3DOP

Hey calm, thanks for your reply. I would only say that when I suggested "pious fiction", I meant inspired pious fiction. Scripture. I doubt the Jonah story as history. But there are good lessons from the tale. Maybe it IS historical. I tend to THINK it is historical. But either way I have faith that it is Scripture. I thought maybe you all could go that way with the Book of Mormon.

This thread seems to hinge on the notion that the Book of Mormon is necessarily a work of actual history. What if it is more fittingly in the genre of true, but pious fiction? Are the parties here agreed that if the Book of Mormon is ahistorical, that the CoJCoLDS is false? I am a Catholic as most here know. I have been around for a lot of years now mainly to defend my Church against Apostasy theory. I am thinking that most LDS here would not go to any other "church" if they become unbelievers in LDS claims. It seems like, above all, Mormons are thoroughly materialistic. NO substance is immaterial. I wish that I could help Mormons who begin to doubt LDS claims would also question the arguably false metaphysics they have assumed. Analytics, hi. I find your method to be fair and honorable. I don't want to derail here. We should all just want to identify the best explanation for the "Jesus Event". Maybe that should come after this examination? Just wanting to feel relevant here and friendly to all. Happy Easter Monday. Carry on. Rory

Hi Tony, good point about non religious images. I think it is a healthy human instinct to make images of those for whom we love or have deep respect. Imagery isn't good if one's imagination is imagining that the image IS God, or Lincoln or Wellington. But we Catholics even kneel before our images. Sometimes through misunderstanding, Catholics have been accused of replacing God with an image. It is a human trait to have trouble concentrating our imaginations. It takes a lot of discipline which I lack. In the Gospel, we are told that Mary pondered certain events in her heart. It CAN be done without physical images. But must it be? Are we in danger of idolatry if we need visual aids to tame our wild imaginations? There is no question in my mind that images must be used as aids to our meditations. Of course, like Mary, we can limit our images to our own interior imagination without outside help, especially if we fear offending God by the use of an artist's representation. The main thing is to develop a deeper penetration into the meaning of an event.

In one of the readings from "the Office" (not Jim and Pam, or Michael, heh) for Palm Sunday we see the familiar prophetic words of Jesus Christ, "When I am lifted up, I will draw all men unto myself." I was meditating on these words a little while gazing at a Crucifix that hangs in our bedroom. It came to mind that this image over my wife's dresser demonstrates why it was necessary for the Lord to suffer as He did, and not only to achieve redemption for our souls. We certainly need forgiveness of sins. I hold that the Cross of Christ is a fathomless mystery, which perhaps no one has fully realized in its depth. Through our imaginations, faithful Christians continually try to realize more profoundly the gift that Jesus gives us on Calvary. He draws all men to Himself. He doesn't force His divine love upon us. Rather He shows it to us, when we picture Him suffering in body, when we hear Him repeat His dying words, when we see the centurion thrust His spear into the side of our dead Savior. When men and women, young and old, have imagined the horrid but sacred scene they have run to this Savior, of their own free will, and offered Him their spirits and souls and bodies for 2,000 years on every continent and in every nation. He draws us to Himself. I am aware that there is a bit of a taboo in some Christian circles against the making of religious art that shows our Lord on a Cross. Perhaps LDS lead the way in this era of time, but they didn't arrive at the conclusion without precedent. Reforming Protestants also disdained the practice centuries before Joseph Smith. Before that there was the iconoclastic movement in the Middle Ages, mostly limited to Eastern Christianity, which was exposed to ideas gained from devout Muslim neighbors. This is not a history lesson. It is try to understand and have sympathy with those who do not like a Crucifix, a rude, garish symbol hanging prominently in Catholic churches, and privately in Catholic homes. I am not suggesting to the Muslim, Protestant Reformer, or Latter-day Saint that they need to start hanging up crucifixes. But I am suggesting that whether one of these should use a physical image such as a crucifix to help them picture the scene at Calvary, or merely use their imaginations to see the event where Christ triumphs over sin and death, that we need to see it in our minds, with or without using our physical vision. However far we may have advanced in our love for God the Father and His Blessed Son, we will always be drawn to a greater love for the Lord Jesus Christ by taking time, and making a point to purposely imagine again what Jesus did for us to make our Easter resurrection and His, a reality of history that shall never fade away. May there be a Blessed Palm Sunday and holy week of preparation for us all. May we be more ready than ever to race to Him, in the glory of His Resurrection, with hearts bursting with love and joy in seven days. May we always be more and more profoundly drawn to Him, using the method He left for us. Rory

Hi manol, It wasn't until 1870 that the First Vatican Council, defined the doctrine of papal infallibility. The pope when acting alone, is almost always fallible. There were some faithful observers of the Council who believed the teaching, but feared that as it was explained, would be misunderstood by non-Catholics and Catholics alike. Sure enough. They had that right!

