Talk:Mormonism/Archive1

Embarassing
Damn, that was a bit embarassing. Thanks Human. --Remarcsd 19:57, 8 October 2007 (EDT)
 * Hehe, whatever I did... probably just a little copyediting... I got me this whole box of commas at a fire sale... Anyway, you're welcome. human be in 20:05, 8 October 2007 (EDT)

SP
Do Americans really spell travelled with 1 'l' & worshipped with 1` 'p' ? (barbaric crowd) SusanG 12:22, 8 April 2008 (EDT)
 * Yes, and missionaries with the "i" after the "r". When I went to fix that, firefox happily offered to correct those two as well. It's an article on an American cult, so it's appropriate to spell it Americanly.  (Now I know why I have to think hard when deciding whether to double up those trailing consonants when past tensing!) human  12:46, 8 April 2008 (EDT)
 * Ha - (No objections to the rationale for the spelling) it makes me want to pronounce as "traveeled" and worsheyeped. :-) SusanG 12:51, 8 April 2008 (EDT)
 * Makes me want to pronounce them "bbookkeeppeerr"! human  13:04, 8 April 2008 (EDT)
 * Sorry, Susan for my poor spelling (and typing). Please attribute it to my overseas education, not to my nationality. When I type at home on my Mac it catches my spelling errors, but here at work my PC does not when I type online. But you do really seem to have a thing about the diferences between British and American spelling.  Rational Ed faith

Not a cult. A religion. -Mormon Guy 10 September 2014

I'd like to see you have a go at Christianity
The fact is that 'Rational'Wiki likes having a go at Mormonism. They are after all easy targets (A small community often at odds with its larger host population, hold some 'different' beliefs) but are no less theologically sound than any of the other monotheistic religions. They all share the common belief in a monotheistic divinity, prophecy, common religious heritage and associated traditions. The reason they are singled out for such ridicule is that their sect didn't emerge until the 19th century.

I put it to you that you are intellectual cowards - its easy having a go at a small community, not so easy being as disrespectful towards a massive religion like Christianity. (And, I might add, your complete absence of insults directed at Islam and Judaism, which I can only suspect is an indication of not wanting to hurt anyone's feelings - at least not the people 'that matter') MarcusCicero 22:11, 20 November 2008 (EST)
 * Right, because that sounds a lot like us - we're very careful not to offend Christians. Seriously though, this is a wiki.  If you think Christianity hasn't gotten its share of lumps, go ahead and give them to it. Of course, that's if your post was meant to do anything other than stir up trouble. --Arcan   ¡ollǝɥ  22:18, 20 November 2008 (EST)
 * You haven't seen many of our articles on Christianity, MC, obviously. As far as Islam, we don't know as much about it, but we are working on it.  Surely we make fun of the Chosen People somewhere too, by now?  What's your real beef?  Why aren't you writing what you suggest?  ħ uman  22:22, 20 November 2008 (EST)

Something has been lost in translation, I fear.

My point is that its easy for you to have a go at small group open to ridicule - yet there is little condemnation of Judaism and Islam, and not nearly as much vitriol reserved for Christianity compared to the abuse this poor little sect gets from this website. At least be consistent with your vitriol. MarcusCicero 22:36, 20 November 2008 (EST)

I would like to add, that is all :-) MarcusCicero 22:55, 20 November 2008 (EST)


 * Why do we go after Mormons so much? Because they are fucking creepy. That is all. 00:01, 21 November 2008 (EST)
 * As I said, if that's what you think, you ain't explored our rips on Xtianity very far yet. Try Fun:Jesus for starters.  (Used to be mainspace, but PC did a massive movearound so we wouldn't have an article on Jesus Christ - get it?  And I never undid it...)  ħ uman  02:47, 21 November 2008 (EST)

did anybody do what I used to do and just send mormon missionaries to people you dont like? say ex-girlfireinds for example? -Matt

