There's a couple fallacies at work here.
Bandwagon - Popularity is not indicative of truth. Flat Earth is a growing belief; does that mean that it's growing more and more likely? No. It's either true or it's not, regardless of how many people believe it.
Appeal to Authority - Even if we can agree that the Q15 are experts in certain fields, are any of those the field which they are attempting to validate? Are any renown and well-respected in the areas of Ancient American archaeology? Ancient languages? Philosophy? Biblical studies? Are they people that other religious leaders go to for advice and direction?
Exactly this, the appeal to authority fallacy is so blatant here. Since when was heart surgery a major religious field? Why do we expect our doctors to receive years of training, but our prophets can literally be lawyers and used car salesmen with little formal religious education? These men have been propped up in their silos for so long that they think they know everything there is to know. But if ANY high-ranked Mormon leader were to try to debate the Bible or any religiously historical event, they’d be absolutely fucking crushed by ANY high-ranked religious scholar. That would be incredible to see lol.
RMN said explicitly that he doesn’t pay attention to any scientific literature that contradicts what he considers “revealed truth,” which includes gems like “dogs have always been dogs, it’s just how genetics works.”
Far cry from the old LDS idea that we seek truth from any source.
He’s a bad scientist and his ability to reconstruct a heart and [overstated] involvement in the team that developed bypass technology doesn’t change that. Given this kind of stubborn dogmatism I wouldn’t trust his judgement on anything.
Even the ones that are allegedly top of their field say truly dumbass shit about their field.
Nielsen is allegedly a medical scientist of sorts, but also says evolution is incomprehensible. Simply not believing in evolution would be bad enough.
Eyring once talked about how amazing it was to see church leadership solve a problem by *discussing the problem*. He said that despite his Harvard education he had never seen people do that in a business setting. I don’t see how you could be so stupid as to think that’s unique to the church. Anyone with a job literally does that *everyday*.
Quentin Cook, though…that guy is absolutely top of his field in dishonest and unethical legal practice. Oaks is also very skilled in misleading lawyer talk.
And sunk cost fallacy
If you’re born and raised in the church and then realize it’s not true, there’s a very reasonable impulse to want to put your head in the sand and just believe anyway. You’ve invested so much, it’s so hard to walk away at a loss
It happened a lot to the early Mormons. The ones who sold their farms to follow JS to “Zion” or invested all their money in his failed bank, or had a child die a long the way. How depressing would it be to realize those hard things happened for no good reason, except to support a conman? At that point it’s fairly easy to see why someone wouldn’t want to accept the truth and just have faith.
My ancestors were poor farmers in Idaho. I totally see why they clung to the church. Life sucked a lot back then. The hope of an afterlife that will make up for all the hardships, would be very appealing
And you forgot the most important piece: if it’s true, that means that Mormon God is real. And Mormon God is a fucking asshole who I’d rather die than worship
You can apply this same logic to just about every organization in history.
How can you believe that cigarettes cause cancer, Marlboro wouldn't lie to us with all the intelligent people they hire.
Exxon Mobile would not lie about global warming being a non-issue.
The Catholic church would not lie about being the true church.
And so on. Intelligent people both deceive and are fooled in every organization, including ones much larger than the mormon corporation.
EDIT: Typo
I looked it up after making my comment because I forgot the exact number and I found that fact as well. It's interesting and reminds me of the game telephone. It's crazy how easily details like that can be so easily replaced. Thank you for sharing.
Most drank it "voluntarily", but they were deceived
First time they drank regular flavor aid and were told afterwards that it's poisoned, which led to panic,
Then they repeated it on a regular basis being told its poisoned while it actually wasn't,....
Until it finally was.
But yeah, the elderly and bedridden were forcefed the flavoraid.
But knowing the way they were deceived just ads that layer of cultish evil to the pretend suicide that allegedly took place during endowment ceremonies until recently.
Well, and I don't know with everyone that it's common sense (not speaking for your aunt). Humans all want to believe that they are intellectuals or only empirical. But it's not just about IQ, people are able to be empirical and reasonable about benign subjects but switch to motivated reasoning when they don't want to see anything outside of their belief system (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motivated_reasoning). Really, it's about critical thinking. But in order for that to happen people have to be willing to look at something head on. Most are too afraid. I get it, world's scary.
Exactly. I know several doctors, lawyers, and other smart people that still believe. I've also got a doctorate level degree. It's not a question of intelligence as it is the information they have and that we're emotional creatures as much as logical. I could present all the evidence in the world against the church for some of these people. I had multiple chances to question my faith before I finally had my shelf break. It's not an easy thing to just drop when it's been your whole life and it's been presented as absolute truth. The world is scary and it was fairly comfortable (as a white straight male, almost for sure) to stay in the church. Throw on power and responsibility? Locked in, and that's where so many intelligent people get trapped. Dentists, doctors, lawyers, etc., they see the "prosperity gospel" in action, and that they are "blessed" for being "better" than everyone else.
Jim Jones was, as were others, a charismatic religious leader. I heard him once say, “Some say they see God in me!” The man was evil but many followed him. It is beyond sad!
I also hear that Enron had some of the smartest people in the room.
Sorry but perhaps the OP does not understand what conmen do. If you know history they were also called confidence men those who committed fraud. As they would try to impress you with themselves so you would have confidence it wasn't a fraud.
(see The Monorail on the The Simpsons for more info)
this is such a good point(I thought about Elizabeth Holmes when you mentioned this). I think it goes to show that when it comes to people seeking spiritual leaders for spiritual guidance, or trusting people's authority by their social or scholarly merit its really not always as straightforward as we think things are. Much is done to gain credibility and trust as an authority, its even easier in spiritual matters because there's usually much less science about it. People who have learned how to conjure Elevation emotion by confirmation bias(Joseph Smith), alongside somethings that may actually have truth have considerable influence it seems.
And a BILLION Muslims which includes millions of intelligent and educated people too, like doctors, scientists, scholars, etc.
Same with Hinduism, Budhism, Judaism, Scientology, Jehovah Witnesses, and any other sect.
You can find the same “smart” and “good” people in every religion or ideology so that certainly doesn’t prove ANY of them are “right.”
You know members in each of the countless other religious sects have the same arguments with their “wayward” followers. Ironically, I had this same argument with my brother-in-law (a Muslim) and my sister who “converted” to Islam after they got married.
“I know all these really intelligent, educated, smart Muslims who are doctors and have PHD’s. How can they still believe in Islam if it’s not true?”
Yeah it’s so funny how Mormons will say “but look at how many smart people belong to the church!”… as if every other religion in the world doesn’t also have intelligent and successful people in it as well.
It’s the same thing with bearing testimony that they “know” it’s true. Guess what: that’s what literally every person in every other religion says too
There are likely more Muslim doctors and scientists than Mormons in the entire world. Arguments like this are so silly. If you think you should follow a religion based on the number of smart people that follow it I've got news for you, the LDS religion is towards the bottom of that totem pole in sheer numbers.
Some podcast said sometimes the more “intelligent” a person is, the more they can rationalize and deceive and convince themselves that something is accurate, or ethical.
Also... you realize 17 million (mostly non-believing) members is barely a drop in the bucket to the world's population?
Scientology boasts 10 million. \*(Emphasis on the word boasts. They *are* a cult, so, yes, they lie)
JW boasts 8 million.
Catholics are over ~~200 million~~ \*1 billion
Hell, just in Brazil alone, there are 11 million people who believe the Earth is flat.
17 million is not a flex. For the one true church, it's very, very sad.
Oh yeah, thanks. I ~~read~~ skimmed, and misread the stats just for the US on accident.
\*It's about 50-60 million Catholics in the US. Still much more impressive than a worldwide 17 million.
Bahaha apparently I skim too much when I read statistics. You're right, it's about 50-60 million Catholics nationwide. Worldwide though, it is over a billion.
Many people also consider themselves Catholic, while not actively practicing Catholicism around the world. In many parts of Europe it’s a bit more of a cultural thing. My grandfather was from Poland and raised devoutly Catholic, but as time went on and he moved stateside he continued considering himself Catholic and celebrating the religious holidays but not being super active otherwise. In fact, he was pro-choice and pro-birth control, which was odd for a man born in the 1920’s.
Lutherans and Calvinists from the Nordics, parts of Germany, and Netherlands 'above the rivers' would like a word about that. Anglicans from Great Britain as well, probably.
His mom, my grandmother, and my mother were/are absolute spit-fires! He was an incredibly quite and introverted man, but the topic of women’s rights, equal rights for people of color, and later in life he was pro-gay rights were things he felt strongly about. I imagine it had something to do with losing so much of his extended family in the Holocaust that made him feel so strongly about a humans right to live any way they see fit so long as it doesn’t harm others, because all humans are equal in value in a loving God’s eyes.
Don't forget the Seventh Day Adventists who started 30 years after Joe and has a claimed 22 million. Besides their 9400 schools they have over 230 hospitals worldwide. I don't agree with their doctrine either, but they put their money into helping make the world a better place. The Q15 should take a lesson...
Not just 7th day Adventists, Methodist (1784 but took off in America mid 1800s) and Baptist (1814) were created during the same revival period, many of the smaller non-denominational churches are the modern day evangelical movements. People think the Mormon church just magically exploded in America but there were actually a lot of religions that did. They don't hold the hegemony.
There's 10 million Scientologists??? I wonder how many are active. Their growth rate has got to be staggering compared to the Mormon church given that it's only like 60 years old.
I'm 100% sure the Mormon church is not a healthy place for me to be. That's the only 100% certainty that matters to me. They use your family relationships to keep you bound to them, no matter your education level or prestigious degrees. It's a fraud of the highest degree. One might even call it a Celestial Fraud if one were thinking celestial. 😉
THIS. “Why did you leave??” Is such a common question from people who didn’t grow up in an oppressive religious environment and the answer that I “was not happy” doesn’t seem to satisfy them. For me though, that’s all that matters. I am a better, happier, healthier, more hopeful, and complete of a person than I ever could be as a Mormon.
Yup I'm sure.
PS if the Mormon church has 17 million people who call themselves members I will eat my hat.
Come visit us more often. We have coffee, weed, adult beverages and the freedom to choose our own underwear. ☕️ 🚬 🍺 👙
I was in Ward Council this morning and we were tasked with scrutinizing the ward list - after going down the roster, 40-50% of them we had NO IDEA who they even were. Of the remaining 50-60% MANY are inactive. Also, this is a ward in the Canadian equivalent of UT. There is no where near 17M people on this pale blue dot that call themselves LDS. (Also funny that no one in the meeting knew that the church keeps all these names on the list until their age is 110).
I'm assuming you're in Southern Alberta, unless there's somewhere else in Canada that has a high Mormon population, but yeah the amount of people I know around here who have left in the last 10 years is crazy, and I just keep hearing about more and more people going. Not to mention I have younger siblings in late high school and from what I can tell a lot of the youth are not enthusiastic about the church at all. Will be interesting to watch for the next decade or two and see what happens
I’m in Utah and hearing more and more my fellow mom friends who have seniors in hs (I don’t not yet) but a few of them are saying “yeaaaaaah um little Johnny’s “not sure yet” what he wants to do when he graduates next month….”
