I guess in the right context, even BYU grads would represent diversity. As McDonald’s managers will tell you, its context, context, context. ; )

What you say about Mormons being radically different was true…once. Mormons practiced polygamy, regularly defied and actively subverted the federal government, experimented with religious communism, and regarded the profit motive as the root of all evil.

All that is ancient history, however. Ever since Brigham Young’s death, Mormons have been assimilating into the American mainstream as fast as their pocketbooks would let them. Free-market capitalism, which Brigham despised, is now as basic to LDS thought as the Book of Mormon, and practically, a lot more important. The degree to which Mormons talk about being different, or, as the local lingo has it, peculiar, is in inverse relation to reality. The only thing peculiar about Mormons now is that they think they’re peculiar, in which is the secret of their neurosis.

One way that Mormons SAY they’re different is this notion you raise of continuing revelation. So, I’ll just put you this question. Why, if this is such a vital feature of Mormon REALITY (as opposed to Mormon self-deception), has there not been a single significant addition to Mormon scripture since Joseph Smith? In fact, the only two additions at all have been by way of removing things, first Joseph Smith’s radical notion of polygamy, and second the unscriptural but no less fundamental prejudice against blacks holding the priesthood. What passes for modern revelation among the LDS today (e.g. General Conference talks) is the same sort of sleepy, spineless sermonizing you can hear on any given Sunday in any other church in America. Again, the amount of hype is inversely related to the reality.

Mormons have known two prophets, one a charismatic maker of religion without parallel in American or modern world history, the other a differently charismatic pioneer. The others aren’t prophets but so many marcom managers. They neither shock the world with new revelations (Joseph Smith’s version of prophecy) nor stand up to it with the force of moral indignation (Brigham’s and Jeremiah’s). Gandhi is a modern prophet in the latter sense. I understand how one could follow him as a disciple. But Harold B. Lee? Ezra Taft Benson? Gordon B. Hinckley? Wherein are these men, these admittedly decent, good-hearted men (well, at least two of them), in anything but an Orwellian kind of abuse of language PROHETS and SEERS? Gordon B. Hinckley is to Jeremiah or even Joseph Smith or Brigham Young what a pussy cat is to the king of the jungle. To call both kinds of men prophets is like calling Sarah Palin and Thomas Jefferson public servants in the same breath. The not-easily-impressed might refer to such an abuse of language as just plain fraud. And these men are going to tell us what Jesus, that strikingly unconventional revolutionary really meant?

“Picking and choosing” is therefore just rewriting history to insure complete conformity with your own palid beliefs. And Mormons are nothing if not wedded to complete and palid conformity, sorry, correlation. Mormon copies of the Bible, a highly uncorrelated text in the original, are written to insure that the very things that should make Mormons wet their pants are rendered innocuous, e.g., the New Testament statement that for all intents and purposes it’s impossible for the rich to enter heaven.

Which brings us back to Jesus, who has indeed influenced history, although not, I think, as he intended (how important that point is, I’m not sure). To the extent that Jesus’s influence was due to the fact that people recognized a universal truth in his statements, then who can deny that that influence is for good? But that wasn’t the point of my previous post. The question is not whether Jesus can speak a universal truth, because ANYONE can do that. The question is whether it is a universal truth just BECAUSE Jesus (or the Bible) says it. Thus, for example, is it a universal truth that homosexuality is a sin just because some Levitical fart says so? And for that matter, how do we define sin? Is the Bible the ultimate arbiter? Is sin even a relevant concept? If you accept the Bible as Scripture, you make a peculiar claim about it that applies to no other book. That claim is NOT that the Bible contains universal truths, because any book potentially might contain them. You say, rather, that because the Bible says something, it is true, indeed, that it is universally true.

So, I come back to the absolute versus contextual issue. Either Jesus and the Bible represent something uniquely binding, or they represent just one of many different, sometimes competing sources that may inform contemporary discussion, at OUR choosing.

