Back when I was a kid in the 50's and 60's the Church bought farms and ranches for the Church Welfare Program. Theyw ere to be used to produce goods for needy people.

Fast forward to 2015. The ranch in Florida is to be made into 500,000 homes. Questions.

1) My dad paid his tithes and offerings into the Church to help people. I am sure he felt that his money was being used to assist those less fortunate. Am I missing something? Did they collect money from my dad and mum under false pretentous?

2) How do you feed people with building material? I understand that it is hard to digest? Second question. Is using the land for building not fraud since it was suppose to be used for Church welfare purposes?

3) So we have a mall, a large apartment building near a temple in the east being built and now this land development, why are TBM not demanding some financial answers as to where the money is coming from? And where the money is going? How can the 12 Apostles in good faith sit back and let this happen with all the poor people, kids starving, etc in the world and say they are apostles of Christ? This is not Christ like is it?

4) If the Church has so much money why are they making more wards go into one building. How can I take pride in my Church building when it is shared with 2 other wards. That was one of the things that made the Church boom in the 70's and 80's. People got new buildings and they felt pride and they could call it "their ward building." Hard to do when you are sharing with other people.

So many questions and so few answers and so few local leaders asking their leaders important questions.

I do not think, and I am being truthful, that I could sit in a Bishopric or high council and be honest with myself at what I am seeling in the Church. I would have to throw any integrity away. Anyone else feel the same way?

They do it "Because the Prophet says so."

Hinckley told us all on National TV that no tithing money was going into the building of the SLC mall. He said they were going to build much-needed "low-income housing."

I agree 100% with what you wrote, Toronto Boy.

Remember, that these same men in high authority probably believe in all the Joseph Smith BS, too. I think you hold these Mormons in too high esteem. Honestly, they don't deserve your respect.

None of them have my respect. I have known some Mormon men in very high positions, mostly family members, all of us related to an important GA, and I know these men do not believe in all of the Mormon lies. They rationalize it away, by supporting their 10 to 12 children and too-many-to-count grandchildren. They are fathers who have given their progeny Harvard educations, new cars when they come home from missions, fancy expensive wedding receptions, ski cabins, beach houses, trips around the world, etc. These Mormon leaders live in mansions, not houses. They pat themselves on the back for being good providers.

I was curious about Mormon corruption in my profession, and made a personal study of how these Mormons rationalize away all their scams and lies. (This was actually printed in the Ensign, as the VT subject of the month. I wish I had that article now.) Mormons believe that the good deeds balance out the bad deeds--it's as simple as that! My VT and her husband scammed several of our neighbors out of hundreds of thousands of dollars, caused them to lose their homes and their jobs--it was all in the newspapers. But, they loved their children, sent all of their kids on missions, donated money to some widows in the ward for several Christmases, the wife volunteered at the soup kitchen on Thanksgiving. Get it? It all balances out.

Mormons believe that if they are serving their cult, they are serving God. Tithing is "God's money." Their prophet will not lead them astray. They simply do not ask the question you are asking.

If the Mormons know the Truth and continue to pocket money out of innocent cult victims, they are corrupt. If they still believe Joseph Smith's lies, they are stupid. Either way, they don't deserve respect.

Except, if you respect WEALTH.

You're also right about community pride. Our ward raised money with bake sales and donations of the wealthier members, for the "building fund." The members did much of the labor, to refurbish, and add on a bigger chapel to our old ward house. We were truly like a big family, back then. Our ward was "consolidated" into one stake, where there used to be 4 stakes, and the cherished ward house was sold to the Seventh-Day Adventists. Our "welfare farm", where we grew and canned peaches and pears, is now a very expensive housing development.

I feel like slapping these people upside the head and yelling, "Wake up!"

Toronto,

You nailed it.

The use of a "church" as a real estate company is a scam. But the greater tragedy is the set of mental shackles that keeps millions funding this scam.

I would love to see the bill for Packer's funeral. We all know who paid it. Then I'd love to see the funeral expenses of an impoverished LDS tithe-payer from, say, Mexico. And I'm guessing TSCC pays none of that.

the church does help some mexicans. some of my mexican relatives died and as I recall the church bought the casket. but in mexico they don't embalm so a body gets buried within a day or so. They also stack graves. the cost as I recall is about $1000 for a funeral so a about a 10th what it is in America.

It's apparent that tithing money went into purchasing these farms and investing in machinery. In pioneer days BY put most of church money into business ventures and farms. People were expected to consecrate their time and resources. They were to receive a living from this. Many of these businesses became very profitable but after the time of statehood ownership began to change. Many church businesses were given to certain prominent men. The church failed to honor the communities that built the businesses. Through time and acquisitions they merged into other gentile businesses we have today. If things were fair the church wouldn't ask for tithing but instead distribute a yearly dividend to the members.

The LDS church owns a 500 acre farm near me in Idaho. Back in the 50s 60s and 70s they would lease it out to local farmers(lds ones)then one day they stopped leasing it and put it in grassland and began collecting a government payment. I don't know about you but a church owning farmland and not putting said farmland to use to help feed the needy and poor is wrong. Collecting a government payment for said land is wrong. Of coarse the folks around these parts started growing malt barley/wheat but I'm sure the church doesn't care as long as they are getting their 10%. Just not on their land.

