"Modar" - Any experience with it?

[smac97]

I'm not sure if we've discussed this, but I thought I'd give it a go.

First, this:

Quote

Researchers from Canada have proven that something is different about Mormons, and even those who do not subscribe to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints can see it.

A study done by psychology professor Nicholas Rule, of Toronto University, shows that Mormons and non-Mormons alike can identify Mormons based on no more than their skin quality.

The 2010 study was conducted while Rule was a graduate student studying at Tufts University and was published in the Public Library of Science Journal. The study was prompted by a comment Rule received from a colleague who said he believed Mormons could identify fellow Mormons from non-Mormons in a crowd.

Rule began the study by collecting images of Mormon and non-Mormon men and women from major cities in the U.S. The criteria for the images of the individuals was limited to people ages 18–30 years old and to individuals without facial adornments, including piercings or glasses.

“We first took out the hair, then took away the shape of the face, then looked at different features: Is it the eyes, the mouth, the nose?” Rule said. “We kept going until we got to having a face with very little left, and so the only thing that seemed reasonable was that it was skin texture.”

Participants were brought in for each of the different studies and were asked to look at a series of images and to differentiate between who was Mormon and who was not.

After additional testing based on this supposition, Rule and his colleagues found that skin texture was the key indicator and determinant in distinguishing a Mormon from a non-Mormon. Rule attributes these results to the healthy lifestyle adopted by active Latter-day Saints, relative to the average American. Mormons abstain from alcohol, tobacco, illegal drugs, coffee and tea. Consequently Mormons have an average lifespan of six to 10 years longer than does the average American.

Non-Mormons were able to identify Mormons 60 percent of the time, and the percentage of Mormons identifying Mormons was slightly higher. While the results are not fool proof, Rule concluded the results are statistically significant and higher than simple chance.

I pretty much grew up in Utah, but at 17 I went to U.S. Army Basic Training in Missourie, then 12 months at a military language school in California, then advanced training in Arizona.  During this time I had two fairly acute experiences with what could be called a "Modar," both of which took place at the language school.

First, there was a young woman, a fellow trainee, whom I'll call Sarah.  We lived on the same floor in the barracks, and became friends.  I had a feeling she was LDS, and after a few months she told me that she was (but not active).  She did not really "act" Mormon (she drank a lot, swore a lot, etc.), but she told me that she had grown up going to church in California with her mother and sister, but had become inactive during the last few years.  So this one was pretty much a bullseye.

Second, there was another young woman, also a fellow trainee, whom I'll call Anne.  She grew up in the Seattle area.  She too did not "act" Mormon at all (lots of drinking, swearing, partying, dirty jokes, etc.), but I had an inkling.  She and I wrote after I left the military and began serving a mission.  In one of her letters she told me that she had frequently attended LDS services growing up with her aunt, but had never been baptized.  So my modar was . . . kinda sorta there.

I guess I'm sort of ambivalent about the "modar" thing.  Have any of you had any experience with it?

Thanks,

-Smac

Edited April 30, 2018 by smac97

[Duncan]

I may have said this before but when I was going on my mission I ran into a young guy in a suit in the Chicago airport and he was surounded by his family and signs and stuff and I thought he too was going on a mission so I approached him and asked him if he was going on a LDS mission, well, I was wrong, he was going into FBI training🤐

[mfbukowski]

12 minutes ago, smac97 said:

I'm not sure if we've discussed this, but I thought I'd give it a go.

First, this:

I pretty much grew up in Utah, but at 17 I went to U.S. Army Basic Training in Missourie, then 12 months at a military language school in California, then advanced training in Arizona.  During this time I had two fairly acute experiences with what could be called a "Modar," all of which took place at the language school.

First, there was a young woman, a fellow trainee, whom I'll call Sarah.  We lived on the same floor in the barracks, and became friends.  I had a feeling she was LDS, and after a few months she told me that she was (but not active).  She did not really "act" Mormon (she drank a lot, swore a lot, etc.), but she told me that she had grown up going to church in California with her mother and sister, but had become inactive during the last few years.  So this one was pretty much a bullseye.

