#LDS doctrine

[midnight-in-eden]



This subject matter is heavy... but I was wondering if you or any of your followers could explain what they were taught, concerning "Outer Darkness." (aka: a Hell Mormons invented so can still say 'we don't believe in Hell! :DDD' to potential converts). Through the 90s, I was told it was reserved for those who knew the 'truth' of the church but denied it. Isolation in darkness, a lot of scary things lurking, implied pain. Though at the end of all things eventually those souls, would be saved no matter what, it simply would just take much longer and they would struggle and suffer for a long time in isolation before being forced to accept the truth. I was told recently that what is being taught is different, that the souls in Outer Darkness have one last chance but then their souls/spirits just dissapear, forever. Is this unique to one wacky bishop my friend was subjected to, or is this more widespread? Am I the odd one, here?

I’m sorry this took a while to get to! Apologies in advance for the essay. Feel free to ask clarifying questions bc I’m not sure if I explained this very well, but ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I tried.

In recent years, I have heard members try to redefine outer darkness as a punishment only for people who have literally seen God and still rejected the church. This is not what the church has always taught.

The Gospel Principles manual describes people who will go to outer darkness:

These are they who had testimonies of Jesus through the Holy Ghost and knew the power of the Lord but allowed Satan to overcome them. They denied the truth and defied the power of the Lord. There is no forgiveness for them, for they denied the Holy Spirit after having received it. They will not have a kingdom of glory. They will live in eternal darkness, torment, and misery with Satan and his angels forever.

Notice that it doesn’t say “These are they who have seen God in the flesh.” It says “who had testimonies of Jesus through the Holy Ghost.” In other words, people who genuinely believed at one point but have rejected the church. The only unforgivable sin is to deny the Holy Ghost, meaning to have a testimony through the Holy Ghost and reject it. That’s what earns a person a one-way ticket to outer darkness.

After death but before physical resurrection and final judgment, spirits who have rejected (or simply not received) the gospel will go to spirit prisons, whereas baptized Mormons will go to spirit paradise. Spirits in spirit prison will be given the opportunity to repent and choose to accept the gospel (and accept the temple work Mormons have so graciously done for them by proxy, at which point they can upgrade to spirit paradise). What you’ve described—a place akin to hell, where people will suffer but ultimately be able to be saved—sounds like spirit prison to me. Outer darkness, however, is something different. Outer darkness comes after the final judgment, and the people in it will not get to repent. They’ve missed their chance.

You can think of spirit prison as Mormon purgatory while outer darkness is actual permanent Mormon hell.

And no, souls in outer darkness will not disappear/die forever. The bishop who said that may have been confused by the fact that, while everyone will be resurrected from physical death, people in outer darkness will not be saved from spiritual death. But “spiritual death” in LDS doctrine just means separation from God (you can read about that in the Gospel Topics essay on “Death, Spiritual”, if you are inclined).

As you can probably tell, this was of great concern to me when I was a believer 😅 I was pretty convinced my sexuality and my inability to “repent” of it meant I was denying my testimony and I was therefore condemned to outer darkness. Ironically, as someone who had a testimony and now rejects the church, I now actually do meet the criteria for outer darkness…but I feel much less anxious about it now lmao.

Anyway. Tl;dr outer darkness is the permanent destination for people who had a testimony of the church and then rejected it, while everyone else including Hitler will end up in one of the various castes of heaven.

#outer darkness #exmo #exmormon #LDS doctrine #anon #ask

[latter-day-saint-nick]

#lds #tumblrstake #queerstake #book of mormon #doctrine and covenants

[loveerran]

Doctrine?

I hope the following will help us identify things that do and do not change over time. I think if members would stick to this, we would have fewer problems honestly. I'll use the Word of Wisdom for my list below, but you can add anything here and it will work well:

Doctrine (pure truth that never changes and can be applied to all God’s children at any time in the history of the world) - * Example: "Our earthly, mortal bodies are an important part of God's eternal plan for us."*

Principle (a good value derived directly from Doctrine that does not contain a specific practice) - Example:  "We should take care of our mortal bodies and treat them with respect"

Policy (a specific practice required by the church as part of the regular order of behaviors) - Example: "No coffee, tea or tobacco, and this is required for a temple recommend."

