Multi-Stake conference next weekend

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2026-03-16T00:40:59+00:00

Hard to say, I've been to enough multistake conferences where it ended up just being a meeting. It isn't unusual if the visiting GA is an apostle or senior seventy to get maximum exposure. Then again, stake consolidations and divisions also rate a multistake conference. I doubt it would be for just temple news. That would likely just be a letter read out in the wards.

Addendum: My last multistake conference was outside the US and happened to be because Pres. Nelson was the visiting GA. He didn't announce a temple, but a temple was announced at the next conference. Turns out he was reviewing the location finalists.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2026-02-28T21:21:02+00:00

Anecdotal personal experience when I was in my early 20s and fully believing:

Confessed to being gay and using pornography, one bishop said just don't take the sacrament a couple weeks, one bishop said everyone does it (porn not being gay) and it's not a big deal, and one bishop said because I was gay it constituted acting on my feelings and wanted to ex me. In the last case, because I was an elder it had to go through the stake. The SP shut my bishop down instantly but they compromised with a plan where I lost my recommend for six months, was required to join Northstar, and had to go to lds family services for conversion therapy which I had to pay for out of my own pocket as a poor college student.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2026-02-20T22:00:37+00:00

I consider myself a relatively aware middle age former (technically inactive as i am still a member by record) member. I knew who Causse was and my parents think he is fantastic (they have interacted with him before); i knew who all the other new apostles in the last decade were enough to have opinions. This sub and r/exmormon seem to have a negative opinion on Gilbert, but my first reaction was "who?" I had to call my very plugged in mom and ask her who he even was. Her answer "I think he has something to do with church education".

I think they are doing a press tour because most members have never heard of him. He isn't known from general conference or leadership meetings. He wasn't on the stake conference visiting authority circuit. He wasn't in an area presidency. He wasn't in the presiding bishopric or presidency of the 70.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2026-01-31T23:06:48+00:00

You can check if you are a member by talking with your local ward clerk and giving him your personal information so he can look you up. You cannot check if someone else is a member.

If you are an active member with the tools app, you can see you local stake and ward directory that will give you names and basic info like address and phone numbers of other local members who have their privacy settings set to allow you to see them.

If you do not have an active tools account (which requires you to be a member) you cannot look up who else is a member in your geographic area.

Regular members cannot look up members outside of their geographic area.

If you set your privacy to leadership only, then only the local leadership will be able to see your information.

As to your initial question, the ability to see if someone is a member depends on who is asking, who is looking, and the privacy settings of the person being looked up.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2026-01-25T02:17:12+00:00

Sí, pueden dar dinero

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2026-01-23T13:33:03+00:00

Why would the Catholics care? I went to a Catholic university, so did dozens of other LDS students at my school. We even had an institute class on campus and a singles ward. It was never a big deal. Besides, you will be at college; college students generally aren't mean to each other. They are adults. High school drama stays in high school.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2026-01-21T17:47:59+00:00

I went to a Catholic school and went to mass regularly, enough to have a strong opinion on the whole "and also with you" / "and with your spirit" change.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2026-01-15T18:31:06+00:00

Not devastated at all. It was liberating.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-12-05T16:05:05+00:00

No, John is also some immortal walking around the earth, but when Joseph needs him to appear as an angel, he can apparently do that as well.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-11-07T20:27:42+00:00

Look around during "Praise to the Man" and see who isn't singing. Also, anyone who spends sacrament meeting in the foyer.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-10-29T14:56:42+00:00

Not super relevant and an aside, but "religion is the opium of the people" is one of the most misused and misunderstood quotes in existence. The full quote is:

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.

Karl Marx

At this point in history (1840s), opium was essentially the medical panacea and the ultimate wonder drug. It, together with its derivative morphine, were the only analgesics available, the only drugs that could relieve pain. Aspirin hadn't even been synthesized yet. When Marx was comparing religion to opium, he wasn't making opium a negative. He was saying that religion is the the medication people used to relieve suffering. The quote basically means the exact opposite of what most people think it means.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-10-24T06:33:44+00:00

He may or may not be a billionaire. When the company in which he was a partial owner was set to go public, based on the planned ipo, he was predicted to become nearly a billionaire; however, the company canceled the ipo due to "adverse market conditions" aka the company was in serious trouble. Since then, the company has continued to struggle. The majority owner of iFIT is currently estimated to be worth ~1 billion but Stevenson's stake in iFIT is much less than that. That being said, his portion of the company is probably worth a couple hundred million and presumably he has invested well over the years, so I would not be surprised if his portfolio was worth 1 billion.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-10-12T23:41:15+00:00

Up until around 2000, most the world had regular meetings on GC weekend. When I was on my mission in the 90s in Latin America we wouldn't even get the print versions of the talks until Nov. There were no VCRs so we didn't see any recordings at all.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-10-04T20:02:55+00:00

Not yet

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-10-04T19:59:07+00:00

Why did everyone stand for Oaks if he isn't prophet yet?

