Former Members Of The Church

[Linda]

I have the church handbook of instructions at home. Into this I read the following:

Page 67

Members Whose Close Relatives Belong to Apostate Groups

Bishops and their counselors must take exceptional care when issuing recommends to members

whose parents or other close relatives belong to or sympathize with apostate groups. Such

members must demonstrate clearly that they repudiate these apostate religious teachings before

they may be issued a recommend.

I see two dangers here:

1. Families are destroyed because they require to avoid the person; which have an other opinion on the church.

2. A form of "thought control" is reached; by nothing being allowed to be analyzed more critically.

There is a similar rule also at the JW. And I have seen in my choosen family what this rule means. The LDS has a powerful tool with it, to control their members, as I suppose.

[The Nehor]

I have the church handbook of instructions at home. Into this I read the following:

I see two dangers here:

1. Families are destroyed because they require to avoid the person; which have an other opinion on the church.

2. A form of "thought control" is reached; by nothing being allowed to be analyzed more critically.

There is a similar rule also at the JW. And I have seen in my choosen family what this rule means. The LDS has a powerful tool with it, to control their members, as I suppose.

1. It does not say to avoid the person.

2. What the hell is "thought control"?

You suppose wrongly.

[volgadon]

I have the church handbook of instructions at home. Into this I read the following:

I see two dangers here:

1. Families are destroyed because they require to avoid the person; which have an other opinion on the church.

2. A form of "thought control" is reached; by nothing being allowed to be analyzed more critically.

There is a similar rule also at the JW. And I have seen in my choosen family what this rule means. The LDS has a powerful tool with it, to control their members, as I suppose.

Or you could be completely misreading it. If you look closely, the whole point is that members will associate with their close relations. The point is to be certain that those church members don't share the apostate beliefs and/or practices of their relatives.

[Duncan]

I Know a family in my stake whose then 17yr old son thought he was a Prophet and tried to marry and then lead the YW down to Utah. He got his butt exed and was banned from all Church property. The rest of the family is very active, except for the other son. So, I don't know what all happened but the four sisters and two parents are all very active members. So, to me, the lived experience has been different

[volgadon]

I Know a family in my stake whose then 17yr old son thought he was a Prophet and tried to marry and then lead the YW down to Utah. He got his butt exed and was banned from all Church property. The rest of the family is very active, except for the other son. So, I don't know what all happened but the four sisters and two parents are all very active members. So, to me, the lived experience has been different

All it really means is that the person issuing the temple recommend should put a little more thought and care into the recommend process if the member being interviewed has close relations who are members of apostate groups.

[Linda]

1. It does not say to avoid the person.

2. What the hell is "thought control"?

You suppose wrongly.

Sorry, I want to write MIND CONTROL. I'm too tired!

[Linda]

I Know a family in my stake whose then 17yr old son thought he was a Prophet and tried to marry and then lead the YW down to Utah. He got his butt exed and was banned from all Church property. The rest of the family is very active, except for the other son. So, I don't know what all happened but the four sisters and two parents are all very active members. So, to me, the lived experience has been different

How had the family behaved to the "rebel" (the apostate member of the family)? I know cases from the Salt Lake Tribune where children who criticized the church were banied from their family. I know other cases where homosexual and transsexual teenagers got homeless because their families had thrown them out because of this.

I think I understand the quotation correctly from the handbook and. Translated in my language: "Either you leave the church critics " in your family; " or you do not get a temple recommend. For me this sounds like blackmailing!

You may leave the church, however, you may never criticize them, otherwise you lose your family. This seems to me to be résumé of this quotation.

[Duncan]

How had the family behaved to the "rebel" (the apostate member of the family)? I know cases from the Salt Lake Tribune where children who criticized the church were banied from their family. I know other cases where homosexual and transsexual teenagers got homeless because their families had thrown them out because of this.

I think I understand the quotation correctly from the handbook and. Translated in my language: "Either you leave the church critics " in your family; " or you do not get a temple recommend. For me this sounds like blackmailing!

You may leave the church, however, you may never criticize them, otherwise you lose your family. This seems to me to be résumé of this quotation.

well, I can't speak for all families because none too are alike but this family tried to help him out but they are all active members of the Church, I think maybe what you're saying would be true if the son got his family out of the Church. None of the provided quotation to me sounds like blackmailing.

Just remember Pres. Benson had a grandson that left the Church but Pres. Benson didn't lose his recommend

Edited December 9, 2012 by Duncan

[Tacenda]

How had the family behaved to the "rebel" (the apostate member of the family)? I know cases from the Salt Lake Tribune where children who criticized the church were banied from their family. I know other cases where homosexual and transsexual teenagers got homeless because their families had thrown them out because of this.

