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nibbler wrote:
the lord picked the wrong week to impress upon my mind the importance of coming back. To be completely honest, I feel like the topic only served to help me rediscover why I stopped attending PH in the first place.
I am about in the same place. I have been planning next month to back off on attendance at church during 2nd and 3rd hour. Part of me said earlier today, “do you REALLY want to do that given your wife is going to not like it?” The spewing forward of “this is the greatest and I just LOVE telling everyone I am a member of the church of Jesus Christ of latter-day saints! I don’t know why I didn’t always say this. It is so much better than Mormon”. One nice elderly lady then said, “But what do we say when someone asks us what religion we are?” I had to just smile a bit, but they just kept going on. It made me realize YES – I want to skip out.
Heber13 wrote:
nibbler wrote:We talk about things that do not relate to my life or help me with life’s challenges and we elevate them to the status of new issues I have to deal with.
This is kinda the feeling I’m wrestling with as well.
My advice to both of you is just let this pass, as I think it will. Not RMN’s finest hour but not something terrible either. He has some good ideas, just not this one.
Roadrunner wrote:
That being said I understand the desire to not be called Mormons, especially in contrast to polygamists. I had an argument with my very orthodox brother in law one time when I explained that the term “Mormons” is non-technical and a fairly general term for anyone who believes in the Book of Mormon, including polygamists. He got pretty upset, but the bottom line is that although the LDS church is the largest, there are many denominations who claim to be Mormon.
I agree, and here’s the reason I came to that conclusion. Mormons are always being told that they are “not real Christians.” Well, what’s a “real Christian” if it’s not someone who believes in Jesus Christ as the Savior of the world? Who has the right to tell anyone who considers himself to be a Christian that he’s not. People can’t just tell Mormons that they’ve got to stop trying to present themselves as Christians. Well, by the same logic, Latter-day Saints can’t just say that it’s technically inaccurate to speak of the FLDS as Mormons. If they consider themselves to be Mormons, it’s not our right to tell them they’re not, just because they’re not the same kind of “Mormons” as we are.
I am all in favor of there being some clear-cut way for “us” (LDS) to distinguish ourselves from “them” (Mormon but not LDS). And ideally, it should be a way that makes sense to people outside our Church. I don’t know that President Nelson’s directive is going to make one ounce of difference, but people should know that when someone refers to “those Mormon polygamists,” the reference is not to members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
SamBee wrote:
Heber13 wrote:
nibbler wrote:We talk about things that do not relate to my life or help me with life’s challenges and we elevate them to the status of new issues I have to deal with.
This is kinda the feeling I’m wrestling with as well.
My advice to both of you is just let this pass, as I think it will. Not RMN’s finest hour but not something terrible either. He has some good ideas, just not this one.
I fully expect for us to have forgotten all about this by next Sunday. My issue is that I feel this way most Sundays on the topics we like to discuss.
How to get more priesthood power. I didn’t know it was an issue and I’m really not interested in getting more “power.”
Let’s revisit the family proclamation… again. No thanks.
I would list more things but we’ve been cycling on those two subjects for several months now.
:crazy: Quote:Mormons are always being told that they are “not real Christians.” Well, what’s a “real Christian” if it’s not someone who believes in Jesus Christ as the Savior of the world? Who has the right to tell anyone who considers himself to be a Christian that he’s not. People can’t just tell Mormons that they’ve got to stop trying to present themselves as Christians.
I do get that. I have appreciated the times we have tried that. Where I get hung up is #1 – Why do we need to add the word “restored” or “restoration”. Just give Church of Jesus Christ and leave it. #2 A name change is not a story change. I would have much preferred a “we are going to be abundantly more Christ centered” no matter what our name.
nibbler wrote:
SamBee wrote:
Heber13 wrote:This is kinda the feeling I’m wrestling with as well.
My advice to both of you is just let this pass, as I think it will. Not RMN’s finest hour but not something terrible either. He has some good ideas, just not this one.
I fully expect for us to have forgotten all about this by next Sunday. My issue is that I feel this way most Sundays on the topics we like to discuss.
How to get more priesthood power. I didn’t know it was an issue and I’m really not interested in getting more “power.”
