Mormon church-owned company buys huge swath of Florida land

Orlando Sentinel ^ | November 7, 2013 | Kevin Spear

[greyfoxx39]

The Mormon church stands to own nearly 2 percent of Florida by completing a deal to buy most of the real estate of the St. Joe Co. for more than a half-billion dollars.

The megapurchase was announced jointly Thursday by a corporate representative of church, which owns the nearly 295,000-acre Deseret Ranches in Central Florida, and by the real-estate and timber business, which has built several communities along the Panhandle coast.

[mountainfolk]

Maybe others have already experienced this, but a word of advice to those who have not. Answering ANY of the anti Mormon posts is not productive unless you agree with their views. Your reply to that poster will be used to spam pages of anti Mormon material to your own posted page. It is obvious that a handful of anti Mormon posters have little to do besides troll for new opportunities to continue their personal vendetta against the Mormon religion and Mormon followers. I am not a Mormon but I respect their choice to worship the same God I do in their own way. Additionally, over the years we have met a number of Mormons in leadership positions who gained our respect for diligence and honesty.

[Guenevere]

Ken, the Mormons have vast land purchases here in Florida....(nothing new)

They are astute business people...

When I first moved to Florida (years ago) my next door neighbors were Mormon (dear people) and we teemed up to go to Orlando to be a counter voice at the 'Year of the Woman conference.....

We were great friends....and shared values.

[Anton.Rutter]

When a mormon becomes an ex-mormon does he cease being diligent and honest?

[AppyPappy]

Slight twist

Maybe others have already experienced this, but a word of advice to those who have not. Answering ANY of the anti Liberal posts is not productive unless you agree with their views. Your reply to that poster will be used to spam pages of anti Liberal material to your own posted page. It is obvious that a handful of anti Liberal posters have little to do besides troll for new opportunities to continue their personal vendetta against the Liberal agenda and Liberal followers. I am not a Liberal but I respect their choice to believe in their own way. Additionally, over the years we have met a number of Liberals in leadership positions who gained our respect for diligence and honesty.

[Anton.Rutter]

Nah. It’s just a small number of Bible thumper nutjobs.

Bitter clingers?

[Guenevere]

Last summer we visited Salt Lake City and were graciously allowed to use their vast genealogy archives.....no questions asked.

While there, I talked to a young man, a LDS missionary, and we had a cordial conversation... although I disagree with many doctrinal positions they hold.

[MinuteGal]

Mea culpa.

I must have been thinking of Ethel Morman.

Leni

[Anton.Rutter]

...although I disagree with many doctrinal positions they hold.

Specifically? ;)

I mean, you get to be a god. When you create your own world and worshippers, you can bring Elvis back. Young, skinny Elvis. Wouldn't that be great?

[turducken]

It’s said that all faiths look absurd when viewed critically from the outside. I maintain that some faiths look more absurd than others.

[Anton.Rutter]

Well, I was born “inside” this cult so I don’t need to look at it from the outside.

Know what I mean?

[turducken]

Hey I don’t disagree - seems absolutely nuts to me and obviously not a Christian faith.

[Elsie]

Yes, Muzzies lop your head off, Mormons don’t.

True.

MORMONs lop your soul off.

[Elsie]

Last year, the obsessive hate campaign was so bad that I know freepers who quit or who lowered their donations in disgust.

Yeah; it's just TERRIBLE when HATE like that is revealed!

---

---

Questions put to Joseph Smith: "'Do you believe the Bible?' [Smith:]'If we do, we are the only people under heaven that does, for there are none of the religious sects of the day that do'. When asked 'Will everybody be damned, but Mormons'? [Smith replied] 'Yes, and a great portion of them, unless they repent, and work righteousness." (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 119).

Joseph Smith: "for the teachers of religion of the different sects understood the same passages of scripture so differently as to destroy all confidence in settling the question by an appeal to the Bible" (from Pearl of Great Price 1:12). "What is it that inspires professors of Christianity generally with a hope of salvation? It is that smooth, sophisticated influence of the devil, by which he deceives the whole world" (Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p.270).

 

 

 

Brigham Young stated this repeatedly: "When the light came to me I saw that all the so-called Christian world was grovelling in darkness" (Journal of Discourses 5:73); "The Christian world, so-called, are heathens as to the knowledge of the salvation of God" (Journal of Discourses 8:171); "With a regard to true theology, a more ignorant people never lived than the present so-called Christian world" (Journal of Discourses 8:199); "And who is there that acknowledges [God's] hand? ...You may wander east, west, north, and south, and you cannot find it in any church or government on the earth, except the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints" (Journal of Discourses , vol. 6, p.24); "Should you ask why we differ from other Christians, as they are called, it is simply because they are not Christians as the New Testament defines Christianity" (Journal of Discourses 10:230).

 

 

 

Orson Pratt proclaimed: "Both Catholics and Protestants are nothing less than the 'whore of Babylon' whom the Lord denounces by the mouth of John the Revelator as having corrupted all the earth by their fornications and wickedness. Any person who shall be so corrupt as to receive a holy ordinance of the Gospel from the ministers of any of these apostate churches will be sent down to hell with them, unless they repent" (The Seer, p. 255).