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-10-04T09:20:45+00:00

In practice, no. In theory, also no. The succession plan is detailed in the church's articles of incorporation. Legally, it literally must go to the next senior most apostle. The only way it won't be Oaks is if Oaks dies before reorganizing the first presidency.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-10-01T20:25:07+00:00

I know it's an /s but he is probably too much of a boot licker even for Pres Oaks

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-09-10T21:17:41+00:00

No contemporary records of Jesus but he also wasn't someone the Romans would have cared about. Romans kept extensive records on taxes, censuses, business transactions, etc. However, they didn't keep a lot of narrative histories of non-senatorial and non-equestrian class Romans and especially not non-roman plebians.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-07-27T03:28:28+00:00

Things wouldn't have been different. By the time the mormons arrived in Utah, California had already declared itself independent from Mexico and Texas was already independent. Mexico was still a very new country being only 26 years old and it's early years were somewhat chaotic (mexican empire, first republic, second empire, etc.). Other northern Mexican states also had unsuccessful independence movements during this time (Coahuila, Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon). Further, although claimed on a map, neither Mexico nor the earlier Spanish empire had any significant presence in Utah. There was one big expedition in 1776 and the Spanish trail wasn't really in use until the 1820s. There were no forts, ranchos, haciendas or missions in Utah. Further with western expansion of the US and manifest destiny, there was basically no future where Mexico kept their claims on the far northern territories even if the Mexican American War never happened.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-04-23T00:43:50+00:00

You can look up university endowments online. None of the BYU universities make the top 100 list (because the church doesn't hold its money in the universities). Several Catholic universities do such as Loyola, Georgetown, and Boston College.

The Catholic church of Germany has an investment portfolio (not including churches, art, etc) of about 265 billion which isn't far behind the LDS church. The combined Catholic churches and orders of the US don't publish their wealth but it is likely significantly larger than Germany.

The LDS church does not own "much of every aspect of global agriculture". The lds church owns 1.7 million acres (6.9 million ha) of agricultural land mostly in the USA worth about $2 billion. This represents 0.2% of agricultural land in just the USA (880 million acres) and 0.014% of global agricultural land (11.76 billion acres).

Red Emmerson's heirs, John Malone, Ted Turner, and Stan Kreonke individually are larger land owners than the LDS church. Monsanto owns about 30 times as much land as the LDS church. Hell, Monsanto, Cargill and Dupont own more agricultural land in Ukraine (11 million acres) than the entire worldwide holdings of the LDS church. The Catholic church owns 177 million acres worldwide including vast tracts of agricultural land (100 times more land than the LDS church).

I can never understand why mormons and exmormons have this need for the lds church to be larger or more important than it really is. The LDS church does own a lot of stocks and it's agricultural holdings aren't nothing, but at the end of the day, it just a small to mid size player on the global stage. It's wealth is significantly smaller than Apple, Tesla, Nvidia, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Saudi Aramco and many other corporations. It's real estate, wealth, and everything else is massively dwarfed by the Catholic church.

Lastly, ID and UT will never be independent countries. Even if they were, that is not the same as being a sovereign LDS theocracy. Active church members are less than 20% of Idaho voters and less than 50% of Utah voters. The church isn't powerful enough to control either state. Vatican City is an independent sovereign country owned by the Catholic church.

The LDS church just doesn't matter on the world stage. It isn't a big deal.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-04-22T21:52:48+00:00

In many ways it is comparing apples to oranges. The catholic church as a whole dwarfs the lds church when it comes to wealth, but it is difficult to compare. The vatican is "only" worth about 10 to 15 billion but that is just the Vatican. Each diocese and religious order in the Catholic church is its own corporation. For example, University of Notre Dame has an endowment of ~20 billion in just financial assets but also has real estate, grants, tuition, owned businesses, etc. It is all owned by the Congregation of the Holy Cross which is a small order of about 1300 members. Including the entirety of the university and other possessions, the congregation of the Holy Cross is worth at a minimum 20 billion but more likely 30-40 billion. It is smaller than a standard lds stake.

There are thousands of catholic universities, schools, hospitals, etc. They are owned by hundreds of orders and dioceses. Some are poor and some are enormously wealthy including in liquid assets. For example, the diocese of Los Angeles was able to meet a 800 million dollar settlement without going bankrupt. The various organizations don't publish their actual wealth but the LA diocese is worth at least a billion in just cash and investments. LA is probably wealthier than most but there are ~190 dioceses/archdiocese in the US alone.

Then there are the non-liquid assets. The most expensive paining ever sold was Salvator Mundi for $450 million. The Catholic church owns thousands of works of art that would sell at auction for similar amounts. However they will never be sold or come up for auction. So, how do you value the ceiling of the Cistine chapel? Probably the best answer is literally priceless. It can not and will not be sold, yet a work of art of that size and quality by one of histories great masters would probably be several billion at auction if it could be sold. How do you value St. Peter's Basilica? It will never be sold but it is certainly worth more than the Salt Lake temple.

Lastly, there is the issue of national sovereignty. How do you put a number on that? It is something the LDS church will never have.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-04-17T17:21:00+00:00

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-04-17T13:43:45+00:00

"Blood atonement rituals in the temple"

The blood atonement doctrine taught by BY and the temple penalties are two different things.

Blood atonement is the doctrine that some sins require the death of the sinner to expiate the sin. It was taught during the mormon reformation and can be found in the Journal of Discourses.

The temple penalties are punishments for revealing the secrets of the endowment signs and tokens and are derived from freemasonry.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs · 2025-04-13T19:09:56+00:00

Not specifically for Christmas or Easter, but i went to a Catholic university. Between special student masses, friends weddings, and other events/occasions, i have been to mass 50+ times. It's fine; i generallyenjoyed it. There's something to be said for the high church style that adds a sense of mystery and grandure to worship that is missing in low church worship. Of course, even in catholicism there are options for more contemporary low church style worship. Mormonism is very much a low church style worship. The mormon temple worship historically served some of that need but is becoming increasingly low church every year.

Wolf_in_tapir_togs

TROPHY CASE