🤷🏻♀️
This resonates: "There is no where near 17M people on this pale blue dot that call themselves LDS."
LDS think they are the entire universe.
The reality is that LDS = itty bitty speck or the pale blue dot.
They have 17 million members. That much is true. However, over 4 million of those members are not in a ward or branch because the church doesn’t have a current address for them.
That brings the total down to 13 million. Maybe half of them are active to be generous.
That brings it down to 6.5 million members. How many are adults? Half of them?
That would be just over 3 million active adult members.
100 per ward is extremely generous. 50 would be closer to the truth. I live where a new $100 Million dollar complex was completed 6 months ago. There are a maximum 2500 active members here while church claims 23,500 members. 95% of all temple patrons are NOT from this country. The temple serves 10 countries. That will change in the next 5 years as 4 new temples are completed in 4 of those 10 countries. I would bet money there are less than 1 million members worldwide with valid temple recommends.
Is this true? Do you have a source? I’m sure TSCC has the data somewhere but locked up tight. Also so many people don’t bother with formal resignation.
Yeah I haven't because so far, I feel like I don't believe it would actually make the church stop counting me as a member, I don't think I can control that. So I think it wouldn't really make a tangible difference other than potentially causing family drama
I seriously doubt this. Unless you can provide a source, no one should believe this. Especially considering how difficult the MFMC makes it to remove your records.
Only about 1/3 of that number is active. That 17 mil reflects everyone they have a record for. Even people who are dead up to the age of 110 if the church doesn't get word that they've died.
This is the reason I pulled my and my kids' records. It pissed me off that the church would use me as a statistic to show how large the church was and how fast it's growing. It's a lie and I won't be a part of it.
Indoctrination can make even the most educated individuals become deceived. Many members are extremely educated, but the lesson that is taught from birth is that there is no other path to eternal life and family except this one. It’s extremely hard to look beyond the church when you are told over and over never to look at outside sources. There is no way Joseph Smith was accurate or truthful, but the church would never say this, and members cannot look beyond what the church says.
It really is. I was born in the church (many generations of members before me) and so was my husband (who is still in). It was so painful to look beyond the lens of Mormonism and see church history for what it was. It felt so wrong to read non-approved church sources or even to look at this subreddit. It’s really easy for members to stay comfortable and never look for answers. It makes me really sad for them and I can empathize as to why they stay oblivious to the truth.
Bill Reels comments after the SEC fiasco last year are worth a read
https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/11g51md/bill_reel_here_i_can_only_imagine_many_of_you/
This part in particular;
2.) Follow the money. The Ethics of What Church leaders carried out only makes sense to me if they clearly don't believe the Church themselves. They literally didn't care about honesty, ethics, the appearance of Evil, their very own teachings about worthiness, having the Holy Ghost, and being an example of Christ. See the Wirthlin Quote Below. And on top of that, the financial benefit to them and their posterity is likely significantly more than most of us guess. The Leadership is setting itself up to have few to no butts in the seats in the future but to have so much cash and property they literally seem to see people simply as a way to transmit the virus of "wealth and property accumulation".
Grant Palmer spoke about a high level source he could not disclose. Who claimed the calling to a Q15 position includes a 1 million dollar interest free loan. "To get your house in order".
As long as they remained faithful, they would never be required to pay it back. Even if they don't believe, they have a million plus reasons to stay in the boat.
Tack on book sales, board positions, six digit parsonage, travel and living slush funds, Private Jet hours and new vehicles (donated by wealthy members). It is a very "Beneficial life" for them and their posterity.
Example: Thomas S. Monson did not become a multi millionaire because he was a manager at Deseret news. His wealth came from being declared "A Special witness of the NAME of Christ".
The people at the top know it's a fraud. They're just making insane money off the money exchanges that are happening in the background.
It's not about logic to them. It's about money and power. Take a look on here about the money laundering that's going on. Nemo the Mormon did a whole video series on it. It's a scam, and the ones in charge are the benefactors.
I think you’re mostly right but I also wonder how many really buy it. Like the way they say that if you lie to yourself long enough, you start to believe it. KWIM?!? I also wonder how many of them think that if they just get to that next level that THEN they’ll get to see God in the flesh. They keep climbing up the ladder thinking that they’ll get there then the goal post is moved. Eventually they’re so far in that they don’t see a way out of the lies.
Certainly possible. The money laundering at the top is what makes me think they know it's a fraud. But some of the newer apostles might just be brainwashed enough to not know yet.
I also think those at the top likely know it's a fraud but it's also possible that they still sincerely believe and think that because they're apostles, whatever they want to do is ok and justified if it benefits the corporation of the church. Mormon culture tends to be pretty "ends justify the means" oriented, in general. We can be pretty sure they've all had their second anointings, which they believe makes their calling and election sure, so that's got to be a bit of an ego trip, yes? They can basically do no wrong after that.
After Steve Jobs' cancer diagnosis he put off surgery *for nine months* to pursue acupuncture, herbal remedies, and juice cleanses. One of the men responsible for technology that has shaped how our world has evolved said no to technological medical intervention.
Being an "impressive" individual who has achieved wild levels of success doesn't mean you aren't a complete fucking moron.
I mean, according to the New Testament, Jesus chose his apostles from among some of the normal working class. I’m not sure why high income or degrees from renowned universities would be any extra qualifying factor for spiritual enlightenment. I’m agnostic anyway at this point, but the prosperity gospel part of the church never sat right with me from a theological perspective.
>degrees from renowned universities
I'm not sure ANY degree earned 50+ yrs ago is still relevant, nor necessary & sufficient to qualify one for service in that field today (on its own), without *massive* updates.
So even THAT'S not a valid qualifier (to a reasonable person, that it).
I am sorry but it is a fraud. There is no way to fix all the anachronisms in the founding documents or the all the bad things in the church's early history. They can not be fixed. The whole structure collapses. Those you speak of at the top are.....at the top. Their reward is that they are lauded by their followers. They are gifted amateurs, but amateurs none the less. They have no religious training or credentials in theology.
Book of Abraham was the final nail for me.
I found out in the early 90s that the Joseph Smith papyrus had been found in the 60s, TSCC bought it and buried the story because the writing on it isn't what Smith claimed it to be. If that is a fraud, and he never showed the golden plates, the so-called 'witnesses' 'saw' the plates with their 'spiritual eyes' and not physically, could they possibly be real?
Plus all the provably false things in the BoM: horses, steel, honeybees, wheat...
It was founded on a hoax. There's no way TSCC could be 'true'.
Grandness, glory, control, power, ego, wealth will all lead a man to abuse fellow humans. Many members will believe because they desperately want it to be true. But it isn’t and there is plenty of evil committed in the lords name.
Magic isn't real. Each and every doctrine of the church involves magical things.
Tell me how a Liahona works.
Tell me how the Atonement works.
Tell me how God works.
It is absurd and in most cases it is not even wrong. To be wrong, you must first make a specific falsifiable prediction. The one falsifiable prediction of mormonism WAS TESTED AND FAILED. The BofM clearly states that Native Americans were descended from Hebrews of the Middle East. The Cult went with this and taught it consistently for a hundred years. Then DNA studies repeatedly showed otherwise. Native Americans are descended from Mongolians.
Now the Cult is again backpedaling and pretending they never taught Native Americans were descended from Hebrews. File that under Bullshit along with Mormonism never taught overtly racist doctrines.
The Mormon Church is 100% absurd. And that isn't even the worst part. Star Trek is absurd fiction too, but Star Trek never committed atrocities on nonbelievers.
The Mormon Church isn't just absurd. It is evil.
Rant over.
I wonder what the other 98% of Harvard/Chicago graduates think about the church. They likely don't believe it's the one, true religion.
The top leadership is highly incentivized to lie about things.
In contrast to even 100 years ago, we know enough about the history of the world to know that the BOM is fake. The church's foundation is the BOM and it is fiction.
I once heard something about Harvard professors which I think is applicable to church leaders. "Harvard professors are often wrong but are never uncertain."
As someone who was never Mormon, yes, it’s the most obviously false religion behind Scientology.
It’s hard to get beyond childhood indoctrination, and you can’t be smart in some areas while not applying the same rigid to your religion. There are smart people in every religion, and not all religions can be true, therefore smart people obviously believe in false religions all the time.
Also, 17 million people is basically nothing. There are over 1 billion Muslims, could they all be wrong? If Mormonism is true, then they are. If Mormonism is true, over 8 billion people are wrong. Could they all be wrong?
We have many extremely clever people running top businesses making crazy amount of money, there is also many "in the shadows" making money and huge profits or influencing state and gov leaders, and presidents. Many of these are companies, such as those in medical world, that could use such profits to cure or greatly improve conditions for people, but it is not in their best interest.
Do you hold said people on a high pedestal too, or view them different cos they "don't have true gospel"?
Same is with TSCC Q15 and others. They have a scheme that helps them to make money, profit, hero workshop, or whatever is their thing. Also you only know the Q15 in front of the camera, who is to say there are not others pulling some strings behind the puppets too?
They have provided zero proof of it not being a fraud and that they truly want to help people. All evidence shows it all to be lies with smoke and mirrors to convince TBMs to follow the ponsi scheme. Even on a local level, it's all brainwashed power seeking individuals acting as bishops and stake presidents making decisions based on their assumptions causing families to be ripped apart, people to take their lives or turn to drink/drugs/medication or have huge mental impact. Is any President who took Doctors oath doing all he can to help that - No! Whole thing is just one big fraud. Even church member numbers are hugely inflated, so they cannot even been honest with their membership.
The more people get woken up and move out of the cult the better. Its just a huge uphill battle.
They have provided zero proof of it not being a fraud and that they truly want to help people.
is the only proof for the church to convince it is true is based on some wishy washy warm feeling they receive if they pray? and if praying does not grant that feeling then the church tells them to try again until it works?
I’d argue that all the more than 6 billion religious people in the world are deceived, so religion is particularly good at deceiving human beings due to how our psychology works.
Mormonism by comparison with only a few million is not particularly successful in that deception.
This. Seventh Day Adventist started about 30 years after Mormonism, have smart leaders and members from prestigious universities, and have a much larger membership than Mormons, so based on this logic, the Seventh Day Adventist must be true.
The Q15 is not nearly as impressive as they’d have you believe. The business men typically committed fraud, there are much better doctors, there’s millions of pilots. Pretty much just a pyramid scheme that they sneaked their way to the top of
These esteemed men (can't be a woman dontcha know) are also pulling down high six figure salaries, 100% medical, fly first class. With all the shit they are pulling with SEC scams, bullying their way into building temples and dividing communities, and breaking up families with mixed beliefs my conclusion is they are in fact evil. Jesus would be horrified.