Counsel (a specific set of recommendations and guidelines, often derived from Principle but not something the church has implemented as required Policy) - Example: The rest of the Word of Wisdom

This was life-changing for me, and I hope it does some good for you as you listen to counsel from church leaders speaking about the doctrine of God - and also about principles and practices that are important to them.

#ldsconf #doctrine #principle #policy or practice #counsel and advice #the word of wisdom #new fsy #tumblrstake #religion #queerstake #lds #mormon

[pressforwardsaints]

"And the arm of the Lord shall be revealed; and the day cometh that they who will not hear the voice of the Lord, neither the voice of his servants, neither give heed to the words of the prophets and apostles, shall be cut off from among the people;

For they have strayed from mine ordinances, and have broken mine everlasting covenant;

They seek not the Lord to establish his righteousness, but every man walketh in his own way, and after the image of his own god, whose image is in the likeness of the world, and whose substance is that of an idol, which waxeth old and shall perish in Babylon, even Babylon the great, which shall fall."

— Doctrine and Covenants 1:14-16

#lds #the church of jesus christ of latter day saints #christianity #doctrine and covenants #scriptures

[mosesonethirtynine]

Seek not for riches but for wisdom, and behold, the mysteries of God shall be unfolded unto you, and then shall you be made rich. Behold, he that hath eternal life is rich.

Doctrine and Covenants 6:7

#daily scripture #doctrine and covenant #godisgood #eternal life #the church of jesus christ of latter day saints #lds #seek not for riches #but for wisdom #mysteries of God shall be unfolded #he that has eternal life is rich

[imminent-danger-came]

I've made it no secret that I'm an ex-mormon, and I have to complain about President Nelson's (the current LDS Prophet) talk from last Sunday. It's so egregious.

(Side note Joseph Smith went to Liberty Jail because he destroyed a printing press that was trying to publish a story about his polygamy lol)

(Other side note, part of the mormon law of chasity includes not having gay sex)

Oh my goddddddd. Oh myyyy GOODDDDDDDDDD. "Never take counsel from those who do not believe." Dude what the fuck are you saying.

#I can hear the mormon speaker cadence in my HEAD i can HEAR IT #hmmmmmm oh baby. this religion is a cult #Sometimes I forget I was raised in a cult and then I remember #conference weekends were grueling #8 straight hours of guiltripping for 2 days baby. #god #imp tag #mormonism #I was looking at their views on transgender folk and I have now learned that in the early 1900s #they considered birth control to be evil. because ''limiting the number of children in a family...is sinful'' #one of the easiest ways to upset me is to have me look through lds church doctrine. I will get teary eyed within 5 minutes #miserable. miserable religion

[thewritehag]

Since I was a kid, I have imagined that the "first" resurrection wouldn't be instantaneous, but like when you rewind that one part in Beetlejuice, except in the cases of people whose parts didnt end up in one place or whole, like if they were cremated. I always picture fully-formed body parts making their way back to their original person (in cases of post-op trans people, those particular parts won't be a problem because of the nature of Identity, which transcends all), so like a tongue doing this down the street

back to their original person and, on the way, they meet up with the other body parts to their person and individual pieces start to form into the complex humam constructthe one person's parts would gather into one group, so you'll have a fully formed hand running next to the crawling tongue after all the little bones got into range of each other and there's a pod of seemingly sentient human remains all headed in one direction, like this

They're all running to where their Person is going to respawn, which would be in and near the brain, because that is where the (living) Self is seated. Imagine the pickled brains wing in a medical museum when most or all of the other parts are close, the brain jars go like

And, as the final body part, the spirit is inhaled like a first breath. Except one time, a whole body is inert on the ground, until somebody sneezes

It doesn't take as long as you'd think either.

