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mackay11 wrote:nibbler wrote:mackay11 wrote:
Then shouldn’t every new member have 80 years grace to adopt the WoW before it’s an expectation? If it’s good for the goose…
In that context… yes. This calls for a toast.
😆 From what I’ve heard meat is afforded some wiggle room because it’s “ordained for the use of man with thanksgiving” and to be used “sparingly” whereas the others are “not for the body” and “not for the belly.” So meat is a shade of grey and the others are black and white. At least that’s how it’s being interpreted.
Yep, give some people guidance with a shade of grey and they will ignore it completely. Unless there are 50 of them. That seems to get everyone’s attention.
I had to think hard about what you were getting at…Council of 50 maybe? When It finally clicked after about 15 seconds of confusion, I burst out laughing. For those that might not understand the reference – this is an allusion to “50 Shades of Grey” a semi-erotic novel series that is popular at the moment.
I would love it if strict adherence to the Word of Wisdom was not a condition of baptism – that it was presented as a goal for which to strive, regardless of whether or not it still was a requirement for temple attendance. I prefer having two different standards for baptism and temple attendance, and decoupling the Word of Wisdom is a good starting point, imo. I just think we require too much of new converts, even as I believe there should be requirements that show commitment. Continuing to attend church for a couple of months is not an easy task in many situations, but it is one I think is important. It certainly would halt many of the baptisms that happen too quickly. Maybe that and a commitment to try to “follow the commandments” to the best of one’s ability would be enough.
I’ve never found it hard to obey the Word of Wisdom and I will probably teach my children to obey the core of it even if for some reason in the future I decide to quit the Church altogether. It is wise, regardless of its divine or human origin. The problem, as others have already said, is the position it occupies in the hierarchy of commandments hammered into every new covert’s mind. The missionaries will tell them that they have to marry if they live with someone, abstain from Alcohol, Tobacco, Cofee, Tea and illegal drugs, promise to pay tithing and to go to church on sundays. Everything else is negotiable.
What about actually following the baptismall requisites delineated in Mosiah 18? What about actually following the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount?
The current interpretation of D&C 89 was given by Brigham Young and started to be enforced by Heber J. Grant. Even if Joseph really received D&C 89 from on High, there’s absolutelly no evidence that Brigham Young received his interpretation from anywhere but his mind.
I’m myself guilty of letting it eclipse everything else when judging people back when I was a bishop. I would be a lot more shocked to hear that someone had smoked or used alcohol than that they had been abusive to their wife or been less than honest on their tax declaration.
I really think it detracts from much more important and less visible aspects of religious life and serves only as a “Us” and “Them” diferentiator.
TheotherHeber wrote:
The current interpretation of D&C 89 was given by Brigham Young and started to be enforced by Heber J. Grant. Even if Joseph really received D&C 89 from on High, there’s absolutelly no evidence that Brigham Young received his interpretation from anywhere but his mind.You mean like the priesthood ban? Sadly, I think there are many such examples, and not only from BY. The WoW just happens to be a very high profile one. (Another example is why we don’t wear/display crosses – it was not uncommon before David O. McKay.)
TheotherHeber wrote:I really think it detracts from much more important and less visible aspects of religious life and serves only as a “Us” and “Them” differentiator.
I agree. Like you, I have never had a problem with the WoW, and I do live it (as in no alcohol, tobacco, etc. – I do eat meat in summer). But there’s definitely a split there between the do’s and the don’t’s, maybe partly because it’s so visible sometimes. As a local leader you are aware that not many people, relatively, pay tithing, either, but that’s far less visible and if someone wants to go to the temple for a wedding or something, they can just pay tithing for a fairly short time and qualify. Smoking is far more difficult to temporarily fix.