Just for the record, informed Catholics are aware that in 2,000 years there have been only two times when a pope has certainly spoken infallibly. And even the declaration in 1950 for the Assumption wasn't made until after consultation with the world's bishops. It is much more often that the Catholic Church speaks infallibly through the joint unanimity of the pope and bishops in an ecumenical council.

Jesse! I had been following and thinking how I needed to close the thread by making a post about what times and seasons are about liturgically and catechetically (word?). Heh. I am glad to see you. Still in the Southwest? Teaching? I retired almost a year ago.

Okay, so we get to deduct the gifts we give from our tithing? Brilliant. Who would have thought? This is great news. So in effect, our gifts ARE tithing? That helps, with like 40 children, grandchildren, godchildren, in-laws, and random gifts we have tithed a lot more than we should have over the years. Now the Church owes me! I am probably good for the next twenty years! TitheDOP, who is kidding, but who when very young tithed on gifts received without considering gifts given. The things you do at 29, you just shake your head at that kid 40 years later. We were broke, so friends would do free mechanic work on my car. Of course we tithed 10% of what it would have cost at a shop. Doesn’t everybody?

Is it true that if I become LDS I need to add up an estimated value to the gifts I receive for Christmas and tithe on that? If yes, I suppose I would also need to tithe on the cost of shipping? Heh. TitheDOP

Hi again InCog. Thanks. I appreciate your reluctance to make firm assertions. Me too. But we are permitted to speculate where revelation is limited to propose plausible scenarios that seem compatible with what we have been given. I think maybe I should take some time off before I offer further speculations on a third question you had asked above about Pope John Paul's Theology of the Body. About speculation. We learn gradually, and especially by corporately pondering and investigating mysteries whether they are mysteries of creation or mysteries of God. God made us this way, and I speculate that it honors and pleases God if when we have faith in Him and His Word of truth, that we are not content without exploring His mysteries to unlock new truths only to discover new mysteries. A delight to be a small part of the exercise. We are made to be speculators! The only problem is that we sometimes have speculations that are not well thought out. Heh. That is why I want to wait a little before I make my speculations public Regards, 3

Hi CV. Do you think it is likely that most of your fellow LDS here, see enough similarity in Catholic ideas on eternal family and heaven to view it in a favorable way if it were true? I would like to believe that. Of course LDS can not believe that the Catholic teaching is true. I am not suggesting that LDS could believe our teaching is true. But I have been trying to demonstrate that it might not be as unappealing as perhaps many think. If you guys feel the teaching as understood is unappealing to the heart, I thought I might be able to explain it in a better light. That is why I ask you and your fellows here the question I pose above. Maybe that is where I should have started instead of assuming that there is an underlying antipathy to overcome? What do you all think? Rory

Hi InCognitus. For context, I will provide something I wrote on the Protestant Apologetics thread to provide the interpretation Pope John Paul II gave: Pope John Paul II, adhering to the ancient teaching of the Church, appeals to Holy Scripture for his authority in affirming that with the Resurrection of the Body, each of us retains the same gender that they had on earth, with the meaning we can learn from the differences and compatibility of the sexes: "When they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage." (Mk 12:25) Those of course are Christ's words to the Sadducees who denied the Resurrection and knew it would be absurd for a woman's seven legitimate husbands to be wife to all of them in any Resurrection. Which is to be the husband? Clearly, none of them. The pope goes on to explain: These words have a key meaning for the theology of the body...All three synoptic Gospels report the same statement, except that Luke's version is different in some details from Matthew and Mark. Essential for them all is the fact that, in the future resurrection human beings, after having reacquired their bodies in the fullness of the perfection characteristic of the image and likeness of God - after having reacquired them in their masculinity and femininity - neither marry nor are given in marriage. In the next paragraph he succinctly states the teaching of the Gospels: As can be seen from these words, marriage, that union in which, according to Genesis, "A man cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh" (2:24) - the union characteristic right from the beginning - belongs exclusively to this age. Marriage and procreation, do not constitute on the other hand, the eschatological future of man. ---The Theology of the Body, Human Love in the Divine Plan, Pope John Paul II, Daughters of St. Paul, Boston MA, 1997, p. 238 (bold mine) I have a comment and a few questions for you if you don't mind: I cannot argue against your position from those words of the Gospels alone. My tradition obviously helps inform my interpretation. I think my position is only plausible from the Scriptures alone. I think I have to agree with you about its not being "black and white" from the Scriptures alone. 1) I often say that the Scriptures alone are ordinarily inadequate to resolve doctrinal controversy because they are subject to multiple interpretations. Do we agree on that? 2) If I understood you correctly...Nobody gets married in what you call the Celestial Kingdom and I call heaven. I think we agree on that? 3) What about procreation? Continuing or ceasing? Thanks IC! Rory

