OOOOH!!!! IT FEELS SO GOOD TO BE SOOOO RIGHT!!!!
by Michael Barker
I learned yesterday that my dear, less-active LDS friend’s wife died two days ago so I decided to call him.
I told him, “Too bad you and your wife weren’t keeping your temple covenants. Now you won’t be together after the resurrection.”
[silence]
If feels so good to be right.
In fact, it’s more important to be right than to be kind.
“…and are willing to bear one another’s burdens, that they may be light; yea, and are willing to mourn with those that mourn; yea, and comfort those that stand in need of comfort…” (Mosiah 18:9-10)
Miguel Barker-Valdez
Miguel is a Guatemalan-American Mormon living in the Northwest with his family. He is one of the proprietors of the Rational Faiths blog.
All posts by Miguel Barker-Valdez
Oh Mike you sound discouraged. Please don’t stop trying.
Wow, another snarky post on Rational Faiths, Imagine that.
What you, and the majority of your semi-active/apostate brethren, is that it is a two way street. You love to mock, ridicule, and judge the “more faithful” (of which I am not)and tell them how wrong they are but you can’t stand it when the tables are reversed and you scream and shout about how un-christ like it is.
You just don’t don’t understand the lofty goals of this website and it’s community. The only way to get back at the dumber, less enlightened “regular” Mormons and their judgmental nature is to judge them publicly in this blog. Using arguments drenched in hyperbole, of course.
Take THAT you lesser, regular Mormons!
I like Mark’s perspective. Nice post brotha.
Nailed it!
For the record, I’ve been a life-long church member and I’ve never heard anything remotely similar to what you’ve posted here. It seems like most of your posts are very much un-kind (towards church members in general or church leadership in general) and rarely grounded in truth — only meant to incite.
Accusing Mike Barker of being unkind and fomenting trouble is so way off base. Mike is known for his extreme kindness and his patience for those who have no insight into the gifts that Christ gave us. Mike is mourning the terrible lack of communication that was so evident in the recent excommunication. All of us know that this will be like other changes in the church: a few years down the line, changes will be made that bring the church more into line with God-like and Christ-like thinking, but the hurt that has been done to certain people will never be rectified. You would do well to study the gospel more and rely less on the traditions of men. Those traditions are what are causing the trouble. Not the gospel. Christ even warned us about relying on the traditions of men over the word of God. God and Jesus always treated women with the respect they are due. Husbands are admonished to love their wives as their own bodies, but the patriarchy has fought against the ERA and the ordination of women, proving that they are having a very difficult time loving their wives as themselves. This was not a loving reaction that caused the excommunication. But maybe it is for the best, because now the whole world can see the problems in the Mormon patriarchy. Maybe, in the long run, it will open up communication.
‘terrible lack of communication in the ex-communication”? Are you kidding me? Obviously you didn’t read the bishop’s letter outlining the numerous meetings they had with Kelly and the numerous attempts they made to meet with her. I don’t doubt that Michael is a good, kindly dude. You’d know better than me. I’m just saying that most of his posts put the church in a negative light and meant to incite untowardly feelings regarding the church. It just seems like a Rush Limbaugh approach to things — an approach I find off putting.
It doesn’t appear that you have read any of Kelly’s statements, which would be necessary in a fair assessment of the facts. Communication goes both ways. Just because the bishop is phoning and sending emails does not mean communication is taking place. The comparison to Rush Limbaugh, I take it, is a reference to sarcasm and irony. It’s too bad you find it so “off-putting”. Personally, I think Mike is very kind when talking about the Church. There are a lot of things that he could say that are much more damaging to the church’s image, things that are true and indisputable. But he does not concentrate on the negative things, which I admire him for. Mike chooses to be loyal to the church despite his awareness of the many mistakes it has made over the years. More importantly, he has a sense of community which, outside of Mormonism, I’ve only seen in the Jewish community. I wonder whether you would be as loyal had you done as much research as he has on church history. As far as trying to incite bad feelings toward the church, Mike has done more to keep me coming back than any other person, no, than 10 people put together. I hope you will use your obviously hearty intellect to do more research so you can put some of this into historical perspective, but of course only if you want to.
Point well taken Tracy. And I’m pleased to hear about Mike’s allegiance and how it’s helped you remain associated with the church. We need more of that for sure.