Thought this article in the Telegram Tribune would be interesting re WOW. http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/home3/57445355-200/church-wine-lds-alcohol.html.csp Heber, I feel that this is one that actually the Lord nailed right on the head with the advice given in the Word of Wisdom. I can understand your logic, but health studying in many circles are confirming more and more the advice given of eating the herbs of the field, and grain for man, and eating meat sparingly. A number of studies like the China study, by Dr. Thomas Campbell, and studies advocated by Joel Fuhrman substantiate such a diet. The China study found in parts of the world that eat most unrefined plants foods and that also keep calories from animal products to less than 10% of overall calories, that these parts of the world have very little heart disease, cancer, diabetes and obesity. These diseases are really diseases of the affluent who cannot afford the high protein, fats, refined sugars and processed foods, but not poor countries. Poor countries deal with tuberculosis, disentary, malaria, but not affluent countries. One county in China of 180,000 it was found that no a single person died of heart disease before age 65. This is readily apparent when comparing data from different countries, but not from studies in our own country because we compare like to like and by just adjusting parameters a little. This is like comparing one group of people smoking 6 packs of cigarettes to those who smoke 4 packs. The real benefits are not seen until certain go way down and others go way up. I think it would be beneficial for the church to emphasize the things we should do with diet in the Word of Wisdom. First, health care cost would be way down because most problems by older members could be prevented. Second, a lot more obese members, especially high priest and older relief society members could do a lot more in terms of church service with health problems and a lot of weight gone. This is the real meaning of to run and not be weary and walk and not faint. Many members interpret the blessings oft he WOW as just spiritual but that’s because they do not really look at the whole benefits of the law. scthomas34 wrote:…I feel that this is one that actually the Lord nailed right on the head with the advice given in the Word of Wisdom. I can understand your logic, but
health studying in many circles are confirming more and more the advice given of eating the herbs of the field, and grain for man, and eating meat sparingly.…The China study found in parts of the world that eat most unrefined plants foods and that also keep calories from animal products to less than 10% of overall calories, that these parts of the world have very little heart disease, cancer, diabetes and obesity. These diseases are really diseases of the affluent who cannot afford the high protein, fats, refined sugars and processed foods, but not poor countries. Poor countries deal with tuberculosis, disentary, malaria, but not affluent countries…This is readily apparent when comparing data from different countries, but not from studies in our own country because we compare like to like and by just adjusting parameters a little. This is like comparing one group of people smoking 6 packs of cigarettes to those who smoke 4 packs. The real benefits are not seen until certain go way down and others go way up. I think it would be beneficial for the church to emphasize the things we should do with diet in the Word of Wisdom. First, health care cost would be way down because most problems by older members could be prevented…Actually one of the first things that really got my attention and made me question the inspiration of Joseph Smith and the Church in general was when I tried a low-carb diet where I ate meat in every single meal and quickly and easily lost weight back below what I weighed when I got home from my mission without feeling hungry. This is not just some short-term gimmick; whether people like the idea or not many Americans simply do not react very well to what some nutritionists refer to as “high glycemic index” foods such as bread, potatoes, pasta, rice, corn, cereal, fruit juice, and sugars so these foods actually contribute to more weight gain, diabetes, heart disease, and other heath problems here than moderate amounts of low-fat meat ever will.
There is no need to wait and see how and when people die and then speculate about what could have theoretically made a positive difference after the fact; the unhealthy effects of these foods can already be directly measured in the blood sugar and insulin reactions many people have to them. There have also been studies that suggest that coffee can actually help prevent dementia, Alzheimer’s, and certain types of cancer and that wine has significant health benefits as well. In any case, I’m not sure how much wisdom there is in looking back to 19th century ideas about what the ideal diet should be and assuming this advice is correct when so much has changed since then as far as what foods are always available and the ability to scientifically test and analyze their health impact has improved so much. Now that we have refrigerators and freezers and can quickly ship fresh food from all over the world unlike the way things were in 1833 there is no such thing as “winter and times of famine” anymore for most Americans as far as food is concerned but there’s no way I’ll ever become a vegetarian anytime soon.
Fwiw, Cadence, a diet is, by definition, a time of famine. Just saying.