I think I understand the quotation correctly from the handbook and. Translated in my language: "Either you leave the church critics " in your family; " or you do not get a temple recommend. For me this sounds like blackmailing!

You may leave the church, however, you may never criticize them, otherwise you lose your family. This seems to me to be résumé of this quotation.

How long ago did these situations occur? I'd be very surprised if it were recent, say the last 10 yrs.

[Sky]

How had the family behaved to the "rebel" (the apostate member of the family)? I know cases from the Salt Lake Tribune where children who criticized the church were banied from their family. I know other cases where homosexual and transsexual teenagers got homeless because their families had thrown them out because of this.

I think I understand the quotation correctly from the handbook and. Translated in my language: "Either you leave the church critics " in your family; " or you do not get a temple recommend. For me this sounds like blackmailing!

You may leave the church, however, you may never criticize them, otherwise you lose your family. This seems to me to be résumé of this quotation.

I think you might be reading more into this than is there. Ultimately we are to love everybody and keep our families intact, which had a large part to do with why the Church launched the new website mormonsandgays.org.

A little more clarification about what they mean by "apostate groups" might be in order.

[volgadon]

Translated in my language

The operative word here being "my."

"Either you leave the church critics " in your family; " or you do not get a temple recommend. For me this sounds like blackmailing!

It does not say that at all. "Such members must demonstrate clearly that they repudiate these apostate religious teachings..." Teachings, not family members.

[GingerRed]

Sorry, I want to write MIND CONTROL. I'm too tired!

Mind control?? LOLOLOL..oh please!!

I am a convert to this church...so I wasn't brought up in it....believe when I say..NO ONE is controlling MY mind, lady!!! I've been thinking for myself long before I joined the church and still do! And I can personally say, I know NO LDS person who is being 'mind controlled'. I dont know where you got that silly idea from. ( besides anti sites)

[Tacenda]

Mind control?? LOLOLOL..oh please!!

I am a convert to this church...so I wasn't brought up in it....believe when I say..NO ONE is controlling MY mind, lady!!! I've been thinking for myself long before I joined the church and still do! And I can personally say, I know NO LDS person who is being 'mind controlled'. I dont know where you got that silly idea from. ( besides anti sites)

I've often wondered about mind control in our church and realized all religion that is taught since birth, is a sort of mind control. Jews believe a certain way, as do Catholics etc. I've envied converts like you because it's a conversion rather something you've been taught to believe.

[Bill “Papa” Lee]

1. It does not say to avoid the person.

2. What the hell is "thought control"?

You suppose wrongly.

Very wrongly...nothing would have me "aviod" my child! Or wife! Edited December 9, 2012 by Bill “Papa” Lee

[urroner]

What is the difference between MIND control and THOUGHT control?

Linda, I think you are reading more into the words in the handbook then should be read.

This is your quote for the handbook:

Bishops and their counselors must take exceptional care when issuing recommends to members whose parents or other close relatives belong to or sympathize with apostate groups. Such members must demonstrate clearly that they repudiate these apostate religious teachings before they may be issued a recommend.

Now, let's look at your reaction to this quote. You had two concerns:

1. Families are destroyed because they require to avoid the person; which have an other opinion on the church.

2. A form of "thought control" is reached; by nothing being allowed to be analyzed more critically.

For #1, where does it say, even in the most round about way that the members of the Church must avoid any person who has an opposing view/opinion of the Church? I think you only read what you wanted to read into the words in the handbook.

I also don't understand what you mean by "by nothing being allowed to be analyzed more critically." I don't ever remember the Church trying to force me to think or not think a certain way. I know some members who have tried...and failed, but never the Church.

Linda, is there a difference between the following or are they the same:

a. Repudiating apostate religious teachings taught by family members

b. Repudiating family members who teach apostate religious teachings

BTW, as a point of clarification, I define "repudiate" in the above sentences as "reject" or "ostracize" and not as "disagree with" or "frown on."

I think that is an important crux of your problem. I feel that you are saying that they are the same.

You later commented

I know cases from the Salt Lake Tribune where children who criticized the church were banied from their family. I know other cases where homosexual and transsexual teenagers got homeless because their families had thrown them out because of this.

I think I understand the quotation correctly from the handbook and. Translated in my language: "Either you leave the church critics " in your family; " or you do not get a temple recommend. For me this sounds like blackmailing!

You may leave the church, however, you may never criticize them, otherwise you lose your family. This seems to me to be résumé of this quotation.

Linda, I honestly think you are grasping at straws here. I can see where you are coming from in your argument, but the logic behind that argument is based on emotions and not on sound logic.

I'm a male type engineer with a lot of software programming and design background and I'm blessed with ADHD, so logic is important to me when it comes to deciding what is the cause of the problem. I've taken several problem solving classes over the years and the most important part of deciding what the problem is and what is causing the problem is to set aside all emotions, because once emotions come into that part of the process, possible causes are automatically rejected which means what might be causing the problem might not ever be considered.

