NOM

I find it interesting how much variety there is in motivation and perspective among those in the "middle way." I suppose there's just as much variety between believers, but perhaps it's not as noticeable there. Although I find myself firmly in the middle-way camp, I rarely see a take that I can rela...

When I was a missionary, we used a particular apartment just for meetings and teaching sessions. The story was that missionaries had lived there at one time but were harassed by unseen entities. Those entities were driven out at one point, but the mission decided not to have missionaries live there ...

When I was a missionary, another missionary told me that a local church leader had once confided in him that the gospel plan is ultimately selfish. That idea stuck in my mind. I couldn't help asking myself whether I would care as much what God wanted me to do if an attractive afterlife with family a...

I hope it's okay if I continue to treat this as a general thread about movies that deal with issues of faith. I recently watched Apostasy , which is about a family of Jehovah's Witnesses who have to deal with the consequences of their doctrines. Not an especially happy story, but an interesting wind...

I've assumed that a lot of flat earth talk on the Internet is more about getting a reaction than about sincerely-held beliefs. I can also imagine that some would overthink the questions in such a poll and select Other because they had heard that the earth is not perfectly round. I can also imagine s...

Welcome back. I think this is a pretty good remix:

Personal Jesus (Alex Metric Remix Edit)

I've been reading this over the past few days, and I can't help noticing how my current perspective colors the narrative for me. Years ago, a book like this would have been a dream come true for me. I was always looking for things that dug a little deeper. Now, I find it amusing to see how they couc...

Corsair wrote: ↑

Wed Jun 27, 2018 7:41 am

I read this book many years ago. While Card is a fully believing Mormon, he has a good eye for some of the silliness of LDS culture.

Have you read Saintspeak? It's like Ambrose Bierce's The Devil's Dictionary but for Mormonism.

Mormon leaders would never allow the images on the dome of the Sistine Chapel I'm trying to remember which Mormon Stories interview it was with a relative of someone who painted a temple mural. The painter included mice smoking cigarettes temporarily as a joke before completing the art. Or did I ju...

I've been looking forward to these, though I've assumed that I will be disappointed in light of all the talk about transparency. I looked at the chapters they've posted so far. The writing style is not especially engaging. I suppose that they are keeping things simple for ease of comprehension and t...

I may be an anomaly, but my mission was great. I had a very relaxed mission president, lived in Europe, learned a foreign language, gained a ton of experience and confidence I didn't have before and I believe I came back a better person, or at least more mature. I was also lucky in this regard. I w...

I had a calling the in the YM presidency when I was starting to seriously question my faith. Like IT_Veteran, I wouldn't have called myself a non-believer. (I guess I'd still feel uncomfortable applying that term to myself--I'm not a fan of most negative-sounding labels.) And like Red Ryder, I'd use...

As you mentioned, I can understand why people find comfort in the belief that someone's in control and everything that happens is somehow ultimately for the best. But the idea of divine intervention (which leads straight to the Problem of Evil) is my number one "faith crisis" issue, above anything e...

There are at least two possible explanations for resurrected beings passing through walls despite being solid. In Joseph Smith's account of Moroni's visit, he was specific about a "conduit" opening when the angel left. After this communication, I saw the light in the room begin to gather immediately...

Enoch Witty wrote: ↑

Thu May 17, 2018 5:39 am

long-time hardcore Dark Souls fan

I find meaning and purpose in similarly pointless activities . . . . I'm with you on this. Everything we do is as meaningful or meaningless as we decide it is. It's not as if anything we do, profound or trivial, will last forever. Well, except maybe temple work, if it really has cosmic efficacy. I ...

Though not all are as significant as succession to the presidency, I have found it interesting to learn how many foundational miracle stories appear to include elements of fabrication or exaggeration when examined. Another example is the the seagulls and the crickets (katydids) . An essay about that...

I find a lot of Ostler's ideas insightful. His Exploring Mormon Thought books cover fascinating topics, even if they get a little dry at times in the way that philosophy can tend to. I've only read the first one so far, but I have all three. I guess the basic problem for humans is that we usually en...

Welcome to the forum. I can relate to your desire to maintain ties to the community, not disrupt family, and so on. It's a strange thing to find yourself going through significant changes in perspective and having to decide what to change outwardly, if anything. Common advice people give is to move ...

I find that I still fit in with Mormons just fine, though perhaps less and less with Mormonism. For example, when I go to church, I still feel comfortable as part of the group. But when I happen to attend a meeting or class, I'm reminded of how far I've drifted and how little I can relate to even th...