You are comparing apples and oranges here. Yes, sugar from refined carbs, white bread, white pasta, white rice, sugary cereal, sugary fruit juice- of course these will spike blood sugar levels way up. Let me repeat, these are not part of a unrefined foods diets, and these are just as bad as a high amount of high animal product diet. The body does not get a high sugar spike from unrefined plants foods, unless someone is just downing fruit all the time. Unrefined grains, vegetables, some fruits, beans, these are plants that take longer for the body to digest than meats. Starch is a much smaller part of their make then the refined junk foods, because unrefined also has fiber and a lot more to it than just starch. The starch that is in the foods is released much more slowly over time and so there is no sugar rush spike because it is a little given slowly. The body is made to run mostly on glucose, sugar, given over time with amino acids from protein and lipids from fat making a a small part of the diet, 8% for protein is fine and likely the same for fat. Starches have been what civilazation have fed on since the dawn of time and our affluent disease have not shown up til the last century. First, only 10% or less of Americans suffer from a wheat allergy of some kind. There are lots of grains besides wheat that have better nutrients like Quinoa, oats, buckwheat grouts, etc. Second, diabetes comes from the over-consumption of refined white flour, and a lot of sugar, and obesity, not from whole flour foods and unrefined plants foods. There are a number of documentaries that cite how when people go on an unrefined plant food diet, they lose the weight and can get off of their type two diabetes medications. Type 1 diabetes is a little trickier though, but people on the unrefined plant food diet can still substantially lower their meds. Fourth, weight loss is not the best indicator of how nutritous something is. This is not to say that eating meat and vegetables from every meal is not more healthy than an empty calorie, high carb made of refine carbohydrates diet, because it probably is. You got to be kidding me that you are comparing a high protein diet to eating on the mission. This does not mean it is the best diet. The human body is not designed for high meat consumption over decades, never was and never will be. Just because someone is skinny does not mean they are healthy.
There are numerous studies documenting the links of high cholesterol to heart disease. You can get all the nutrients you need from a vegetarian diet if whole proteins like soy beans and Quinoa are incorporated, as well as nutritional yeast. You cannot even get close to get all the nutrients you need from meat. Not to mention other problems, kidney stones, dehydration, osteoprosis, inflammation problems from arachadonic acid, rheumatory arthiritis, food allergeries, etc there are numerous problems when the body is not run from the right fuel. In nature carnivores have a digestive tract that is typically about 6 times its body length from head to waist, increased masseter (cheeks) muscles, spaced needle teeth, and herbivores digestive tract about 11 to 14 times its body length, reduced masseter muscle, jaw that moves side to side, and flat teeth. Guess which one humans overwhelmingly resemble. Function follows form.
Coffee, good for you? Caffeine has a serous negative effect on sperm count, not to mention mention other side effects of stimulants in general. Yes there is likely some benefits to a little alcohol consumption, but if a law is given one would have to see if the benefits outweigh the cost. The question in giving the green light to alcohol consumption to members of the church, would the cost be worth the benefits. You might argue let people drink and decide for themselves. Well, if you say its okay, then there are always those people with alcoholism in their family and do not know when to stop and they do not know when they are drunks, you will have to explain to them why they can’t drink and some people can. It just doesnt work that way. Considering that 90% of abuse involves alcohol and drugs, I think that the benefits do not outweigh the cost. The benefits would come anyway, because wine is from plants. It just better to consume the whole plant, grapes and get the antioxidants in their pure form, so again the plant best diet is still the what we were made for. You may want to watch the documentary forks over knives, and look at John McDougalls videos on you tube.
When vegans start living significantly longer than omnivores I might become one. DarkJedi wrote:When vegans start living significantly longer than omnivores I might become one.
