Religion

[Valsum]

Weird In spanish, we call the religion "Cristianismo", that's why I translated it to Christianism, but I understand now.

And well Seko, I believe the catholic church despite all its mistakes is the one true church. Jesus put Peter in charge of His Church, and for unity the figure of the Pope is very important. Look at how many protestant churches there are. But I respect your views -of course- and I pray for the unity of the christian churches every day...As future priest I've been taught of the importance of celibate: mainly you can't have a "divided heart", you must give all your love the Christ and the Church, and through them, to the rest of the world. I think it's a quite good point of view.

[Nalaris]

One vision?

Go read the Joseph Smith history. Joseph Smith was visited by Moroni three times before he got the plates, and my heck if God and Jesus Christ come to tell you to restore the true church to Earth, do you ask for a second vision for confirmation?!?

At the opening of the first Mormon temple angels walked in and on it, and Joseph Smith and some of the other general authorities saw Christ. The history of the Mormon Church is littered with visions.

One vision, bah!

[deadboy]

Ehehehe I know someone called Joseph Smith, I didn't like him.

[Phalynx]

my heck if God and Jesus Christ come to tell you to restore the true church to Earth, do you ask for a second vision for confirmation?!?

Nope I'd take clozapine...

[west]

As future priest I've been taught of the importance of celibate: mainly you can't have a "divided heart", you must give all your love the Christ and the Church, and through them, to the rest of the world. I think it's a quite good point of view.

What's good for one may not be good for everyone. But if it works for you, I say go for it, and Jesus backs me up. References provided upon request.

Joseph Smith was visited by Moroni three times before he got the plates, and my heck if God and Jesus Christ come to tell you to restore the true church to Earth, do you ask for a second vision for confirmation?!?

Yes. Yes I do. Once could be a dream. Once could be a hallucination. Heck, Reese Witherspoon visited me in a vision once. But if I was visited twice, with "I was here. -Jesus 06!" written in fiery letters on the wall, and a picture of me with Jesus, well sign me up for church-building!

[the_antisocial_hermit]

Couldn't the plates only be read with special glasses or sight or something? And weren't they gold or something?

I don't know really, just some vague things I was told, but maybe distorted or not understood fully. I do know the library I work in has a couple of Mormon books (lots of books about Mormons in general though I'm not sure why... some guy donated them all...) in some weird looking written language... and I'd heard to understand the language you needed some sort of special glasses or sight that were only granted to the guy that recorded it once. The language almost looked like a written Native American language, but it wasn't. We've got lots of those books too.

*Edit* Found what the alphabet is called, the Deseret alphabet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deseret_alphabet

There's also a link to the Cherokee alphabet page, which is the Native American language that my supervisor said it looked a lot like when we first came across the book.

And this is the book that we have:



The Book of Mormon : an account written by the hand of Mormon, upon plates taken from the plates of Nephi
Smith, Joseph, 1805-1844, tr.
Publication info: New York : Pub. for the Deseret University by Russell Brothers, 1869.
Physical descrip: [8], 116 p. ; 23 cm.
General Note: Title and text printed in the Deseret alphabet. cf. Bancroft, Hist. of Utah, 1889. 712-714.

I'm pretty sure that's the right holding for the right book; it's the only one I could pull up in our library with the Deseret alphabet. I know that's the cover of the book I saw.

[Nixit]

Ahahaha! Funniest thing! I just learned that my -BIOLOGY- teacher believes in Creationism and not Evolution!! Oh my... that's funny.

Not saying that I don't respect people who believe that, but just the fact that he teaches Biology, it's kinda weird.

[Dee]

And because he teaches biology, he knows better

I believe in creationism.

I can't even believe that some people believe in Evolution, no offense. But it is kinda logical.. Everything has a beginning, and an end.

[N-Aldwitch]

Not necissarily... Most people in the professional business of philosophy are universally agreeing that the Universe has no start nor an end.

What you said was a little stubborn let me explain.
Humans have 'invented' a thing called Time. It's not real, it just measures a certain period in human existance.

You know for a fact that the universe is never ending- it goes for ever. Think of getting a ruler, a 30 centimetre one, and holding it in space. You're only measuring that space, not all the universe and because of that, you can't multiply the ruler over and over until you figure the length of the universe, it just automatically is unending.

[formerly known as hf]

Not necissarily... Most people in the professional business of philosophy are universally agreeing that the Universe has no start nor an end.

References, please.

Last time I looked into it, not that long ago, opinion was deeply divided, and there was almost zero consensus, especially amongst physicists.

[Nalaris]

God created 'worlds without number'. The Universe is infinite.

Never seen the Deseret alphabet before, my Book of Mormon (and, for that matter, my Bible, Pearl of Great Price and Doctrine and Covenants) is in English.

The Book of Mormon was originally a set of gold plates which was only seen by a select few for fear that it would be stolen (Joseph Smith was ambushed on his way back to his house with the plates), but Joseph Smith did write down several of the characters in it and gave them to a friend who had them certified by a university professor. Upon learning the requester of the certification was Mormon, he ripped up the certificate of authenticity. Jerk. They were translated by divine power more than special glasses, but the glasses were the instruments of aforementioned power.

I promise you, that I would dare not pass off a meeting with God as a hallucination (unless it obviously was. If you met God and Jesus Christ, don't you think it would stick? Unlike a hallucination which either seems oddly unreal or is obviously unreal but you're too drunk to realize it at the moment.).

Um...any other questions?

[deadboy]

Yes. If I claimed to have seen Jesus and wrote down some things on some..... oh I don't know, platinum..... bowls, would you believe me?

[SekoETC]

One vision?

Go read the Joseph Smith history. Joseph Smith was visited by Moroni three times before he got the plates,

Ok correction, one person's visions. It all started from that.

and my heck if God and Jesus Christ come to tell you to restore the true church to Earth, do you ask for a second vision for confirmation?!?

Oh, absolutely.

1 Thess. 5:21 prove all things; hold fast that which is good;

I couldn't know for sure that it really were Jesus. And about Jesus showing himself to a bunch of people... He wouldn't put on such a big show if it weren't the second coming. People are easily fooled, especially by charismatic leaders and demons in disguise.

2 Cor 11:14 And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light

Actually Jesus wouldn't have a need to tell people to start a new church, he already planted the seed 2000 years ago. Sure all churches to follow have failed in one way or another but that's because we're human, there's no chance of perfectionism. Actually the thought of worldwide churches is pretty twisted, people are being lead by priests and bishops when Jesus should be the head of church!

And is it any good Mormons are gathering donations from lonely old ladies and building big-ass churches with the money, when Jesus himself said not to build treasures on earth, gather them into Heaven. Everything people do here on Earth is terribly small, what is a temple compared to the whole damn universe?? A person could spend whole his life building up a cathedral but it would be smaller than a single electron compared to all what God has created.

[deadboy]

In fact I've got to try that I'm going to buy some ... platinum bowls, write some stuff on them, and see if anyone bases a religion on me

[Stan]

I believe Joseph Smith was a false prophet talked about by Jesus in Matthew 24 when he said "and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people." Matt 24:11