Second, there was another young woman, also a fellow trainee, whom I'll call Anne.  She grew up in the Seattle area.  She too did not "act" Mormon at all (lots of drinking, swearing, partying, dirty jokes, etc.), but I had an inkling.  She and I wrote after I left the military and began serving a mission.  In one of her letters she told me that she had frequently attended LDS services growing up with her aunt, but had never been baptized.  So my modar was . . . kinda sorta there.

I guess I'm sort of ambivalent about the "modar" thing.  Have any of you had any experience with it?

Thanks,

-Smac

Yeah, it's "light" which is non-quantifiable

Before i was a member I had noticed various people in the community I did business with- one as a lawyer, another a grocery clerk and another a printer.

There was something about these three that was similar but I could not quantify it- they were all nice and friendly and seemed to be "good people'.  

I joined the church.  At the first stake conference I attended all three were there, all in different wards from mine. he printer was in the Stake presidency.

I was cooked. 

My wife has also experienced MANY similar experiences.

 

Edited April 30, 2018 by mfbukowski

[Calm]

No modar specifics, but our Chinese immigrant neighbours told the missionaries and then us our family had a glow about us so they were interested in having the discussions.  Other than that some on a plane to Utah and two young men in suits or women together (that then turn around and I saw nametags,, but those are a high percentage possibility so no way would I count it.

Otoh, missionaries have come up to our family a few times around the world and asked...but in all but one case (out in the middle of rural Russia) they may have seen us at church and just didn't recall.

Edited April 30, 2018 by Calm

[Rain]

When we went on vacation to Seattle years ago we were in a restaurant on a Saturday night.  We were trying to figure out what to do to keep the kids entertained the next day after church that would be Sunday appropriate. Another family came in and sat a few tables away from us and we instantly both thought they were LDS. We don't know why.  We couldn't hear what they were saying, the family was not large,  we could find no garment lines etc. We discussed in depth what might be giving us that idea. 

 I finally went over to them and asked if the were LDS. They were. They were probably disappointed we were too after that question.  Lol. They gave us some good ideas. 

Edited April 30, 2018 by Rain

[Robert F. Smith]

1 hour ago, smac97 said:

.................................I guess I'm sort of ambivalent about the "modar" thing.  Have any of you had any experience with it?...................

Maybe, but I'm not sure about the reasons.  It could be a kind of ethnicity, since Mormons do have a lot in common, speak and behave the same way a lot -- even if they are Jack Mormons.  I have experienced the same among Jews (I spent many years among them and attending synagogue).  I find it easy to spot a Jew.  I would say the same of Cajuns, and other distinguishable groups (such as gang members and men who have done hard time -- they walk and talk a certain way, which I know well from having worked among them for so many years).

I have never heard of the skin texture thing though.  Or an aura?  Sounds almost like some comments in a talk at Church today in which a woman from Mexico spoke about the actual facial glow  and eyes of the members she met (including missionaries) before she was baptized in Mexico at age 15.  What sparked her initial interest was the conversion of her father -- a man she knew as a drunk, and who had divorced his wife, leaving that little girl to care for her smaller brothers and sisters while her mother worked.  When she saw her father again a few years later, he had given up booze and had a glow about him.  The Church (the Gospel) truly does make bad men good, and good men better.

[MiserereNobis]

I'm not sure about "modar," but I'll tell you that I can sure pick out from a crowd of people a Catholic monk

 

[mfbukowski]

33 minutes ago, MiserereNobis said:

I'm not sure about "modar," but I'll tell you that I can sure pick out from a crowd of people a Catholic monk

 

I think Catholics can also glow, but I am sure that is a heretical belief among Mormons.

[Tacenda]

Test it out when you go to Sacrament meeting, I see some glow from people and not from others. And I believe it is from their feeling good in life and all is well, but there are those that don't have it because of problems at home and the stress from it all. And those that may do healthy things in their lives to get that glow. Just too many variances.

