The Church Hides Its History....

[Stone holm]

CFR please

Sorry, the Church published a flier or posting or whatever that was posted on Chapel message boards, which is where I got the information. I did a google search to try and retrieve it, but have not found it yet. However, the outreach program is described if you scroll down through the following Wikipedia link. I am fairly sure my memory is correct that Dallin Oaks was put in charge of it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_relations_of_The_Church_of_Jesus_Christ_of_Latter-day_Saints

[Calm]

Thank you for trying. Will look for some myself later....should be asleep but something woke me up....

[Tacenda]

"A Thoughtful Faith" posted this on FB this morning. I thought it interesting and realised something, recently I answered a rather vague poll asking people about their faith crisis. Could this be a poll done by Greg and Fiona Prince and Richard Bushman before this presentation? I think so, in fact at first I thought it was coming from the church. Has anyone come across this poll and what do you think? Also, I read elsewhere that someone who knows someone higher up in the church, said the church is very concerned about this subject and are going to do some inoculation before it gets out of control. Maybe these three that are providing this helpful conference were prompted by our church leaders. I really feel they care.

http://bycommonconse...a-faith-crisis/

c/p: During the first week of July, Richard Bushman and Terryl and Fiona Givens will be presenting an all-day conference for those in a faith crisis. This conference would not be helpful to ex-Mormons or to Mormons who are not struggling with aspects of their faith. If you would like to participate, please message me or let me know in comments. Space is limited. It will be held in Provo.

BTW: My last post until 10:15 am, if I need to respond to anyone please refer to this post.

ETA: Thanks Cal, for starting a new thread about this conference, you're the best!

Edited June 10, 2013 by Tacenda

[Calm]

It is going to be recorded and help in several other cities as well (I am thinking Boston, DC, maybe NY). But I won't be going due to lack of space, sounds like they really want it to be reserved for those who need it.

Deserves its own thread...will put it up for you, Tac

Edited June 10, 2013 by calmoriah

[Stone holm]

Sorry, the Church published a flier or posting or whatever that was posted on Chapel message boards, which is where I got the information. I did a google search to try and retrieve it, but have not found it yet. However, the outreach program is described if you scroll down through the following Wikipedia link. I am fairly sure my memory is correct that Dallin Oaks was put in charge of it.

http://en.wikipedia....tter-day_Saints

I can't say that I have necessarily been pleased with what this movement is doing to religious discussion in the Church, but I can understand the strategy and most Mormons relish the pablum that results.

[canard78]

"A Thoughtful Faith" posted this on FB this morning. I thought it interesting and realised something, recently I answered a rather vague poll asking people about their faith crisis. Could this be a poll done by Greg and Fiona Prince and Richard Bushman before this presentation? I think so, in fact at first I thought it was coming from the church. Has anyone come across this poll and what do you think? Also, I read elsewhere that someone who knows someone higher up in the church, said the church is very concerned about this subject and are going to do some inoculation before it gets out of control. Maybe these three that are providing this helpful conference were prompted by our church leaders. I really feel they care.

http://bycommonconsent.com/2013/06/10/a-discussion-of-belief-and-doubt-in-mormonism-for-those-negotiating-a-faith-crisis/

c/p: During the first week of July, Richard Bushman and Terryl and Fiona Givens will be presenting an all-day conference for those in a faith crisis. This conference would not be helpful to ex-Mormons or to Mormons who are not struggling with aspects of their faith. If you would like to participate, please message me or let me know in comments. Space is limited. It will be held in Provo.

BTW: My last post until 10:15 am, if I need to respond to anyone please refer to this post.

Very exciting. Will await the online version with anticipation.

[ERayR]

To jump back in. some points - (edited to add - This post deal with feelings of those who doubt and the perceptions they have. It doesn't necessarily reflect reality and is meant to help others see why some, including myself at times, struggle with doubt) please

1.) If we pretend for a moment that we belong to scientology. A false cult that looks to reap rewards off the backs of it's members. How would they handle troublesome history and theology. They would ignore it, mention as little as possible and only talk about sporadically to appease those who are struggling with discovered information. This is the problem people perceive when they encounter a "lot" of info they were never made aware of through the institution. It feels "cultish"

Follow the Leaders = "follow the brethren"

Keep going, don't stop = pray and read your scriptures more - have more faith.

drink the koolaid = "stay away from anti mormon propaganda, it's all lies"

We have the secrets to life that no one else has = "we are the only true and Living Church"

Also brinking up up one informed teacher shared in a lesson despite the manual doesn't solve the problem

(edited - Any solutions to Faith Crisis must deal with this perception and work to change expectations and assumptions and show why this is a false way to view the Church.)

So lately I have been thinking about the translation. I recently read the Interpreter article which overall does a great job I think of just laying the info on the table.

but one piece is major problem for me

the author on page 150 - http://www.mormonint...on-translation/

I can not no matter how hard I try make this author's interpretation work.

How is Joseph clearly using Urim and Thummim to mean both instruments?