You said:

If you believe Jesus spoke universal truths, universal in their applicability to all people in all times, then how do YOU reconcile the convention-bending nature of his statements with your entirely conventional worldview and behavior?

Well - Jesus changed everyone’s worldview. Put differently, Columbus was a revolutionary at a time when many (allegedly) believed the world was flat. I am a follower of Columbus, but I am very conventional nowadays because everyone says the world is round. Does that make sense?

Even setting that argument aside, I believe Jesus continues to speak today through prophets. That way, I don’t have to rely strictly on highly contextualized tidbits taken from Christ’s life (which have undergone numerous translations, etc).

I do agree that, words which Jesus spoke which have been bolstered and reiterated by later revelation are more likely to get the “infallible” status (as opposed to the “hate thy mother” or “angels don’t marry” type language).

So, yeah - thanks to modern revelation, we can do what you would probably call picking and choosing.

As a side note - I don’t know you, and you haven’t expressed all your views, but I am willing to bet that you are much more conventional and mainstream than ANY believing, practicing Mormon. LDS beliefs are revolutionary, challenging and go against everything the world teaches - so much so that people like you probably consider them foolishness.

My experience at a very liberal graduate school is that everyone seems to believe the same pluralistic, relativistic garbage (like tapping the same two or three notes of a piano). LDS people, however, are truly unique and outstanding in that regard. Even our admissions director, a Jewish lesbian, said, in effect: I recruit BYU grads because I know they will provide real diversity. Not exactly on topic, but something to think about.

The problem comes when BELIEVERS take one of these books and make them apply for all time. So, writing to this group of believers, I take that same line as they do and say, “OK, if it applies for all time, and if it says X, then how do YOU reconcile X with what you say and do?” Jesus, as I read the New Testament, said a lot of stuff that should make the contemporary Moral Majority squirm, but they’re not squirming. And they, unlike me, don’t have the luxury of contextualizing Jesus’s sayings because they believe he spoke for all time. That’s why Scripture is Scripture, right?

So, the problem isn’t mine but yours. If you believe Jesus spoke universal truths, universal in their applicability to all people in all times, then how do YOU reconcile the convention-bending nature of his statements with your entirely conventional worldview and behavior? If, on the other hand, you say, “Well, you have to look at Jesus in context,” then I say great, but don’t talk to me then about Scripture as an absolute that should in any way influence the discussion today.

In short, you can’t have your scriptural absolutism and and your contextual flexibility.

You might be right that there may be relevant similarities - but you didn’t even provide for the possibility that Christ’s words in situation “a” may not apply to situation “b.”

Also - you said:

“A fine example of this is the intolerance and self-righteousness that America’s evangelic Right, and this includes the Mormon Majority, shows toward gays and “non-traditiona” families.”

Generalization. It works well into the resume you are developing for not knowing how to engage in honest argument.

The reason for my choice of the NT–strange that you should complain that I’m picking the NT since it is the story, according to believers, of the son of God’s new deal for humanity–was that to discuss all of the OT issues connected with family would take a good-sized dissertation. The NT is easy because the number of quotes is so small. That in itself says something about the relative doctrinal importance of the issue for Jesus and his early followers.

As for the effect of unbelief on my professionalism, I would have thought the taint usually goes the other way. Be that as it may, belief or no, understanding scripture is first and foremost a matter of understanding a text, and that can be done with a lot of good old common sense and a bit of specialized knowledge. It doesn’t require any special spirit any more than the newspaper does.

Your assumption that N is reacting to the words of Jesus here is, I suspect, erroneous. Rather I think that if he is indeed “pissed off” (another immature and illogical assumption) it is because of what YOUR words attempt so desperately to imply. You might think you are clever, but it is glaringly obvious that you didn’t choose your quotes from the text of the New Testament for the sake of brevity. You chose the New Testament specifically because it contained the “quotes” you wanted to use to support your rebellious and unbelievably arrogant agenda.

