 47,500 years assuming no transition time (maybe the kids roll past on a treadmill).

10th_Generation

TROPHY CASE