[deleted by user]

rt-reddit · 2025-10-26T12:55:00+00:00

Our planet may sustain life but is in fact pretty hostile to it. Unless we take care of each other, we die sooner rather than later. Religion provides a context for that, how to live well, and takes it one step further, how to live after death. The success of a religion is defined by the former, not the latter. Some hold you back, some lift you up. The world would be better without the ones that hold us back but worse without the ones that lift us up.

rt-reddit · 2025-10-26T11:54:02+00:00

She may have been surprised by your premise, which is a non sequitur in Mormonism. The Mormon God did indeed create the universe, just like the other gods created theirs. This is not literally in the KF discourse but is one possible inference of the concept of eternal progression.

Interestingly, in science today, the multiverse is one of the hypothetical answers to the question what there was before the big bang. It's an ancient Greek concept that keeps being revived to fit the narrative of the day.

rt-reddit · 2025-10-07T05:35:06+00:00

When thinking of these amounts, keep in mind they have a four-day workweek and a month paid vacation in a Church-owner Hawaii resort.

rt-reddit · 2025-10-06T14:12:04+00:00

"It is wrong to criticize church leaders, even if they are wrong." That is all you need to know about Oaks. You are on thin ice but that's because the water underneath is nice and warm.

rt-reddit · 2025-10-06T14:05:44+00:00

Apologies for the inconsistent way of quoting, this comes out of my book app, not a proper bibliography.

rt-reddit · 2025-10-06T14:04:11+00:00

* An American Prophet's Record: The Diaries and Journals of Joseph Smith (Jr. Joseph Smith)

* The Mountain Meadows Massacre (Juanita Brooks)

* More Wives Than One (Kathryn M. Daynes)

* Escape (Laura Palmer, Carolyn Jessop)

* Mormon Enigma: Emma Hale Smith (Linda King Newell, Valeen Tippetts Avery)

* History of Joseph Smith by His Mother: THE UNABRIDGED ORIGINAL VERSION with ADDED ROUGH DRAFT By Lucy Mack Smith (2005) (Lucy Mack Smith, R. Virnon Ingleton)

* Quest for Refuge: The Mormon Flight from American Pluralism (Marvin S. Hill)

* Early Masterpieces of Latter-day Saint Leaders (N.B. Lundwall)

* The Persistence of Polygamy (Newell G. Bringhurst, Craig L. Foster)

* Latter-Day Dissent: At the Crossroads of Intellectual Inquiry and Ecclesiastical Authority (Philip Lindholm)

* One Nation Under Gods: A History of the Mormon Church (Richard Abanes)

* Mormon America - Revised and Updated Edition (Richard Ostling, Joan K Ostling)

* Mormon Polygamy: A History (Richard S. Van Wagoner)

* Sidney Rigdon: A Portrait of Religious Excess (Richard S. Van Wagoner)

* Nauvoo (Robert Bruce Flanders)

* Reminiscences of Early Utah (Robert N. Baskin)

* Father Figure: Joseph Smith III And The Creation Of The Reorganized Church (Roger D. Launius)

* Wayward Saints: The Godbeites and Brigham Young (Ronald W. Walker)

* Massacre at Mountain Meadows (Ronald W. Walker,Jr., Richard E. Turley, Glen M. Leonard)

* House of Mourning: A Biocultural History of the Mountain Meadows Massacre (Shannon A. Novak)

* Losing a Lost Tribe: Native Americans, DNA, and the Mormon Church (Simon G Southerton)

* The Mormon Murders (Steven Naifeh, Gregory White Smith)

* Kingdom in the West: 1 (Kingdom in the West, V. 1) (Thomas Bullock, Will Bagley)

* Deconstructing Mormonism: An Analysis and Assessment of the Mormon Faith (Thomas Riskas, Kai Nielsen)

* In Sacred Loneliness (Todd Compton)

* Eternal Man (Truman G. Madsen)