[Judd]

13 hours ago, Duncan said:

I may have said this before but when I was going on my mission I ran into a young guy in a suit in the Chicago airport and he was surounded by his family and signs and stuff and I thought he too was going on a mission so I approached him and asked him if he was going on a LDS mission, well, I was wrong, he was going into FBI training🤐

The FBI hires a lot of RMs as they like the experience and training it gives, so him saying going into FBI training could have also been accurate.

[Bernard Gui]

14 hours ago, smac97 said:

I'm not sure if we've discussed this, but I thought I'd give it a go.

First, this:

I pretty much grew up in Utah, but at 17 I went to U.S. Army Basic Training in Missourie, then 12 months at a military language school in California, then advanced training in Arizona.  During this time I had two fairly acute experiences with what could be called a "Modar," both of which took place at the language school.

First, there was a young woman, a fellow trainee, whom I'll call Sarah.  We lived on the same floor in the barracks, and became friends.  I had a feeling she was LDS, and after a few months she told me that she was (but not active).  She did not really "act" Mormon (she drank a lot, swore a lot, etc.), but she told me that she had grown up going to church in California with her mother and sister, but had become inactive during the last few years.  So this one was pretty much a bullseye.

Second, there was another young woman, also a fellow trainee, whom I'll call Anne.  She grew up in the Seattle area.  She too did not "act" Mormon at all (lots of drinking, swearing, partying, dirty jokes, etc.), but I had an inkling.  She and I wrote after I left the military and began serving a mission.  In one of her letters she told me that she had frequently attended LDS services growing up with her aunt, but had never been baptized.  So my modar was . . . kinda sorta there.

I guess I'm sort of ambivalent about the "modar" thing.  Have any of you had any experience with it?

Thanks,

-Smac

 When we picked up our son Abogadissimo from his mission in Poland in 1999, we all noticed that Polish LDS most definitely could be spotted in a crowd. It was remarkable. We noticed the same difference on entering their chapel for Sunday meetings having spent some time roaming around Warsaw and mingling with the folks.

Edited April 30, 2018 by Bernard Gui

[Okrahomer]

When I went to Oklahoma last year for cancer treatment, all of the "new" patients were taken on a tour of the facility.  I was feeling terribly alone and unsure of myself and didn't want to go.  But something spurred me on. 

Since proton therapy is very often the treatment of choice for babies, children and adolescents with cancer, there were several younger mothers there carrying their sick babies.   One of those mothers "stood out" to me for some ineffable reason.  She was with another woman who was an older version of herself, so I assumed it was her mother.  They took turns carrying the baby.  But I quickly put out of my mind that they were LDS, and turned my attention back to the tour.  But as it went on, I could not get out of my mind that these women must be LDS.  And just to be clear:  I did not "see" anything outward that convinced me of it--it wasn't their clothing--it was something else.

At the end of the tour, we were invited into a conference room and then asked to introduce ourselves.  The vast majority of patients there were residents of Oklahoma.  When my turn came, I told them that although I had grown up in Oklahoma, I now lived in Utah; and that I had come back to Oklahoma for treatment, because there was no proton facility in Utah.  A while later, this young mother stood up to introduce herself.  She indicated that she was from Kansas City.  She had 3 small children, and she (not her baby) was being treated for a very rare form of spinal cancer.  Then she turned directly to me and said:  "We also looked all over Utah in the hopes of finding a proton center there."

I quickly approached her in private after the meeting.  It came as no surprise when she confirmed that she and her mother were indeed LDS.  She also confided with me that she had had a similar experience earlier with one of the oncologists there who turned out to be LDS. 

Some of you probably understand what it's like to be receive a scary diagnosis; to confront your own mortality; to struggle with fear and doubt and despair; and then to find yourself in completely unfamiliar surroundings, full of technology you don't understand; and you have consented to put your life into the hands of strangers.  In an instant, when I was feeling so vulnerable and alone, we (this young LDS mother and I) were shown a tender mercy that brought both of us to quiet but profound tears.  Although I never saw her again, she and her family have continued in my prayers to this day.

It was real; it was true; and it was sacred.