Rather it seems obvious to me that in this instance and others he would prefer to ignore the seer stone completely and have others believe the book was translated "The means by which" was the instrument he found with the plates - the Nephite interpreters or Urim and Thummim

So to me and others who struggle it FEELS like an effort to hide our history starts early with examples like this and dishonesty about polygamy, polyandry, making Adam God a bad policy despite prophets and apostles teaching it as Doctrine (even in the temple), president Hinckley denying any knowledge God was once a man, ect.... Those discoveries just don't fit our paradigm. We can't make them compute

On my good days (most) I justify it and on my bad days it feels wrong (Wrong instituted in place of "cultish" so as not to offend or seem extreme)

So can we just discourse about our disagreements and stop with the "hides" rhetoric? It gets old.

[Scott Lloyd]

... president Hinckley denying any knowledge God was once a man, ect....

Whatever the shortcomings in his responses to interview questions, they did not amount to "denying any knowledge God was once a man."

When you make these laundry lists (as you are wont to do), please be accurate in how you state things. People less acquainted with the facts are apt to pick up carelessly worded statements and run with them.

[Stone holm]

So can we just discourse about our disagreements and stop with the "hides" rhetoric? It gets old.

Yeah, I agree the "hides" is over the top.

[Calm]

So can we just discourse about our disagreements and stop with the "hides" rhetoric? It gets old.

I may have got him suspended! Hopefully he finished reading my posts so that is the last time he loses out on following a conversation to the end...at least for using "drink the kool-aid".

[Stone holm]

I may have got him suspended! Hopefully he finished reading my posts so that is the last time he loses out on following a conversation to the end...at least for using "drink the kool-aid".

Didn't know that expression was against the rules, wondered why I got bounced out of another thread, that explains it.

[Calm]

Didn't know that expression was against the rules, wondered why I got bounced out of another thread, that explains it.

Comparisons to Nazis, certain tyrants with a bloody reputation, serial killers, rapists and other criminals and extreme cult leaders are generally not allowed under Godwin's Law....and it doesn't have to be a direct reference, but implied....(though he was direct in that he mentioned Jones and Koresh IIRC) There are a few cases where it is appropriate to discuss them, but if they are not the main topic, one is risking a suspension.

[Scott Lloyd]

Comparisons to Nazis, certain tyrants with a bloody reputation, serial killers, rapists and other criminals and extreme cult leaders are generally not allowed under Godwin's Law....and it doesn't have to be a direct reference, but implied....(though he was direct in that he mentioned Jones and Koresh IIRC) There are a few cases where it is appropriate to discuss them, but if they are not the main topic, one is risking a suspension.

I agree that the flippant expression "drink the Kool-Aid" has become all too frequent in general discourse. For one thing, it has become trite from over-use and is no longer even clever or witty (if it ever was in the first place).

My guess is that a lot of people use it thoughtlessly or ignorantly, not being well-acquainted with the horrific events at Jonestown.

Edited June 10, 2013 by Scott Lloyd

[Calm]

My guess is that a lot of people use it thoughtlessly or ignorantly, not being well-acquainted with the horrific events at Jonestown.

And according to wiki is morphing into meaning positive things as well such as buying into a group's mission passionately.

I am not against language change, but I think some of it is uncalled for.

[Scott Lloyd]

And according to wiki is morphing into meaning positive things as well such as buying into a group's mission passionately.

I am not against language change, but I think some of it is uncalled for.

Such are the consequences of pooled ignorance.

[Stone holm]

I agree that the flippant expression "drink the Kool-Aid" has become all too frequent in general discourse. For one thing, it has become trite from over-use and is no longer even clever or witty (if it ever was in the first place).

My guess is that a lot of people use it thoughtlessly or ignorantly, not being well-acquainted with the horrific events at Jonestown.

Huh, I never connected that phrase with that horrific event, I always connected it with the "Electric Kool Aid Acid Test". Will never use it again if some people connect it with that horrible event.

[Calm]

Huh, I never connected that phrase with that horrific event, I always connected it with the "Electric Kool Aid Acid Test".

I had never heard of that one before seeing it on wiki today, will be sure and give people the benefit of the doubt unless they give further references that make it obvious in the future.

I do appreciate you refraining from using it in the future. It is undeniably connected in my mind with Jonestown.

[Wiki Wonka]

Huh, I never connected that phrase with that horrific event, I always connected it with the "Electric Kool Aid Acid Test". Will never use it again if some people connect it with that horrible event.

I'm from the San Francisco Bay Area (where the People's Temple was originally located), and I remember the Jonestown massacre very well. Pictures of hundreds of bloated bodies lying in the hot sun after they all drank Kool-aid laced with cyanide. Every time I see the phrase "drink the Kool-aid," that is the image that comes to mind.

WW

Edited June 11, 2013 by Wiki Wonka

[Calm]

I'm from the San Francisco Bay Area (where the People's Temple was originally located), and I remember the Jonestown massacre very well. Pictures of hundreds of bloated bodies lying in the hot sun after they all drank Kool-aid laced with cyanide. Every time I see the phrase "drink the Kool-aid," that is the image that comes to mind.

WW

So I am not alone in my reaction....good to know.

