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Posted on 05/08/2008 5:04:47 PM PDT by Grig
I am posting this on behalf of many LDS freepers. They will post their own 'signature' to this in the comments below. --- Some of you have noticed lately a lot of LDS (ie: Mormon) threads here on FR. I'm going to tell you why.
For many years there have been several active LDS freepers here. We post to all the forums on relevant issues, and were happy to have a site where conservative values were so openly welcomed.
Those conservative values include faith in God, and freedom of religion. We fully respect the rights of all posters to express their opinions and views on religious matters, even when people choose to use those rights to express criticism of our own faith. We also support the ideas embodied in FR rules against religion bashing. There is no need for hostility and there should be no room for bigotry on FR. Every religion has it's miracles and mysteries. Every faith has things in it that are not or can not be proven, and things that run contrary to what secular science would have us believe. Someone mature and confident in their own faith generally doesn't feel the need to belittle the faith of others.
We have, to the best of our ability, conducted ourselves with civility and dignity. We do not feel that that respect has been returned by some posters (putting it mildly).
When Mormon missionaries were murdered, the moderators were kept busy pulling jubilant posts off the thread. When Elizabeth Smart was abducted from her home, we contended for months with posters who appeared to be motivated by religious bigotry doing all they could to smear the family and accuse the father. Several posters openly admitted their religious motivation in opposing Mitt Romney and confessed that no matter how conservative any Mormon was, they would never vote for one for President of the USA. When the Pope died, I don't think any Mormon poster posted anything unkind, yet the thread about the passing of our President recently needed many comments removed.
Nearly every thread having any connection with Mormons, or Utah winds up being hijacked by anti-Mormon activists who copy and paste the same false accusations over and over even when it has been clearly and factually pointed out to them on multiple occasions that they are bearing false witness against our faith. Everything possible is done by these activists to make FR a hostile place for Mormons, and for at least some of them, bashing Mormonism is all they do here. Their most recent project is trying to blur the fact that the polygamous FLDS is a separate and distinct religion from ours, just as Lutherans are a separate and distinct religion from Catholicism.
In our opinion, such poster do a great disservice to FR and to their fellow freepers by spreading disinformation and promoting hostility towards a people known for walking the walk of conservative values.
Why the moderators here don't see the behavior of these anti-Mormon activists as religion bashing is a mystery to us, but it is the moderators call to make and we respect their right to do so. That doesn't mean we have to be passive however. We have all spent many hours refuting the accusations leveled at our faith, but these wind up buried deep in a flood of comments, effectively shouting us down.
Recently some of us have decided to take a more proactive approach. Rather than try to wrestle the pig into taking a bath, we are just going to hose it down. We will actively define our faith here rather than just respond to accusations.
So expect to see lots of Mormon threads, now and for as long as we see fit to keep posting them (although probably not as many as there are Catholic threads). They will be about our basic doctrines and responses to common accusations. If you want to know what our faith is about, read the articles we post. We will post them as open threads and I encourage you to compare the difference in tone and spirit between what we post and what our critics say.
No...
Quacker jack ducks...
Peabody Hotel, Memphis, TN...
But there was one drake and four “wives”....
>>FWIW, it goes without saying that - five years later - I’m still here.<<
Oh we do know that.
I didn’t realize that you were equal opportunity!
Gotta go to bed now kids.
I'd go more for the pagan ladies dancing nekkid under the moon. OT? Nope: "Mormons, Pagans, and Naked Women"
Just to be clear, not this Pagan...
I said ladies...
"God bless those pagans." --Homer Simpson
Brevity or levity?
God love you, I think you mean “levity,” not “brevity.”
;O)
You want em I can do that all day.......
Thats like shootin fish in a barrel.
I’m partial to the smooth-shaven Krishnas myself.
They look so tidy.
There are a lot of nice mormons too. But when you get into doctrine the SDAs are actually a very nutty bunch.
Now, this is turning into a discussion of the religion, but frankly, I’ve never had a single Mormon I know ever agree with or defend Polygamy. And I’ve never seen any mormon here at FR defend Polygamy.
I know that there was a history of Polygamy in the Mormon church. There was a history of Polygamy at the start of the Jewish people as well. I don’t say that to compare, I say that to know the historical reference.
I know there is still Polygamy, that it is practiced by people who believe it is still the correct interpretation of their Mormon faith. But I don’t hold every Mormon responsible for that belief.
There are people who believe nearly what I believe, who sincerely believe Catholicism is a cult, and of the devil. These are not fringe characters. Their opinion has some weight and is shared by a minor but not insignificant population of believers. If I were Catholic, I would not hang out in a political forum dominated by evangelicals who followed Hagee, or the earliar practices of the Bob Jones University crowd.
Mormonism is on the fringe for me. I won’t defend it as a Christian religion. I will defend it against some attacks, simply because of the people I know personally who practice the faith. You aren’t likely to see me expressing the same level of concern for attacks against Scientology for example.
On the other hand, I’ll try very hard not to bring Scientology up in a political context. I love chatting about religion — but I find those discussions are a little better in person, where you can include emotion and get feedback. I’ll be happy to spell out my beliefs, but I find whenever I MENTION other beliefs, I invariably cause problems.
For example, in this thread, I believe I have reason now to apologize to Mormons, Catholics, Methodists, and probably a few other religious groups as well.
2 Nephi 1:23 Awake, my sons; put on the armor of righteousness. Shake off the chains with which ye are bound, and come forth out of obscurity, and arise from the dust.
Signed Domandred
LOL, yeah, levity. Heaven knows this thread won’t be seeing any brevity.
BTW, Polygamy isn’t my hangup with the Mormon faith. I obviously don’t agree with it, because of the Bible’s clear admonition that the man shall leave his father and mother, and join with the woman, and the two shall become one flesh.
But it pains me, not just with Mormons, how many people I know who are “good people”, who have a religious nature, who “try” to be “good”, and yet in my opinion need God’s salvation. I understand those who say they care not for God. But how those who seem to be seeking for the truth cannot SEE it, when they can quote the scriptures to me, makes me sad. They have eyes, but cannot see.
I’m not sure if you directed your comment to the right person, or what you were trying to say. So forgive me if this response is off base. I’m Charles, the poster you responded to is not, but was responding to me.
I did not say Polygamy is the reason Mormonism is not mainstream, the other poster did. And I disagree with that assessment, and in fact I have said that polygamy, while wrong, is not the reason I have to oppose the Mormon faith.
My very dear Mormon friend convinced me that my opposition to polygamy wasn't thought through, and converted me to accepting that there are ways it could work.
Yes, but I was generally speaking of those who already have a desire to follow biblical teaching. I should have made that clear.
I don’t know what is sadder, that someone actually took the time to put a list like that together, or that such a list might well be populated with references to posts here at FR.
I think some played that victim card. Some opponents were anti-mormon, the rest were just not sufficiently susceptable to logic and reason :-)
Some, in finding I’m Presbyterian, have quoted that to me in asking how I could defend a church whose founder said that about my religion.
But frankly, Baptists have said that to me face-to-face. Why wouldn’t they? They obviously believe Presbyterianism is not true, that’s why they joined a different church.
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