[Tacenda]

I've often wondered about the whole thing, especially when I started to go down the trail of unbelief. Oh no, will my face change? Will I look different. No one has said I have changed. But maybe they think it. I use to think, sure I've changed in my demeaner, I'm mad as heck as to how this could have happened, and how it's so unfair, to have had lived my whole life in a belief and then it turned upside down. I think my face surely shows some of the tension this has all caused. And my glow, haha, is no longer there. Oh, dear. 

As silly as this whole subject is I have to admit thinking these things in my past life.

[MiserereNobis]

4 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

I think Catholics can also glow, but I am sure that is a heretical belief among Mormons.

I agree, but it's the monastic habit that gives it away for me

 

[MiserereNobis]

2 hours ago, Judd said:

The FBI hires a lot of RMs as they like the experience and training it gives, so him saying going into FBI training could have also been accurate.

Rather than issue a CFR I poked around the internet and it seems to be true. I also found the interesting tidbit that the first FBI agent indicted and found guilty of spying for the Soviet Union had been recruited while a Mormon, but was excommunicated shortly before his arrest for adultery. It reads like something straight out of the TV show Amerikans.

The article also says there was a class action discrimination law suit because non-Mormon agents felt that their Mormon superiors were promoting Mormons over non-Mormons.

It also says that Mormon FBI agents find work for the LDS Security Department.

[smac97]

1 hour ago, Tacenda said:

I've often wondered about the whole thing, especially when I started to go down the trail of unbelief. Oh no, will my face change? Will I look different. No one has said I have changed.

My friend in the Army was doing all sorts of things she shouldn't have been doing.  But my "modar" still went off.  It's possible that I was prompted by the Spirit about her.  I ended up trying harder than I otherwise would have to be her friend.  While in the Army I totally friendzoned myself as to all women.  I really, really wanted to serve a mission, and I saw what was going on around me.  While on Fire Guard duty late at night, which involved periodically walking through each hallway in the barracks, I heard . . . quite a bit going on behind closed doors (kinda hard not to).  Quite a few female trainees ended up pregnant during my stint at the language school.  Furthermore, my friend was quite pretty, and popular.  Given these circumstances, my preference would have been to just keep to myself.  I did not want to be seen as pursuing her and get ribbed for it.  However, the impressions I had about her pushed me toward reaching out and befriending her.  We ended up having a nice, entirely platonic friendship.  I felt like sort of a brother who was keeping an eye out for his sister.  I prayed for her sometimes.  She has asthma and was slightly anemic, so she had difficulty running.  Several times I ran along side her to encourage her.  I also invited her to Church and FHE a few times.  I also remember dropping off a tape of LDS music to her once.  Mostly, however, we just said hello and occasionally talked about home.  

In the end, I don't know how much good I did.  I have tried to track her down in the years since, but no luck.

This I do not, however: But for the "modar," thing, I would not have come to be friends with her.

Thanks,

-Smac

Edited April 30, 2018 by smac97

[Garden Girl]

16 hours ago, Rain said:

When we went on vacation to Seattle years ago we were in a restaurant on a Saturday night.  We were trying to figure it what to do to keep the kids entertained the next day after church that would be Sunday appreciate. Another family came in and sat a few tables away from us and we instantly both thought they were LDS. We don't know why.  We couldn't hear what they were saying, the family was not large,  we could find no garment lines etc. We discussed in depth what might be giving us that idea. 

 I finally went over to them and asked if the were LDS. They were. They were probably disappointed we were too after that question.  Lol. They gave us some good ideas. 

This was my experience also...  almost exactly... One day here in coastal Lincoln City, OR. I was doing errands and stopped at the local Burger King for lunch... I was sitting at my table when this family came in... Mom, Dad, and 5 children, with the oldest child being about 11 and youngest about 3.  They got a table near me... Mom and Dad went to order the food while the oldest children started setting the table with napkins and plastic utensils, and helping the younger ones get settled... I observed this with interest, noticing how neatly they were dressed in their "beach" clothes... their hair and general appearance... Same with Mom and Dad when they came to the table.  I continued to observe their interactions and thought to myself they seemed like Mormons... finally as I finished I went over and asked Mom if they were LDS... Yes, she laughed and beamed... and we began talking, slipping easily into their trip so far, etc.  When I left we all said a genuine goodbye like I was an old friend... It amuses me how I knew they were LDS... I remember them often...