There are basically three different phases of solving problems:

1. Defining very specifically what the problem or problems are. This is very important because it might be determined that what was thought to be a single problem could be several problems being conflated into a single problem. This situation can be found in this phase, but it's usually detected in the next phase.
   
2. Finding the cause(s) of the problem(s). It may be discovered that there are causes to the problems might not even be related to each other or IOW, they are independent of each other. Also, like stated earlier, what was considered to be a single problem can be recognized as two or more independent or quasi-dependent problems.
   
3. Finding possible solutions to the problems.
   

For example, I was on a small project at work and we were having problems with the software design and the problems were just getting worse and worse as time went on. All of us software weenies finally decided to have a little pow-wow and find out what was causing the problems. The software lead was all for this meeting and was thrilled to have the meeting. Interesting thing is he had already decided that it wasn't one of his pet ideas that was causing the problems, so he refused to put it on the table. None of the rest of us knew about these pet ideas of his.

We found several possible causes for the problems, but none of them could really result in all, or even most, symptoms of the problems. We even looked at combining several of the possible causes and a satisfactory explanation couldn't be found.

Finally the lead caved in and put aside his love/devotion/ego for his pet ideas and put them on the table. The cause of the problems was found within a very short time.

But, even with the cause found, the third part of problem is often the most difficult of the process, because this is where the human side has to an important part. Often, the most logical solution is too unpalatable to those who have to fix the problem, or people will crusade for a solution because it will make their jobs easier, make them more important, or they just want job security.

Often, figuring out what the problem is is the easy part. Trust me on that.

On the software problem, all in all, it took about three hours to figure out the causes, it would have been a lot shorter if the lead had been willing to put all the cards on the table, but coming up with the fix took several days because the fixes had to be done by people and that meant getting them to sign on with the fix.

So Linda, if you have gotten this far, thank you for taking the time.

You are stating that the directions in the handbook are needlessly tearing families apart.

I have a son who I threw out of the house because he refused to follow what I thought was important principles and I did it because his actions were causing more harm to the family and to himself then could be overcome. I know people who have done similar things, but most of them weren't even members of the Church.

If you were to rewrite that part of the handbook, how would you do it? Remember, this part is about the temple recommend interview (TRI) and it's important to keep in mind the purpose of the TRI, the determination of ones worthiness to enter the temple. This determination is not up only to the bishop, but also the member being interviewed. I believe that the latter is more important then than former.

[rpn]

It was common in years past that those groups who continued to practice polygamy after the manifesto, but still believed in the restoration had their young people join the LDS church and marry in the temple so that they had their temple blessings. The section in the manual quoted is just instructions to route out those who were doing so and prevent it.

[Tacenda]

It was common in years past that those groups who continued to practice polygamy after the manifesto, but still believed in the restoration had their young people join the LDS church and marry in the temple so that they had their temple blessings. The section in the manual quoted is just instructions to route out those who were doing so and prevent it.

I've heard from someone who lived polygamy that it stills occurs. I have a nephew by marriage that grew up in a polygamist family. He joined the church and served a mission. I sometimes wonder if he might want my niece to live it. It's probably wrong to think it might happen, because he is a very active believing LDS.

[Sleeper Cell]

I have the church handbook of instructions at home. Into this I read the following:

I see two dangers here:

1. Families are destroyed because they require to avoid the person; which have an other opinion on the church.

2. A form of "thought control" is reached; by nothing being allowed to be analyzed more critically.

There is a similar rule also at the JW. And I have seen in my choosen family what this rule means. The LDS has a powerful tool with it, to control their members, as I suppose.

I believe that you have made two of the most common errors that most people make when they look at other’ people’s religious beliefs and practices.

1. A religious group (or any other group) should not be judged by the bad behavior of a few of its members.

2. A religious group should not be judged by what its own religious writings mean to outsiders. It should be judged by what these religious writings mean to its members. (In the case of the CHI, what these religious polices mean to those who administer them).

To this, I would add that on those occasions when I have had first hand knowledge of a “newsworthy event,” the news reports usually came across to me as somewhat distorted, and, at times, even omitted critical details. And if the cases you cite “from the Salt Lake Tribune” were unsubstantiated letters (or internet comments) … well, it is difficult enough to understand problems in other families when you hear both sides of the story, but if you hear only one ...

[Linda]

@ urroner,

I see two problems here:

What a liberal expression of opinion is for me; the faith waste may already mean for a church member.