Unfortunately the loss of your faith taints your professionalism in this post just as much as it does your newspaper articles and it reflects poorly on any scriptural or archaeological integrity you claim to have. Apparently you abandoned your faith before you learned the greatest truth of all…that what God reveals THROUGH His spirit ABOUT scripture trumps both what some people believe and what others claim they say.

Your reaction to the implications of Jesus’s own words (if that is in fact what the Bible is giving us, and in this case, because those words are often so shocking it probably is a good witness), is a great illustration of what I’m talking about. Jesus made people as uncomfortable then as now. He forced them out of their moral comfort zone. And that pissed them off, as it pisses you off.

In conversation with Orthodox priest Fr. John Hennies today, I was eager to tell him about your recent dream, which I thought would be as significant to him as it is to you and me. This is because one of the reasons he only recently converted to Orthodoxy from having been an Episcopal priest for 47 years was due to his concern for an improper Episcopal understanding of and attitudes toward homosexuality. To me your dream addresses his concerns directly in an enlightening way!

Then I discovered your #135 and 136 responses to my #134 question about Old Testament prophets, especially the prophet Jonah. This is because our little parish had recently studied the book of Jonah in an after-liturgy discussion. When I read your comments aloud to him, Fr. John was familiar with the idea that the book of Jonah could indeed be a parable (not unlike how Jung looks at Job is in his “Answer to Job”), rather than a literal event. But the thing that struck us both was your notion that Jonah’s disappointment with God’s acceptance of Nineveh’s repentance was more than a simple childish temper tantrum (which is how I have always understood it before), but that Nineveh repented in terms of a righteous *Muslim* ideology, rather than a *Hebrew* one. That observation of yours produced a great “aha!” in both of us.

First, to JMF: I think your distinction between family and faith then and now unconvincing. The family-centeredness that Jesus challenges has absolutely nothing to do with Jewish law. Motherhood is motherhood and fatherhood is fatherhood in any age. That isn’t to deny nuances that may exist in one age or another, but attachment of parents to children and vice versa is a human universal. Telling someone, then, that he must “hate” his mother and father, is a provocation in any age, and it applies as much today as ever, if you believe Jesus spoke for all time (I’m not sure he did, but I’m writing to those who do).

Actually, one could argue the reverse of your position and say that the today’s ideologically hardened “family values” are in fact an even bigger stumbling block than the attitudes of Jesus’s day because they prevent us from seeing the larger human picture that is such a vital necessity for our generation. A fine example of this is the intolerance and self-righteousness that America’s evangelic Right, and this includes the Mormon Majority, shows toward gays and “non-traditiona” families. What people today say about the unnaturalness of gays was said about other minorities and about women in earlier generations. The notion, for example, that women are capable of conducting their own life and should have rights equal to those of men, a proposition that almost everyone in America accepts today, was NOT universal 200 years ago. Indeed, many assumed and preached the opposite. The same is true of our attitude to blacks, who were considered by many in this country, Mormons included, to be inferior human beings. One of the things that the contemporary world has done right is to cast these prejudices into the garbage can, where they belong. Some day, we’ll say the same thing about our homophobia and our hangups about same-sex marriage.

In any event, the family that we today suppose is normative, the nuclear family of American in the 1950s, is an historical aberration, not because the essential connection between parents and children is emotionally different (though some historians have argued this) but because the sociology of family over the ages has varied enormously.

To N: Actually, the argument I make about Jesus’s success with converting the scum is one that serious scholars of the historical Jesus consider pretty basic. Romans and Jews alike regarded the people Jesus hung out with as contemptible. Anyone who had success in making respectable citizens of them would have the thanks of EVERYONE in Palestinian society. Ergo, the fact that Jesus didn’t garner such thanks, either from the Romans or from the Jews, the fact that he got the opposite reaction, suggests LOGICALLY that he couldn’t or wouldn’t change them. Why? That IS speculation, but I agree with scholars who attribute this to Jesus’ being focused on the imminence of the Kingdom of God, which rendered other considerations secondary if not irrelevant. As Jesus was the messenger of that kingdom, loyalty to him was paramount. Nothing else really mattered, including otherwise sacred ties such as family. To the extent that such ties got in the way, they were an evil. All of which points to this interesting conclusion, that, in the worldview that Jesus represents what is good is not as absolute and timeless as orthodox Jews and Christians today suppose. It is conditioned by circumstances. Family, for Jesus, is clearly NOT an absolute value, and it must yield to other considerations. Sin, itself, may be subject to the same relativity. Thus Jesus’s willingness to pardon the woman taken in adultery, thus Jesus’s willingness to tolerate the apparently still unredeemed life of the people he associated with, unredeemed, that is, in conventional social terms. For Jesus, their loyalty to him was redemption enough, whatever their behavior.

