bluebell

Those who are convinced that we are not doing things the “right“ way will often tell us we need to change and behave more like they behave and believe more like they believe. We do the same. We are just honest enough to acknowledge it.

As an introvert I’m totally ok with them reinventing the wheel on my account.

Yes, I’m not a fan of the social obligations either. Church culture is a bit harder for introverts.

Update: we are in Layton UT and we accidentally ended up at Deseret Book a couple minutes before they opened. We weren’t trying to be there when they unlocked the doors, just trying to get that “to-do” item marked off the list. There was a line in the parking lot! We were so confused. I was finally able to buy a few of the open sleeve option which was great. I grabbed 4-5 items and got in line to pay with two people ahead of me. By the time I got to the register and finished paying there were probably 20 people in line behind me! And they were all older men and women (40-60 age range by the look of it). The popularity of these new options is not about young girls wanting to wear more “revealing” clothes.

I’ve seen the same idea shared on the LDS Daily facebook page but couldn’t find anything official to back it up. Im all for changing chapels to make them feel more worshipful and with the ordinance of the sacrament being the focus rather than the speaker. I’m doubtful of this announcement mostly because it seems like it would take decades to get all the chapels done and some areas would get the shaft, endlessly waiting, while others (Utah) would get it quicker. My stake center right now is typical of those built in that era. The chapel has no windows, is different shades of brown and orange, and has burlap-type stuff on the walls. It’s utilitarian and not at all inspirational. I can’t even see the sacrament table from our side of the chapel.

I don’t understand this reasoning. Can you clarify? If you made a pagan cry because you asserted that Jesus is the Christ rather than affirming their own beliefs, then you would be being committing symbolic violence towards that pagan? Also, are you saying that the best way to have faith is to abstain from all certainty? So the best way to have faith in Christ is to remain uncertain that He is the Christ, for example? That seems like a paradox considering some of the things you have asserted previously so I must be missing something.

Beagles are really hard dogs. But super cute!

Our old ward used it a lot but my new ward pretends like it doesn’t exist. I actually forgot all about it until you were listing the communication options. (My new ward is pretty geriatric so we don’t really use much technology for anything).

The way that chat presents this, I read it the same way you did. Then I wondered if “arguments” might imply evidence and data included and not just “him arguing” about why he’s right? I couldn’t tell if there’s more backing up his assertions or not.

My ward here is a little backward so it wouldn’t surprise me if it’s a church policy that we just don’t do. My ward is mostly very old people, and they struggle with technology. We haven’t even been here two years yet and I bet we have a funeral every other month from an older person who has passed away.

If there’s one thing that I admire about you, it’s that you are nothing if not consistent. You never disappoint in your ability to lambast the church for both doing and also not doing something. It’s definitely your superpower.

They are still doing a sign-up list on the bishop’s door in my current Ward so it could be a policy that all stakes aren’t enforcing or maybe it was just from that one Stake. It’s really hard to tell sometimes where these directives come from.

No one is using circles? I thought the church was really pushing that.

Oh well. Almost 50 years old and no one ever said a thing about it. The church really sucks at embracing their own secret agenda. 😉

They were probably invited but if we didn’t bring them unless we had to because we didn’t have a babysitter.

I've started just clicking on stuff that I think might be right and about 98% of the time it works. I used to low key stress about it but now I don't care enough.

I guess we never got the memo as we never took our kids with us until they were old enough to have a job and were paying consistent tithing themselves.

Makes me wonder if there’s either a new bishop or a new executive secretary.

That makes sense.

Agreed. It’s much worse for me now than it used to be

We’ve had a lot of TULIP Calvinists who have posted here over the years. I’m aware of their doctrine. It doesn’t translate into a belief that a specific Calvinist church is the only true church though. Not as it’s been explained to me anyway. There is probably one out there somewhere that does believe it. Lots of independent Calvinist churches out there. Catholicism is probably the closest mainstream church to our views on one true church. The biggest difference is that they accept Protestant baptism as valid (if I understand correctly. Probably best to let one of the residents Catholics speak on that)

Youth conferences are still held in most stakes (at least in the US) and are different than EFY or the new FSY stuff. They are generally put together by the stake youth leadership (the stake young mens and young womens presidencies) and then the ward YM and YW presidencies help during the event. They are a lot of work, it was always my least favorite thing about serving youth leadership callings. Entertaining and spiritually feeding (and just physically feeding and keeping alive) a few hundred kids for a couple of days is a herculean task. Some of the people in charge of the big ones probably should get paid as well!

I'll try to clarify. It is equivalent to them not considering themselves to be the true church because the disagreement has no bearing on their beliefs about what will be happening to each of them in the next life. While the presbyterian may believe the methodist or the baptist is wrong on some points of doctrine or belief, they generally don't believe that translates into a need for the methodist or the baptist to change anything in order to receive eternal life or be saved. There probably was a time (and in some independent congregations I'm sure that time is right now) where the doctrinal differences were much more tied to heavenly consequences. Most of the big denominations came to existence during a time when people were very much trying to find the 'correct' gospel and they persist today, even though the members don't usually hold to the same perspective, for a lot of different reasons. My husband grew up very active Lutheran. He began investigating the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when the pastor of his church was kicked out due to disagreements with the ruling church council and they wanted to hire someone else. The pastor that was booted started his own congregation and took a large chunk of the other congregation with him (while my husband started taking the missionary discussions and moved on). That's one example of why so many different protestant churches exist and it has nothing to do with the old Lutheran congregation believing that they were the only true church, nor the new Lutheran congregation believing they were the only true church. (I was shocked to learn just how many different kinds of Lutheran churches there are!). As an aside, I'm not sure that 'snotty' is the tone that you want to be conveying right now, but it's what's coming through so just be aware. Sometimes we don't realize the tone that our posts have and I'm guessing you aren't here to do more harm than good. Accuracy is important to me. I've seen to many members become the worst enemies of the gospel of Christ because of they way they speak and act when trying to defend it. I have been that person in the past and all that comes from it is bad fruit.

They’ve had a form of FSY for decades. At least since the 80s I think. But it was called EFY and you had to travel to BYU (or maybe a couple other locations around the US, I’m not sure) to attend. Worship band type music has been a staple of those events for just as long. You could even by the tape or CD at Deseret Book each year.

I’ve spent enough time with people telling me, as a latter-day saint, what I actually believe that it’s a red flag to me when a Latter Day Saint does it to someone else. We have to be really careful not to create a double standard in these kinds of conversations, where it’s ok if we do something to someone else that we would never tolerate them doing to us. There are obviously some independent denominations out there that do believe they are the only right ones. There have certainly been times in the past (and in places even now) when persecution between denominations was intense. Some of that had more to do with cultural heritage rather than doctrinal disputes. It’s messy But most (I was very careful in my work choice there) do not view church and Christianity through that lens. A Presbyterian may think that a Methodist is wrong in some of their beliefs, but, generally speaking, they don’t have a problem considering them to be Christian. I’m curious why it’s so important to you that they do? It’s seems like a weird hill to die on.