#heretical mormon #first resurrection is an lds term in doctrine #it might be in other doctrines too but i just know of the one #gif warning #writing #a little like the end scene in iron giant

[bookish-bi-mormon]

Okay, listen. So, in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (and mormonsim and general) we believe the Godhead to be three separate and distinct beings, right? Joseph Smith saw Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ at the same time so we don't subscribe to the notion of the Trinity (that God is one being, simultaneously Father, Son, and Spirit). So then there are multiple gods right? If Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Ghost are all different people then it's more than one. But no, church leaders say, they're united in purpose so we only worship one God, because even though they're different we worship the Father in the name of the Son, which makes it as monotheistic as possible.

Then bring in the belief in Heavenly Mother. She is equal to Heavenly Father. She also helped form the earth and create the Plan of Salvation. So now there are two Gods right? But then people say no, God is actually the term to refer to our Heavenly Parents working in tandem. They are only really God when they are united.

and I KNOW that technically we are a Henotheistic religion (meaning that we acknowledge the existence of multiple Gods but only worship one) but I just think it would be fun and funky if we were polytheistic. We have a Father, a Mother, and a Son. Plus the Holy Ghost who is like Their helper/conduit for humanity. It's a really small "pantheon" but I like it. idk. I wanna pray to Heavenly Mother, I have developed a separate relationship with Christ that is similar but different to my relationship with Heavenly Father. And the more I start to frame Mormon lore that way, the more I feel like it makes sense and isn't just trying to get the Protestants off our backs.

#yeah I said lore #I like it better than doctrine cause it includes the unofficial and forgotten teachings #which are sometimes cool (although a lot are problematic) #queerstake #tumblrstake #monotheism vs polytheism vs henoteheism #mormon #lds #mormon witch stuff

[gaymormonmike]

Doctrine in LDS church

Fascinating thoughts can be found here

facebook.com/watch/?v=1504378886766847

#queerstake #doctrine #LDS

[anghraine]

Being a lesbian who was brought up Mormon but ended up agnostic is occasionally surreal, because many people will be like, oh, that must have been strange and difficult, and yes, there’s lots of institutionalized homophobia, racism, misogyny, transphobia, etc, very scarring for a lot of people including me actually, but no they mean weird doctrinal shit like differing conceptions of the nature of heaven and eternal life.

I mean, sorry, but no, kid me thought becoming an almighty goddess of my own creation sounded fucking awesome. It just was unfortunately attended by a lot of bigotry and assorted normativities I couldn’t buy into. No, being raised to believe “Jesus, while divine and the redeemer of humanity, is a separate person from God” is not a hardship in anything like the sense of “your best friend is a danger to your soul because he’s a Jewish atheist and you should be careful of your purity in spending so much time with a boy.” I don’t care about Christian theological gripes, I care about actual bigotry and real-world harm.

#my aunt (on the mormon side) is having a crisis of the faith bc apparently the church isn't homophobic enough for her #so she's attending some baptist cult in a barn now #and then i saw a separate thing about how lds doctrine is problematic not bc of the bigotry but bc it offers the possibility of divinity #and it's like... if your biggest gripe with it is divergences from mainstream christian dogma then i don't even know what to say #it was such a hostile and damaging environment but people complain about the stupidest things #esp people who believe things that sound absolutely batshit if you're not used to them #anghraine babbles #/ #// #/// #//// #///// #a #b #c #d #e #religion #mormonism for ts #i think was my tag! #anghraine rants #a treeful of monkeys on nitrous oxide

[heathersdesk]

In which I make the point that D&C 138 should be part of your readings during Holy Week.

#mormon #lds #mormonism #tumblrstake #the church of jesus christ of latter day saints #religion #faith #christianity #scripture study #holy week #easter #holy saturday #doctrine and covenants

[nerdygaymormon]

Thoughts on Queer People as part of the Eternal Family

That word "the" is important! In our church we usually speak of eternal families like there's a bunch of individual ones and we're hoping to turn our earthly family into one of them. But in LDS theology, we are all linked together to form the great family of God.