To Marcia: I don’t make a big deal of my genealogy. It’s there in this case because blogs and newspapers, for which I write fairly frequently, often like to have biographical information about the writer. In this case it is nothing more than a way of establishing the fact that, although inactive in the church, I come from that tradition, however tenuous my present connection to it. The bio also establishes the fact that I speak with some expertise about the subject, whatever such expertise is worth (and I recognize that what people believe about Scripture usually trumps what Scripture actually says or can reasonably be said to say).

Hey…you might actually be right…

Maybe I AM literally being used as “a tool”. Think about it. Sid says that it is man’s nature to want to please the Father, so obviously no human being would never choose to behave in such a morally unrighteous manner like I do. How would you learn to love ALL people, even intolerant bigots, if people like me hadn’t agreed to this with God in the pre-existence?

Sid was so right. God’s plan seems so much more loving and glorious if I accept that God is only showing His goodness through me and you, and that in order to fulfill this special purpose, God had to make it impossible for me to control all my impulses and desires to act this way.

Opposition in all things takes on a whole new meaning. For every person in the world who needs to learn true tolerance and genuine charity, there HAS to be someone like me to provide that lesson; fill that role. I might even be one of those reworked clay vessels.

Or maybe this is just my first world and I’m a spiritual infant in the serving and loving kindness department. Luckily our loving Father doesn’t expect me to get it all right in one shot. Since Christ already paid for my sins and I’ll obtain Celestial glory someday no matter how long it takes, I’m sure Sid has already forgiven me (like he does all men everywhere) and still loves and accepts me as fully as he does anyone else.

Hopefully it won’t take too many more probations for me to catch up with him! It would totally suck to end up with the Sons of Perdition and have to be ground up and returned to my former spirit element and have to start all over again like Brigham Young once hypothesized MIGHT happen.

I say your post is not honest because it does not acknowledge the context and circumstances of Christ’s teaching. Christ was teaching to a culture of people who were more likely to have family unity be a stumbling block to their following of Christ than not. In other words, people were refusing to follow Christ because they clung to the mosaic-law-based traditions of their family. Obviously, in this context, Christ is going to invite them to follow him - even if it means leaving one’s family. Christ wouldn’t have needed to emphasize family in this context any more than you or I would need to teach a class to humans on the importance of oxygen.

In contrast, Christ’s prophets on the earth today face a different problem: family unity, family traditions, and family values are vastly vastly undervalued, under-encouraged and under attack. These days, strong family connections are much more likely to draw people to Christ. Christ is teaching people now that the pendulum has swung way way too far in the opposite direction. We need families - eternal families - to return to Heavenly Father.

Anyway - I don’t have all day to polish the foregoing, so, hopefully it makes sense.

Maybe he was forced to sacrifice accuracy and balance in order to satisfy the demands that “brevity” places on one’s “historical curiosity” when you want to be sure there’s room for your resume at the bottom?

Had Jesus converted a lot of prostitutes and drunks into upstanding citizens, it’s hard to see why he wouldn’t have earned the thanks of the establishment. As it is, they seem to have regarded him with suspicion. Either he wasn’t very successful, or he didn’t particularly care about their behavior so long as they followed him.

100% supposition and does not logically follow from the texts.
As for the rest of the post, full of snark, half-truths, and outright fabrications. Enjoy your “wit.”

