What did you make of this guy?

[Anonymous]

Quote:

My wife and I are active, temple-going LDS with 6 kids, including one on a

mission, one turning in papers, three married in the temple and one still

at home.. We keep our covenants. We are also naturists. I know many LDS

nudists who have gone inactive and I hope to pick up some wisdom to share

with others on our regular forum, http://www.ldssdc.org. I have posted a link to

this site in one of my postings. We are a tiny minority among membership

in the US so it is easy for us to feel marginalized and go inactive. I try

to prevent that from happening.

This is Argonaut’s request for an account activation. I felt really bad for laughing when I first read it, but sounded like he DOES want people to stay LDS…..

Didn’t know what you guys made of it, and I was curious to know if any of you activated the account.

And did you check out their site?

[Anonymous]

We had a bunch of naturists on MM a couple months ago when poster James did a post called Families: Forever Naked and Not Ashamed. One of the commenters (a naturist) ended up being my DH’s cousin. Unbeknownst to the family, he is a practicing naturist. Anyway I tend to think that it’s not a big deal. Americans are very prudish about nudity, far more than Europeans, for example. So, I suppose I’m OK with allowing this guy.

[Anonymous]

I just hope they don’t try to recruit via our site…that was my only hesitation.

[Anonymous]

I don’t know. Honestly at the moment, to me it sounds like a distraction.

Have these people experienced a faith crisis? Are they trying to reconcile historical/doctrinal concerns with what they’ve experienced in the church?

[Anonymous]

You both may have a point about it being a distraction (not our primary mission). Also, about recruiting, but more in terms of using our site to mainstream their practice. Personally, I don’t care if it’s made mainstream or not. I don’t see why it needs to be marginalized, but it’s not the mission of our site either. If there’s not a crisis of faith, it’s probably just not on point. We don’t need to do their work for them. They aren’t going to do our work for us.

[Anonymous]

I don’t mind someone participating, but I don’t really see a synergy between our two sites.

[Anonymous]

I say someone sends this person am e-mail and tells him clearly that we are not interested in discussing “naturism/nudism” here – but that he is welcome to participate if he can help discuss faith struggles that are common to many of our readers and commenters. I agree that we shouldn’t be prudish about it at all, but . . .

[Anonymous]

^ agreed

I am not really interested in hosting discussions on LDS nudity for the sake of that topic, unless it clearly ties back to reconciling faith issues.

[Anonymous]

I agree with the sentiment here. Naturism/nudity in LDS culture is a topic worth discussing but probably not on our website. Doesn’t fit our goals and aims.

Did we decide who would email him? I will if no one else wants to.

[Anonymous]

Go for it – and thanks.

[Anonymous]

Here’s what I sent:

jmb275 wrote:

Argonaut-

Thank you very much for coming to StayLDS.com and welcome!! We hope you will find a nice community in which views regarding various crises of faith can be openly discussed. While we welcome anyone who wants to join we feel strongly about sticking with our intended mission. We have carved out a fairly nice niche that tries to be positive and friendly towards the church, while acknowledging the problems therein, with an emphasis on discussing what we, individually, can get out of our decision to remain LDS. I think, in this respect our goals are fairly well aligned. Our mission statement is:

Quote:

The information provided and discussed is primarily geared towards members of the Church who have questions, concerns, problems and issues that led them to change their views about their faith. This is often in the form of a heart-wrenching disillusionment. We are here to listen, and to offer advice to each other. You can talk about it here. This is a safe place to discuss difficult subjects — many of which we simply can’t talk about within our normal social support network. Family, close friends and even local Church leaders are not always ready or able to help. You might not be able to talk about it with your spouse, your mother, your father or your friend at Church. You can talk about it here.

We openly discuss problems in history, doctrine, practices and culture. We also openly discuss solutions that have helped people in the community reconcile themselves, and find a new, personal path of active faith within our rich LDS tradition. There is no going backwards. There are paths forward. We also discuss problems and solutions regarding the impact a change in faith can have on our family, friends, workplace and community.

The purpose of the site is to try to Stay LDS, and be a part of the solution.

We welcome your participation, along with any others involved in your cause, that remains along the lines outlined above. There is some concern among the admins about discussions devolving into debates that surround nudism/naturism rather than discussing the mechanics of remaining in the church despite differences. We have checked out your forum and while the topics for discussion are different, there is certainly overlap in the attempt to remain LDS while maintaining heterodox views. We support this overlap and your contributions along these lines!

Thank you once again, and we hope to see you around StayLDS.com!!

I will post his response when I hear back from him.

[Author]

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