“For we without them cannot be made perfect; neither can they without us be made perfect.” (D&C 128:18). Everyone talking about being exalted without their LGBTQ+ family members WON’T BE. Our theology is one of inclusion, expansion, and progress. Our work is not done. If same-gender couples and trans people aren’t exalted, NO ONE will be. We cannot be pro-family and anti-LGBTQ+ at same time. 100% of LGBTQ+ people are from families and are part of God's eternal family. 

Being a queer member of the LDS Church means I tense up a little every time I hear the word "family" spoken in church, but it shouldn't be that way. I try to remember that Jesus didn't create a single traditional family during His lifetime. He never performed a marriage. He didn't get married. He didn't have children. Instead, Jesus redefined family by constructing a chosen family. Jesus created a new way of doing family, one which could include everyone.

Unfortunately, this chosen family approach isn't the model of family emphasized in our church, which means all the goals in our church are designed for straight people, and that's not me so it feels like I will never measure up. Our church has a doctrinal gap about what happens to anyone in the afterlife who isn't in a man+woman marriage, including singles and queer people. I believe I'm included in God's plan, just not in the Church's version of God's plan. 

Humans crave to love and be loved, to have companionship, we have a God-given sex drive (this is not meant to dismiss my aro/ace friends, I'm speaking in generalities). How cruel for people to be created this way and then told these things are not for us and we are to shut down these fundamental parts of who we are. We're to be miserable in this life for a shot a happiness after death. Does this sound like the plan of a loving God? Especially when everyone else is offered a win/win proposition to find happiness in this life and it will carry over to the other side. 

I have a feeling that Latter-day Saints are going to be deeply surprised at who all makes it to the Celestial Kingdom, and at how loving our Heavenly Parents are, and how family structures & sealings are going to be far more inclusive than many currently believe. What I know is God is in charge, ultimately God will win. The Godly approach in attitude, whether it’s on matters of race, gender, or sexual orientation, God will win and we will be the one eternal family because that’s the way He’s designed it. We won’t be pushing others away and singling them out as “them.” It’ll be “us.” In the interim, those of us who are deemed “the other,” whatever the “other” is, need to recognize that God will win. 

#tumblrstake #queerstake

[victoriadallonfan]

I don't agree with a lot of Sanderson's politics - and they aren't, in fact, based in Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints doctrine, but rather Utah culture - but it also makes me pretty uncomfortable to hear you badmouthing the church I'm part of?

I badmouth religious organizations in general, Catholic Church included (in which I was raised) because they tend to be overwhelmingly corrupt and abusive towards their own church members (and especially towards people outside of them)

Mormonism in particular is especially bad for how being part of the church requires “tithings” from paychecks plus their treatment of women, minorities, and even men in ways that are almost so explicitly manipulative and cultish that it feels like it comes out of parody.

(For example, I simply declared, “I am no longer catholic” and that was it. Done. You cannot generally do the same in LDS without incredible backlash and slander by its members)

And it’s very obvious when it shows up in fictional books by a lot of Mormon writers, because it’s so conservative that it’s a step or two behind the times.

It’s not as bad as Westeros Westboro Baptist Church or Scientology, but that’s not a high bar to clear.

If your time in the church was different, I’m happy for you, because it means you likely avoided the worst parts of their abuse.

Still, if you have the time, I’d suggest watching these videos (in no particular order):

Why I Left Mormonism - Video covering the creation of the channel “Cults to Consciousness” and her abusive home life under the church

The BITE Model - Simple PowerPoint explaining the reoccurring factors of cults

Ex-Mormon Cast Reacts to Mormon Debates -Cast of ex-Mormon members react to a Mormon debate and highlight various lies and falsehoods presented, as well talk about teachings/history Mormon Church does not want revealed publicly

How the Mormon Church ‘Help Line’ Hid Child Abuse - Exactly what it says. Survivors speak out and the church has done nothing for them or worse.

