Former Mormons declare independence from LDS church


Dozens of Mormons from three states gathered in a Salt Lake City park to declare independence from the LDS church. Key to their discontent was the intolerance and social conservatism pushed onto Mormon members by the old guard and traditional doctrine.

Terra— The church bills itself as the one “true” Christian faith, and its theology promises families eternal relationships among those who remain faithful, sealing those gifts through special religious rites.

Among the reasons cited by those resigning are the church’s political activism against gay marriage and doctrinal teachings that conflict with scientific findings or are perceived as racist or sexist.

Others cite inconsistencies in the Mormons’ explanation of its own history, including the practice of polygamy. The church renounced plural marriage over a century ago as Utah was seeking statehood.

Mormons take hits from all sides, enough to make me feel a bit of sympathy at times. Even with Mittens running as the great white hope, some Christians can barely coneal their contempt for the ‘new and improved’ Bible at the heart of the “heresy“. Claims about the One and Only True religion thrust into the national spotllight won’t exactly help heal wounds resulting from centuries of tension and violence many present day Christian would just as soon forget.  Should Romney win in 2012, the weirdest conspiracy crap will almost certainly be spun and marketed by the usual wingnut grifters. 

Others object to the practice of baptizing dead heroes and villains into the church. But skeptics simply note the pseudo-scientific claims about Native Americans, details of Mormon cosmogony, along with hasty revisions of original purported revelations, are so recent, so ridiculous, and well documented that they’re far easier to thoroughly discredit.

Comments

  1. raven says

    Mormons take hits from all sides, enough to make me feel a bit of sympathy at times.

    If you were female, you wouldn’t.

    It’s one of the most officially misogynistic religions on the planet, even more so than the Catholic church.

    There are no real positions of any sort of power in that church that doesn’t have a man supervising. And the Mormon church violently opposed the Equal Rights Amendment which failed.

    Really Steve Darkside, you might just as well feel sorry for the Branch Davidians or FLDS, which BTW is a Mormon offshoot.

  2. raven says

    It’s estimated that half of all Mormons are inactive, apathetic, or just plain gone.

    A few estimates are much higher.

    No one knows for sure. The Mormon church is ultra secretive and frequently inflates its numbers to appear more powerful than they are.

    They do have a lot of money though due to their relentless enforcement of the 10% tithe. No one knows how much or where it goes either. This is unfailingly a recipe for corruption and the LDS church wouldn’t be the first one with that problem. It happens a lot in fundie xian churches.

  3. F says

    Now if all the Catholics who don’t really respect or support the central Church or their diocese would just stand up and do the same.

  4. anubisprime says

    Mormons take hits from all sides, enough to make me feel a bit of sympathy at times.

    They do not deserve the steam off my crap.
    They have systematically bullied coerced brow beaten members and those unlucky enough to live in their area since time immemorial.
    They have interfered with politics and actively sought to deny a significant proportion of society equal rites for various brain fart reasons for many many years.
    They have absolutely ridiculous dogma that is based on the greed and manipulation of one well known confidence trickster and they have not one shred of evidence to back their hilarious, if not completely bat shit insane, nonsense up.
    Sympathy?…not a bit of it!…for none of them schismatic or not!

  5. david says

    I’m thankful for the Mormon Church. As for Scientology, Wicca, and all the other extremist religious cults.

    I’m also thankful for splinter groups. Fundamentalist LDS, Traditionalist Catholics, Hassidic Jews – any group that distinguishes itself by some obviously eccentric behavior.

    They all help make atheists look more acceptable to the mainstream.

  6. left0ver1under says

    I’m of two minds when I read this story, both here and elsewhere.

    Dozens of Mormons from three states gathered in a Salt Lake City park to declare independence from the LDS church.

    Does a split actually mean they are giving up all religion, or are they becoming independent christians? Religion is still religion, and they are the same as if they were still mormons.

    On the other hand, mass turnarounds and changes in public policy and societal attitudes often start with only a few people (e.g. the Stonewall riots, the Freedom Riders). These people may be a few, but they have the knowledge to make convincing arguments to other LDS people.

    ——————–

    When Romney was mentioned, I remembered a political joke from two years ago, and another from 12 years ago.

    In 2012, during the republican debates, only Romney was married once yet belongs to a religion that allows polygamy. Meanwhile, all the other republicans had been divored and remarried at least once. The only monogamist was the polygamist.

    In 2000, the republican presidential candidate said there was too much violence in movies and TV – that was his actual position. As well, the democratic presidential candidate said there was too much sex in movies and TV, his actual position on the matter. In other words:

    Bush said there was too much gore, and Gore said there was too much bush.

    Sometimes, nothing is funnier than the truth.

  7. Pierce R. Butler says

    left0ver1under @ # 6: … all the other republicans had been divor[c]ed and remarried at least once.

    Cit. needed.

    Bachmann’s had only one spouse, I’m fairly sure; haven’t seen any mention of divorces in discussion of the two Texas RPs; don’t recall much about the others except for the Newt, but even he hasn’t racked up enough to bring the group average above 1.0.

    Of course, we’ve only ever in history had one previously divorced President, and as all true patriots know, the sun shone out of his ass every morning – so we should amend the Constitution to require a messy legal breakup for all future presidential candidates.

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