Heaven/Hell
I'm a former Mormon and I think there is some inaccurate information about the Heaven/Hell thing. In mormonism God does not give "bad" souls to Satan, and in the Second Coming God actually destroys Hell. Instead he puts the "bad people" in the lowest level of Heaven (even most murderers and rapists). The only unforgivable sin is getting the "gift of the Holy Ghost" (also called the Confirmation) done immediately after baptism and than denying it (as I have done). That will get you a ticket to Outer Darkness where you will cease to exist (No eternal suffering or burning or anything). I haven't practiced in years so I'm not exactly sure how true this is, but I was wondering if anyone else can confirm this. [unsigned]

Not so. I'm a practicing and active Mormon so I can help you with this. The outer darkness place you refer to doesn't happen to people like you who deny the faith after confirmation. It comes to people who are called "sons of perdition" who do something quite a bit more severe. To summarize without preaching here, I've heard it put concisely this way: You'd have to look God in the face and fight against Him after receiving a perfect witness (not faith, a perfect witness as in literally KNOWING, not just believing, even very strongly). And not much is known or said about Outer Darkness. Just that it's permenant (as far as we know) and that's it not a good place to go. -Mormon Guy 10 September 2014

As another ex-Mormon, I can confirm this. There is no 'hell' in Mormon theology; the closest equivalent is 'Outer Darkness' which I always took to mean simple nonexistence, and not even the really horrible people ended up with that punishment unless they denied the aforementioned 'Gift'. 72.213.166.77 23:22, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

There is a hell, but it's not synomnous in virtually any way with the mainstream Chistian idea of hell. I.E. No fiery burning pit where you get poked with devils with pitchforks. From what I've understood it as, Hell is called "Spirit Prison" and it's a place where you look on your sins with horror as they denied you the chance to be as happy as you potentially could have been in the next life. In other words, it's a place where a mirror is held up to your true self and you feel really bad about all the stuff you've done your whole life and how it prevents you from being as happy as you could have been after death if you'd just been a kinder more faithful person. Also, the guy below has a pretty good explanation too. It definitely complements mine. -Mormon Guy 10 September 2014

you two well-meaning ex-mormons have a typical shallow understanding of mormon doctrine.

mormons believe in hell, they just don't believe in a permanent hell like traditional christianity. the belief is that "bad" people like murderers and rapists go to hell when they die. this is sometimes called "spirit prison", but usually it's referred to as hell in the mormon scriptures. in hell, they suffer for their own sins, like really bad burning in hell kind of suffering, until they are ready to go through the repentance process through christ, which only works if it is deep, sincere and emotionally arduous. after that, their hell ends. see doctrine and covenants section 19 for the most specific scriptural description of this process. most clueful mormons are well aware of this, however the vast majority of mormons and ex-mormons have a high-school equivalent level of understanding of the doctrine.

btw, this whole article on the mormon church is crap. it's just cherry picked garbage about the mormon church, and to fix it so it's fair and rational would take too much energy, and the knuckle heads that runs this place would just change it back anyway. best i can tell, this site is like the atheist version of conservapidia, so i guess i shouldn't expect much.98.202.201.25 (talk) 19:34, 21 December 2009 (UTC)

Celeb
As the scientology page has a small list of famous scientologists, shouldn't we do the same for Mormonism? For example, Brandon Flowers, lead singer of The Killers, is a Mormon. 15:05, 21 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Not to mention The Osmonds (please don't mention the Osmonds). NO! I really mean it: don't mention the Osmonds!  15:12, 21 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Done and done :) Sorry.  Had to mention THE OSMONDS!!!!! hahahaha Secret Squirrel 17:02, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Something you may not be aware of is actually there are a lot of famous Mormon scientists. In fact, a mormon invented the television. Philo T Farnsworth. The same dude Professor Farnsworth off of futurama is based off of. - Mormon Guy 10 September 2014

Posthumous conversion?
This might just be one of my own personal superstitions, but it seems you can get your departed ancestors into Heaven (or a higher level of it?) by having them converted to Latter-Day Sainthood. I believe the church keeps a huge genealogical database in aid of this, and at one time would research the family trees of non-Mormons, for monetary contribution, of course. No time nor inclination to put this suitably into the article, but someone might want to go nuts with it. Sprocket J Cogswell 16:56, 26 September 2009 (UTC)
 * I understood they were trawling census details & "baptising" all the people thereon with no cash motive at all. Mighty strange! 17:09, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