Blew me away when on the tour I was told this beer company gets its barley from Idaho!!! I guess these are non LDS farmers. How can you grow barley for the beer company when you believe the Word of Wisdom, and need to follow it to get a temple recommend.

My tbm grampa had a 5000 acre farm in middle of nowhere, Idaho. Summers would find me "moving pipe" on barley fields some years. What it got used for never entered his mind, so far as I could tell.

http://exmormon.org/phorum/read.php?2,524,524#msg-524

It's been discussed here before.

My take is that since the Wow actually states the mild barley drinks (ie beer) are okay, it shouldn't be a issue.

Party on mates, drink up and stay thirsty my friends

I rented farmland from the Lethbridge Stake for 6 years in the late 80's. The local church authorities had not a fucking clue about farming but pretty much left me alone. Incidently, I was never asked to pay tithing (and I never have) as a condition of my rental agreement.

RB

Hate to burst any bubbles, but the cattle operation in Florida was a for-profit operation. Back in the 1960s, the ranch was the largest single property tax payer in three Florida counties. It was never about helping the needy. The cattle were and are sold commercially.

They also frequently lease out farm land. Also, a lot of the welfare farms sell their products to the volunteer labor for food storage, so some percentage of what the farm produces is sold, presumably at a profit, to church members. My mom had shelves of welfare farm canned goods that were tossed a couple months ago.

Feed the needy. Yeah, right.

I agree BoJ but one can swallow a little easier knowing that the farm was producing food for God's children even for a profit rather than developing the farm for high end housing and Gucci/Prada/Rolex stores so God's children can be well equipped for church on Sunday with the latest swag. I may be wrong and they may develop this into low income housing, medical and educational facilities, you know the stuff that might benefit those in need. Time will tell.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/13/2015 11:18PM by lush.

The cult own several ranches in southern Alberta, the Knight Ranch and Bar K-2 comprising around 100,000 acres of the best ranchland in the province. They produce thousands of calves every year from their cow-calf herd which are sold at auction to commercial feeding operations all over the west. Between these two ranched is the McIntyre Ranch with 55,000+ acres which I just know the church covets.

Ron Burr



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/13/2015 11:39PM by Lethbridge Reprobate.

Tho shalt not covet they neighbor.....ha

Indeed...but the McIntyre Ranch is the jewel of the Milk River Ridge and worth GAWD knows how many millions of dollars...pocket change to the cult.

Ron Burr

Has the church ever had a tobacco growing operation?

The church owns 50 or more acres of prime land outside of Portland Oregon. They used to have a berry farm there.

They had tons of free labor from the stakes in the area. The berries did NOT go to the welfare. They sold the berries to Smuckers. The members either didn't know this, or didn't seem to care. They would show up on their assigned days to do the farm work for free. Everything from tying up canes to processing the berries for shipment. None of it went to the Bishops storehouse.

The church wasn't making enough money off of that venture, so they now lease out the land. It's land that many a developer would love to get a hold of.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/14/2015 02:17AM by madalice.

Hi Toronto Boy,

I think many leaders don't question because they have no time. I am also in the GTA and any questions I had were quickly off my mid because I kept very busy with church callings and such. But a few things made me turn to google for answers.

1. Why were the janitors let go? I spoke to one of them thinking he has chosen to retire and move out of the city but he explained the church let him go. Soon after we were all on cleaning duties.

2. The Thomas S. Monson park just outside of Toronto. Many members were excited about having a place for scout and girl camps. We assume it was going to be free for these young boys an girls. Surprise, after getting all the YM and YW to help with the cleaning, the trimming, the cutting of the trees and any jobs they could get any member to do, WE HAD TO PAY to stay at the park. I once said in ward council, it is just like any park where you pay, the bishop gave me a look to shut up.

3. Canadian tithing going to BYU, one year it was 102 million being donated to BYU, that was the last straw for me.

I think is lack of information and lack of time to obtain the information.

BTW, have you checked out how much Canadians pay in tithing and how much is transferred out of the country? If you haven't you may want to do so.

I'm in the GTA also and I'm so happy to see so many of our youth go inactive. =)

D

You know what? TBM's will never question any of this for-profit jazz, because they will congratulate the church on using that pioneer spirit to be self-sufficient ever since they "had to, because of persecution, and being in this world, but not of it, and being humble and taking care of their own" and any other shelf they choose to build.

And they have a point.

Except for the billions and billions of dollars that Jesus would look at say: "Wow, that's a bit much, dontcha think?"

I always thought it was so ironic that Spencer Kimball could get up in General Conference and give his little "don't shoot the little birdies" speech while at the same time the Church was investing heavily in the sport hunters game clubs across America where plenty of little birds got shot to heck (or Kolob).

I heard speaking in a group of local church leaders---
chortling about how silly the church leaders were before the 80s when they didn't invest their wealth.

He said a group of new finance folks stepped in at that time and showed them how they could make real money by investing in projects such as the ones they are doing now.

I also griped about the SLC mall to my sister one time. She huffed, "Well, what do you expect them to do with all their money. They have to invest it!"

So???