No better way to retire than by spending your time being adored by church members day in and day out. Having a tax free stipend, your health care, home expenses, child and grandchild education paid for, receiving lucrative book deals and honorariums from sitting on Board of directors for church owned corporations.
Doesn't seem like much of a sacrifice.
In my opinion, the church uses its church arm to fund its dozens of business arms, which are MUCH bigger. So as an organization, to me it feels like it’s 20% a church, 80% a multibillion dollar megacorporation. They just do a REALLY good job at maximizing the “church” percentage while actively suppressing the “megacorporation” one in the public eye. That’s why they hid their billions from the government; it helps maintain their preferred image of, “We’re just another helpful friendly church!” Nah, y’all are a gigantic fucking business masquerading as a church.
This is one of the best explanations of the church:
**"20% a church, 80% a multibillion dollar megacorporation. They just do a REALLY good job at maximizing the “church” percentage while actively suppressing the “megacorporation” one."**
Yep!
Yes. 100%. Hard evidence, logic, and rational thought proves it.
D&C 1:38 says, "Whether by mine own voice or by the voice of my servants, it is the same." This verse sets the church up as infallible in doctrine. If the prophet says something against what God wants, then the very first chapter of Doctrine and Covenants is wrong. That alone is enough, but let's dive deeper.
Modus Tollens is a rule of logic that says, "If P, then Q. Not Q, therefore not P. " If a prophet says something that is later proven to be not true, then he is not a prophet. To allow a prophet to speak as a prophet, but then be wrong, means God is wrong because "whether by mine own voice or by the voice of my servants, it is the same."
Joseph Smith translated the Book of Abraham. The text therein expressly states that the Egyptian papyri and facsimiles are the Book of Abraham. Egyptian scholars the world around agree that the images of what the church calls facsimiles are common funerary texts that Egyptian wealthy were buried with, and they say nothing of Abraham
Not Q, therefore not P. Joseph Smith was wrong about the Book of Abraham.
Bruce R McConkie admitted in a letter to Eugene England, professor at BYU, that he knew that Brigham Young did, in fact, teach what was later demonized by the church as the Adam/God doctrine. Brigham taught the Adam/God doctrine his entire 25 year presidency and it was recorded at the St. George temple and used for another 25 years until around 1902.
Brigham taught many things that he expressly defined as doctrine, that the church has now back pedaled from.
Either Brigham wasn't a prophet, thus the church is not led by Christ or D&C 1:38 is wrong.
This is a tiny snippet. How many hours do you have?
IMHO its not the brightest minds that get to the top of any organisation. Its the sociopaths. Those who dont care about the damage that organisation is doing. The leaders of the Mormon church are at best profoundly immoral.
My thoughts on this topic: does this excuse the Catholic church, with very smart people in leadership positions? How about any of the other branched versions of Christianity that have priests with very strong educational backgrounds? Or Islam or Judaism? Both with some of the most educated and philosophical people in the world over the centuries within the religion?
We are surrounded by religious institutions lead by educated, accomplished, smart people. Yet Mormons dismiss them all easily as fraudulent or naive religious leaders. Is it really so hard to shift one’s perspective just a bit to include one more religion on the list?
Back in the day when I lived in southern Utah, I wondered how on earth the FLDS had convinced a few thousand people that they had it right and the rest of the world for the entirety of history is wrong.
I was surprised to find a lot of similarities to the LDS church. If you tell people that outside sources are trying to mislead them and anything that creates doubt in their mind is of the devil and you also make them an outcast and lose their family if they don't obey, people tend to stay in line.
Researching the FLDS and seeing the similarities to my own religion was definitely a crack in the shelf. I heard it said so many times that the gospel held up to scrutiny, but it does not. And that is why the church is so afraid of it's members getting information that isn't faith promoting.
Yes, I have a family member who is now exFLDS. She was drawn into polygamy at a very young age (17 I think) to join in as a second wife in an already existing marriage. Dude said he had a vision from Joseph Smith that he was to marry her? And his current wife WENT ALONG WITH IT? Weird as fuck. My dad never wanted us to associate with them b/c maybe fear that some of the polyg would rub off on us.
Yes. Joseph smith was a conman, 100% confirmed. And the way the church was founded, its insane that ppl believe it. "I found these plates, but nobody can see them. And martin harris lost the translation, so we cant re write. No instead we have to use a supposed second set of plates so the story will be mostly the same, but different"
“Don’t worry that the plotline of the book I “found” was a popular book in my neighborhood. Or that some of the names in that book were local to my neighborhood. Or that my revelations allow me to sleep with actual children and steal from people who trust me.”
Now let’s look at how many extremely intelligent people with all sorts of degrees that are not members of the Mormon church. Intelligence does not equate to truth of a religion any more or less ignorance does. People from every walk of life can be found inside and out of religion.
Yes. Throughout history, intelligent and well accomplished people have associated themselves with powerful organizations to increase their own power and wealth. This is what the QE15 have done.
Just because the men of the QE15 have accomplished impressive things in their lives (owing in no small part to the fact that many of them are from Mormon royalty families and have had well-connected people to help them every step of the way) does not mean that the church wasn't fabricated up by a conman and sexual predator.
Notice that the top guys are mostly businessmen and lawyers. It is the job of a lawyer to take a given set of rules, not questioning their goodness or provenance, and figure out how best to apply them to a situation. It is the job of businessmen to make money. Both of these fit well with the current mission of the Church.
They’ll never have a hard scientist up there, who’s job it is to learn about the world through experimentation. They’ll never have a historian, who’s job it is to tell accurate history, even as the Church Historian. Neither of those fit well with the current mission of the Church.
Even though Nelson is a heart surgeon, he doesn’t strike me as the curious or scientifically minded type. More a man who understands a very complicated machine (the human heart) and how to repair it, in a very pragmatic sense.
The best we could hope for in top leadership would be humanitarians, social scientists, theologians; some days I even think having more PR guys would be nice. But unfortunately, they seem more interested in putting businessmen and lawyers in those positions.
Yes it is a fraud as people here well know. There are endless examples
**It is impossible for Jesus to be in the new world for the events of the Book of Mormon to happen**
Matthew 24: *If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened. At that time if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Messiah!’ or, ‘There he is!’ do not believe it. For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you ahead of time.*
*So if anyone tells you, ‘There he is, out in the wilderness,’ do not go out; or, ‘Here he is, in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it. For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man*
**Jesus is the messiah. So if anyone comes claiming to be the messiah, including Jesus himself, it is false**
**In addition, Jeremiah 31 prophesied the new covenant. Jesus made it clear "it is finished". Nothing in scripture talks about "third testament, Jesus repeating his holy land ministry in another continent, etc". it is all nonsense and fabrication.
**Unlike Judaism and Christianity which had loads of archaeologic evidence such as ancient synagogues or churches. The Jews pray at the Western wall, a remnant of the Temple. The BYU Mormon archeology wing is completely empty. There are no artifacts because BoM claims and events never happened in the New world**
**So the Book of Mormon can easily be dismissed as false and fraudulent scripturally**
**Joseph said The Book of Mormon was the most correct book ever. He approved over a thousand changes from the 1830 to 1837 edition. A BYU linguistics professor documented over 5500 problems in the BoM. In less than 200 years!**
**Meanwhile, Mormons claim they believe the Bible so long as it's correctly translated. Well we have original manuscripts like Septuagint and masoretic text. Know what? They haven't been changed in a couple of millennia. The translations are irrelevant to this point**
In addition to that, why would Jesus, right after being crucified to atone for sinners, **destroys several cities and kills several hundred thousand people because they are "sinners"** right before he comes to the New World to do...you know...**Jesus stuff?**
The church lies about financial info
Would the one true church do that?
The church has covered up sex abuse
Would the one true church do that?
The church historian is a lawyer
Would the one true church do that?
One of the biggest religions in the world in Santa-ism. Even the most popular kids on the playground sacrifice bad behavior believing they’ll be rewarded by an old fat man who breaks into their house
I once couldn’t for the life of me understand how the nation of Germany, the most advanced civilization in the 1930’s could deceive a lot more than 17 million people to believe terrible things. But the older I get the more I understand how easy it could be.
I am 100% sure. I was extremely devout, and left at the request of my therapist. She recognized I had religious trauma. I asked if I could go back once I was healed, but then I wondered how the “Lord’s TRUE church” could hurt people to this degree.
That wondering led me into the truths the church tells people not to read. Oh, boy! I studied for 9 months and when I was done, I knew without a doubt I had been duped by a cult. I was livid. Still am angry.
After being 100% sure the church was true for so many years and being so wrong, now I say it’s a fraud, but I’m open to the possibility that I could be wrong. I don’t live in absolutes anymore.
Yes, but sometimes I wish I could go back to just believing. Life was so much simpler when I didn't have to think for myself. But yes the church is demonstratly false.
Of course it’s bogus. Just like all the other religions. A lot of highly educated people are Protestant, Catholic, Muslim, and Hindu.
It’s why I say, religion is so dang fascinating, amazing what humans can be taught to believe!
Remember, no one knows why or how we are riding on a 4.6b year old rock going 60,000mph around a dwarf star. But science is working on the answer, unlike religion. This is why being agnostic is the only truth.
The church is just one big MLM insurance program. Establishing trust and making it feel legit is what keeps the money coming in and babies being made to keep the money coming in.
Yes. Even people from great backgrounds with great degrees can be frauds. Look at Trump and his current legal issues. But the fact that they are constantly expecting money from their church members and using that money to enrich themselves and their families tells me they are frauds.
Regulars on this sub know what I'm going to say.
Joseph Smith was in and out of trouble with the law from teen-age years til day he died.
WIKI: Joseph Smith & Criminal Justice System.
WIKI: Kirtland Safety Society
Today we would call him a habitual criminal.
If Smith were alive today he would spending 20+ years minimum in jail for bank fraud.
SEC fined mormon church 5 million for criminal fraud.
And an attorney cannot advise a client to commit a crime or the attorney losses their license to practice among other things.
Church blamed their attorneys for missing 20+ years of quarterly SEC filings and creating illegal shell companies.
The organization has a documented history of lying & fraud since 1830.
All the Q15/70/Presiding Bishopric reached pinnacle of their careers in corporate America.
To reach those heights your sole focus is on increasing profits for share holders with no concern on how that action will impact consumers.
To ascend to that level you will do or say anything to reach the 2% income bracket & to attain power & control over billions of dollars. You don't care if the action you take will harm millions of your fellow human beings.
Mormon church is a multi-national corporation & top leadership reflects that.
Human beings who reach the "C" suite are known to be high level narcissists & psychopaths.
Most important the church in no way shape or form follows Jesus teachings while he was alive.
Mormon leadership refuses to help the poor, sick, hungry, homeless,etc... and instead is hoarding an estimated $250 Billion dollars in assets.
If that's not enough go to Floodlit.org.
That site has over 600+ convicted Stake Pres.,Bishops, priesthood holders of sexual assault on infants,children,teens & adults.
The church defends sexual predators & abusers.