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Vegans do live longer than omnivores. Studies show that humans are designed to live on a certain amount of calories. High calories diets, omnivores and carnivores, generally have shorter lives sometimes by decades because high amounts of calories speed up the life process of the body. Low calorie diets, herbivores, Seventh day adventist etc. have shown to increase life span because lower calories do not wear out the cells of the body as fast. Of course genes are a factor as well. scthomas34 wrote:Vegans do live longer than omnivores. Studies show that humans are designed to live on a certain amount of calories. High calories diets, omnivores and carnivores, generally have shorter lives sometimes by decades because high amounts of calories speed up the life process of the body. Low calorie diets, herbivores, Seventh day adventist etc. have shown to increase life span because lower calories do not wear out the cells of the body as fast. Of course genes are a factor as well.
There is no unbiased scientific study that proves that vegans live longer than omnivores – it is theoretically true but lacks scientific proof. There are studies that show genetics are much more of a factor than anything. You really believe the average SDA is outliving the average Mormon, Catholic, Muslim or Buddhist? I’m not going to get into an argument about it because that’s not what these forums are about. I’ll just point out that my wife’s grandmother is 108. She lives in assisted living, but is probably more lucid than her 80-year-old daughter, knows our names and who we are when we visit, dresses herself and practices good hygiene daily, walks to her meals, uses a cell phone, etc. She grew up in New England, and loves lobster – she ate lobster at least once a week her whole life and makes the meanest Boston baked beans ever. She is also very much a meat and potatoes person, far from being a vegetarian much less a vegan. She outlived three husbands. She never smoked, and only drank socially (usually wine). There is probably a 108 year old vegan out there who is similar to her (I don’t know that for sure) – but that’s the whole point, there is no 120 year old one.
scthomas34 wrote:Yes, sugar from refined carbs, white bread, white pasta, white rice, sugary cereal, sugary fruit juice- of course these will spike blood sugar levels way up. Let me repeat, these are not part of a unrefined foods diets, and these are just as bad as a high amount of high animal product diet.
The body does not get a high sugar spike from unrefined plants foods, unless someone is just downing fruit all the time. Unrefined grains, vegetables, some fruits, beans, these are plants that take longer for the body to digest than meats. Starch is a much smaller part of their make then the refined junk foods, because unrefined also has fiber and a lot more to it than just starch. The starch that is in the foods is released much more slowly over time and so there is no sugar rush spike because it is a little given slowly. The body is made to run mostly on glucose, sugar, given over time with amino acids from protein and lipids from fat making a a small part of the diet, 8% for protein is fine and likely the same for fat. Starches have been what civilazation have fed on since the dawn of time and our affluent disease have not shown up til the last century…diabetes comes from the over-consumption of refined white flour, and a lot of sugar, and obesity, not from whole flour foods and unrefined plants foods… The human body is not designed for high meat consumption over decades, never was and never will be. Just because someone is skinny does not mean they are healthy…There are numerous studies documenting the links of high cholesterol to heart disease… That’s part of the problem; even when I went out of my way to eat whole grain bread and cereals, brown rice, etc. I continued to gain weight. Sure I gained even more when I was eating fast food all the time and drinking soft drinks loaded with sugar but even when I tried to diet and exercise I only ended up losing a few pounds and I felt hungry all the time so I would never stick with it for very long. So far the only way I have been able to control my weight in a lasting way is by eating more meat, not less. My recent health check-ups haven’t shown any obvious problems in terms of cholesterol, glucose, kidney and liver function, blood pressure, etc. and personally I doubt this would be the case if I hadn’t started paying more attention to the amount and type of carbs I was eating.
At first I tried to rationalize and make excuses about how this part of D&C 89 could still be inspired in spite of my direct experience to the contrary but now it is easier for me to simply question why grain should be considered the staff of life and good for everyone to begin with. It makes much more sense to me to interpret D&C 89 as more of a product of the author, time, and place it originally came from than any kind of lasting and universal wisdom. It looks like Joseph Smith simply took what was already most convenient and affordable for many people at the time anyway and then tried to attach some mystical significance to it as if this was just the way it was supposed to be and what God intended from the beginning. It would definitely complicate things to not have refrigeration and other modern technology and have to be butchering animals all the time whenever you wanted to eat meat so it’s no surprise that people back then would probably have even more of a tendency to get caught up in the idea of austere diets and preach this as a supposed universal ideal than they do now.