As a Mormon I can tell you this is partially true, but the teaching is that the person on the other side has the choice whether or not to accept it. Agency is an important part of our faith. Or free will as you might know it. There is no "monetary contribution" aspect however. All of the genelogical libraries our faith owns (and there are a LOT of them, we even have a vault in the mountains in salt lake with millions if not close to a billion names in the form of various public records going back centuries.) are open to the public and 100% free. No donations, no collection boxes, none of that stuff. -Mormon Guy 10 September 2014

How accurate is this cartoon?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nwEGsQM5CQ Is this an accurate depiction of Mormon theology? &mdash; Unsigned, by: Ryantherebel / talk / contribs
 * I'm not sure, but if it is, I see why the cartoon is banned by the Church. It seems pretty scathing, but it also seems, as far as I can tell, pretty truthful.  Perhaps it seems so scathing because the truth is so bizarre?  As an aside, my best friend in high school was a Mormon.  When he turned 21 he said unto me, "I really want to try a beer."  Knowing this was against the code of conduct of Mormonism, I agreed to take him to a bar.  he was drunk after 2 beers and a mixed drink (a martini I believe).  Now he is a huge pot-head, and I feel like I had a major hand in sending him in his current direction.   22:26, 7 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Interesting. Makes more sense than Genesis.  But so do Spiderman comics.--BobNot Jim 22:45, 7 November 2009 (UTC)
 * Actually the cartoon reminded me a bit of Superman, replacing Elohim with Jor-El.  22:47, 7 November 2009 (UTC)
 * No, it's not. There is perhaps a small inkling of truth in that cheesy '70s video. And the Church didn't "ban" it (though I'm sure it doesn't go around showing it in sacrament meeting). MIP has actually signed in - 17:13, 8 July 2010 (UTC)

How accurate is this cartoon? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06jF1EG8o-Q dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb Scherben (talk) 21:00, 8 February 2014 (UTC)

Mormon guy here. Our church doesn't "ban" cartoons. I don't even know how that'd be possible. But if that's the cartoon I'm thinking of, it's from the movie "the godmakers". It's a movie even our usual detractors, evangical christians and people who hate us have commented on as inaccurate, hyperbolic and misleading in the extreme. I can't comment about the South Park one although interesting fact, Trey Parker and Matt Stone used to be Mormon and actually respect Mormons even if they aren't Mormon themselves anymore. 10 September 2014

Quote from God Fail Blog?
" Mormons: The second “m” is silent" Would this quote help with the article's Snark at all? Several ingredients (talk) 09:13, 18 November 2010 (UTC)


 * I like it, but it's important not to just insult people for the sake of it. If we go past casual snark, we just end up looking like an atheist hate blog to Conservapedia's christian hate blog. 09:27, 18 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Actually, we already redirect to Moronism at the top... :P 09:28, 18 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Okay, thanks for the feedback.Several ingredients (talk) 09:38, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Mormon Fundamentalists
I know we have a list of Mormon celebs, but how about a list of infamous Mormon Fundamentalists like Ron and Dan Lafferty? Or how about certain past events like the Mountain Meadows Massacre? Feredir28 (talk) 05:01, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
 * You got a drop on it. Why are you asking? Nutty Roux (talk) 05:10, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, RW already talks about Crusades, witch hunts, Jim Jones, 9/11, and dozens of articles of other nutjobs for several other religions. I just wondered why not include a few small samples from Mormonism. Feredir28 (talk) 15:03, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Mormon vampires
As a group of Mormon wards is a stake, would Mormon vampires relocating to such an area 'go to the stake'? 82.44.143.26 (talk) 18:15, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Mormons Exposed
Here's some stuff about an internet entrepreneur who was excommunicated. nobsCorporations are people, too. 06:39, 23 April 2012 (UTC)