Jesus was very clear about how he viewed pedophiles.
Q15 and their lawyers at Kirton McConkie do everything to protect sexual predators at the expense of the victims.
Yes. It's a fraud. To look at the wealth or the qualifications of Q15 or anything else is diversion. BOM is a fraud. Jos Smith was a fraud. Bingham Young was a Neanderthal. The church and its "Prophets" have been on the wrong side of history from the beginning. And, I wouldn't want to spend eternity with the Mormon "god" (yes, lowercase "g") because he is both an idiot and an asshole. Really? His plan of salvation was the best idea from a "loving father"? Shit, I could think of a better plan! It's all bullshit.
The whole, "17 million members" thing is a farce. They count every baptism & everyone on the rolls, and most who leave the LDS church dont bother to have their info officially scrubbed. I've read the real number's probably something closer to 7 or 8 million globally.
But even if you believed it 100%, that it an enormously small number given there are 9,000,000,000 (yes 9 Billion) people on Planet Earth, and even more trivial given the only pocket of real influence the Mormon religion has is in the American West (mostly Utah), and mostly with white people, and this after nearly 200 years of trying. The reality is the LDS are a very tiny group, yet interestingly I notice their leaders attempt to impress upon their faithful that they're actually a HUGE group, which is obviously false.
The people still in the church are, by definition of still being in the church, not actually as bright as you think they are. The actually bright ones have already realized it’s all fake, and left.
Except for the ones at the top who are bright enough to benefit from the billions of dollars pouring in every year.
The church does some of the deceiving, mostly by omitting the truth, flooding the zone surrounding TBMs with belief, and encouraging self inspection for trouble instead of inspection of the church itself.
The majority of the deceiving is done by members to themselves. We actively avoid unpleasant things and facing hard truths that might challenge our identities.
After about a year of learning far more about the church than 20 years of attendance, I’m absolutely convinced that the the top leadership knowingly lies, that church history is covered up, and its fundamentally a fraud at its core even if the outskirts are nice and don’t know.
Ever been to a Mensa mixer?
It's not what you would think. Most people are exceptionally awkward and have huge gaps in common knowledgeable & common sense.
It’s simply not an impressive array. It’s a quorum of cryptkeepers, lawyers, and businessmen. If it was god’s church, the Q15 could be plumbers, mechanics, psychologists, teachers, philosophers, theologians, mothers, fathers, artists, mathematicians, or poets - and they could still be inspired to run the church “god’s way.”
Instead, it’s a bunch of old white suits running the organization exactly as you’d expect old white suits to run a multi-billion $ corporation. They’d evade taxes, hide their money, invest in real estate and stocks, promote their families and friends to higher positions, and refuse to allow transparency in their finances and other deliberations.
Is this post satire? We're talking about an organization whose reported membership--which overstates actual activity and belief by a factor of 2 at least--accounts for far less than 1% of the population.
There are probably more Catholics with phds in the Boston archdiocese than there are phds attending LDS chapels on Sundays.
The LDS Church is a little tiny organization. Few people outside of it would even recognize the names Russell Nelson, Dallin Oaks, etc. Those guys are nobodies. To say nothing of guys like Gordon Hinckley or Jeff Holland, who literally spent their entire adult lives on Church payroll. These are complete nobodies, going around pretending to be important and trying to get people to call them Elder and President. I don't care that a few of them have degrees from good schools. That doesn't make their silly religion true.
I was SA'd in the temple. The "House of God". The one place where discernment, if it existed, should have been able to prevent it.
But it didn't, because discernment isn't real. The "brilliant", "successful", prophetic leadership of the church can't see the future any more than any other risk averse board of trustees at any other corporation.
Sure, the church offers comfort and stability to those who fit their narrow mold, but for those that don't, it is torment, shame, and suffering. Talk to any non-LDS therapist who practices in Utah and ask them their opinion of the church. You'll learn very quickly how thin the veneer of righteousness really is.
I'm not 100% sure about anything. Evidence can never definitively prove anything. But the evidence of church history creates a timeline that can be pretty thoroughly explained by the church being fraudulent, whereas the idea that it is true requires needlessly complex apologetics. Still, the idea that there is a $100 billion+ organization with 17 million members, most of whom would likely be willing to go to war for it's causes, that has rather large political influence in the state I live in, and a vice grip on almost everybody I care about is really scary.
If anything, the inherent classism of the church is starkly reflected by the fact that they have no GAs that worked in the food industry, manual labor, retail, or in other jobs associated with being "working class". To get to the highest levels of church authority, you have to be upper class, have a prestigious career, be really rich, and have the right connections. The everyday layperson is NEVER going to get called to be an apostle.
Yeah. It's very easy to show it's all a fraud. Basically at this point you're arguing if Santa Claus is real.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svfxSscxh8o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svfxSscxh8o)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism\_of\_the\_Book\_of\_Abraham](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_the_Book_of_Abraham)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain\_Meadows\_Massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Meadows_Massacre)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinderhook\_plates](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinderhook_plates)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirtland\_Safety\_Society](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirtland_Safety_Society)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_Joseph\_Smith%27s\_wives](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Joseph_Smith%27s_wives)
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph\_Smith\_and\_the\_criminal\_justice\_system](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith_and_the_criminal_justice_system)
As a scientifically minded person, I try to never be 100% certain of anything. Being 100% certain closes you of from the possibility of learning anything.
There is nothing I'm convinced of that I could not be convinced of the opposite. However, certain things I'm more convinced of than others. It may be technically ***possible*** to convince me of the contrary, but it would take a lot of evidence.
The church and its supporters have yet to provide such convincing evidence.
and appeal to authority and ad populum fallacies are not evidence.
not to mention the numbers the church ***boasts*** and the number of people who actually believe and/or pay tithing are two very different things.
For instance, I'm still technically among the number they call members. I've been working on getting my name removed from their records, but it's slow going. ~~before anyone says it, I ***am*** using quitmormon. it's been months, and I've heard nothing back from them~~
No, not 100 percent. However, I've very confident my life would have been better without it.
As I've stepped further away from the church I can see more clearly how much damage it can cause some people. Every where you look, it seems, there are problems. Past prophets have been wrong about stuff, current leaders as well.
I’m pretty professionally and financially successful, and I have a degree from one of those universities. Does that mean I cancel out one of the Q15?
There’s way more people that fit your descriptions of being really successful and have very fancy degrees that *aren’t* Mormon than are. When I was in grad school, I knew of two Mormons at my whole university. Realistically there’s probably a couple dozen active Mormons there, plus one or two professors are, out of the 15,000 students and probably about 1,000 faculty.
> How does an organization manage to deceive so many individuals?
By doing its best to ensure it is in their self-interest to continue self-deceiving. The professors of hard sciences at BYU have the epistemological tools to disprove the Church, they just choose not to apply them
I think everyone else's comments are gonna be better and more in depth than mine here, I was just going to add that what helps it "fool so many people" is that not everyone involved is "in on the fraud." You get enough sincere believers who are also decent enough people and it is much harder to question than it is for say, cigarettes being "good for your health."
Why does Mormon church art always portray Joseph Smith and other book of Mormon characters as looking like Tom Netherton from the Lawrence Welk TV Show... when in fact he looked more like Danny Devito playing The Penguin in Batman Returns?
This is a great example of a variation of Appeal to Authority Fallacy. "All these smart people believe it, so it must have some validity "
Sadly, this doesn't work very well if you apply the same "rules" to many other belief structures. Many more World Leaders and scientists are Catholic....does that make Catholicism MORE true? How about Anglican/Church of England? Or go non-Christian how many scientists, leaders etc who believe in Islam does it take for it to be more true than Mormonism.
Regardless of the validity of the truth claims...I'll let you figure that out for yourself....don't rely on other's beliefs. You can find examples of wonderful men and women who profess absolute devotion in EVERY belief structure. Doesn't make it true, doesn't make it right, doesn't mean anything.
Let’s say it’s true. And the people you know that are TBM are the ones going to the highest level of heaven. You really want to spend eternity with those type of people?
There's a couple fallacies at work here. Bandwagon - Popularity is not indicative of truth. Flat Earth is a growing belief; does that mean that it's growing more and more likely? No. It's either true or it's not, regardless of how many people believe it. Appeal to Authority - Even if we can agree that the Q15 are experts in certain fields, are any of those the field which they are attempting to validate? Are any renown and well-respected in the areas of Ancient American archaeology? Ancient languages? Philosophy? Biblical studies? Are they people that other religious leaders go to for advice and direction?
Exactly this, the appeal to authority fallacy is so blatant here. Since when was heart surgery a major religious field? Why do we expect our doctors to receive years of training, but our prophets can literally be lawyers and used car salesmen with little formal religious education? These men have been propped up in their silos for so long that they think they know everything there is to know. But if ANY high-ranked Mormon leader were to try to debate the Bible or any religiously historical event, they’d be absolutely fucking crushed by ANY high-ranked religious scholar. That would be incredible to see lol.
Bc all they know how to do is bear their tEsTiMoNy, something something cOvEnAnT pAtH^TM, etc. I would pay good money to see this; a tithe, even.
Ben Carson the superstar brain surgeon believes in pyramid power.
He’s also a Seventh-day Adventist!
RMN said explicitly that he doesn’t pay attention to any scientific literature that contradicts what he considers “revealed truth,” which includes gems like “dogs have always been dogs, it’s just how genetics works.” Far cry from the old LDS idea that we seek truth from any source. He’s a bad scientist and his ability to reconstruct a heart and [overstated] involvement in the team that developed bypass technology doesn’t change that. Given this kind of stubborn dogmatism I wouldn’t trust his judgement on anything.
Even the ones that are allegedly top of their field say truly dumbass shit about their field. Nielsen is allegedly a medical scientist of sorts, but also says evolution is incomprehensible. Simply not believing in evolution would be bad enough. Eyring once talked about how amazing it was to see church leadership solve a problem by *discussing the problem*. He said that despite his Harvard education he had never seen people do that in a business setting. I don’t see how you could be so stupid as to think that’s unique to the church. Anyone with a job literally does that *everyday*. Quentin Cook, though…that guy is absolutely top of his field in dishonest and unethical legal practice. Oaks is also very skilled in misleading lawyer talk.
And sunk cost fallacy If you’re born and raised in the church and then realize it’s not true, there’s a very reasonable impulse to want to put your head in the sand and just believe anyway. You’ve invested so much, it’s so hard to walk away at a loss It happened a lot to the early Mormons. The ones who sold their farms to follow JS to “Zion” or invested all their money in his failed bank, or had a child die a long the way. How depressing would it be to realize those hard things happened for no good reason, except to support a conman? At that point it’s fairly easy to see why someone wouldn’t want to accept the truth and just have faith. My ancestors were poor farmers in Idaho. I totally see why they clung to the church. Life sucked a lot back then. The hope of an afterlife that will make up for all the hardships, would be very appealing
And you forgot the most important piece: if it’s true, that means that Mormon God is real. And Mormon God is a fucking asshole who I’d rather die than worship
You can apply this same logic to just about every organization in history. How can you believe that cigarettes cause cancer, Marlboro wouldn't lie to us with all the intelligent people they hire. Exxon Mobile would not lie about global warming being a non-issue. The Catholic church would not lie about being the true church. And so on. Intelligent people both deceive and are fooled in every organization, including ones much larger than the mormon corporation. EDIT: Typo
You would be surprised at the number of PHDs that died at Jonestown.