If I were Mike I would’ve bailed on the church years ago and been ten times more critical towards it in my blogs. He is patient and generous to the church, almost to a fault. If you have a problem with his posts, perhaps its more about the hard truths in the message rather than the messenger.
I’m glad to hear that about Mike. Truly. I was just calling a spade a spade regarding his last post about some fictive conversation between members of the church. I cannot even fathom a faithful member (who understands the gospel) would ever say something like that. We all know there’s ignorant members that may say something like that — but why focus on that? Thankfully, there’s not too many who fall into that category. Almost all members, upon finding that someone had lost a loved one would offer nothing but love — not judgment.
“Too bad [your husband’s parent’s] weren’t keeping [their] temple covenants [and left the church]. Now you won’t be together after the resurrection. [It must make you so sad…]”
i have personally been confronted with this phrase several times over the past 25 years; while my in-laws were still living, shortly after each of their deaths, and occasionally when i run into those who knew them when they were new converts and involved members for a decade, before their difficult decision to take another religious path…
The people who have spoken these words have been fairly well educated, highly committed to the Gospel, and motivated, high-achieving individuals with high-level callings.
How can this “core group” of members the church depends on for its continuance be so closed-minded about the agency of other people? Is there no respect for the choices of others? There seems to be no trust that God could possibly allow someone who has ever been a member of our church the chance to explore other belief systems without losing their salvation.
How could they believe that God had already decreed the Final Judgement for my parent’s-in-law–with no further consideration into possible reasons behind their decision to leave the church–much less blast me in the face with it in a public setting (middle-school band concert refreshment table, in one instance–and, in front of our children, no less, in another). It was beyond astonishing.
My mind would gasp for words to respond to them–but I was always caught off-guard. The sudden “punch in the stomach” left me speechless, unable to do anything but stare at them in horror, mouth agape, in complete bewilderment…
Roo – I agree with what you said, no argument there. I disagree that you hear these things often by educated people in the church who have ANY grasp of the gospel of Jesus Christ. I just sent an e-mail to active family and friends and asked if anyone has ever heard something like this in a mormon church — out of 84 people; only one had heard something like this. That’s the point I’m making. Let’s not focus on the one bad example and sensationalize it. That’s why I loathe people like Rush Limbaugh. Let’s not take the Rush Limbaugh approach and sensationalize everything.
Straw men arguments are in regular rotation around these parts.
All you have to do is go read the comments on pretty much any of the MoFem blog posts about Kate Kelly, especially the one about mourning and grieving, and you’ll have it slapping you in the face. I’m very happy for you that you haven’t experienced this type of nasty attitude but it is very much out there.
You may be right Esther, but I’ve had a different experience for sure. Maybe I’m unique, but I think it’s more of a mindset. Every congregation (of whatever faith) will have some ignorant, judgmental people coming to church; I’ve learned just to ignore their ignorance and move on. Some people get all bent out of shape and attribute one person’s ignorance to entire faith and it’s membership (whether it’s muslims, mormons, etc.). That’s why I didn’t like Mike’s post; because it completely contradicts what mormons teach and how most of them act. Why use an example of an ignorant mormon that we all recognize as ignorant? That’s my point.
1. Not everyone recognizes them as ignorant
2. They’re not as uncommon as you seem to think. Again, the Kate Kelly thing has really brought it out in people in the worst way.
Mike didn’t say “All Mormons are like this”. Mike didn’t even say “Most Mormons are like this”, or anything else that indicates that he “attributes it to the entirety of Mormondom”. It’s a post that makes an accurate point. If it doesn’t apply to you, great. But given the lack of blanket statement-ness, if it offends and upsets you and sets you on the defense that badly, maybe you should look deep inside and prayerfully consider why that is.
*Note: All “you’s” are general.
BTW, I am not “maybe” right, I *am* right. I have personally witnessed it. There’s no ambiguity about that.
JTS,I have personally heard my mother say these exact words when a non-member dies. She doesn’t believe that other religions think families will reunite in the afterlife. I guess they will all be wandering around as strangers….
I’m sorry to hear that Darlene – all I can say is that your Mom must not have a very good grasp of what Christ’s gospel is all about. It’s all about love, nurturing and serving. If she acted that way, it certainly wasn’t something she was taught to do in an LDS church. I think we can all agree that any behavior like that discussed in Mike’s original post would be something completely unChrist-like.
