edit: I want to be clear that I enjoy this type of back and forth, but only if you do. I'm not trying to demean anybody here, I just enjoy this type of sparring. I still think the people who jumped on the "mormons are not Christian" thing immediately after (now 4) people were killed are bad people. If you want to keep arguing because you also think it's fun, then all good, but please don't take any of this as me wanting to attack you, or other mormons. If you want to know my feelings: I consider you guys brothers, and think that a lot of what the mormon church has done from a strategic and organizational perspective is impressive and something I wish my own church would take notes on, but I also think that the book of mormon is very obviously a hoax from a creative young man in 1800s upstate New York. From talking to mormons, I see a lot of overlap in the implementation of Christian philosophy, especially the emphasis on the importance of doing good work, with my own, Catholic beliefs. I think that's good. Okay I hope I've been reassuring enough that I don't mean any of this in bad spirit, just because I enjoy the game:
It seems like you’re claiming there really aren’t many differences.
Then why the need for the entire project? And if so many core theological beliefs of Mormons just eventually get erased out, as the “god was once a man” did in 1997 or so, then what is the point of any of it?
By the way, I think this is a good thing. Mormon beliefs like black people lesser-than (or in some cases outright demons), everybody getting their own planet, Kolob, polygamy, etc. are all things which I think are wrong, and all thinks which the Mormon leaders have later discovered that they think are wrong too.
They also seem like things a teenager in the 1800s in upstate New York would make up as part of a fantasy universe.
As far as the literal truth of the Book of Mormon: there’s obviously a ton of problems here. Horses not existing in pre Colombian America, for instance. Jews not sailing from the Levant to North America in ~600BC for another.
Stellula
1d ago
What are the parts of Christianity that Mormons believe were missing for 1800 years?
Which differences would you accept as “yes these actually are the different beliefs we have”, that were so important that an angel had to come to upstate New York in the 1800s and reveal them to Joseph smith?
Stellula
1d ago
I, luckily, have no idea what your first sentence is talking about. Could you expand on this?
Stellula
1d ago
I would imagine so? This is a pretty unambiguous teaching which is routinely affirmed by their leadership.
Stellula
1d ago
Jesus and Paul both believed that God was The Universal Prime Mover, that is: there is nothing before God. He set the universe in motion. Mormons do not believe this, but rather that God was a human that lived in an existing universe, and through good works ascended to God status.
No. Mormons are substantially less Christian that Christians are Jewish.
The mormons believe that God was once a man who then became a God, and their version of enlightenment/ascendance/heaven is that they will themselves become God. Christians and Jews believe in the same God. Mormons do not believe in the same God as Christians, Jews, or Muslims.
Here are some mormon redditors trying to figure out how to square this, btw.
I know there are quite a few mormons who post here. Feel free to just ignore all this, btw. I love a good debate about religion, but I love you guys more, and don't want it to come at your expense, or to feel like people are kicking you while you're down - what happened yesterday was horrific.
Stellula
2d ago
American liberals do not understand that the US has by far the most permissive immigration policy in the developed world.
Stellula
4d ago
My point is to illustrate how deceptive reporting is on these things. My choice of “coinbase app on my phone” was a deliberate choice for the exact reason you are stating.
Stellula
4d ago
a loaded handgun, a hunting knife, and $3000 in cash.
Iowa is a constitutional carry state.
What percentage of men have hunting knives in their car? 100%? I've had some sort of knife on my person at all times where it was legal and practical since I was like 12 years old. A pocket knife is as much a part of my pants as my wallet is.
$3000 cash? Who cares?
If you pulled me over and tried to write this story about me it would be like: "man found with a loaded handgun (normal where I live), multiple tactical knives (a leatherman in my pocket, and the one that fell between the seats and I never found), spotting equipment (binoculars I keep in the glovebox for monitoring the situation), and hundreds of thousands of dollars of untraceable cryptocurrency (my coinbase account viewer on my phone).
I hate that this is highlighted on these stories.
The story here is: illegal immigrant given job as head of DMPS. Apparently the weapons charge he had was bad enough that he was given a deportation order by the Biden administration in 2024. Maybe that was a legit gun charge?
"Had gun in car" is a pointless non-fact.
Stellula
7d ago
I’m surprised at the controversy.
It seems like this was a tactical choice. I think this also reflects exactly in how I see Buttigieg, as the absolute stereotype of the political striver.
It’s clearly not a good choice to run a gay man in 2024, especially when the effective ad from Trump they keep talking about is “I’m with you, she’s with they/them”. Pete does not deserve the presidency for running through the gauntlet correctly. It’s not a crown. People actually have to vote for him.
Stellula
9d ago
Saint Peter, the Protestant!