However, the truth is that people lived as hunter/gatherers much longer than they have had developed agriculture so it doesn’t make sense to me why we should expect that everyone would quickly adapt to some of the radical and more recent changes in diet especially enough to make something like wheat of all things the “staff of life” that people should supposedly base their entire diet around when it only grows well in specific temperate climates. We already know that there are genetic differences in terms of what health problems some people are more susceptible to than others so I don’t see what is so unusual about the fact that some people are more vulnerable to overeating and the impact of certain types of carbohydrate foods than others. Basically it looks to me like D&C 89 has it backwards and it would actually be a better idea in general for people to plan their meals around some source of protein and eat grains and potatoes sparingly, if at all, because that’s what will typically satisfy their hunger longer.
DevilsAdvocate wrote:It looks like Joseph Smith simply took what was already most convenient and affordable for many people at the time anyway and then tried to attach some mystical significance to it as if this was just the way it was supposed to be and what God intended from the beginning. It would definitely complicate things to not have refrigeration and other modern technology and have to be butchering animals all the time whenever you wanted to eat meat so it’s no surprise that people back then would probably have even more of a tendency to get caught up in the cult of austerity and preach this idea as a supposed universal ideal than they do now.
This sounds like a reasonable view except that it is based on faulty assumptions.This assumption that D & C 89 was peddled by JS based on 19th century bias on eating is inaccurate, because the view of the times was not leaned towards a plant based, small meat diet. Meat has always and still is viewed as the food of the strong and affluent and beans the food of the dirt poor. This stems back from the middle ages and much earlier. During the middle ages, the Kings and upper class men ate mutton and venison because they were the only ones with rights to hunt on public land, while the peasants ate the same fava beans and porridge every night with no spices, and very bland. One of the reasons why people were so eager to move to America was because of its vast resources of fishing, hunting, lands for pigs, sheep and cows and crops, whereas Europe was overfishing, and game very scarce due to the overpopulation. In this century, the view has been that people in poor countries are so weak and small because they do not consume animal protein like us rich countries. Suprisingly, studies have come to vastly different conclusions. I serously doubt the early saints, or anyone in this country advocated for a diet of minimal animal meat consumption, this would have been unamerican at the time. Now today, we still fight this war of the right information, because for every study that is found to validate an unrefined plant based diet, the industry hired their own industry advocated scientist, who get the results that the Dairy and Agriculture industry wants. Very few people realize how much money is fed to government from the meat and dairy industries, of course their is a huge conflict of interest here. This smear campaign is the same way the cigarette companies fought the studies on tobacco for decades and decades.DevilsAdvocate wrote:However, the truth is that people lived as hunter/gatherers much longer than they have had developed agriculture so it doesn’t make sense to me why we should expect that everyone would quickly adapt to some of the radical and more recent changes in diet especially enough to make something like wheat of all things the “staff of life” that people should supposedly base their entire diet around when it only grows well in specific temperate climates. We already know that there are genetic differences in terms of what health problems some people are more susceptible to than others so I don’t see what is so unusual about the fact that some people are more vulnerable to overeating and the impact of certain types of carbohydrate foods than others. Basically it looks to me like D&C 89 has it backwards and it would actually be a better idea in general for people to plan their meals around some source of protein and eat grains and potatoes sparingly, if at all, because that’s what will typically satisfy their hunger longer.
Again, this is another faulty assumption. Hunting, just does not pay off on a regular basis for that to be a main staple. It was really a lot more gathering than it was hunting. The great apes of primarily gatherers.If it were true that humans were hunters gathers than it would show in our body plan. Chimpanzees are 95% vegatarian with way bigger canine teeth than we have. Their only protein really is terminites and some other bugs. If we were hunters for so long than our body would have adapted natural-selected for these traits for this diet, our teeth more pincer-like, not more deer like, our cheekbones more dog-like, not reduced, as they our now. Form follows function, that’s how evolution and adaptation works. I feel that the meaning is more important than the literal word for word verse in D & C when it comes to grains, it is clear that grain and herbs of the field are very important, be it wheat, rice, oaks, corn, or whatever.