If you don’t want to watch these videos, if you can’t stomach the testimonies, ask yourself and others these questions:

- How often are you allowed to preach about Heavenly Mother?

- How often do you see women in power within the church, as in, deciding doctrine and not just playing piano or making food for the men?

- How often do you see minorities in power within the church, as in, deciding doctrine or being treated as a token?

- How often does your church talk about the incredibly high suicide rates for children and how it’s associated with its practices?

- How come when a racist, anti-Semitic, misogynistic etc Prophet speaks its “the word of God” and doctrine, but then another Prophet can simply claim it was mere “policy”. Was ‘God’ lying to the prophets? Were the prophets lying about God? How can you trust what is their words and what is God?

- How come the church hid $30 Billion dollars from the public and even its own lower members?

- How come the founder lied about what was on the Egyptian papyrus, claiming it was a translation from God, but people who can actually read Egyptian pointed out he was lying?

- How come you get treated differently for asking these supposedly easy to answer questions?

I do not go after Brandon or you because you happen to be religious. I think belief in a higher power is one’s own choice and prerogative.

I instead care far more about the religious system that is using well-intended people like pawns for goals that pretty much boil down to money and power.

#rant #religion #cw: religious trauma #religious trauma #mormonism #Mormon #church of latter day saints #lds church #cults to consciousness #ex mormon #ex Mormon podcast #brandon sanderson #utah

[pressforwardsaints]

"What I the Lord have spoken, I have spoken, and I excuse not myself; and though the heavens and the earth pass away, my word shall not pass away, but shall all be fulfilled, whether by mine own voice or by the voice of my servant, it is the same."

— Doctrine and Covenants 1:38

#lds #the church of jesus christ of latter day saints #christianity #doctrine and covenants #scriptures

[hazardous-waste-containment]

Religious fundamentalism: The process of isolating out a religion’s core doctrine and investing it with ultimate authority while rejecting all later developments as superfluous or heretical; e.g. Salafi Islam, Karaite Judaism, fundamentalist Christianity.

Religious conservatism: The preservation of a religion and its customs as they have been passed down over the centuries by the clergy and wider society; e.g. traditional Catholicism, Orthodox Judaism, Hindu traditionalism.

Religious modernism: Altering a religious tradition to adapt it to new social, political, cultural, and scientific developments; e.g. modernist Christianity, Reform Judaism, ‘neo-Hinduism’, Islamic modernism.

Fundamentalism and conservatism do not have anything inherently to do with religious politics and likewise modernism does not necessarily mean the removal of religion from public life. I will get to politics soon.

A better way to visualize these than discrete categories might be something like this, sorry for the image quality:

They are processes and tendencies, things you do to your religion, which can absolutely bleed together and coexist.

Today the official position of many religious institutions (e.g. the mainstream Catholic Church or LDS Church) falls somewhere between conservatism and modernism. Conservative and Modern Orthodox Judaism are also good examples – of being willing to bend significantly in some areas while upholding tradition in others.

The Islam of Muammar Gaddafi, the Hinduism of Dayanand Saraswati, and arguably the State Shintō of the Meiji Restoration (though Shintō isn’t scriptural) exemplify a different trend: that sometimes the most effective way to modernize is to fundamentalize. If your goal is to radically reshape the tradition, then stripping it down to the fundamentals can give you more latitude to innovate, and delegitimizes the conservative clergy who have a stake in keeping the tradition the way it is, all while framing your project as in fact the most orthodox.

More commonly though, fundamentalists will make common cause with conservatives. Christian fundamentalists in the U.S., with a few radical exceptions like Reconstructionism, have more or less always considered themselves a type of conservative, and there is a strong resonance between fundamentalists and conservatives in Islam – Saudi Wahhabism takes a fundamentalizing approach in law and culture while upholding ecclesiastical and monarchical power, and was instrumental in the rise of more categorical fundamentalisms like al-Qaeda (though even bin Laden cited medieval scholarship when it suited him). In a similar sense some on the Jewish Orthodox right, especially Kahanists, have a fundamentalizing emphasis on returning to the Torah given at Sinai but remain bound to the later rabbinic tradition – “aspiring fundamentalists within a framework that poses challenges to achieving such a thing” in @boffin-in-training’s words.