I obviously like my orthobros, but this is a major cope. Why did none of the bishops oppose the gospel of Mathew during the councils assembling the Bible? Why did they ask the pope for his blessing (in the colloquial sense) over their work?
By the 4th century, it was already established that the Pope had a leadership role different than the other bishops. It makes sense that at some point (1000 years after the church was founded and after it had become a major global power) that there would be people who would claim leadership of it, but for geopolitical reasons.
Again, I like the orthodox bros. They are cool, and I pray almost daily for reunification, but this claim is pretty ridiculous on its face. Was Jesus a Protestant too?
Stellula
9d ago
Well yes Catholics would say that we have access to more, we have the Bible, but also we have the Church which was founded by Christ himself.
The claim that Protestants worship the Bible is based on the idea that they seem to hold the words in the book at a higher relevance than what they actually say, or what Jesus actually did or said.
(Snark snark)
Stellula
10d ago
I'm sure anybody with time can run circles around me going toe to toe about Bible translations.
But this is kindof the difference between Catholics and Protestants. We don't worship a book, we're trying to live good, Christian lives. While Protestants will get obsessive about bible translations, Catholics get more obsessive about the meaning implied.
That all said, I think the broad strokes of the reformation and the early church are pretty obvious. Ironically, it's access to information (the internet) which will likely end Luther's work.
Martin Luther claimed that the church was intentionally making the bible difficult for local people to read in their own language. The purpose of this lie was so that he could create his own "interpretation".
Luther did not believe in free will. One "fix" he added to the bible was in Romans 3:28.
“So we hold that a man is justified without the works of the law, by faith alone.”
The previously accepted translation was:
“For we hold that a man is justified by faith without the works of the law.”
Stellula
10d ago
The schism maintained the concept of a Church.
The reformation basically threw out 1500 years of philosophy in favor of "vibes" and "sola scriptura" (which is the idea that all of Christian philosophy can be derived from The Bible itself and idea which is on it's face stupid due to the fact that it was only assembled 400 years after the Church was founded).
EOs and Catholics are bros. There's a reason why you see the Ecumenical Patriarch and The Pope together so frequently.
Stellula
10d ago
my local Unitarian church
Can I be annoying Catholic for a second? Here's the general timeline of Christianity.
-
Christ upon death, entrusts Saint Peter with the formation of a church.
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This church exists for about 400 years, doing philosophical work, being murdered by romans, and assembling the gospels
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400 years into it, they start calling some councils so that they can assemble a book which encompasses and explains their theology.
-
They assemble the bible
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One thousand years later, and one thousand and five hundred years after Christ establishes a Church on Earth, a retarded autist named Martin Luther decides that he doesn't like the Church that Christ founded, and wants to start his own, with his own [stupid] philosophical beliefs at the center. Marty creates a lie about bible translations so that he can insert his own idea by "translating" the bible into German.
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This effects of this are...negative. 500 years after this, we have the things you experienced.
tl;dr - you didn't go to a Church. You went to a weird narcissism cult that is wearing Church as a costume.
If you want to go to a Church, then go to a Church.
Stellula
11d ago
credulous HR departments with no technical knowledge
This is exactly right. Just wanted to highlight the best part of your post.
The US is not an economic zone.
While the implementation is cruel (giving people out of the country essentially 24 hours to return), this had to happen.
The 2008 housing collapse could arguably be blamed on the appraisers. They were going along with the scam and giving 20% annual appreciation to houses, while the rating agencies were fudging the quality of the debt being sold. People were supposed to be watching each other, but they weren't and everybody was getting rich.
In US tech jobs, the blame lies on the HR departments. The obvious fake resumes the obvious nepotism and discrimination between Indian hires, etc.
Everybody who works in this industry has seen how this scam functions. You get one Indian in a position of power in your company, and shortly thereafter, the entire company is Indian, and the quality of work has dropped to 0. HR doesn't understand because the resumes claimed that these were all "high quality" employees with tons of certifications (fake) degrees (fake) and experience (fake).
Yes this benefited many Indians, benefitted India, and may have benefitted some American companies, but it was all at the detriment of middle class Americans.
Again, we are not an economic zone. The H1B system was blatantly abused, specifically by Indians, and now it's ending. Good.
(Although my guess is that this get's reversed over the weekend, I'm still going to enjoy the few more hours where it's real)
Charlie’s dead, man. I’ll be outside. Good luck.
While yes I generally agree with this, and yes this is all against my principles…
…the opponents of western liberal democracy have resorted to simply executing people. Those not actively involved in the execution have demonstrated that they will happily burn our cities when they don’t get their way.
My sense is that the conservatives don’t WANT any of this.
I really wish you and the person below you would just link to the part of the speech you are talking about.
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