I realize that you do not believe the Bible is accurate, but no one is obligated to accept your re-written version of the “greatest commandment”.

But then you like to rewrite things, including your own life story.

“Growing up with gays in my family (my favorite uncle and my slightly older cousin) and now being the father of an incredibly gifted and compassionate gay son, never once did I think gays were abnormal or bad-they were just gay”

(Contrasted with a later version)

“Heavenly Father-Would you have learned to love all people, even gays, if your son hadn’t agreed to it with me in the pre-existence?
Me-I doubt I could. (For 48 years I was very homophobic and wanted nothing to do with gays)”

I’m sure you have a perfectly “rational” explanation for why a man who “never once” thought gays were “bad or abnormal” would be a homophobic for 48 years!

Here’s the thing.You repeatedly INSIST that God “made” your son gay (or asked him to be gay to help you learn to accept others)and declare that ALL gays share the same purpose. You view it as a “horrific challenge” PLACED on your son that will someday be removed from him. If homosexuality is no longer repulsive to you, why have you NEVER spoken of it as a normal or natural alternative lifestyle?

Sid,it is YOU that is incapable of “hating the sin and loving the sinner”…so you created a mindset where your son can’t be guilty of “sinning” because God asked him to be gay. But no everyone is like you.

You said that Heavenly Father “only” asks us to love and support ALL of His children, while at the same time insisting that “Nowhere do we have the actual word of God, except in our own experiences, one to one”.

Which is it? You cannot discredit the bible when it says something you do not like, and then appeal to it as God’s word when it says something you do like. You cannot say we do not have the actual word of God and then tell me what God has asked me to do. Your arguments contradict your own arguments.

You said “You Abe, seem more interested in fixing me (my beliefs) and Bruce (his behavior and beliefs). That is not your responsibility.”

And yet isn’t your self-declared mission to “fix” the beliefs of the LDS Church, its leaders and its members?

YOU took offense on Bruce’s behalf-when none was intended and my words were sincere-instead of “turning the other cheek”. Rather than showing how much you love your neighbor (me) you “returned evil for evil” and with amazing hypocrisy. You went so far as to diagnose me (online no less) as being “passive aggressive” and having a “superiority complex”, and most ironically accused me of making “unknown assumptions” about others-WHILE in the act of doing the exact same thing!

But my favorite “rational” argument so far is your version of the Multiple Mortality theory. You say “Who knows, this might be world number 12 for me and 84 for my son? Who can say?”

Um…you DO realize that if your multiple chances at the SAME mortality theory is correct, in order for your son to experience THE SAME LIFE 84 times, then YOU also have to experience THE SAME LIFE 84 times. If that is not how it happens, then your son isn’t experiencing THE SAME mortality every time.

AND, if he’s not, then in the above scenario “your” son has a DIFFERENT “father” (other than you)72 times! Which one of you will be his “eternal father”? What if he wants to be “sealed” to someone other than you? What if he isn’t “gay” in those other mortalities? Did he marry a woman? Women? What happens to the male companion he hopes to marry in this world?

Even if there was a RATIONAL way to explain such a theory (and there isn’t) wouldn’t it be rather UNLOVING for God to “ask” your son to crush the eternal hopes and dreams of even ONE of His other sons (or daughters) let alone more just so YOU could learn how to accept and love others?

Oh, and Bruce-”Good luck with applying logic to religion. That’s got to be a full time job”.

Look up “the logos” from which the word “logic” was derived sometime.

Your assumptions aren’t dogmatic, but they are still assumptions; concluding that because YOUR prayers are one way conversations so are everyone else’s. That because YOU don’t know the mind of God no one else does either. And because YOU define love by certain terms and certain demands, so should God and everyone else.

I’d wish you well in life but why bother when you don’t really want the love and concern of ANYONE who doesn’t agree with you anyway. Besides, Sid and Adam can tell you what I (and JCP and God for that matter)am REALLY thinking/feeling better than I ever could.