[Scott Lloyd]

I'm from the San Francisco Bay Area (where the People's Temple was originally located), and I remember the Jonestown massacre very well. Pictures of hundreds of bloated bodies lying in the hot sun after they all drank Kool-aid laced with cyanide. Every time I see the phrase "drink the Kool-aid," that is the image that comes to mind.

WW

I've not read Tom Wolfe's novel, but from what I know about the novel, the Kool-Aid imagery as a metaphor for blind, unquestioning obedience has a much clearer allusion to the Jonestown massacre than to drinking an LSD-laced beverage a la Wolfe. My guess is that those who have connected it with the latter were to one degree or another unacquainted with the former.

Edited June 11, 2013 by Scott Lloyd

[Calm]

I've not read Tom Wolfe's novel, but from what I know about the novel, the Kool-Aid imagery as a metaphor for blind, unquestioning obedience has a much clearer application to the Jonestown massacre than to drinking an LSD-laced beverage a la Wofe. My guess is that those who have connected it with the latter were to one degree or another unacquainted with the former.

The Acid Tests were a series of parties held by novelist Ken Kesey in the San Francisco Bay Area during the mid 1960s, centered entirely around the use of, experimentation with, and advocacy of, the psychedelic drug LSD, also known as acid. Kesey, along with the Merry Pranksters, a group of people associated with Kesey, traveled around the United States and held events called Acid Tests, where LSD-laced Kool-Aid was passed out to the public (LSD wasn't illegal in the U.S. until 1966). Those who drank the "Kool-Aid" passed the "Acid Test". These events were described in Tom Wolfe's 1968 book The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. However, the expression is never used figuratively in the book, only literally. This source of the phrase may explain why some references to "drinking the Kool-Aid" are not negative, but, rather, refer to enthusiasm for a new idea. Basically, though, the inference can be made that if someone "drank the Kool-Aid" then they are "tripping," i.e., hallucinating and are removed from reality.

Some survivors of the Jonestown incident object to the link between blind faith and the deaths of members of the People's Temple implied by the phrase, because some victims were murdered—forced to drink at gunpoint—rather than being convinced to commit suicide. In addition, Jim Jones had previously had many rehearsals for the event in which the drink contained no poison, which led to cult members believing the drink was harmless on the day that it did contain poison.^[5]

Objections notwithstanding, the phrase has been used in a variety of contexts to describe blind, uncritical acceptance or following. This usage began in limited circles in the late 1990s, and reached mainstream use in the late 2000s.

from wiki...it really does seem that it naturally fits the Jonestown context better than the "Acid test"...especially since "acid test is any definitive test for some attribute" (also from wiki)

[Scott Lloyd]

from wiki...it really does seem that it naturally fits the Jonestown context better than the "Acid test"...especially since "acid test is any definitive test for some attribute" (also from wiki)

I love this footnote in the Wikipedia article:

In February 2012, "Drinking the Kool-Aid" won first place in an online poll by Forbes Magazine as "the single most annoying example of business jargon".^[15]

Hear, Hear!

Edited June 11, 2013 by Scott Lloyd

[Stone holm]

I've not read Tom Wolfe's novel, but from what I know about the novel, the Kool-Aid imagery as a metaphor for blind, unquestioning obedience has a much clearer allusion to the Jonestown massacre than to drinking an LSD-laced beverage a la Wolfe. My guess is that those who have connected it with the latter were to one degree or another unacquainted with the former.

I was acquainted with the Jonestown incident, but those of us who went to college during the hippie era, I think associate the phrase with electric Kool aid, rather than that tragedy. To us it means going on a fantasy trip, not poison. But knowing now that some associate it with Jonestown, that puts a spin on it that I would not use.

[Scott Lloyd]

I was acquainted with the Jonestown incident, but those of us who went to college during the hippie era, I think associate the phrase with electric Kool aid, rather than that tragedy. To us it means going on a fantasy trip, not poison. But knowing now that some associate it with Jonestown, that puts a spin on it that I would not use.

The hippie era was ending by the time I got to college, but I did grow up during that time and well remember it. I was in college when the Jonestown massacre went down, and If anything was apt to make Kool-Aid infamous in the minds of average people it is far more likely to be Jonestown than some esoteric reference in a counter-culture novel that only a relatively few from a certain generation would even recall.

Moreover, as I already said, the idea of blind, unquestioning obedience is far more clearly associated with an allusion to Jonestown than to going on an LSD trip.

[Stone holm]

The hippie era was ending by the time I got to college, but I did grow up during that time and well remember it. I was in college when the Jonestown massacre went down, and If anything was apt to make Kool-Aid infamous in the minds of average people it is far more likely to be Jonestown than some esoteric reference in a counter-culture novel that only a relatively few from a certain generation would even recall.

Moreover, as I already said, the idea of blind, unquestioning obedience is far more clearly associated with an allusion to Jonestown than to going on an LSD trip.

Well I guess you are right, although electric kool aid was a pretty common reference amongst college students back then. But I asked my ultimate earthly authority last night where the phrase, "keep drinking that kool aid" came from and she said the Jonestown incident. So you are undoubtedly right.