| Subject: | Mormon myths on the fly. How many of us hear utterly bizarre explanations |
| Date: | May 27 23:46 |
| Author: | Socrates |
| from TBMs for tragedies that happen in the lives? I
call these "Myths on the fly" where the TBM comes up with some
kind of church acceptable explanation for the tragedy that has just
happened. Twelve years after my brother was killed by a drunk driver we had a little graveside service with the whole family, including my brothers two boys that were now sixteen. My dad said "The day that Carl died I had the overwhelming sense that the Lord had a work for him to do that was soooo important that the Lord gave him the choice to stay with his family or to go and perform this great work". Now I realize that the loss of a child is probably the most heart rending tragedy that most of us can imagine and so a little slack needs to be cut my dad for looking for an explanation that will bring him some comfort. But how many bizarre explanations have we all heard from TBMs to explain away lifes' many difficulties? Any examples? |
| Subject: | Called by God to serve a special mission |
| Date: | May 28 00:01 |
| Author: | Kim |
| I'm sure people must come up with divine purposes
for the loss of loved ones in order to psychologically deal with it. If
that helps their grieving and healing process, then it's not such a bad
thing. However, the fact remains that people die in tragic, senseless
accidents. God hasn't planned them. They just happen. There
doesn't have to a reason for them other than negligence on someone's
part. The other thing that mormons seem to say to help them deal with their losses is that the loved one has "gone to a better place." Hogwash! The better place, especially for children, is remaining alive, with their families. |
| Subject: | I was told my mother had more important work to do... |
| Date: | May 28 08:36 |
| Author: | piloti |
| than, presumably, raise her three children aged 11, 7 and 4. It took me another 20 years or so to take off the blinders and get quite pissed off over this lame-ass explanation. I miss her still, now 35 years on. |
| Subject: | Re: Mormon myths on the fly. How many of us hear utterly bizarre explanations |
| Date: | May 28 09:18 |
| Author: | squeezebox |
| I remember all of the utterly stupid things I heard
from people when our young daughter died. "she's too good for this world" "she must have been SO valiant" "she was needed on the other side to help her sister (she was a twin)" "God took her because he knew your wife wouldn't have been able to handle all of the pressure (my wife has an incurable brain disease...this explanation has a bit of truth to it. Life probably was a BIT easier but I don't think God works this way)" "she had a special mission to perform" "she's so happy now up with the angels in heaven" BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH All of these things ring so terribly hollow to a parent. I can't understand anyone who would actually believe these things and use them to calm their soul. The bottom line is that I had beautiful twin daughters. I had great dreams and plans for them. One of them died after an unsuccesful (botched in my opinion) heart opperation. I don't care where she is. I don't care if God needed her. The fact remains that I NEEDED HER and she's gone and I still miss her terribly. Even after almost 13 years I still miss her! TBM's have a solution for everything. If things go really good then you were blessed, probably because you're so great and valiant and keep the commandments etc. etc. If things go wrong then you must have been sinning. OR you are SO SPECIAL and God knows that you can handle such a difficult trial. You get the whole Joseph Smith thing thrown at you , know ye my son that all these things shall be for thy good and shall give thee experience. Enough with the stinking experiences already. I've had enough! Sometimes bad stuff just happens. Why me?? WHY NOT ME?!! Why am I so darn special that bad things can't happen to me. Life is just hard. Some people manage to get more bad stuff than others. I've burried a child. I've lost a child to the international courts and my in-laws, I haven't seen her in almost 7 years. I've got my other daughter in a adolescent psych hospital because she's suicidal and has thoughts of killing her mom (she seems to be doing much better and should be released this week). Mom (my wife)has a terminal disease plus all manner of other problems mental and physical. My young son seems to be doing pretty good but I know all of this is really hard on him. I'm keeping a real close eye on him. It's really no ones fault. It just IS. I'll admit I'm a much stronger man now because of it. If all of this is part of some mystical school then I quit. I don't want any more courses. I don't care about the stinking degree. I'm so special. I must have really been valiant in the pre-existance. Yeah right. |
| Subject: | A really bizarre one. |
| Date: | May 28 11:53 |
| Author: | Longtimegone |
| My 53 year old apostate sister died of breast
cancer. Within a year my TBM mom wrote me a long letter explaining that
god had taken my excommunicated sister in order to separate her from her
husband. Mom "knows" son-in-law was the only reason sister
apostatized, so god had to kill her in order to give a second chance at
being reconverted in heaven. I couldn't speak to my mom for several weeks after that stupid bit of information. Her mormon god is one piece of work. Mom thought that story would bring me back to the morg. It some how made her feel better. |
| Subject: | Re: Yeah! My stillborn son was sent to earth to claim a body! |
| Date: | May 28 13:08 |
| Author: | Anoymous |
| That one will ring eternally in my mind. My TBM dude asked me about my baby and I explained my horrific story of seizures, near death experience, kicking the doctor into the wall behind him (out of my mind with pain from being sliced into without anestesias, and many more unpleasant details)and having my son die of suffocation inside of me before he could be safely removed. So the explanation was clear to him, the baby obviously only needed to "get a body" and that's why he was sent to earth. Even then I thought the "get a body" thing was a crock of sh**! Especially since my baby's body was now rotting in a grave. But he sat there smiling, with the confident look on his face that he had dispensed the wisdom necessary to get me through my little tough spot. Honestly, he did not have one clue. He was trying to be an a$$hole, it's just that the church had stripped him of any natural feelings of humanity. Well, maybe he would understand if it had been his own loss. |
| Subject: | This one is really sick... |