I will however offer the suggestion that perhaps Neal A Maxwell and Thomas S Monson (why is it that Mormon Leaders insist on always being refferenced with their middle inital included? Must be their part of their stage names) aren’t quite the BFFs of Jesus that you may believe.

May I suggest that they are no different than you or I. That when they have chats with God their chats are no different than yours or mine. and its a rather one sided conversation.

It would appear that we are putting an awful lot of trust in an institution (the quorum of the twelve and first presidency) that claims to speak for God. This same instiution for the past 150 or so years has directed its members to do many questionable and embarrasing things.

So before you go off preaching that you’re loving God buy suspending rationale thought and conscience consider the small possiblity that maybe these fine folks with a penchant for middle initials don’t really know the mind of God any more than any of the other 6.5 billion people inhabiting this planet.

And if you really loved your on concept of God, you’d love your neighbor. Call it what you want, voting yes on prop 8 didn’t protect your family, and certainly didn’t show love

If you are not a father, then we can have this same discussion in about 20 years.

However, if you are a father, can you imagine yourself doing any of the following things to your own children?

1. Choosing to accept one child over another.

2. Choosing to ask one child (over another) to bare additional burdens without sympathy or recourse from you.

3 Accepting love from one child, while that same child treats his brother (your other child) with contempt and disdain.

4. Believing the love shown you from a child is sincere when that same child tell others that you don’t love or accept his brother (for whatever reason).

5. Accepting your child who says, “It is more important to defend the definition of a word, than it is to show love and respect for my brothers who are different from me.”, to be doing what you really want him to do.

JCP in CA, if you believe God is more like the Old Testament God (vengeful, jealous, on the side of the chosen people only, impatient, etc) then perhaps your view of God condoning the actions of church members in Prop 8 is accurate.

I, on the other hand, along with more and more people, am more willing to view God as a loving father, who not only doesn’t discriminate or condemn his children because of their differences, but rather embraces and loves them more because He know they may require more love at this time.

I fear that you have allowed your belief in man (granted, he is the prophet of a church) to put you in a position that won’t allow you to act with rational thought and compassion on some issues.

You cannot hate the sin and love the sinner in this situation, because for you (and all the other people who claim to follow this statement), the sinner is the sin!

There comes a time in everyone’s life when we realize that it isn’t the institution that saves us but rather our relationship with God and our Savior. The sooner one can get to a point where he can think and act as Christ would, then that person will understand what is means to Love God and our Neighbors as much as we love ourselves.

I am a decendant of English lower class textile workers who’s male members were often drunk and probably alchoholics. I am bound to Jesus because of my faith in Him.

Jesus’ saving power is no respector of a persons rank or familial affiliation. Faith, humility, a broken heart and contrite spirit are the keys to a famial relationship with Jesus and God the Father.

As I seek the Lord first above everything else “all things will added to me.” To me this promise includes temple blessings of family preisthood binding for eternity.

Abraham left his fathers’ unholy house for the Lord and “all things were added to him. He recieved the blessings of the Fathers including the priesthood a marriage covenant and endless posterity.

The point Jesus is making is Abrahams’ posterity can not have have redemption or claim on these blessing in unrighteousness.

I’m not ashamed of my vote because I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ nor of his prophets President Monson or Elder Ballard who specifically addressed this issue to Californian members. I knew it would potentially be hurtful to gays. Yet I also know the commitment required by my faith. I chose to offend some, rather than offend God. It is a bitter experience to see hateful things being said about my church, and about me because of my stance. Yet is is much more bitter to see a former Mormon friend and former BYU alum turn away from his religion and question who his friends are as a result. How are we meant to cope with this sorrow?

I listened to an old 1999 BYU devotional this morning. In it Elder Maxwell gave a caution that applies. Essentially he cautions that the second commandment, to love our neighbor, is second for a reason. It must come after the first commandment, to love God.