Mormon War/Brigham Young/Mountain Meadows Massacre
We don't have any articles on any of these things, and yet I think they're probably very relevant. If not an article, but mentions in existing articles? -- Seth Peck (talk) 18:39, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

Coffee, tea or me?
The section on beverages is a mess --it's never really clear if "hot caffeineated beverages," "hot beverages of any kind" or maybe "caffeinated beverages regardless of temperature" are the problem.... Nailed a retread to my feet and prayed for better weather. 17:06, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

A few errors I'd like to correct...
I'll preface this with an explanation: I am myself a member of the LDS church, not to mention a new account-holder on the wiki. Accordingly, I feel it would behoove me to post my intentions here before making any edits to the page in question.

I'm okay with most of the snark here, but there are a few purely factual errors I'd like to correct. To wit:


 * Several mentions of the mark of Cain as rationale for exclusion of African-Americans from the priesthood, which, while it was a popular theory, was not the official explanation for the practice. In fact, there was never an official explanation. (The penultimate paragraph in the Theology section is particularly confusing -- the Book of Mormon doesn't teach any such thing, that I'm aware of.)
 * The Word of Wisdom does not forbid caffeinated beverages; it forbids "hot drinks", which was later clarified explicitly to mean "coffee and tea". The common link between these two is caffeine, and the cultural (not doctrinal) ban on cold caffeinated beverages is an attempt at a logical extrapolation. This leads to occasionally hilarious situations e.g. professors at BYU "secretly" hoarding Dr. Pepper in their offices. The existing Word of Wisdom paragraph is lulzy, but partially incorrect.
 * In a rare example of making my religion seem more weird, I'll note that the Second Coming won't in fact be Jesus' "third" literal coming; in the Book of Mormon Jesus states that he's actually got to visit yet a few more groups before he finally flies off to Heaven. That's a minor detail, but if we're being pedantic, might as well go all the way.

Aaaand actually that's it. If I don't see any comments to the contrary, I'll go ahead and make those edits later today. Arandur (talk) 15:52, 12 March 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm curious - what do Mormons drink on cold days? I'm guessing hot chocolate is also out then? Can't really see a problem with your proposed edits, so go ahead. I don't suppose you'd care to share any info on the passing through the veil ceremony? That's quite interesting, especially with all its Masonic parallels (and in the interests of disclosure, I am a Mason). -- PsyGremlin Parlez! 16:00, 12 March 2013 (UTC)
 * I have never known a member of the church to turn down hot chocolate -- or chocolate in any form -- based on religious constraints, which is why I personally see the rabid extrapolation over all caffeinated beverages as a little silly. It's just not internally consistent. And unfortunately I'm bound by sacred oath not to discuss that ceremony outside the temple -- as a Mason, I presume you understand. Arandur (talk) 17:26, 12 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Understand totally. The explanation I've heard for the no caffeine thing is that - like alcohol - it's a mind-altering substance, and therefore anathema. I've been trying to find the reference in the Book of Mormon, but boy... that book is not easy on the eye. -- PsyGremlin 講話 17:42, 12 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Reference is not in the Book of Mormon itself, but in a separate canonized book of scripture, the Doctrine and Covenants. The relevant section is here. Arandur (talk) 17:45, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

One more thing I caught -- although someone (opinion varies as to whether it was, in fact, Joseph Smith, or otherwise W. W. Phelps) did make the (insultingly pedantic and laughably inane) claim that "Mormon" literally means "more good", the claim was not that it was an Egyptian word. The actual claim is far more stupid. Arandur (talk) 17:45, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

As a mormon, even for satire a lot of this stuff is very inaccurate.
As a Mormon and I know this is more a satire site rather than straight up encyclopedia, I just wanna say a lot of the stuff you guys wrote is just not accurate. It's one thing to make fun of something or even dislike it, but considering this is "rational wiki" satire or not, you'd think you'd want to have the facts straight before you make fun of it.