 

 

 

Orson Pratt also said: "This great apostasy commenced about the close of the first century of the Christian era, and it has been waxing worse and worse from then until now" (Journal of Discourses

, vol.18, p.44) and: "But as there has been no Christian Church on the earth for a great many centuries past, until the present century, the people have lost sight of the pattern that God has given according to which the Christian Church should be established, and they have denominated a great variety of people Christian Churches, because they profess to be ...But there has been a long apostasy, during which the nations have been cursed with apostate churches in great abundance" (Journal of Discourses , 18:172).

 

 

President John Taylor stated: "Christianity...is a perfect pack of nonsense...the devil could not invent a better engine to spread his work than the Christianity of the nineteenth century." (Journal of Discourses , vol. 6, p.167); "Where shall we look for the true order or authority of God? It cannot be found in any nation of Christendom." (Journal of Discourses , 10:127).

 

 

 

James Talmage said: "A self-suggesting interpretation of history indicates that there has been a great departure from the way of salvation as laid down by the Savior, a universal apostasy from the Church of Christ". (A Study of the Articles of Faith, p.182).

 

 

 

President Joseph Fielding Smith said: "Doctrines were corrupted, authority lost, and a false order of religion took the place of the gospel of Jesus Christ, just as it had been the case in former dispensations, and the people were left in spiritual darkness." (Doctrines of Salvation, p.266). "For hundreds of years the world was wrapped in a veil of spiritual darkness, until there was not one fundamental truth belonging to the place of salvation ...Joseph Smith declared that in the year 1820 the Lord revealed to him that all the 'Christian' churches were in error, teaching for commandments the doctrines of men" (Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 3, p.282).

 

 

 

More recent statements by apostle Bruce McConkie are also very clear: "Apostasy was universal...And this darkness still prevails except among those who have come to a knowledge of the restored gospel" (Doctrines of Salvation, vol 3, p.265); "Thus the signs of the times include the prevailing apostate darkness in the sects of Christendom and in the religious world in general" (The Millennial Messiah, p.403); "a perverted Christianity holds sway among the so-called Christians of apostate Christendom" (Mormon Doctrine, p.132); "virtually all the millions of apostate Christendom have abased themselves before the mythical throne of a mythical Christ whom they vainly suppose to be a spirit essence who is incorporeal uncreated, immaterial and three-in-one with the Father and Holy Spirit" (Mormon Doctrine, p.269); "Gnosticism is one of the great pagan philosophies which antedated Christ and the Christian Era and which was later commingled with pure Christianity to form the apostate religion that has prevailed in the world since the early days of that era." (Mormon Doctrine, p.316).

 

 

 

President George Q. Cannon said: "After the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized, there were only two churches upon the earth. They were known respectively as the Church of the Lamb of God and Babylon. The various organizations which are called churches throughout Christendom, though differing in their creeds and organizations, have one common origin. They all belong to Babylon" (Gospel Truth, p.324).

 

 

President Wilford Woodruff stated: "the Gospel of modern Christendom shuts up the Lord, and stops all communication with Him. I want nothing to do with such a Gospel, I would rather prefer the Gospel of the dark ages, so called" (Journal of Discourses , vol. 2, p.196).

[Elsie]

The intolerant stirring-up against the Mormans goes on and on with no end in sight.

Hi!

We're here to tell you that ALL of Christianity is wrong.

Wanna give us a few moments of your time?

[Elsie]

It's the same obsessed actors again...

I see you've cleaned out your desk and found the old memo...

Office of First President & Living Prophet®:

April 21st, 2012

URGENT!

Fellow MORMON Freeper Christians!!

 

Hot diggity dog; our boy has MADE it!!

Now beware; for the media is gonna be on us like... well; you know the saying.

I've been getting lots of feedback from those of you on Free Republic (spit) about a certain ELSIE (or something like that), who is REALLY giving us a hard time there!

 

Why not try to point out to the uninformed how OBSESSED he seems to be.

 

Let's see if we can tangle him up so much trying to defend his reputation

that he'll no longer have as much time to post facts about MORMONism.

 

As always, Tommy M.  

 

(Keep pressing that we are CHRISTIAN and avoid anything MORMON like the DEVIL!!)

[Elsie]

...that I know freepers who quit or who lowered their donations in disgust.

All Mormons?

[Elsie]

You guys have met the 'good' ones.

This ain't here for no reason...

[Elsie]

The "fundamentalist" Bible-thumping zealots on this board are (yes, I mean to use this word), legion.

I sure hope so!

You are welcome, you know, to point out any ERROR and LIES that are told about Mormonism.

Or would you rather just complain?

If you don't like bible thumping; then thump the Book of MORMON.

I'm just SURE we could find some things to talk about in it!

[elcid1970]

That’s Ethel Merman!!!!

BTW, she shortened her name. Used to be Zimmerman.

;^)

[Elsie]

The "fundamentalist" Bible-thumping zealots on this board are (yes, I mean to use this word), legion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_legion