In light of the recent events with the FLDS church and polygamist groups, I have been increasingly annoyed at the way the news portrays this group as having ANY affiliation with "MY" church (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints). I understand the distant link back to the 1800's but SERIOUSLY. Honestly and truly. The beliefs, the lifestyle, what we regard as 'okay' and 'normal' is not even close to related.
I guess I get tired of the lies and the misconceptions about the LDS church. I get tired of other churches having sermons on 'how to save your mormon-friend's soul'. It is so ridiculous. I am so thankful that I do not go to church on Sunday and learn how to "save" my Catholic, Baptist or Protestant friends.
Although I have personally chosen to align myself with the teachings and lifestyle recommendations of the LDS church - and through my own personal path of doubt, learning and prayer have decided that this particular Gospel is the way in which I want to raise our children ..........what I ULTIMATELY believe is that it is absolutely vital to live a Christ-like life, full of love, compassion, forgiveness and honesty.
In that vein, I am actually HAPPY that there are many churches out there to teach these values. I have many family members who are not of the LDS faith, but live good, upstanding, Christ-like lives and I do not for a second believe that they are any less than me, or different than me. I appreciate that they, and many of my friends, have found God and look to him for direction and light - regardless of which organized body of religion they choose to do that with. It does not shake my faith whatsoever in what I have come to believe. I wish there was more of an overall focus on common goals, thoughts and ideas rather than CHANGING eachother.
Back to my original topic, here is what I found on a website about the FLDS group:
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (a.k.a. the LDS Church and Mormons) is by far the largest denomination in the LDS Restorationist movement. They regard themselves as the only true spiritual descendent from Smith's original church. They consider the term "Fundamentalist Mormon" as a contradiction in terms, since they don't regard themselves as Fundamentalist, and they don't acknowledge any other denominations to be truly Mormon.
I don't even like that they say we are denominations of the same group because we are SO different now. Anyway, just had to vent a bit.
And for the record, I also hope the government works this out without scarring the poor little innocent children - regardless of how different and strange the group's beliefs (or hair-dos) are.
4 comments:
I love your comment about the hair do's. Every time we see it on the news Ryan comments that I need to fix my hair like that:) I agree with this post whole heartedly. I don't deal with the "other" churches trying to change the mormons. I have the opposite- the mormon attitude of better than- when in my own experience of growing up in a non LDS area that MANY people are Christian, and very SPIRITUAL. In fact, some of the most spiritual people I know aren't LDS. Thanks for the post.
I think if there were problems with sexual child abuse of young girls perhaps they should have left the moms and kids at home and moved the men out!
MOM
I agree with Pam, aside from the media association of FLDS with LDS that irritates me (I'm in the same boat as Katie), my heart ACHES for those kids. They should have moved the men out, and let the women and children stay in familiar environments until things got sorted out. What a mess. For some reason, this whole thing seems as psycho and historical as Waco.
I do have to comment that I watched a dateline or something that had a few women that had left. They said some of the women are just as guilty as the men. One lady left her husband because he wouldn't LET their daughter get married underage! She went and lived with their "prophet" instead so she could make her daughter get married underage. It is just a big mess.
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