An example:

Years ago I went to a ward in Berlin and to be more precise on Fast Sunday. I gave my testimony and told my story into shortened form. After that the quorum president got up and wanted to forbid me the word. I had said only the truth and hidden even the really bad things (the abuse of my father). I was thrown out, got ban on entering the house place. I received an e-mail (today, I still have it) approximately a month later by it being reported to me what happened after that. The councellor of the bishop and the quorum president got up and claimed I would have come to destroy their testimonies. And a member pleaded "to kill subjects like me" as he said it. He shall have referred to the "Laban story" from the BoM.

Two members has left the church and a brother confessed after that to be homosexual. I have since then in Berlin in every war house ban.

[Deborah]

I Know a family in my stake whose then 17yr old son thought he was a Prophet and tried to marry and then lead the YW down to Utah. He got his butt exed and was banned from all Church property.

I wonder if this is my nephew!!!

Seriously, I do have a nephew who has led his Mom and Dad and a sister out of the church with his teachings that the church is in apostasy, all based on the old writings of Brigham Young, including the fact that polygamy should never have been banned. He was exed for openly teaching these things at church. He twists Pres. Young's words and they believe him. I make it very clear I do not support such false teachings, and keep asking my brother in law when he's going to take his second wife. He ignores me!

[Deborah]

Years ago I went to a ward in Berlin and to be more precise on Fast Sunday. I gave my testimony and told my story into shortened form. After that the quorum president got up and wanted to forbid me the word.

That is not the purpose of testimony meetings. It is to bear testimony of the gospel and of Jesus Christ. That was a very inappropriate thing to do and sounds like something that should have been presented to the Bishop in privacy, I don't know exactly what you said but if you were truly banned it must have been egregious, Furthermore there were young children present and the remarks were totally inappropriate for them.

Furthermore the Church Handbook is supposed to be for church leaders only for a reason, so that a discussion can be had if members have questions about certain aspects and avoid the gross misinterpretation you have given certain passages.

[CV75]

I see two dangers here:

1. Families are destroyed because they require to avoid the person; which have an other opinion on the church.

2. A form of "thought control" is reached; by nothing being allowed to be analyzed more critically.

RE: #1:

Avoiding a person is a behavior not mentioned here.

No requirement to avoid another person is mentioned here.

Any person’s opinion about the Church is not mentioned here.

RE: #2:

Demonstrating a repudiation of apostate teachings is a behavior, not a thought.

Are you mind-reading? Or reading way too much into what is written?

[halconero]

How had the family behaved to the "rebel" (the apostate member of the family)? I know cases from the Salt Lake Tribune where children who criticized the church were banied from their family. I know other cases where homosexual and transsexual teenagers got homeless because their families had thrown them out because of this.

I think I understand the quotation correctly from the handbook and. Translated in my language: "Either you leave the church critics " in your family; " or you do not get a temple recommend. For me this sounds like blackmailing!

You may leave the church, however, you may never criticize them, otherwise you lose your family. This seems to me to be résumé of this quotation.

That puts my dad in a tough spot for sure...seeing as how my younger brother is very critical of the church. I'll go remind him so he cancel his plane ticket home and Christmas presents this year.

You're reading too much into it.

An example of where this is useful is in two instances that I can think of.

1) We have a polygamist group about twenty minutes from our ward building here in Canada. Many members have family relations and social connections with them. There has been no direction as to not associating with them in this context but we have been warned from mixing official church activities with them. The members who associate with these groups, when they receive their recommend are pretty much asked, to what extent do you doctrinally mix with them?

2) A family had two its sons leave the church and start an atheistic apostate group. The parents are active, they have not been told to cut off ties with their kids, they have them over all the time, and sometimes the sons still show up at church. The parents have received counsel to avoid some of the teachings of their kids...but not avoid the kids themselves.

[BookofMormonLuvr]

I'm interested which groups the writers of the CHI consider "apostate"?

Being a RLDS Restorationist, am I in an aforementioned group, and should my LDS kinfolk be more carefully scrutinized to determine whether they should be allowed to enter the Temple?

[Calm]

How long ago did these situations occur? I'd be very surprised if it were recent, say the last 10 yrs.

I have known several families over the last 50 years who have had an apostate member. None of them have been required to avoid that family member in order to receive a temple recommend. In fact, they have been encouraged by their leaders to be understanding and forgiving and longsuffering on the occasions where the apostate family member has tried to lead others in the family out of the Church.

One of those families was my own with an uncle who thought of himself as a sort of new minor messiah. No one in the family was ever told to not associate with him. I have in my possession boxes of his writings to my mother, in fact.

I have no doubt that there are families that have kicked out family members who have left the Church or have engaged in behaviour that the family has found offensive; I know of families that have kicked out family members for joining the Church. This is a family dynamic, not a church dynamic. Unless you can show a consistent pattern favouring expulsion of family members among church teachings as well as actual practice, claiming that it is a result of church instruction is a faulty argument.

Edited December 9, 2012 by calmoriah