I don't particularly like people making fun of what I view as sacred. But I like it even less when my beliefs are misrepresented by society at large. This is America and you have the absolute right to free speech and to say whatever you like about religion or anything of just about any nature. But as a duty to removing prejudice against all people everywhere and as a commitment to the truth just for it's own sake (a scientific ideal after all), I'd really appreciate it if you guys could research your stuff a bit more objectively. A lot of the stuff you guys say here comes from Evangelical christian sites who specialize in "ministries" that are pretty much just based on tearing us down and spreading lies to scare people away from us. I know, you must be spinning in your office chairs. Oh the irony. You've literally been taking material from the one kind of religious fundamentalist most of you detest the most.

So as an occasional reader and a supporter of science and progress and all that good stuff, blah blah blah, I'd really appreciate it if you just tried a little harder to get accurate info.

Thank you for your time.

-Mormon Guy 10 September 2014


 * What is in this article that (as your denomination says) is inaccurate?--TemplarJLS (talk) 07:20, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
 * 07:29, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
 * Oh, and "This is America" - no - this is the UK. Scream!! (talk) 08:48, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

Mormonism and Christianity
It appears an editor thinks that classifying Mormons as non-Christians is a No True Scotsman fallacy due to Mormons believing that Jesus is the Son of God. But there are actually theological reasons for supporting the assertion that Mormons aren't Christians. 1. The phrase "Son of God" means something different when used by Mormons and Christians. This is discussed in the Differences from Christian orthodoxy section where Mormons are described as following monolatrism instead of monotheism. The God of Mormonism has many sons, not one son. The God of Christianity has one son, not many. 2. Christianity teaches that the God is eternal. Mormonism believes "as man is, God was; as God is, man can be."

The question of "What is a Christian" is answered rather well by the Nicene Creed, and Mormon doesn't fit that without some very serious twisting of the meaning of the words involved.

Also, Christians believe in Moses, Solomon, David, the 10 commandments, etc. Does that mean Christians are Jews?
 * Nah, that's not really valid. Among other reasons, Christians don't call themselves Jewish, and using the Nicene creed, which was established after the religious movement started, to separate "true Christians" is literally the no true Scotsman fallacy restated.  The only basis for using that creed is that some people think it's relevant, and realistically the Mormon theological differences are minimal compared to some that already exist.  ikanreed You probably didn't deserve that 18:00, 9 June 2015 (UTC)
 * By the BoN's definition of Christianity, I suspect that we could start designating the Easter Orthodox churches as "non-Christian" too because of their differing (i.e. non-Chalcedonian) Christology as well as ditching all non-trinitarians too. Also, how the hell is Mormonism monolatric? Splitting the Trinity into its/their constituent parts isn't the kind of monolatrism normally associated with the word, because Mormons do worship and acknowledge the divinity of all three parts of the Trinty, but simply go about the practical worship by appealing to God by way of Jesus. Similarly, the "become god of your own planet"-stuff seems more like a sort of "franchise" under God, than becoming a "real" god like the omni(-scient, -present, -benevolent, -potent) God. ScepticWombat (talk) 10:55, 10 June 2015 (UTC)

It's not a franchise God, it's becoming literally equal to God. And no, Mormons don't believe you get your own planet.


 * The "Becoming Like God" page by the Mormons themselves explains the belief better for those interested.--BruceGrubb (talk) 23:50, 14 December 2016 (UTC)

Magic underwear vs Clockwork Orange
Does anyone else think that the magic underwear looks like the outfits from Clockwork Orange? I think we could upload an image comparison, just for S&G. CorruptUser (talk) 06:09, 16 March 2017 (UTC)

United Order/communalism
I was reading on Wikipedia about, the (largely 19th century) Mormon idea where people were encouraged to give all their possessions to the Mormon church. Wikipedia suggests it originated when Smith found himself a little short of cash. Apparently it's still practiced in some non-mainstream Mormon groups. Also some fun stuff where they attempted to deny it was in any way communist. Seems like the sort of interesting practice that should be mentioned. --Annanoon (talk) 11:32, 3 November 2020 (UTC)