| Date: | May 28 22:20 |
| Author: | Diane |
| I got this whacked one from my MIL who told me this
many years after all the truth about the family came out and my FIL was
dead. My FIL molested his daughters (he started raping one of his daughters at age 3) then they ended up adopting a 15 year old girl who "diverted" the dad's attention from the FIL. My MIL said God sent the adopted daughter to distract him from his own daughters. SICK, SICK, SICK! Same FIL was a sealer and was interviewed by Kimball personally, so he MUST have gone directly to the Lord and repented of said behavior. Diane |
| Subject: | One of my sons has Down syndrome and... |
| Date: | May 28 13:51 |
| Author: | BeenThereDoneThat |
| Mail Address: |
| several people gave me a copy of an alleged patriarchal blessing of a child with DS. It stated that the child was so valiant, special etc in the pre existence that he was given this disability as a type of protection. He would automatically be sent to CK. |
| Subject: | A Happy church for Happy people and a Happy God. |
| Date: | May 28 17:06 |
| Author: | Dude |
| One of the phony features of Hollywood movies is the
obligatory happy ending. Seems like Mormons always want a happy ending
too, and are quite happy to create facts and doctrines on the fly to
make a happy ending to even life's worst tragedies. Voltaire eviscerated this juvenile mindset in "Candide," which ridiculed the then-current theory that this was the best of all possible worlds. Sorry, it's the real world. Real tragedies happen here. Mormons and Mormonism, to put it bluntly, are unable to recognize real tragedy because they are so unwilling to situate themselves and their gospel in the real world. This comes out in a couple of odd ways. First, Mormons are unable to see depression or mourning as natural, instead seeing them as a lack of faith or as Satanic tricks to make people . . . unhappy. That's the unpardonable sin, being unhappy. My sincere condolences to those who have suffered a terrible loss and were never allowed to grieve, mourn, or be authentically sad over their loss. Second, it explains why there is no Mormon art or literature. Mormons don't have a category for tragedy ("God is happy and so are we") and are too uptight to laugh at themselves, so there's no comedy. Not much left to write or paint, is there? Phony art isn't art, it's a lie. Plenty of phony art in the Church. |
| Subject: | How all of your troubles are explained: (one curse) |
| Date: | May 28 18:19 |
| Author: | NEM |
| 1. Satan was tempting you. 2. God was testing you. 3. Other peoples' bad choices affected you. These were the reasons given for "trials", according to one of the RS manuals. My hubby and I were laughing about how silly all this is. I've decided to settle for "shit happens". |
| Subject: | Reading this thread has made me cringe |
| Date: | May 28 19:28 |
| Author: | Wag |
| Remembering all the times I gave various of these
bullshit answers to some tradgedy or other and feeling cocky and sure
that I was absolutely saying the right thing at the right time for the
right reasons etc. etc. ad pukieus. The worst one I did was one time a couple asked me and my companion to go to the hospital and give a blessing to their distressed newborn baby. As I struggled to feel the non-existent spirit, I said something to the effect that the child had been sent here solely to bring the parents together and that his mission in life had been fulfilled. Then, in an attempt to fudge the fact that I had no clue whether or not the kid would live or die, I said that any further life that would be given him would be to help futher the kingdom of God on earth, blah de blah de blah. I never did find out if the kid lived or died. Pretty stupid stuff we did as TBM's, eh? --Wag-- |
| Subject: | Me too. |
| Date: | May 28 20:53 |
| Author: | Al |
| I hurt due to some of the stupid things I parroted.
The best I can do now is try to atone to the people I hurt, and realize
I have grown beyond the stupidity. Al |
| Subject: | A nephew dropped dead at 4 years old |
| Date: | May 28 19:57 |
| Author: | Stray Mutt |
| He was running to Primary and just collapsed. It was
devistating to his parents and a shock to the rest of us. Naturally,
everyone tried to make sense of the tragedy and the usual Mormon myths
were trotted out to give comfort. Years later, through a series of events unrelated to the nephew's death, our family became subjects in a genetic study. It was learned that the nephew almost certainly died from a rare congenital neurological disorder. Knowing what really caused the boy's death gave far more comfort that the stories we told ourselves. |
| Subject: | This thread is a heartbreaker... |
| Date: | May 28 21:09 |
| Author: | Sandyslc |
| When I lost my firstborn twins, I numbed myself by
believing that there was a high purpose as I had been trained to do. So
many years later after shedding all of the b.s.... I finally began to
grieve and continue to. Now I deal with guilt for not having felt the
pain from the start and anger that the morgue had dehumanized me to such
a degree that I didn't know how to see how much I'd lost at that time. Sandy |
| Subject: | No explanation given but on the death of our first twins... |
| Date: | May 29 04:09 |
| Author: | mikemgc |
| ...I called the bishop to notify him that Sandy had
lost our first set of twins at 5 months of pregnancy. He responded only
with, "Uhhh..Ok, can we reschedule your tithing settlement for
Friday?" That was it. What an asshole. I've also heard so many other stupid Mo things during the last 2 months over the death of my brother that it makes me sick. "His body is just a glove." (It's not a fucking glove, it's his body you freak, I loved his body too). "He had work to do on the other side." (Like what? Fix heaven? Is it broken or something?) "He's a soldier for God now." (why does God need soldiers?) "He went to be with Mom." (I think his kids need him more than Mom right now thankyou). Ad nauseum. With my TBM siblings included, these people don't seem to know how to access their feelings sometimes during tragedies. They seem to be able to maintain a smile and laugh at the strangest times and think they're stronger for it because they have some knowledge that the rest of us don't have. Big deal. It's not like I don't have beliefs of somewhere else after death myself. Thanks but I'd rather feel the loss on this side and grieve anyday. I'm alive and here right now and I'll worry about the rest when I get there. My heart goes out to all of you that have posted here with the stories you have mentioned. They're heart wrenching and bring tears to my eyes. If I could hug you, I would. |