I am sure you are right about what your church teaches CV75. I had thought that there was some clearing up to be done about what my Church teaches. Undoubtedly, each us will tend to like best what our own church teaches. I am trying to illustrate that our beliefs have some significant parallels with yours. Is yours better to you? Of course. But maybe ours is not as bad as perhaps some LDS have thought?

Marriage will continue in Heaven, but not in the way it is foreshadowed before the resurrection of the body. Right or wrong, Silin taught Solzhenitsyn (A.S.) that conjugal love is a manifestation of something else! "...a lofty aspiration to Union". A.S. capitalized the word Union, signifying a still greater union than Holy Matrimony. If he is right he is referring to nothing less than deification, to become partakers of a nature that makes us one in Love with Christ and His Father and the Holy Spirit. And one in love with all the Children of the Father, and of course not excluding their families and friends. It is the Marriage Supper of the Lamb which is symbolized in what we call Sacramental Marriage. You will recall the unusual reply Jesus gave to some disciples who approached Him while He was with the multitude: And one said unto him: Behold thy mother and thy brethren stand without, seeking thee. But he answering him that told him, said: Who is my mother, and who are my brethren? And stretching forth his hand towards his disciples, he said: Behold my mother and my brethren. For whosoever shall do the will of my Father, that is in heaven, he is my brother, and sister, and mother. ---Mt. 12:47-50 The Unifying Marriage takes place after the Judgment. At this time the happy citizens of that glorious city of God will for the first time have intimate knowledge of how each of his "brothers, and sisters, and mothers", did the will of Jesus' Father, and helped to advance the salvation of all through the acts of charity that they performed. Those souls will love each other in the unity of Christ. Everyone will also know every little thing that we (I hope) did for the kingdom of God. If all we did was clean up a mess in the bathroom of the church, not wanting a potential "brother, sister, or mother" to be scandalized, that little act of charity will be remembered. The ripple effects of every act of charity through the centuries will be honored, and God will exalt the humble. And though they will shine like stars, with some brighter than others, no one will be dissatisfied in the One Family of God. I think we will be forever delighted in all of the Saints, each in their unique way, depending on when they lived, and what they did, but each of them our "brother, sister, and mother". We could never exclude our earthly family members, who are also our spiritual mothers, and sisters, and brothers. I am in Grandpa mode and won't see half of the grand kids lives. But they will know if he loved them and prayed for them every day as he should. Of course, I am not saying that LDS believe the same thing, but we aren't as far off as might appear at first glance. I support and honor your desires and expectations for eternal families. We are not made to find our satisfaction in ourselves alone, or even with God alone. He wants us to be a family, modeled after the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We are invited to share in that eternal intimacy. Who could believe such a wonderful thing? None of us except by faith. It would be great if we could be that kind of family here below. It is that which I pray for in my efforts to make my beliefs understood to the LDS and others here. Without forgetting our differences, let us become closer by discerning if we have similar hearts, even when our minds are apart. After all of these years, I cannot fail to see grace in the words that are spoken here by many LDS and others who I admire. We should hope to admire each other. But alas, for the times, (our present distress, eh, InCog? Heh.) there sometimes lingers other and less worthy desires to which none of us are immune. Thanks InCog, I will try to get to the other two questions if time allows. Regards, Rory