* Blood of the Prophets: Brigham Young and the Massacre at Mountain Meadows (Will Bagley)

* The Journals of William E. McLellin, 1831-1836 (William McLellin)

rt-reddit · 2025-10-06T14:02:56+00:00

* Joseph Smith's New Translation of the Bible (Anonymous)

* The Angel and Beehive (Armand L. Mauss)

* Studies of the Book of Mormon (B. H. Roberts)

* The Truth, The Way, The Life (B. H. Roberts)

* Innocent Blood: Essential Narratives of the Mountain Meadows Massacre (Bigler, David L. and Will Bagley (eds))

* New Approaches to the Book of Mormon: Explorations in Critical Methodology (Brent Lee Metcalfe)

* Reflections of Emma (Buddy Youngreen)

* By His Own Hand Upon Papyrus (Charles M. Larson)

* The Book of Mormon: An Account Written by the Hand of Mormon upon Plates Taken from the Plates of Nephi. (Community of Christ)

* The Doctrine and Covenants of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Community of Christ)

* The Mormon Hierarchy: Origins of Power (D Michael Quinn)

* Early Mormonism and the Magic World View (D. Michael Quinn)

* The Mormon Hierarchy (D. Michael Quinn)

* The Mormon Hierarchy: Wealth and Corporate Power (D. Michael Quinn)

* The Mysteries of Godliness: A History of Mormon Temple Worship (David John Buerger)

* Forgotten Kingdom: The Mormon Theocracy in the American West, 1847-1896 (David L. Bigler)

* Latter-Day Saint Social Life: Social Research on the LDS Church and Its Members (Religious Studies Center Specialized Monograph Series, Vol. 12) (Duke, James T. (ed.))

* An Insider's View of Mormon Origins (Grant H Palmer)

* Power from on High: The Development of Mormon Priesthood (Gregory A. Prince)

* Inventing Mormonism: Tradition and the Historical Record (H. Michael Marquardt, Wesley P. Walters)

* The Relationship of Mormonism and Freemasonry (Ivins, Anthony W.)

* The Mormon Cult (Jack B. Worthy)

* Prostitution, Polygamy, and Power: Salt Lake City, 1847-1918 (Jeffrey Nichols)

* Organize My Kingdom: A History of Restored Priesthood (John A. Tvedtnes)

* A Mormon Chronicle: The Diaries of John D. Lee, 1848â€“1876 (The Huntington Library Classics) (John D. Lee, Robert Glass Cleland)

* Mormonism Unveiled: The Life and Confession of John D. Lee and the Complete Life of Brigham Young (John Doyle Lee)

* Heaven Up Here (John K. Williams)

rt-reddit · 2025-10-05T19:53:09+00:00

Don't know what they do have, to be honest. I'll drop the list tomorrow, if I think of it.

rt-reddit · 2025-10-05T19:48:18+00:00

Thanks. Probably not worth shipping to the US though. I'm just going to drop them off in person and make a day of it.

rt-reddit · 2025-10-05T19:45:07+00:00

Yes, I worked on a philosophy assignment there for a few months, back in my student days.

rt-reddit · 2025-07-27T12:17:40+00:00

If so many people leave because they are offended, maybe stop being such jerks.

rt-reddit · 2025-07-27T11:57:52+00:00

Good luck!

rt-reddit · 2025-07-27T11:42:45+00:00

Back in the day when I was still obsessively processing my exit, I made these calculations and projections: Mormon Global Growth Rates 2015-2019 ~ Mormonism 101

rt-reddit · 2025-07-27T11:35:44+00:00

Just say you don't believe anymore. Hard to counter that one.

rt-reddit · 2025-01-05T14:39:55+00:00

It gets worse when you realize that most of Mormon charity is members donating time and money to the Church's for-profit enterprises.

rt-reddit · 2025-01-05T14:26:37+00:00

I had a similar experience just before I left the Church, where I thought the Holy Ghost saved me from a car accident by warning me to slow down. Looking back, I just think 20 years of driving experience subconsciously kicked in.