“Now we don’t think about it enough in the Church, but the first commandment is first for a reason. And the second commandment is second for a reason. True, the second commandment is like unto the first, but it isn’t the first commandment. We worship the perfect object of that first commandment, God, because of His spiritual supremacy. We do not worship our neighbors. We are to love them but not worship them. This recognition of God’s supremacy on all counts is why that commandment is first and why it is completely safe for us to submit to Him. Besides, at a university it is not inappropriate to remind you that that first commandment includes all of our heart, soul, and mind. The mind must surrender to God, too. It is my impression, looking about the world, that there are comparatively more knees bent in reverence to God than there are minds bent in reverence to Him. That human stubbornness tends to show up in terms of our unwillingness to submit our minds to Him.” — Elder Neal A Maxwell, “Sharing Insights from my Life”, BYU Devitionals 1999. http://speeches.byu.edu/reader/reader.php?id=3590&x=54&y=4

The doctrine of marriage and the doctrine of charity toward all men (and the requisite charge to not judge) exist side by side. There is no contradiction. This is the Lord that cannot look upon sin with the least degree of allowance. Yet the Lord has a perfect love of each soul, regardless of its condition because he knows the composition and potential of each soul. And so, what guidance has God given us to comply with both of these principles, to love the sinner without embracing the sin or creating provisions in society to embrace it? I go back to Elder Maxwell’s charge that we must put the two great commandments in their proper order; putting God first which sheds the proper light on his second commandment to love our neighbor. In the correct order we are equipped to navigate this issue.

All of this has been consistent with my experience with Proposition 8. In closed-door meetings, and in hallway conversations and in parking lots of LDS chapels, and on freeway overpasses while waving signs in the rain, I have never heard a member of my church disparage gays. I have only heard them firmly defend God’s standard of marriage.

“I am going to preach a hard doctrine to you now. The submission of one’s will is really the only uniquely personal thing we have to place on God’s altar. It is a hard doctrine, but it is true. The many other things we give to God, however nice that may be of us, are actually things He has already given us, and He has loaned them to us. But when we begin to submit ourselves by letting our wills be swallowed up in God’s will, then we are really giving something to Him. And that hard doctrine lies at the center of discipleship. There is a part of us that is ultimately sovereign, the mind and heart, where we really do decide which way to go and what to do. And when we submit to His will, then we’ve really given Him the one thing He asks of us. And the other things are not very, very important. It is the only possession we have that we can give, and there is no resulting shortage in our agency as a result. Instead, what we see is a flowering of our talents and more and more surges of joy. Submission to Him is the only form of submission that is completely safe.”

From a BYU Devotional given by Neal A. Maxwell in 1999. The full text is here: http://speeches.byu.edu/reader/reader.php?id=3590&x=54&y=4

You’re a great father. Your son is lucky to have a father that loves him no matter what. NO DOUBT he is grateful that you are defending him and wish him the best. I wish my own father felt the same way you do. Unfortunately my father will never know me because i know he wouldn’t be able to handle it. Keep on truckin Sid. Please, Keep in touch

Bruce

Nice email address.

I can be reached at gdhtsshrmp@gmail.com

Do you know what my email address means? And why?

Extra credit for the first right answer! ;>}

I am perplexed by how perplexed Mormons are by the backlash over Prop 8.

While we only make up 2% of CA population we provided between 50-70% of the funds for prop 8. While the checks were written by individuals and not the church itself. WE ARE the church and we wrote those checks at their request. We obtained our happy YES ON 8 signs at church and distributed them for family home evening. IF we object to political backlash. We should stay out of politics

Secondly, We have been on the short end of the stick when it comes to how the majority feels about our own definitions of acceptable families.

To say Mormons are advocates of “traditional marriage” is absolutely laughable given our own involvement in very “nontraditional marriages”. Its fine and dandy for us that we no longer practice our dirty little secret but we should be very very cautious about setting a very dangerous precedent that its ok for a majority to vote on the rights of a minority. This applies no matter how repulsive we may find homosexual marriage.

To those who say this law strengthens their own traditional marriage I would say start looking for a really really really good divorce lawyer. If the strength of your marriage and family really depends on whether or not Rick and Steve have a piece of paper that says marriage certificiate, you my friend, are about to get served.

