jnevin said:
It's the fastest growing one in the world. To be in good standing with the church you have to give 10% of your pre tax income, no matter how poor or how many kids you have. They keep tabs on it too. The bishop will come around asking why you haven't paid, they don't let you into the temple, pretty fucked up IMO.
believe me bro, I know, they give the statements at the end of the year.
I've had a temple reccomend before, and a pair of garments. I wanted to learn so much about this church. It started in high school when I dated a mormon chick, she had like 5 brothers, they all hated me cuz I was not mormon, i was regular christian.
Then I found out about the garmets you wear.. the biblical names they give you.. the baptisms of the dead... all those things, and I wanted to find out more. I read books, joined a ward.. they were really nice, but then the bishop started telling me things I had to not do.. like no coffee or tea.. or alcohol.. they call it the words of wisdom..
then I leared the history... but they don't like you to lear the history.. read a book called "No Man Knows my History" it is all about joseph smith, boy is that one an eye opener.
I don't think they are evil people really, just misguided. I think its cool to live a good life, have a strong healthy family, have family at home night once a week.. spend two years of your life volunteering.. that is totally cool. But when they start saying its because some god or higher power told them.. or better yet, that moroni came and told joseph smith, via these plates.. that he used stones to decopher.. the urim and thuminin or whatever.. the same stones he used for treasure hunting! That is when it starts to get wacky and scary.
And then there is the mountain meadows massacre.. all kinds of other violence that surrounded the church.. brigham young was a real piece of work... then Joseph smith's wife started her own faction... and there are fundamentalists too in AZ and Bountiful canada that still practice poligamy and fuck 13 year old girls (their own daughters in some cases).. then you just sit back and start to go WOW>