I would also mention the tendency for an old fundamentalism to calcify into a new conservatism, almost cyclically. The Protestant Reformation was in many ways a radical fundamentalization of Christianity, but today Protestantism is its own religious tradition with its own conservatives. Again, see Saudi Wahhabi Islam for what Michael Cook calls an “eighteenth-century fundamentalism” that evolved into a “puritanical conservatism”.

Religious politics: Any use of religion for the purposes of modern politics, e.g. political Catholicism, Islamism, Hindu nationalism.

Religious nationalism or ‘religio-nationalism’: Religious politics with primarily nationalist, ethno-territorial concerns linking religious identity with national identity; e.g. most Balkan nationalisms, Hindu nationalism, Buddhist nationalism, the Muslim League, Zionism. There’s a subtle difference between religious identity as national identity, such as in the examples above, versus a national church playing a strong role in cementing an existing secular nationality, e.g. Anglicanism in England or Catholicism in Spain and Poland.

Fascisms which define the ingroup religiously belong here. They are still technically secular and prioritize national and cultural identity above all: the Sangh Parivar has a Muslim wing and the Ustaše even tried to set up their own Orthodox Church.

Religious dominionism or clericalism: Religious politics trying to expand religious control over the government to impose certain values on society, whether in a fundamentalist or conservative (or even modernist) spirit; e.g. Islamism, the Christian right, integral Catholicism, Israel’s Orthodox right. These could be divided, on the model of Salafism, into ‘activist’ or ‘political’ movements which try to win elections within the existing system, and ‘insurgents’ who want to overthrow godless governments and install ones of their own.

Both names have drawbacks: dominionism suggests fully-fledged theocratic rule whereas I mean it much more broadly, while clericalism implies the role of a clergy even though many fundamentalists and modernists are explicitly anti-clerical. Certainly it would seem odd to describe Hassan al-Turabi or Muammar Gaddafi as ‘clericalists’.

Clerical fascism: Given what I just said it might be most accurate to use ‘clerical fascism’ as Roger Griffin does, to refer specifically to the collaboration of clergy with fascist movements (e.g. the stance of the Catholic Church in Italy, Croatia, Brazil, etc), especially through genuine ideological fusion like in the work of Emanuel Hirsch. Theoretically this is distinct from (quasi)fascist movements which incorporate dominionism on their own, like the Kahanist ‘halachic state’ or the League of the South’s intention to run independent Dixie on Biblical law. None of the original clericofascisti or Deutsche Christen had such extreme goals.

This post brought to you by:

Ancient Religions, Modern Politics: The Islamic Case in Comparative Perspective, Michael Cook

“The appeal of Islamic fundamentalism,” Michael Cook

“The New Religious Politics and Women Worldwide: A Comparative Study,” Nikki Keddie

Salafi movement – Wikipedia

“The ‘Holy Storm’: ‘Clerical Fascism’ Through the Lens of Modernism,” Roger Griffin

My attempt at a typology of fascist religious discourse with @anarchotolkienist’s helpful addition, and a later one which sort of anticipated this post although with some different terminology.

And a very interesting conversation about Cook’s work with @ boffin-in-training in the fash study Discord.

#reading #christian identity politics #armp #cannot emphasize enough that i have no professional authority in history or political science i'm just autistic

[noodlerock56]

To any of my fellow ex-Mormon bloggers out there, would you agree that, even though The LDS Church is a misguided cult, a lot of the members are still genuinely kind? I’m still friends with a lot of the people I used to go to Church with, and I’m even hanging out with one of them tomorrow.

Also, while I have heard horror stories about people being mistreated by Church management, that wasn’t really the case for me. I just left after I heard the real story of Joseph Smith and realized the doctrine didn’t click with me like progressive Christianity and Hinduism did.

#ex mormon #christianity #hinduism