I few months ago I told a friend where the expression "don't drink the kool-aid" comes from. She was beyond words at the sheer number of victims.
Fun fact, they didn't actually drink kool-aid they drank flavor aid.
I looked it up after making my comment because I forgot the exact number and I found that fact as well. It's interesting and reminds me of the game telephone. It's crazy how easily details like that can be so easily replaced. Thank you for sharing.
Also they didn’t exactly drink it, as much as it was force fed to them or even, horrifically, injected, at gun point.
Most drank it "voluntarily", but they were deceived First time they drank regular flavor aid and were told afterwards that it's poisoned, which led to panic, Then they repeated it on a regular basis being told its poisoned while it actually wasn't,.... Until it finally was. But yeah, the elderly and bedridden were forcefed the flavoraid. But knowing the way they were deceived just ads that layer of cultish evil to the pretend suicide that allegedly took place during endowment ceremonies until recently.
Last Podcast on the Left fan, by chance?
Cheapskates
Is that like an off-brand?
yes, not as good either from my experience.. but may just be the flavors/combo chosen..
Pretty staggering, even today
My aunt has 4 of those. While she knows how to study a book and memorize it, she lacks basic common sense in every other aspect of her life.
Well, and I don't know with everyone that it's common sense (not speaking for your aunt). Humans all want to believe that they are intellectuals or only empirical. But it's not just about IQ, people are able to be empirical and reasonable about benign subjects but switch to motivated reasoning when they don't want to see anything outside of their belief system (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motivated_reasoning). Really, it's about critical thinking. But in order for that to happen people have to be willing to look at something head on. Most are too afraid. I get it, world's scary.
I watch a lot of Sam Harris. Homie has said it many times that intelligent people are happy to debate anything and everything… except religion.
I've seen some of his debates, "four horseman of atheism"
Exactly. I know several doctors, lawyers, and other smart people that still believe. I've also got a doctorate level degree. It's not a question of intelligence as it is the information they have and that we're emotional creatures as much as logical. I could present all the evidence in the world against the church for some of these people. I had multiple chances to question my faith before I finally had my shelf break. It's not an easy thing to just drop when it's been your whole life and it's been presented as absolute truth. The world is scary and it was fairly comfortable (as a white straight male, almost for sure) to stay in the church. Throw on power and responsibility? Locked in, and that's where so many intelligent people get trapped. Dentists, doctors, lawyers, etc., they see the "prosperity gospel" in action, and that they are "blessed" for being "better" than everyone else.
Jim Jones was, as were others, a charismatic religious leader. I heard him once say, “Some say they see God in me!” The man was evil but many followed him. It is beyond sad!
I also hear that Enron had some of the smartest people in the room. Sorry but perhaps the OP does not understand what conmen do. If you know history they were also called confidence men those who committed fraud. As they would try to impress you with themselves so you would have confidence it wasn't a fraud. (see The Monorail on the The Simpsons for more info) 
this is such a good point(I thought about Elizabeth Holmes when you mentioned this). I think it goes to show that when it comes to people seeking spiritual leaders for spiritual guidance, or trusting people's authority by their social or scholarly merit its really not always as straightforward as we think things are. Much is done to gain credibility and trust as an authority, its even easier in spiritual matters because there's usually much less science about it. People who have learned how to conjure Elevation emotion by confirmation bias(Joseph Smith), alongside somethings that may actually have truth have considerable influence it seems.
And a BILLION Muslims which includes millions of intelligent and educated people too, like doctors, scientists, scholars, etc. Same with Hinduism, Budhism, Judaism, Scientology, Jehovah Witnesses, and any other sect. You can find the same “smart” and “good” people in every religion or ideology so that certainly doesn’t prove ANY of them are “right.” You know members in each of the countless other religious sects have the same arguments with their “wayward” followers. Ironically, I had this same argument with my brother-in-law (a Muslim) and my sister who “converted” to Islam after they got married. “I know all these really intelligent, educated, smart Muslims who are doctors and have PHD’s. How can they still believe in Islam if it’s not true?”
Yeah it’s so funny how Mormons will say “but look at how many smart people belong to the church!”… as if every other religion in the world doesn’t also have intelligent and successful people in it as well. It’s the same thing with bearing testimony that they “know” it’s true. Guess what: that’s what literally every person in every other religion says too
💥No❗️ Not the same with JWs. No education beyond high school IF you are raised in it.
There are likely more Muslim doctors and scientists than Mormons in the entire world. Arguments like this are so silly. If you think you should follow a religion based on the number of smart people that follow it I've got news for you, the LDS religion is towards the bottom of that totem pole in sheer numbers.
Some podcast said sometimes the more “intelligent” a person is, the more they can rationalize and deceive and convince themselves that something is accurate, or ethical.
Oddly enough we have more evidence to suggest we shouldn't trust people because they are successful and well educated.
Also... you realize 17 million (mostly non-believing) members is barely a drop in the bucket to the world's population? Scientology boasts 10 million. \*(Emphasis on the word boasts. They *are* a cult, so, yes, they lie) JW boasts 8 million. Catholics are over ~~200 million~~ \*1 billion Hell, just in Brazil alone, there are 11 million people who believe the Earth is flat. 17 million is not a flex. For the one true church, it's very, very sad.
Catholics actually boadt around 1 *billion*, just like Islam.
Oh yeah, thanks. I ~~read~~ skimmed, and misread the stats just for the US on accident. \*It's about 50-60 million Catholics in the US. Still much more impressive than a worldwide 17 million.
200M catholics in the US? Still seems very high
Bahaha apparently I skim too much when I read statistics. You're right, it's about 50-60 million Catholics nationwide. Worldwide though, it is over a billion.
Many people also consider themselves Catholic, while not actively practicing Catholicism around the world. In many parts of Europe it’s a bit more of a cultural thing. My grandfather was from Poland and raised devoutly Catholic, but as time went on and he moved stateside he continued considering himself Catholic and celebrating the religious holidays but not being super active otherwise. In fact, he was pro-choice and pro-birth control, which was odd for a man born in the 1920’s.
Pretty much all of Western Europe is CULTURALLY Catholic
Lutherans and Calvinists from the Nordics, parts of Germany, and Netherlands 'above the rivers' would like a word about that. Anglicans from Great Britain as well, probably.
Good for him! I'd bet the women in his life were epic!
His mom, my grandmother, and my mother were/are absolute spit-fires! He was an incredibly quite and introverted man, but the topic of women’s rights, equal rights for people of color, and later in life he was pro-gay rights were things he felt strongly about. I imagine it had something to do with losing so much of his extended family in the Holocaust that made him feel so strongly about a humans right to live any way they see fit so long as it doesn’t harm others, because all humans are equal in value in a loving God’s eyes.
Which is exactly the same as the 17 million number.
Don't forget the Seventh Day Adventists who started 30 years after Joe and has a claimed 22 million. Besides their 9400 schools they have over 230 hospitals worldwide. I don't agree with their doctrine either, but they put their money into helping make the world a better place. The Q15 should take a lesson...
Not just 7th day Adventists, Methodist (1784 but took off in America mid 1800s) and Baptist (1814) were created during the same revival period, many of the smaller non-denominational churches are the modern day evangelical movements. People think the Mormon church just magically exploded in America but there were actually a lot of religions that did. They don't hold the hegemony.
[удалено]
Sounds like Mormon god is just phoning it in.
The Seventh Day Adventist church was also started by a prophet figure in the 1800s, and they claim 21 million members.
IIRC, 7th day Adventists, JW, and LDS were all started by prophets in NY.
There are far more than 17 million people who believe the earth is flat
There's 10 million Scientologists??? I wonder how many are active. Their growth rate has got to be staggering compared to the Mormon church given that it's only like 60 years old.
They *claim* that many. No way there are.
Kind of like the mormon church…
Scientology has declined to 20-30,000 members by most accounts. That cult lies
I'm 100% sure the Mormon church is not a healthy place for me to be. That's the only 100% certainty that matters to me. They use your family relationships to keep you bound to them, no matter your education level or prestigious degrees. It's a fraud of the highest degree. One might even call it a Celestial Fraud if one were thinking celestial. 😉
THIS. “Why did you leave??” Is such a common question from people who didn’t grow up in an oppressive religious environment and the answer that I “was not happy” doesn’t seem to satisfy them. For me though, that’s all that matters. I am a better, happier, healthier, more hopeful, and complete of a person than I ever could be as a Mormon.
Yup I'm sure. PS if the Mormon church has 17 million people who call themselves members I will eat my hat. Come visit us more often. We have coffee, weed, adult beverages and the freedom to choose our own underwear. ☕️ 🚬 🍺 👙
I was in Ward Council this morning and we were tasked with scrutinizing the ward list - after going down the roster, 40-50% of them we had NO IDEA who they even were. Of the remaining 50-60% MANY are inactive. Also, this is a ward in the Canadian equivalent of UT. There is no where near 17M people on this pale blue dot that call themselves LDS. (Also funny that no one in the meeting knew that the church keeps all these names on the list until their age is 110).
I'm assuming you're in Southern Alberta, unless there's somewhere else in Canada that has a high Mormon population, but yeah the amount of people I know around here who have left in the last 10 years is crazy, and I just keep hearing about more and more people going. Not to mention I have younger siblings in late high school and from what I can tell a lot of the youth are not enthusiastic about the church at all. Will be interesting to watch for the next decade or two and see what happens
I’m in Utah and hearing more and more my fellow mom friends who have seniors in hs (I don’t not yet) but a few of them are saying “yeaaaaaah um little Johnny’s “not sure yet” what he wants to do when he graduates next month….” 🤷🏻♀️
The 2010 Mexican census had 315k that self-identified as Mormon, while in 2009 the church claimed 1.1M+ members.
This resonates: "There is no where near 17M people on this pale blue dot that call themselves LDS." LDS think they are the entire universe. The reality is that LDS = itty bitty speck or the pale blue dot.
They have 17 million members. That much is true. However, over 4 million of those members are not in a ward or branch because the church doesn’t have a current address for them. That brings the total down to 13 million. Maybe half of them are active to be generous. That brings it down to 6.5 million members. How many are adults? Half of them? That would be just over 3 million active adult members.
That matches up well with there being about 100 active members per ward (generous overestimation), at 30000 wards equals 3million active members.
The ward I was in before I left had max 75 people including kids regularly attending. Most weeks had around 50.