I had pretty much decided to discontinue the discussion on marriage in heaven, even though I had been asked to start a new thread. If you haven't followed, there have been discussions that took place on at least two threads. I had been hoping to kind of pull everything together. But it seemed too hard and time consuming. 1) I want to be on record for commending the LDS teaching on eternal marriage and families. If I correctly understand the teaching of my church (Roman Catholic), we concur that the citizens in heaven will experience the greatest joys of family unity while retaining their genders. 2) I also hold that the Scriptures teach that after the resurrection of the body, that it is revealed in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, that marriage and procreation are for this age only. 3) I reconcile points 1 and 2 by affirming the teaching of Pope John Paul II called the Theology of the Body. In that work he repeatedly refers to the nuptial meaning of our bodies. I can't write a book. But I had even made myself comfortable with abandoning the idea of starting a little thread here. That was until I came across the subject in a most unexpected place. A Soviet prison camp. Popularly known as the Gulag Archipelago, a history and literary work of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn that recalls the prison camp system which was populated by political prisoners who had often been guilty of nothing more than being captured by Germans in World War II. Not everyone fit this category of prisoner. Solzhenitsyn himself was "guilty" of corresponding with a friend and expressing doubt about Comrade Stalin's leadership. After the fall of Germany, and the liberation of Russian prisoners from German camps, instead of having a heroes welcome, they were usually treated as traitors. It is over-simplification, but there was fear that while in the camps of the west they had imbibed anti-Soviet ideas. In at least one case it was true that anti-Soviet ideas had been conceived by a prisoner in a German camp. In his Gulag Archipelago, Solzhenitsyn recalls his friendship with Anatoly Vasilyevich Silin. Born around 1910, Silin had been an orphan, raised as an atheist in a children's home, and was fighting against the Nazis, like all good Soviet citizens. But after being captured by the Germans, while imprisoned he had come across some religious literature for the first time, and was reportedly carried away, and converted to Christianity. When Solzhenitsyn knew him, it appears that he had never even had the freedom to visit a church. I am afraid we do not know if he ever survived the prison system. Here is what we read about him and marriage in a biography of Solzhenitsyn by Joseph Pearce: Since he had spent the entire period since his conversion in prisons of one sort or another he had never had the benefit of further spiritual reading. Instead he gleaned the truth through his own perceptions, expressed in verse. According to Solzhenitsyn, Silin knew some twenty thousand lines of verse by heart at the time they met, reciting many of them to his younger fellow poet. Like Solzhenitsyn, Silin looked upon his verse as a 'way of remembering and of transmitting thoughts'. For the Gulag Archipelago, Solzhenitsyn gleaned a few precious memories of their time together in the camp. He recalled Silin bending over one of the rare blades of grass growing in the barren camp. 'How beautiful are the grasses of the earth,' he exclaimed. 'But even these the Creator has given to man for a carpet under his feet. How much more beautiful, then, must we be than they!' I wanted to share that, and this: Silin's theological mysticism was distinctly unpuritanical, and he asserted to Solzhenitsyn that 'even earthly, carnal love is a manifestation of a lofty aspiration to Union'. ---Solzhenitsyn, A Soul in Exile, by Joseph Pearce, Baker Books (2001), p. 121, (bold mine) I will try to explain how I understand Silin if there is any interest. If not, I hope you find the little look inside the prisons inspiring.

Its okay ZealouslyStriving. Next time I will try to remember to wait until my wrath subsides, hopefully before nightfall.🤪

On the contrary, if this is a question that is unsettled for Catholics, I have nothing to say except that I apologize for my haste, and retract my comments on the subject. I didn't want to start a new thread anyway. On the other hand, I was quoting authentic teaching from a canonized Pope St. John Paul II. What level of ecclesiastical authority was being cited by those Catholics at New Oxford Review who disagree with the pope? Did they quote papal bulls or encyclicals, doctors of the Church, church fathers, ecumenical councils, bishop's conferences, etc.? How do they explain the question the Sadducees asked of Jesus about people who are married multiple times? To which will they be married in heaven? Catholics are free to marry again after the death of a spouse. The question must be answered. I am not sure, but I think LDS can only marry one spouse "for time and eternity"? How would a Catholic deal with that? Articles in a respected periodical like New Oxford Review are only slightly more weighty than letters to the editor. I have a feeling that this "Hold on let's explore this" crowd are well-meaning people, perhaps widows and widowers happily married once for many years. Maybe they are kids remembering their good parents? Perhaps the Church can be blamed for failing to teach them about how marriage is a sacramental symbol of the marriage that will be perfected in Heaven between Christ and His Church, where all will be family as sons and daughters of the Father? I suspect that these are fine people whose understandable sentimentalism about the subject is misplaced. But my main point is still valid even if I have to retract what I mistakenly wrote. Either way my main point was that we are in much more agreement with LDS than a lot of people seem to think.