DevilsAdvocate wrote:That’s part of the problem; even when I went out of my way to eat whole grain bread and cereals, brown rice, etc. I continued to gain weight. Sure I gained even more when I was eating fast food all the time and drinking soft drinks loaded with sugar but even when I tried to diet and exercise I only ended up losing a few pounds and I felt hungry all the time so I would never stick with it for very long. So far the only way I have been able to control my weight in a lasting way is by eating more meat, not less. My recent health check-ups haven’t shown any obvious problems in terms of cholesterol, glucose, kidney and liver function, blood pressure, etc. and personally I doubt this would be the case if I hadn’t started paying more attention to the amount and type of carbs I was eating.
A vegeratarian diet does not mean a good diet. Some vegetarian diets are worse than animal protein based ones. A good diet is 90% of ones diet being foods that whole grain, fruits, and vegetables and highly processed foods, dairy, meats and junk to less than 10% of ones total calories. If you really want to see what a diet of unrefined plants foods will do for you than I suggest completely getting on it for three months and see what it does and how you feel and also look at your cholesterol now and weight and compare it in three months. Just incorporating whole grain breads and cereals, while leaving everything else the same is like going from 6 packs of cigarettes to 4 and expecting to see all of the benefits of no smoking, you have to go all the way.This especially important if you going to based your whole testimony of the Word of Wisdom on your own anecdotal experience just a couple of experience when you have not accounted for all of the factors going into the before and after. Eating on the mission is the worst diet in the world and it typical for missionaries to look light they should be in the high priest group and then lose the weight when they get home no matter what diet they are on. You probalby could have been on the pancake and eggs diet and lost a lot of weight after the mission. Meats and dairy just do not have the whole package-antioxidants, micro and phyto nutrients, Folate, Vits A-K, calcium, iron, potassium. With meats you get Vits A, the Bs and Iron and thats it. On the unrefined plant food diet, it is normal for your LDL, bad cholesterol to go down to 80. Many doctors are happy if your LDL is below 130 because as a nation everyone Cholesterol is so bad that not real bad is seen as good, when it shouldn’t. Your doctor will probalby be happy if you are hovering around being overweight and just not obese, but the unrefined plant food diet takes people back to their high school weight, if they were skinny then.
Caldwell Esseltyn, MD, was given 17 no hope cases of people with heart disease,to test the unrefined plant food. These people had months to live, and they too far gone for stents and bypass surgery to help them. 15 years later, all but one was a live and healthy. This groups average total cholesterol, ldl +HDL, dropped from 257 to 137. Someone show me a meat based diet that can reverse heart disease, the number killer in our country, like that. Dr. Joel Fuhrman treats his patients almost exclusively with a plant based diet approach and his patience typically lose so much weight that relatives and friends wonder if they are healthy. This is normal, our country is just so fat we do not know what normal looks like anymore. The Gershon institute, founded by Charlotte Gerson, MD, have helped thousands recover from the deadliest cancers, diabetes, heart disease, autoimmune disease, arthiritis, etc. In fact, their survival rates for stages 4 melanoma patients is 39% compared to 6% regular, stage 3 survival rate was 74% compared to 24-47% normally. These are huge increases considering that the therapy is fighting a life time of bad eating habits and melanomas late stage low survival rate. Where is a meat based diet that can do that. I do not sell any products, I do not get any money or benefit in any way from this kind of information getting out other than I know people will get better. We are a nation of largely fat and sick people. It is embarassing to walk into church and see how many people are overweight. Our church largely does not keep the Word of wisdom. It is a combination of way too much animal products, empty carbs and processed foods
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