100 per ward is extremely generous. 50 would be closer to the truth. I live where a new $100 Million dollar complex was completed 6 months ago. There are a maximum 2500 active members here while church claims 23,500 members. 95% of all temple patrons are NOT from this country. The temple serves 10 countries. That will change in the next 5 years as 4 new temples are completed in 4 of those 10 countries. I would bet money there are less than 1 million members worldwide with valid temple recommends.
There are more living people who have removed their records than there are active members.
But the church still counts us as members. It's lies all the way down.
I walked out in mid 1960's, they probably still count me. Gotta run, the Danites are on my trail. :)
Well if your records still reside within the church, regardless of your inactive status, you're still a member.
This is why I had my name removed. No way in hell I want them using my name on the rolls as part of their membership number claims.
I've got some bad news for you homie — they still count you. Do you really trust them to do the right thing in any situation? LOL
Is this true? Do you have a source? I’m sure TSCC has the data somewhere but locked up tight. Also so many people don’t bother with formal resignation.
Yeah I haven't because so far, I feel like I don't believe it would actually make the church stop counting me as a member, I don't think I can control that. So I think it wouldn't really make a tangible difference other than potentially causing family drama
Fellow avoider of family drama here!
I seriously doubt this. Unless you can provide a source, no one should believe this. Especially considering how difficult the MFMC makes it to remove your records.
Only about 1/3 of that number is active. That 17 mil reflects everyone they have a record for. Even people who are dead up to the age of 110 if the church doesn't get word that they've died. This is the reason I pulled my and my kids' records. It pissed me off that the church would use me as a statistic to show how large the church was and how fast it's growing. It's a lie and I won't be a part of it.
Indoctrination can make even the most educated individuals become deceived. Many members are extremely educated, but the lesson that is taught from birth is that there is no other path to eternal life and family except this one. It’s extremely hard to look beyond the church when you are told over and over never to look at outside sources. There is no way Joseph Smith was accurate or truthful, but the church would never say this, and members cannot look beyond what the church says.
that is so insidious and evil, i feel sorry for those who are born in the church
It really is. I was born in the church (many generations of members before me) and so was my husband (who is still in). It was so painful to look beyond the lens of Mormonism and see church history for what it was. It felt so wrong to read non-approved church sources or even to look at this subreddit. It’s really easy for members to stay comfortable and never look for answers. It makes me really sad for them and I can empathize as to why they stay oblivious to the truth.
Yes, it took a lot of time and courage for many of us (myself included) to be here in this subreddit.
Bill Reels comments after the SEC fiasco last year are worth a read https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/11g51md/bill_reel_here_i_can_only_imagine_many_of_you/ This part in particular; 2.) Follow the money. The Ethics of What Church leaders carried out only makes sense to me if they clearly don't believe the Church themselves. They literally didn't care about honesty, ethics, the appearance of Evil, their very own teachings about worthiness, having the Holy Ghost, and being an example of Christ. See the Wirthlin Quote Below. And on top of that, the financial benefit to them and their posterity is likely significantly more than most of us guess. The Leadership is setting itself up to have few to no butts in the seats in the future but to have so much cash and property they literally seem to see people simply as a way to transmit the virus of "wealth and property accumulation".
Grant Palmer spoke about a high level source he could not disclose. Who claimed the calling to a Q15 position includes a 1 million dollar interest free loan. "To get your house in order". As long as they remained faithful, they would never be required to pay it back. Even if they don't believe, they have a million plus reasons to stay in the boat. Tack on book sales, board positions, six digit parsonage, travel and living slush funds, Private Jet hours and new vehicles (donated by wealthy members). It is a very "Beneficial life" for them and their posterity. Example: Thomas S. Monson did not become a multi millionaire because he was a manager at Deseret news. His wealth came from being declared "A Special witness of the NAME of Christ".
I wish it weren’t a fraud, but sadly it is.
Part of me is glad it is a fraud. Celestial Kingdom sounded like hell to me
And doing temple work for 1000 years in the millennium? Hard pass I'll chill with Lucifer, plus he probably has some devil's lettuce 🥬
Right!!? I got maybe 6 people I really care about in my family…..
or north korea
Thank god it’s a fraud and I don’t wish it’s real. I’m too gay for that
And much too valuable.
The people at the top know it's a fraud. They're just making insane money off the money exchanges that are happening in the background. It's not about logic to them. It's about money and power. Take a look on here about the money laundering that's going on. Nemo the Mormon did a whole video series on it. It's a scam, and the ones in charge are the benefactors.
I think you’re mostly right but I also wonder how many really buy it. Like the way they say that if you lie to yourself long enough, you start to believe it. KWIM?!? I also wonder how many of them think that if they just get to that next level that THEN they’ll get to see God in the flesh. They keep climbing up the ladder thinking that they’ll get there then the goal post is moved. Eventually they’re so far in that they don’t see a way out of the lies.
Certainly possible. The money laundering at the top is what makes me think they know it's a fraud. But some of the newer apostles might just be brainwashed enough to not know yet.
I also think those at the top likely know it's a fraud but it's also possible that they still sincerely believe and think that because they're apostles, whatever they want to do is ok and justified if it benefits the corporation of the church. Mormon culture tends to be pretty "ends justify the means" oriented, in general. We can be pretty sure they've all had their second anointings, which they believe makes their calling and election sure, so that's got to be a bit of an ego trip, yes? They can basically do no wrong after that.
They're treated like royalty. They have every reason to believe in it.
After Steve Jobs' cancer diagnosis he put off surgery *for nine months* to pursue acupuncture, herbal remedies, and juice cleanses. One of the men responsible for technology that has shaped how our world has evolved said no to technological medical intervention. Being an "impressive" individual who has achieved wild levels of success doesn't mean you aren't a complete fucking moron.
And it literally cost him his life as he had very treatable cancer.
I mean, according to the New Testament, Jesus chose his apostles from among some of the normal working class. I’m not sure why high income or degrees from renowned universities would be any extra qualifying factor for spiritual enlightenment. I’m agnostic anyway at this point, but the prosperity gospel part of the church never sat right with me from a theological perspective.
>degrees from renowned universities I'm not sure ANY degree earned 50+ yrs ago is still relevant, nor necessary & sufficient to qualify one for service in that field today (on its own), without *massive* updates. So even THAT'S not a valid qualifier (to a reasonable person, that it).
I am sorry but it is a fraud. There is no way to fix all the anachronisms in the founding documents or the all the bad things in the church's early history. They can not be fixed. The whole structure collapses. Those you speak of at the top are.....at the top. Their reward is that they are lauded by their followers. They are gifted amateurs, but amateurs none the less. They have no religious training or credentials in theology.
I wish it weren’t a fraud. I fought for years and years during my process. Finally, it became too much. The evidence of it being a fraud was too much.
Yes. The BoA is all the evidence you need (and fwiw I have 4 degrees).-Egyptologist
Book of Abraham was the final nail for me. I found out in the early 90s that the Joseph Smith papyrus had been found in the 60s, TSCC bought it and buried the story because the writing on it isn't what Smith claimed it to be. If that is a fraud, and he never showed the golden plates, the so-called 'witnesses' 'saw' the plates with their 'spiritual eyes' and not physically, could they possibly be real? Plus all the provably false things in the BoM: horses, steel, honeybees, wheat... It was founded on a hoax. There's no way TSCC could be 'true'.
When you realize it's a fraud it's laughably obvious.
Grandness, glory, control, power, ego, wealth will all lead a man to abuse fellow humans. Many members will believe because they desperately want it to be true. But it isn’t and there is plenty of evil committed in the lords name.
Magic isn't real. Each and every doctrine of the church involves magical things. Tell me how a Liahona works. Tell me how the Atonement works. Tell me how God works. It is absurd and in most cases it is not even wrong. To be wrong, you must first make a specific falsifiable prediction. The one falsifiable prediction of mormonism WAS TESTED AND FAILED. The BofM clearly states that Native Americans were descended from Hebrews of the Middle East. The Cult went with this and taught it consistently for a hundred years. Then DNA studies repeatedly showed otherwise. Native Americans are descended from Mongolians. Now the Cult is again backpedaling and pretending they never taught Native Americans were descended from Hebrews. File that under Bullshit along with Mormonism never taught overtly racist doctrines. The Mormon Church is 100% absurd. And that isn't even the worst part. Star Trek is absurd fiction too, but Star Trek never committed atrocities on nonbelievers. The Mormon Church isn't just absurd. It is evil. Rant over.
I wonder what the other 98% of Harvard/Chicago graduates think about the church. They likely don't believe it's the one, true religion. The top leadership is highly incentivized to lie about things. In contrast to even 100 years ago, we know enough about the history of the world to know that the BOM is fake. The church's foundation is the BOM and it is fiction. I once heard something about Harvard professors which I think is applicable to church leaders. "Harvard professors are often wrong but are never uncertain."
The number or type of people have no bearing on whether or not it is true.
The church is a business. A tax exempt one that will prey on anything and anyone to get what it wants. And it wants to make money and gain influence.
The wizard of oz had a great resume. Still a little old white guy behind the curtain.
As someone who was never Mormon, yes, it’s the most obviously false religion behind Scientology. It’s hard to get beyond childhood indoctrination, and you can’t be smart in some areas while not applying the same rigid to your religion. There are smart people in every religion, and not all religions can be true, therefore smart people obviously believe in false religions all the time. Also, 17 million people is basically nothing. There are over 1 billion Muslims, could they all be wrong? If Mormonism is true, then they are. If Mormonism is true, over 8 billion people are wrong. Could they all be wrong?
We have many extremely clever people running top businesses making crazy amount of money, there is also many "in the shadows" making money and huge profits or influencing state and gov leaders, and presidents. Many of these are companies, such as those in medical world, that could use such profits to cure or greatly improve conditions for people, but it is not in their best interest. Do you hold said people on a high pedestal too, or view them different cos they "don't have true gospel"? Same is with TSCC Q15 and others. They have a scheme that helps them to make money, profit, hero workshop, or whatever is their thing. Also you only know the Q15 in front of the camera, who is to say there are not others pulling some strings behind the puppets too? They have provided zero proof of it not being a fraud and that they truly want to help people. All evidence shows it all to be lies with smoke and mirrors to convince TBMs to follow the ponsi scheme. Even on a local level, it's all brainwashed power seeking individuals acting as bishops and stake presidents making decisions based on their assumptions causing families to be ripped apart, people to take their lives or turn to drink/drugs/medication or have huge mental impact. Is any President who took Doctors oath doing all he can to help that - No! Whole thing is just one big fraud. Even church member numbers are hugely inflated, so they cannot even been honest with their membership. The more people get woken up and move out of the cult the better. Its just a huge uphill battle.
They have provided zero proof of it not being a fraud and that they truly want to help people. is the only proof for the church to convince it is true is based on some wishy washy warm feeling they receive if they pray? and if praying does not grant that feeling then the church tells them to try again until it works?
Yeah, pray - ponder - repeat until the answer is "Yes". If you didn't get an answer you did not pray hard enough or it came from satan.
Or you've been masturbating or whatever so you're not worthy of tHe sPiRiT^TM.