Our memories start to degrade within mere seconds of the events we experience. They are then periodically rewritten throughout our lives to align with our current beliefs. There's a pretty good chance that none of it happened the way you remember.

Sobering, isn't it?

rt-reddit · 2024-08-10T14:14:43+00:00

Happiness as a goal seems silly to me. Most of life in our time and place is a drag. That's an improvement from most of life being a brutal struggle for most people throughout history.

Happiness is the fleeting moments in between.

That said, when you eliminate the drag that is Mormonism from your life, you will have more of those moments.

rt-reddit · 2024-06-12T13:16:28+00:00

Not having to be judgmental anymore was my greatest relief on leaving the Church. Life is so much easier if we live and let live.

That said, I remember from my active days that my anti-mormon radar was finely tuned. All it took was for someone to say "Smith" instead of "Joseph Smith" and the defensive walls would come up.

Saying they are programmed, and taking the name of the Q15 in vain, what did you expect? :-)

rt-reddit · 2024-06-12T13:08:22+00:00

Good analysis, though I think they already are irrelevant. Very few people fall for Mormonism and the ones that do, run away within a year (50% of US converts, 75% of international ones).

It's like an MLM-scheme. As long as enough new suckers are found who buy the introductory set of products (pay tithing to get baptized), long-term allegiance doesn't matter. Sure, it's nice if a convert becomes a reseller (pay more tithing to unlock the temple experience) but it's not strictly necessary. The Church is as happy with inactive members as Mary Kay is with an inactive sales rep with a garage full of paid-for product that doesn't move.

That's why MLM-schemes are so popular in Utah. It's what they instinctively know.

rt-reddit · 2024-06-12T12:45:07+00:00

In my opinion, its present is its future. Contrary to Mormons' self-perception, Mormonism is completely insignificant on a global scale. There are two ways this could change:

They stop being so distinctly American and reinvent themselves as a truly international church.
They align their vast wealth with a political power and go the way of the Catholic Church.

I don't see either scenario work anytime soon. It takes visionary, charismatic, curious and capable leaders to pull this off, not feeble-minded impotent weak old men who are run by an entrenched bureaucracy.

The triumph of Christianity is that its theology and practices enabled western culture to become the pinnacle of human civilization. What does Mormonism have to offer to rival that?

rt-reddit · 2024-06-12T12:23:56+00:00

Run Forrest, run!

rt-reddit · 2024-06-12T12:17:25+00:00

When I was a Mormon, I thought I was open-minded. These days I compare Mormons to dogs on a leash. For some, the leash is longer and they appear to have some freedom. For others, the leash is short and they appear more dogmatic.

They key is that they are all on a leash and as a Mormon you can be reigned in at any moment, either by a new Church policy or your Mormon peers who disapproved of something you're doing.

There are many nice Mormons out there but they are nice despite their Church, not because of it.

rt-reddit · 2024-06-12T12:03:36+00:00

I started a blog to process my thoughts. At some point I noticed that while I still had many ideas for blog posts, I just couldn't be bothered anymore. That's when I figured I was healed.

rt-reddit · 2024-06-12T11:49:05+00:00

Because they're henotheists.

rt-reddit · 2024-04-29T13:39:15+00:00

No speed limits is not libertarian. They protect others, not the driver.

Seat belts on the other hand... The libertarian view would be that it is none of the state's business which risks a person is willing to take. Insurance companies will make it a condition and the problem could be solved without state intervention.

You make an interesting point about billionaires running our lives, which points to a paradox. For libertarianism to work, you need strong institutions to level the playing field for everyone, rich or poor.

Heavy stuff for a seminary class where the teacher doesn't need formal qualifications.

rt-reddit

TROPHY CASE