Let’s revisit the family proclamation… again. No thanks.
I would list more things but we’ve been cycling on those two subjects for several months now.
:crazy:
Might be to do with your leaders. We hear about priesthood power regularly, the proclamation less.
If we don’t want to be called ‘mormons’ anymore, then I think RMN should introduce a new demonym, because “members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints” or “Latter-day Saints” aren’t realistically going to happen. It needs to be something short and catchy. Some possibles for consideration: – Brighamites
– LDSites (pronounced ElDeeSights)
– 3CHers (three church-hours. Pronounced “Threechers”)
– Saints (this is the most correct technically, but sounds a bit presumptuous, and could cause confusion when missionaries teach certain other Church members)
– TBMs (we just tell people that it now stands for The Book of Mormoners)
SamBee wrote:
Church of Jesus Christ is too generic. There are a dozen organizations with names like that.Isn’t the church website lds.org? Or mormon.org? I don’t think either are offensive.
Exactly; what is so bad about “Mormon” and “LDS” to the point that they should be actively discouraged in the first place? And why does Nelson think that this time it will be different from the other times they have already tried (unsuccessfully) to reject the Mormon label? It just seems odd especially when the Church itself has already used Mormon and LDS for many website domain names, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, the “I’m a Mormon” advertising campaign, etc.
I guess this could be a way to try to put more emphasis on “the Church of Jesus Christ” but the problem is that this is so generic and basically redundant; it doesn’t really differentiate the Church from all the other Christian churches out there, so I think that’s one of the main reasons why Mormon and LDS have been more popular because they are a short way to effectively distinguish the religious tradition similar to Lutheran, Methodist, etc. If Nelson really wants to leave the Mormon and LDS labels behind so much then it seems like he should have provided a decent replacement nickname to use instead.
mom3 wrote:I do get that. I have appreciated the times we have tried that. Where I get hung up is #1 – Why do we need to add the word “restored” or “restoration”. Just give Church of Jesus Christ and leave it. #2 A name change is not a story change. I would have much preferred a “we are going to be abundantly more Christ centered” no matter what our name.
Amen! I think it’s totally reasonable for us to ask that in news stories, TV interviews, etc. the correct name of the Church be mentioned at the very beginning. Whenever I read, “Today the Mormon Church issued a statement….” “Our guest today is [so-and-so] from the Mormon Church.” That happens less likely than it used to, but it still happens. And I really, really hate it when people call us, “The Church of the Latter-day Saints.” After the full name is used once, though, I think references just to “the Church” should be sufficient. If the article or news story is about us, it should be pretty clear by then that we are “the Church” being discussed. If subsequent references are to “The Church of Jesus Christ,” it’s misleading as there are many churches with that same name or a very similar name. I honestly don’t think it’s even reasonable for subsequent references to be to “the restored Church of Jesus Christ.” That’s the verbiage (including lack of capitalization of the word “restored”) the press release used. If “Restored” were part of our name, that would be a different thing entirely. But “restored” (all lower-case) is an adjective that is entirely subjective. We might as well be asking people to use the phrase, “the only true Church of Jesus Christ.”I’m entirely okay with the request that people use the full, official, correct name of the Church when it is first mentioned in an article, etc. about the Church, but what bothers me is how the Church can have a huge ad campaign, “I’m a Mormon” or create a movie, “Meet the Mormons” and then turn around and ask us to stop calling ourselves Mormons. And then implying that it was a “revelation!” Come on! What are they going to do about the thousands upon thousands of “I’m a Mormon!” write-ups? Go modify them all to say, “I’m a Latter-day Saint!”?
Katzpur, I just want to say publicly how much I appreciate your comments in this thread. That’s all.
🙂 Katzpur wrote:
We might as well be asking people to use the phrase, “the only true Church of Jesus Christ.”
Technically the phrase, “the only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth, with which… the Lord [is] well pleased” is the more accurate and scriptural term. Could you make sure to use the full descriptive phrase please?
😈 I have already noticed commentors on articles and blogposts to LDS Living and LDS Daily criticizing the authors for the use of the word Mormon in the title of their piece. In the case of LDS Daily the author even responded that the blog posting had been written several weeks ago and was not in any way an attempt to undermine the new name directive. It gets ugly when Mormons attack other Mormons for using the word “Mormon.”