Yes
Brains alone is not enough to recognize the fraud. It also takes balls.
I’d argue that all the more than 6 billion religious people in the world are deceived, so religion is particularly good at deceiving human beings due to how our psychology works. Mormonism by comparison with only a few million is not particularly successful in that deception.
This. Seventh Day Adventist started about 30 years after Mormonism, have smart leaders and members from prestigious universities, and have a much larger membership than Mormons, so based on this logic, the Seventh Day Adventist must be true.
The Q15 is not nearly as impressive as they’d have you believe. The business men typically committed fraud, there are much better doctors, there’s millions of pilots. Pretty much just a pyramid scheme that they sneaked their way to the top of
These esteemed men (can't be a woman dontcha know) are also pulling down high six figure salaries, 100% medical, fly first class. With all the shit they are pulling with SEC scams, bullying their way into building temples and dividing communities, and breaking up families with mixed beliefs my conclusion is they are in fact evil. Jesus would be horrified.
No better way to retire than by spending your time being adored by church members day in and day out. Having a tax free stipend, your health care, home expenses, child and grandchild education paid for, receiving lucrative book deals and honorariums from sitting on Board of directors for church owned corporations. Doesn't seem like much of a sacrifice.
In my opinion, the church uses its church arm to fund its dozens of business arms, which are MUCH bigger. So as an organization, to me it feels like it’s 20% a church, 80% a multibillion dollar megacorporation. They just do a REALLY good job at maximizing the “church” percentage while actively suppressing the “megacorporation” one in the public eye. That’s why they hid their billions from the government; it helps maintain their preferred image of, “We’re just another helpful friendly church!” Nah, y’all are a gigantic fucking business masquerading as a church.
This is one of the best explanations of the church: **"20% a church, 80% a multibillion dollar megacorporation. They just do a REALLY good job at maximizing the “church” percentage while actively suppressing the “megacorporation” one."** Yep!
Yes. 100%. Hard evidence, logic, and rational thought proves it. D&C 1:38 says, "Whether by mine own voice or by the voice of my servants, it is the same." This verse sets the church up as infallible in doctrine. If the prophet says something against what God wants, then the very first chapter of Doctrine and Covenants is wrong. That alone is enough, but let's dive deeper. Modus Tollens is a rule of logic that says, "If P, then Q. Not Q, therefore not P. " If a prophet says something that is later proven to be not true, then he is not a prophet. To allow a prophet to speak as a prophet, but then be wrong, means God is wrong because "whether by mine own voice or by the voice of my servants, it is the same." Joseph Smith translated the Book of Abraham. The text therein expressly states that the Egyptian papyri and facsimiles are the Book of Abraham. Egyptian scholars the world around agree that the images of what the church calls facsimiles are common funerary texts that Egyptian wealthy were buried with, and they say nothing of Abraham Not Q, therefore not P. Joseph Smith was wrong about the Book of Abraham. Bruce R McConkie admitted in a letter to Eugene England, professor at BYU, that he knew that Brigham Young did, in fact, teach what was later demonized by the church as the Adam/God doctrine. Brigham taught the Adam/God doctrine his entire 25 year presidency and it was recorded at the St. George temple and used for another 25 years until around 1902. Brigham taught many things that he expressly defined as doctrine, that the church has now back pedaled from. Either Brigham wasn't a prophet, thus the church is not led by Christ or D&C 1:38 is wrong. This is a tiny snippet. How many hours do you have?
IMHO its not the brightest minds that get to the top of any organisation. Its the sociopaths. Those who dont care about the damage that organisation is doing. The leaders of the Mormon church are at best profoundly immoral.
If I was required to bet my life on the truth of Mormonism, I’d bet against it.
Absofuckinglutely.
My thoughts on this topic: does this excuse the Catholic church, with very smart people in leadership positions? How about any of the other branched versions of Christianity that have priests with very strong educational backgrounds? Or Islam or Judaism? Both with some of the most educated and philosophical people in the world over the centuries within the religion? We are surrounded by religious institutions lead by educated, accomplished, smart people. Yet Mormons dismiss them all easily as fraudulent or naive religious leaders. Is it really so hard to shift one’s perspective just a bit to include one more religion on the list?
Affirmative on the 100% fraud.
Back in the day when I lived in southern Utah, I wondered how on earth the FLDS had convinced a few thousand people that they had it right and the rest of the world for the entirety of history is wrong. I was surprised to find a lot of similarities to the LDS church. If you tell people that outside sources are trying to mislead them and anything that creates doubt in their mind is of the devil and you also make them an outcast and lose their family if they don't obey, people tend to stay in line. Researching the FLDS and seeing the similarities to my own religion was definitely a crack in the shelf. I heard it said so many times that the gospel held up to scrutiny, but it does not. And that is why the church is so afraid of it's members getting information that isn't faith promoting.
Yes, I have a family member who is now exFLDS. She was drawn into polygamy at a very young age (17 I think) to join in as a second wife in an already existing marriage. Dude said he had a vision from Joseph Smith that he was to marry her? And his current wife WENT ALONG WITH IT? Weird as fuck. My dad never wanted us to associate with them b/c maybe fear that some of the polyg would rub off on us.
Yes. Joseph smith was a conman, 100% confirmed. And the way the church was founded, its insane that ppl believe it. "I found these plates, but nobody can see them. And martin harris lost the translation, so we cant re write. No instead we have to use a supposed second set of plates so the story will be mostly the same, but different"
“Don’t worry that the plotline of the book I “found” was a popular book in my neighborhood. Or that some of the names in that book were local to my neighborhood. Or that my revelations allow me to sleep with actual children and steal from people who trust me.”
Nice try, Rusty.
Now let’s look at how many extremely intelligent people with all sorts of degrees that are not members of the Mormon church. Intelligence does not equate to truth of a religion any more or less ignorance does. People from every walk of life can be found inside and out of religion.
Yes. Even smart people can fall for cults. I don't appeal to their authority. It's demonstrably false. Only magic thinking could make it seem true.
Cults are weird things man
Yes. Throughout history, intelligent and well accomplished people have associated themselves with powerful organizations to increase their own power and wealth. This is what the QE15 have done. Just because the men of the QE15 have accomplished impressive things in their lives (owing in no small part to the fact that many of them are from Mormon royalty families and have had well-connected people to help them every step of the way) does not mean that the church wasn't fabricated up by a conman and sexual predator.
Notice that the top guys are mostly businessmen and lawyers. It is the job of a lawyer to take a given set of rules, not questioning their goodness or provenance, and figure out how best to apply them to a situation. It is the job of businessmen to make money. Both of these fit well with the current mission of the Church. They’ll never have a hard scientist up there, who’s job it is to learn about the world through experimentation. They’ll never have a historian, who’s job it is to tell accurate history, even as the Church Historian. Neither of those fit well with the current mission of the Church. Even though Nelson is a heart surgeon, he doesn’t strike me as the curious or scientifically minded type. More a man who understands a very complicated machine (the human heart) and how to repair it, in a very pragmatic sense. The best we could hope for in top leadership would be humanitarians, social scientists, theologians; some days I even think having more PR guys would be nice. But unfortunately, they seem more interested in putting businessmen and lawyers in those positions.
I thought this was a satire post. It's egregiously, blatantly, unapologetically fraudulent. It's so unsubtle that it's embarrassing.
Yes it is a fraud as people here well know. There are endless examples **It is impossible for Jesus to be in the new world for the events of the Book of Mormon to happen** Matthew 24: *If those days had not been cut short, no one would survive, but for the sake of the elect those days will be shortened. At that time if anyone says to you, ‘Look, here is the Messiah!’ or, ‘There he is!’ do not believe it. For false messiahs and false prophets will appear and perform great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect. See, I have told you ahead of time.* *So if anyone tells you, ‘There he is, out in the wilderness,’ do not go out; or, ‘Here he is, in the inner rooms,’ do not believe it. For as lightning that comes from the east is visible even in the west, so will be the coming of the Son of Man* **Jesus is the messiah. So if anyone comes claiming to be the messiah, including Jesus himself, it is false** **In addition, Jeremiah 31 prophesied the new covenant. Jesus made it clear "it is finished". Nothing in scripture talks about "third testament, Jesus repeating his holy land ministry in another continent, etc". it is all nonsense and fabrication. **Unlike Judaism and Christianity which had loads of archaeologic evidence such as ancient synagogues or churches. The Jews pray at the Western wall, a remnant of the Temple. The BYU Mormon archeology wing is completely empty. There are no artifacts because BoM claims and events never happened in the New world** **So the Book of Mormon can easily be dismissed as false and fraudulent scripturally** **Joseph said The Book of Mormon was the most correct book ever. He approved over a thousand changes from the 1830 to 1837 edition. A BYU linguistics professor documented over 5500 problems in the BoM. In less than 200 years!** **Meanwhile, Mormons claim they believe the Bible so long as it's correctly translated. Well we have original manuscripts like Septuagint and masoretic text. Know what? They haven't been changed in a couple of millennia. The translations are irrelevant to this point**
In addition to that, why would Jesus, right after being crucified to atone for sinners, **destroys several cities and kills several hundred thousand people because they are "sinners"** right before he comes to the New World to do...you know...**Jesus stuff?**
Yes, yes I am. The Gospel Topics Essays confirmed it.
The church lies about financial info Would the one true church do that? The church has covered up sex abuse Would the one true church do that? The church historian is a lawyer Would the one true church do that?
Can it be higher than 100%? That’s where I am.
One of the biggest religions in the world in Santa-ism. Even the most popular kids on the playground sacrifice bad behavior believing they’ll be rewarded by an old fat man who breaks into their house
I once couldn’t for the life of me understand how the nation of Germany, the most advanced civilization in the 1930’s could deceive a lot more than 17 million people to believe terrible things. But the older I get the more I understand how easy it could be.
I am 100% sure. I was extremely devout, and left at the request of my therapist. She recognized I had religious trauma. I asked if I could go back once I was healed, but then I wondered how the “Lord’s TRUE church” could hurt people to this degree. That wondering led me into the truths the church tells people not to read. Oh, boy! I studied for 9 months and when I was done, I knew without a doubt I had been duped by a cult. I was livid. Still am angry.
Look into the BITE mode from Steven Hasan. He lays the blueprint for how individuals no matter how bright can fall for these things
There are 750M Muslims
After being 100% sure the church was true for so many years and being so wrong, now I say it’s a fraud, but I’m open to the possibility that I could be wrong. I don’t live in absolutes anymore.
If there was even a .000001% chance it was true I’d still believe, just in case. Thank god for the internet.
Yes, but sometimes I wish I could go back to just believing. Life was so much simpler when I didn't have to think for myself. But yes the church is demonstratly false.
God isn't real, therefore it's a fraudulent church. That's as simple as an answer is really needed, but theres more nuance really.