And finally a note about Love. Please remember that this debate is not between US (the wonderful rightous happy Mormons) and THEM (the evil god forsaken, servants of Satan, Sons of Sodom Homsexuals. Because gays are not a seperate group of people. Gay people are often times Mormon people. They happen to be our sons, our daughters, our uncles and aunts. We may be devasted when a family member turns out to be gay because we love them and want to spend eternity with them. But lets not call our bigotry love and create an enviornment where our gay relatives wouldn’t want to be a part of our family in this life….let alone the next.

Good luck with applying logic to religion. That’s got to be a full time job

I don’t know for sure, but I get the feeling that you are still quite young and are still relying on what you’ve been taught, as opposed to what you have seen and experienced. I don’t mean any disrespect. But there is something to be said for living and overcoming some of life’s challenges in person.

May I leave you with a couple cautionary comments.

1) Don’t ever believe or say something will “never” happen. There may come a time in your life that will require you to have enough hope that the impossible still can happen.

2) Even though you believe that 1/3 of God’s children who followed Satan are lost forever, think it through to the end. What are they going to do for eternity? Brigham Young taught that Sons of Perdition (which I believe they are called) will be given another chance - hence the Potter’s Clay doctrine. When the Lord isn’t satisfied with the pot (the word vessel is used in the bible) that was made, He throws it on the Potter’s wheel and makes a new vessel. This is taught in JofD and in the Old Testament. Otherwise, what would the 1/3 do for eternity? BTW, I called the Potter’s Clay a theory in an earlier post, but it isn’t actually a theory as much as it is a principle that has gone dormant. I think I know why too. If we knew there would be other opportunities, we might not feel the urgency to do it right this time. I, on the other hand, feel like it gives me incentive by saying, “I want to get it right THIS TIME!”

3)I believe Satan said he was doing that which has been done in other worlds simply because it is the same pattern done each world. Casting him down to this earth is also what is always done. Actually pretty benign.

4) The Proclamation on the Family is what it says: a proclamation. Never are the words “Thus saith the Lord” or anything like it, mentioned. Rather, it is very good counsel from 15 men who are called to lead the church. To my knowledge it has never been referred to as a “revelation”, otherwise it should be canonized and put into the D&C. In it there are many questions left unanswered, and even some things need further explanations. But as an important guide for family life, I completely agree with it. As for my gay son, I can also believe that there is more coming than what we know right now, like the possibility that gays are meant to be monogamous with partners of the same sex. I know you won’t accept that right now, but remember to never say never. Asking my son to live a life void of love (any human contact) may only be a reaction by “man” to something he finds repugnant. So, I can still believe and keep an open mind. I sincerely believe more information will be coming soon, especially now that the minority voice has shouted so loudly.

BTW were you aware that in 1947 the First Presidency sent out a letter stating interracial marriage as being “repugnant to normal minded people…and against church doctrine”? Just like this doctrine seemed right to members in the 40s and 50s, it seems right to most people today that homosexual relation are an abomination to God. BUT, that could change in the future. Never say never.

5) You say the spirit tells you that homosexuality is wrong, and I believe you. But maybe what you are hearing is that it is wrong for you. And being a straight man, it IS wrong for you.

There is nothing wrong with you or me keeping an open mind. As long as we refrain from sinning ourselves, there is no harm. And for people like me and my wife (and our son’s younger sisters) we are able to keep hope alive that we can still be an eternal family. If I didn’t have that hope, then I would rather be with him in hell. He has already been through hell here on earth.

When a gay person is as good of a person as it gets, it would be a real shame if God rejected him simply because he wanted the same thing we all have - a family of our own. Our church is all about family, yet we say some aren’t worthy of having one. I just have to disagree with that belief.

Robert, good luck with your life. I realize I probably won’t hear from you again as it seemed like you felt further debate was unnecessary. I hope you continue to have uplifting weeks. That really is a nice feeling.

Respectfully,
Sid