GG

[Amulek]

21 hours ago, smac97 said:

I guess I'm sort of ambivalent about the "modar" thing.  Have any of you had any experience with it?

Until fairly recently my wife and I only had one vehicle. She she often needed transportation to run errands during the day, so she would usually take the car and then come pick me up after work. 

Sitting in the car, waiting for me to come out, she had opportunity to see many of my coworkers exit the building day in and day out.

One day she said she had finally figured out who the other Mormon was: the guy with the goatee.

Nope, I said, the other LDS guy has a full beard, and you probably haven't seen him come out because his shift starts and ends half an hour or so later than mine.

The guy with a goatee is a good guy, and he's got an LDS sounding name, but he drinks, smokes, etc. Good guess though. 

Well, fast forward six months, and goatee guy and I end up going on a business trip together. We share political views, have similar tastes in music, movies, etc., so he made for a good traveling companion.

Anyway, while we were traveling on the train between the airport and the hotel, he mentions to me that his family is totally LDS, and that most of his family - save for himself and one of his siblings - are all active, faithful Mormons. 

So, maybe this 'modar' thing is a thing - if it is, all I know is that my wife's is more attuned than mine. 

 

[mfbukowski]

5 hours ago, MiserereNobis said:

I agree, but it's the monastic habit that gives it away for me

 

Yeah we wear ours under our clothes.  Kind of like a VERY LARGE scapular. 

You just have to look for the underware lines it creates.  But not too closely if a sister is wearing it, you could get slapped.  Or decked.  

Not good form in either case.  

Edited May 1, 2018 by mfbukowski

[Storm Rider]

9 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

I think Catholics can also glow, but I am sure that is a heretical belief among Mormons.

Nope, when I have been wrong about someone being LDS they are always fervent Catholics.  ☺️

[mfbukowski]

19 minutes ago, Storm Rider said:

Nope, when I have been wrong about someone being LDS they are always fervent Catholics.  ☺️

Glad to hear it, I thought I was aware of it as a former Catholic.  

[Storm Rider]

2 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Glad to hear it, I thought I was aware of it as a former Catholic.  

It surprised me the first time it happened. Then I just realized I may not have a very good Modar.  😉

[Eek!]

On ‎4‎/‎29‎/‎2018 at 10:13 PM, smac97 said:

I guess I'm sort of ambivalent about the "modar" thing.  Have any of you had any experience with it?

Roughly 40 years ago, as a college student at Louisiana State University, I was staying in a friend's house while he and his family went back to their home country for several weeks.  During this time the house was burglarized, and an insurance adjuster came around to interview me.  He recorded the interview and puffed on a cigarette while I tried to remember what had been in the house.  Anyway at some point it came out that I was a Mormon.  He was a big guy and he kinda snickered down at me as he said, "Oh, so you believe in Joe Smith and all that?"  For some unknown reason I blurted out, "Are you Mormon too?"  His eyes bugged out and his jaw dropped and he looked down at his feet for a while as he kinda tried to make the cigarette in his hand disappear.  Then he said, "Yeah.  Yeah, I'm a Mormon."  I ignored the cigarette and offered him only acceptance to the best of my ability.   Actually I was quite impressed with his honesty, as that question had to have been very awkward for him, and he so easily could have said no.

As for the modar thing, must confess that I'd had zero impression he was a Mormon, and was almost as stunned as he was when those words tumbled out of my mouth.   I have a vague recollection of hoping to buy myself a little time so I could prepare for the anticipated anti-Mormon onslaught, but that's all.  It wasn't even a Hail Mary shot in the dark - the thought that he might actually be Mormon had not entered my mind. 

Poor guy, he probably thought I had mighty powers of discernment.  The possibility he may have thought so is kinda funny to me in retrospect.  

Edited May 3, 2018 by Eek!