Update: The LDS daily blog author released a new post that I can only imagine to be in response to the commenters that I referenced above.
the-name-of-christ-means-nothing-if-its-not-written-in-our-heartsYou go Girl! :clap: This today on MSN:
Quote:SALT LAKE CITY — The University of Utah says a tweet from comedian David Cross showing him wearing undergarments sacred to the
Mormonfaith was “deeply offensive.” College president Ruth Watkins issued a statement Sunday about the tweet, says she resisted calls to cancel Wednesday’s performance and that the tweet is protected by the First Amendment.
Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints wear white, two-piece cotton undergarments daily considered similar to holy vestments in other faiths, like a Catholic nun’s habit or a Muslim skullcap.
The university is a public college and has many
Mormonstudents. The performance isn’t sponsored by the university, but Watkins says she won’t censor those who renting its facilities. Cross representative Michael O’Brien did not immediately return an email message Monday seeking comment
Emphasis mine. Either MSN did not get the memo or is deliberatly ignoring the request to not use the word “Mormon” to descibe the faith, the culture, or the membership.
Katzpur – Quote:“I’m a Mormon” or create a movie, “Meet the Mormons” and then turn around and ask us to stop calling ourselves Mormons. And then implying that it was a “revelation!” Come on! What are they going to do about the thousands upon thousands of “I’m a Mormon!” write-ups? Go modify them all to say, “I’m a Latter-day Saint!”?
Amen.
I am also in total agreement about word semantics. I volunteer with Lutheran’s. No one calls them by their full name Evangelical Lutheran Church of …. You just say Lutheran. No one wonders if they are Christian or not. No one gets all buzzed up because you didn’t use the 6 other words in their title.
Likewise, Evangelicals, Catholics, Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians. We have a Coffee Church in our area. It’s a legit church. They have pastors and choir and day care like all the rest of the “religions” in the area. No one seems confused as to who they are. Their name means nothing. But as a ecumenical team, they rock. They are volunteering in schools, with refugee’s, hosting AA meetings, kids camps for underpriveleged kids, host a living Nativity. They believe in Christ.
***OK, climbing off my soapbox***.
Katzpur wrote:
Mormons are always being told that they are “not real Christians.” Well, what’s a “real Christian” if it’s not someone who believes in Jesus Christ as the Savior of the world? Who has the right to tell anyone who considers himself to be a Christian that he’s not. People can’t just tell Mormons that they’ve got to stop trying to present themselves as Christians.
It’s a bummer when other people try to tell us who we are. Story time.
Shortly after joining the church a friend of mine in college walked up to me and said, “I know why you’re sad all the time…” For the record, I didn’t view myself as sad, but who knows, maybe I was
I’ve had a long time to reflect on that experience. I had a reaction very similar to yours. How can someone else judge whether I’m Christian, I’ll let Jesus make that call. I thought that perhaps they were speaking from a place of ignorance, if they only knew… etc.
I’ve also had a long time to reflect on that experience post faith crisis. I let my defenses down and mulled over whether they had a point.
This move may very well have been a move to advertise to the world that “Mormons” are indeed Christian and it may have even been an effort to reorient the minds of the members towards Christ in the process but in reflecting on that experience with my friend I was able to see, for the first time, that we quote and talk about church leaders far more than we quote and talk about Christ. Perhaps that’s what my friend saw when pronouncing their judgment. Perhaps we were both right, Mormons are both Christian and not Christian.
I find myself wondering what would have a greater impact on reorienting the minds of members and changing how others view the church – insisting people call us by a specific name or… instead of making the 3rd hour about what church leaders have said make the 3rd hour (and maybe the other two hours while we are at it) about what Christ has said. I can go entire Sundays without hearing the word “Christ” outside of prayers, all while hearing a laundry list of names of church leaders.
dande48 wrote:
What bigger issues do you think they should cover?
Well…I’m no prophet…but I think there are important issues around how to unify groups and rid our communities of hate and discrimination. Perhaps mental illness issues and suicide are important issues. Things that bring us together to help work with making the world a better place.
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