Hey marineland. Thanks for the upvote! I hope you can follow me as I continue my thoughts on comparisons to the LDS point of view. I have to be sure that LDS thinkers have pondered over the same passages that led Pope John Paul II to say "Marriage and procreation, do not constitute...the eschatological future of man." I would be disappointed if the LDS haven't arrived at some kind of biblical solution to the pope's interpretation which appears to contradict the LDS teaching on family life after the resurrection. I deliberately added the first word "appears to contradict". This is because while I must conclude that the LDS position can't be entirely right from a Catholic perspective, there is a very important sense that can be easily missed in which we agree wholeheartedly with the LDS. Family life continues. It is an admirable and good instinct to be repulsed at the idea that our most intimate earthly family ties will have no correspondence in heaven. It is plain to me from our discussions lately, that there are highly distorted ideas among LDS about those who accept John Paul's point of view, which is the same as most Protestants. Some LDS seem think that there must of necessity be a dehumanizing of the current nature of man in non-LDS thought. I have seen words like transhuman to describe what they think John Paul's position implies. Some even seem surprised that we believe that we retain our genders eternally. They also seem to think that we doubt the full humanity of the Lord Jesus. There was a long thread recently dedicated to discovering if non-LDS believed that Christ could have been fertile! There is so much ignorance about each others faiths and it gets perpetuated wherever we find a desire to understand the belief of the other in the least attractive and sensible light. It can be reassuring to know that only our own beliefs make any sense. There is no point in discussion if we cannot see the areas in which we agree. Again, I agree with the LDS about the necessary human need for family forever. I will not suggest that LDS can easily start teaching against a century or more of belief in eternal families, sealings for time and eternity, etc. But I want our LDS friends to see that what we believe is not so different and alien as perhaps they have thought. This post is already too long. If there is interest when I have some more time, I would be happy to make a followup post which might help Latter-day Saints to disagree with the pope's conclusions, while on the other hand, finding his concept of "eternal family" to be not unattractive. It seems like we should be able to reach that point. In the meantime, maybe some of our LDS friends might like to explain their problems with John Paul's exegesis of the Gospel passages that led him to his conclusion. (Does anybody think I should start another thread? This doesn't exactly fit with "The Oddity of Protestant Apologetics", but now this thread has the preliminary information needed to be able to easily discuss our agreements and disagreements on the subject) 3DOP

calm, Hi. The guy is apparently only an immature, over zealous Catholic convert. No priest, bishop, or pope could ever endorse such a strategy in favor of his faith, which it seems he abandoned (the stupid strategy). He was truly ignorant of basic Catholic principles of love and truth telling. I am sorry for the LDS mockery. But I am glad to see the instinctively loving reaction of most of you to that. One could argue about which side is the most poisonous. I couldn't watch more than a minute. I thought the guy who has been identified as Catholic, with his weird beard and glasses was more excusable. All that said, in 40 or 50 years, we can hope that all parties will reflect on their current follies in a different and repentant light.

Pope John Paul II, adhering to the ancient teaching of the Church, appeals to Holy Scripture for his authority in affirming that with the Resurrection of the Body, each of us retains the same gender that they had on earth, with the meaning we can learn from the differences and compatibility of the sexes: "When they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage." (Mk 12:25) Those of course are Christ's words to the Sadducees who denied the Resurrection and knew it would be absurd for a woman's seven legitimate husbands to be wife to all of them in any Resurrection. Which is to be the husband? Clearly, none of them. The pope goes on to explain: These words have a key meaning for the theology of the body...All three synoptic Gospels report the same statement, except that Luke's version is different in some details from Matthew and Mark. Essential for them all is the fact that, in the future resurrection human beings, after having reacquired their bodies in the fullness of the perfection characteristic of the image and likeness of God - after having reacquired them in their masculinity and femininity - neither marry nor are given in marriage. In the next paragraph he succinctly states the teaching of the Gospels: As can be seen from these words, marriage, that union in which, according to Genesis, "A man cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh" (2:24) - the union characteristic right from the beginning - belongs exclusively to this age. Marriage and procreation, do not constitute on the other hand, the eschatological future of man. ---The Theology of the Body, Human Love in the Divine Plan, Pope John Paul II, Daughters of St. Paul, Boston MA, 1997, p. 238 (bold mine)

I hope I did not give the impression that you were being thought of as one who had entertained such an ignorant idea. It came to my attention as a desperate attempt to show that Catholicism is anti-sexual. I was referencing another recent thread that you might have missed.