And Adam – you say ‘you would have bailed on the church long ago’ if you were Mike. Does that mean you already have bailed? If so, why are you reading an LDS blog?
Aside from the fact that many people actually like reading and learning about faiths and cultures they aren’t part of, it’s not like there’s been anything going on lately in Mormonism that has attracted a great deal of media attention from the mainstream media and turned a lot of non-Mormon attention on the Church. And it certainly isn’t like Mormons who share Mormon blog links on social media have non-Mormons on their friends lists/followers/whatever that follow the links to read what’s been posted…
So we’re you born an insensitive self righteous asshole, or do you work hard at it?
News flash–self righteous jerks who think they are headed to the celestial kingdom–aren’t.
Thank you Marilyn — it just comes natural for me. It’s one of my gifts. And no, I’m sure there won’t be a spot for me in the Celestial Kingdom. I might be a jerk, but i’m not a self-righteous one.
JTS….thanks for being a Mormon crusader and coming to the rescue. Your Christlike example will shine through to all and help us become better people. Obviously, as we can tell, your experiences seemingly trump all the experiences that anyone else has had…so thank you for coming here to enlighten and bring us all to Christ.
Thank you Garrett; your sincerity and non-judgmental attitude is appreciated.
I’m reading through older comments and I thought this one was very Rush Limbaugh. Do you confess it so?
Probably — though that’s a hard pill to swallow.
I so appreciate your honesty. Thank you.
All who are throwing negatives at Mike obviously don’t know him. He fits none of your erroneous stereotypical assessments. And those of you who have never heard the above mentioned comments regarding the destiny of inactive members and/or “apostates”, you definitely need to get out of the house and pay closer attention.
Brent, I have no reason to doubt Mike is a good dude. I just take issue with his statement (not the substance of it — we all agree on that) that it’s common in active church members — that simply is not true. I just polled 82 active members and only ONE person has ever heard a statement like that and, more importantly, they just shrugged it off b/c it was made by someone who everyone knew was a gossip and didn’t have any proper grasp of the gospel. The church only teaches uplifting things — its doctrine is good (it’s Christ’s doctrine) — the fact that some people don’t apply it very well is sad indeed but let’s not focus on the few bad apples and attribute it to all or most of active church members. It does no good.
JTS,
You just polled 82 active members and none of them had heard anything like that….damn….those results must represent the other several million members. Why don’t you poll your sample group as well and see how many know ham many teenage brides Joseph smith had. Apparently, JTS, you are under the impression that since you have never seen, witnessed, or experienced something like this or that the other 82 people in your poll haven’t that it never happens. If I asked 82 people that had never been sexually abused by their friends, family, leaders, etc then I guess I could assume that sexual abuse never happens either. I’m glad you hit the magical number of 82 polled….because you have taken the study now to a quantitatively and qualitatively accurate study and worthy of scientific publications.
Garrett, what’s your problem? Do you watch Rush Limbaugh all day? You seem to use his tactics very well. By the way, I’m quite sure J.S. had 30 wives and most of the 82 would probably guess something in that range.
JTS,
Hahahaha….rush Limbaugh…..damn that is really funny. The question isn’t what’s my problem. I’m not the one attacking every single person that disagrees with your stance. You have proven to be nothing more than argumentative and looking to take down anyone, who doesn’t share your stance, with your fool proof knowledge. So what’s my problem….I can’t stand arrogant individuals who always think they’re right on everything and unwilling to consider that possibly they might be wrong once in a while.
Garrett, I think you’ll be able to think more clearly without those goofy glasses.
Or is that your attempt to look like your hero George F. Will?
JTS,
I love the insults. Keep them coming. The funny thing is that if I went and polled 82 members and asked them if an active, believing member would be willing to lower themselves down to this level of pitiful insults to defend the faith, none of them would believe it.
Ahhh, religion. It brings out the best in people.
Agreed; I need to put an end to my silly insults. Crazy what normal human beings can do when hiding behind initials instead of a real name.
Personally I am looking forward to the day we can move from most Mormons know this is wrong to all Mormons know this is wrong and stop doing things like this. The only people who should feel defensive or accused here are the people who hold the attitude expressed.