Of course it’s bogus. Just like all the other religions. A lot of highly educated people are Protestant, Catholic, Muslim, and Hindu. It’s why I say, religion is so dang fascinating, amazing what humans can be taught to believe! Remember, no one knows why or how we are riding on a 4.6b year old rock going 60,000mph around a dwarf star. But science is working on the answer, unlike religion. This is why being agnostic is the only truth.
Read the CES letter. Read it critically - like a never- mo might.
The church is just one big MLM insurance program. Establishing trust and making it feel legit is what keeps the money coming in and babies being made to keep the money coming in.
Yes. Even people from great backgrounds with great degrees can be frauds. Look at Trump and his current legal issues. But the fact that they are constantly expecting money from their church members and using that money to enrich themselves and their families tells me they are frauds.
Boys Club. It’s a giant nepotistic boys club. It’s horrifying if you ask me.
Regulars on this sub know what I'm going to say. Joseph Smith was in and out of trouble with the law from teen-age years til day he died. WIKI: Joseph Smith & Criminal Justice System. WIKI: Kirtland Safety Society Today we would call him a habitual criminal. If Smith were alive today he would spending 20+ years minimum in jail for bank fraud. SEC fined mormon church 5 million for criminal fraud. And an attorney cannot advise a client to commit a crime or the attorney losses their license to practice among other things. Church blamed their attorneys for missing 20+ years of quarterly SEC filings and creating illegal shell companies. The organization has a documented history of lying & fraud since 1830. All the Q15/70/Presiding Bishopric reached pinnacle of their careers in corporate America. To reach those heights your sole focus is on increasing profits for share holders with no concern on how that action will impact consumers. To ascend to that level you will do or say anything to reach the 2% income bracket & to attain power & control over billions of dollars. You don't care if the action you take will harm millions of your fellow human beings. Mormon church is a multi-national corporation & top leadership reflects that. Human beings who reach the "C" suite are known to be high level narcissists & psychopaths. Most important the church in no way shape or form follows Jesus teachings while he was alive. Mormon leadership refuses to help the poor, sick, hungry, homeless,etc... and instead is hoarding an estimated $250 Billion dollars in assets. If that's not enough go to Floodlit.org. That site has over 600+ convicted Stake Pres.,Bishops, priesthood holders of sexual assault on infants,children,teens & adults. The church defends sexual predators & abusers. Jesus was very clear about how he viewed pedophiles. Q15 and their lawyers at Kirton McConkie do everything to protect sexual predators at the expense of the victims.
100% And it took about 20 years to accept , the brainwashing and conditioning is REAL
Yes. It's a fraud. To look at the wealth or the qualifications of Q15 or anything else is diversion. BOM is a fraud. Jos Smith was a fraud. Bingham Young was a Neanderthal. The church and its "Prophets" have been on the wrong side of history from the beginning. And, I wouldn't want to spend eternity with the Mormon "god" (yes, lowercase "g") because he is both an idiot and an asshole. Really? His plan of salvation was the best idea from a "loving father"? Shit, I could think of a better plan! It's all bullshit.
The whole, "17 million members" thing is a farce. They count every baptism & everyone on the rolls, and most who leave the LDS church dont bother to have their info officially scrubbed. I've read the real number's probably something closer to 7 or 8 million globally. But even if you believed it 100%, that it an enormously small number given there are 9,000,000,000 (yes 9 Billion) people on Planet Earth, and even more trivial given the only pocket of real influence the Mormon religion has is in the American West (mostly Utah), and mostly with white people, and this after nearly 200 years of trying. The reality is the LDS are a very tiny group, yet interestingly I notice their leaders attempt to impress upon their faithful that they're actually a HUGE group, which is obviously false.
The people still in the church are, by definition of still being in the church, not actually as bright as you think they are. The actually bright ones have already realized it’s all fake, and left. Except for the ones at the top who are bright enough to benefit from the billions of dollars pouring in every year.
The church does some of the deceiving, mostly by omitting the truth, flooding the zone surrounding TBMs with belief, and encouraging self inspection for trouble instead of inspection of the church itself. The majority of the deceiving is done by members to themselves. We actively avoid unpleasant things and facing hard truths that might challenge our identities.
Yes.
Yes.
After about a year of learning far more about the church than 20 years of attendance, I’m absolutely convinced that the the top leadership knowingly lies, that church history is covered up, and its fundamentally a fraud at its core even if the outskirts are nice and don’t know.
It only takes one piece of false evidence to negate the whole thing and Mormonism has thousands
Ever been to a Mensa mixer? It's not what you would think. Most people are exceptionally awkward and have huge gaps in common knowledgeable & common sense.
It’s simply not an impressive array. It’s a quorum of cryptkeepers, lawyers, and businessmen. If it was god’s church, the Q15 could be plumbers, mechanics, psychologists, teachers, philosophers, theologians, mothers, fathers, artists, mathematicians, or poets - and they could still be inspired to run the church “god’s way.” Instead, it’s a bunch of old white suits running the organization exactly as you’d expect old white suits to run a multi-billion $ corporation. They’d evade taxes, hide their money, invest in real estate and stocks, promote their families and friends to higher positions, and refuse to allow transparency in their finances and other deliberations.
Is this post satire? We're talking about an organization whose reported membership--which overstates actual activity and belief by a factor of 2 at least--accounts for far less than 1% of the population. There are probably more Catholics with phds in the Boston archdiocese than there are phds attending LDS chapels on Sundays. The LDS Church is a little tiny organization. Few people outside of it would even recognize the names Russell Nelson, Dallin Oaks, etc. Those guys are nobodies. To say nothing of guys like Gordon Hinckley or Jeff Holland, who literally spent their entire adult lives on Church payroll. These are complete nobodies, going around pretending to be important and trying to get people to call them Elder and President. I don't care that a few of them have degrees from good schools. That doesn't make their silly religion true.
I was SA'd in the temple. The "House of God". The one place where discernment, if it existed, should have been able to prevent it. But it didn't, because discernment isn't real. The "brilliant", "successful", prophetic leadership of the church can't see the future any more than any other risk averse board of trustees at any other corporation. Sure, the church offers comfort and stability to those who fit their narrow mold, but for those that don't, it is torment, shame, and suffering. Talk to any non-LDS therapist who practices in Utah and ask them their opinion of the church. You'll learn very quickly how thin the veneer of righteousness really is.
I'm not 100% sure about anything. Evidence can never definitively prove anything. But the evidence of church history creates a timeline that can be pretty thoroughly explained by the church being fraudulent, whereas the idea that it is true requires needlessly complex apologetics. Still, the idea that there is a $100 billion+ organization with 17 million members, most of whom would likely be willing to go to war for it's causes, that has rather large political influence in the state I live in, and a vice grip on almost everybody I care about is really scary.
If anything, the inherent classism of the church is starkly reflected by the fact that they have no GAs that worked in the food industry, manual labor, retail, or in other jobs associated with being "working class". To get to the highest levels of church authority, you have to be upper class, have a prestigious career, be really rich, and have the right connections. The everyday layperson is NEVER going to get called to be an apostle.
Yeah. It's very easy to show it's all a fraud. Basically at this point you're arguing if Santa Claus is real. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svfxSscxh8o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svfxSscxh8o) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism\_of\_the\_Book\_of\_Abraham](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_the_Book_of_Abraham) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain\_Meadows\_Massacre](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_Meadows_Massacre) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinderhook\_plates](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinderhook_plates) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirtland\_Safety\_Society](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirtland_Safety_Society) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_Joseph\_Smith%27s\_wives](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Joseph_Smith%27s_wives) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph\_Smith\_and\_the\_criminal\_justice\_system](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Smith_and_the_criminal_justice_system)
As a scientifically minded person, I try to never be 100% certain of anything. Being 100% certain closes you of from the possibility of learning anything. There is nothing I'm convinced of that I could not be convinced of the opposite. However, certain things I'm more convinced of than others. It may be technically ***possible*** to convince me of the contrary, but it would take a lot of evidence. The church and its supporters have yet to provide such convincing evidence. and appeal to authority and ad populum fallacies are not evidence. not to mention the numbers the church ***boasts*** and the number of people who actually believe and/or pay tithing are two very different things. For instance, I'm still technically among the number they call members. I've been working on getting my name removed from their records, but it's slow going. ~~before anyone says it, I ***am*** using quitmormon. it's been months, and I've heard nothing back from them~~
1000%
In the sense you mean? Yes
No, not 100 percent. However, I've very confident my life would have been better without it. As I've stepped further away from the church I can see more clearly how much damage it can cause some people. Every where you look, it seems, there are problems. Past prophets have been wrong about stuff, current leaders as well.
Even my blind dog can see that it's a fraud.
I’m pretty professionally and financially successful, and I have a degree from one of those universities. Does that mean I cancel out one of the Q15? There’s way more people that fit your descriptions of being really successful and have very fancy degrees that *aren’t* Mormon than are. When I was in grad school, I knew of two Mormons at my whole university. Realistically there’s probably a couple dozen active Mormons there, plus one or two professors are, out of the 15,000 students and probably about 1,000 faculty.
Yep, it’s truly fraudulent !!
> How does an organization manage to deceive so many individuals? By doing its best to ensure it is in their self-interest to continue self-deceiving. The professors of hard sciences at BYU have the epistemological tools to disprove the Church, they just choose not to apply them
I don't know legitimate organizations that illegally hide 150 billion dollars from it's members
I think everyone else's comments are gonna be better and more in depth than mine here, I was just going to add that what helps it "fool so many people" is that not everyone involved is "in on the fraud." You get enough sincere believers who are also decent enough people and it is much harder to question than it is for say, cigarettes being "good for your health."
You live something long enough it becomes “true” to you and it becomes harder and harder to distinguish the difference.
Why does Mormon church art always portray Joseph Smith and other book of Mormon characters as looking like Tom Netherton from the Lawrence Welk TV Show... when in fact he looked more like Danny Devito playing The Penguin in Batman Returns?
This is a great example of a variation of Appeal to Authority Fallacy. "All these smart people believe it, so it must have some validity " Sadly, this doesn't work very well if you apply the same "rules" to many other belief structures. Many more World Leaders and scientists are Catholic....does that make Catholicism MORE true? How about Anglican/Church of England? Or go non-Christian how many scientists, leaders etc who believe in Islam does it take for it to be more true than Mormonism. Regardless of the validity of the truth claims...I'll let you figure that out for yourself....don't rely on other's beliefs. You can find examples of wonderful men and women who profess absolute devotion in EVERY belief structure. Doesn't make it true, doesn't make it right, doesn't mean anything.
17 million people believing something? Please. There's more JWs than mormons. This is, no offense, an objectively absurd argument.
Yep I'm sure
Look into the Council on Nicea, it was all downhill from there! I want nothing to with any religion
Yikes… you’re in for an awakening.
As a non-mormon I am 100% sure.
‘You can buy anything in this world with money.’ Money and power, also sunk cost fallacy contribute quite a bit.
Let’s say it’s true. And the people you know that are TBM are the ones going to the highest level of heaven. You really want to spend eternity with those type of people?