A friend of mine sent me a pdf file of a book that perhaps others of you would find interesting. It is called Tetragrammaton: Western Christians and the Hebrew Name of God, From the Beginnings to the Seventeenth Century, by Robert J. Wilkinson. If anyone is interested, here is a link to a site where the book may be purchased that provides helpful information about the book. https://books.google.com/books/about/Tetragrammaton_Western_Christians_and_th.html?id=1xyoBgAAQBAJ

I see your point about the name and ineffability. Perhaps I was straining to defend the exact wording of the catechism, which could be tweaked more satisfactorily.

Okay. I don't have a problem with that, if you will allow that IWillBeWhatIWillBe is subject to a lot more speculation than a mere surname like Baker, or Fletcher, or Smith. The Catholic Church says that unlike a lot of surnames, the name YWHW is beyond description (ineffable, however one translates it). The name is spoken, but the meaning of the name suggests many qualities. "I am Who I Am" has been understood by Jews and Christians alike as God claiming to be the source of all existence. He is the Source without a source. God is not a creation. He is not a contingent being, depending on existence from anything else. I am aware that there is a lot of LDS philosophy invested in materialism. But you are a young church and have made many seachange moves regarding teachings that were previously non-negotiable. I doubt it will happen in our lifetimes, but I cannot see why a transcendent God, who is also very near to us should be so repugnant as it seems many of today's LDS seem to believe. Is this not what Paul is testifying to (a transcendent God) while in Athens where he proclaims to the pagan philosophers the Unknown God? I do not mean pagan pejoratively. They only had natural revelation and some were groping towards the truth as Paul could recognize. (Now all the Athenians, and strangers that were there, employed themselves in nothing else, but either in telling or in hearing some new thing.) But Paul standing in the midst of the Areopagus, said: Ye men of Athens, I perceive that in all things you are too superstitious. For passing by, and seeing your idols, I found an altar also, on which was written: To the unknown God. What therefore you worship, without knowing it, that I preach to you: God, who made the world, and all things therein; he, being Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; Neither is he served with men's hands, as though he needed any thing; seeing it is he who giveth to all life, and breath, and all things: And hath made of one, all mankind, to dwell upon the whole face of the earth, determining appointed times, and the limits of their habitation. That they should seek God, if happily they may feel after him or find him, although he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live, and move, and are; as some also of your own poets said: For we are also his offspring. ---Acts 17:21-28 Most commentators assert that Paul is quoting favorably from well-known Greek poets and philosophers using their own words to show the Athenians that their own scholars have implied that they discard their idols and seek this unknown God, who reveals his existence to all. It seems to me that they come very close to saying the same things about God as may be plausibly claimed by YWHW. There is nothing that does not come from God. He is seen as the source of all existence. The Source without a source, whose existence transcends matter. What could be so bad about that? Nothing, if it is in Him that we live, and move, and have our very being. We are His offspring! GodWillDoWhatHeWill! Clearly, He wills to be with us, and to teach us that adoration of Him Who Is, is all fulfillment to all creatures (especially us).

marineland, hi. We used to have long discussions here about apostasy theory years ago now. I always found them unsatisfying. Maybe they did too? I wonder if this is why some apparently spend time concocting ignorantly ludicrous theories about why Catholics believe in a neuter, genderless eternity? It makes one wonder if some of these ideas are more common among LDS "in the pew" than they are here on the better informed internet. (calm, and others from ZLMB days, I refrained from using the expression coined by Dr. Shades so long ago now. Do you think there is no validity to Dr. Shades categorization)? In any case, I don't like offense, and it has been mostly unnecessary in my case. I always grant all the LDS defensive apologetics without studying them much. I don't trust the anti-apologists, and the answers given by LDS seem fine. My only time for argument these days are those rare times when somebody says something ignorant about my faith. Most of the time now, I am pointing out areas of agreement between Catholics and LDS, which I believe are becoming more and more frequent. We are even closer with Protestants, but in different key ways. Regards, 3DOP