I never thought of this before, but I don't remember any members at all having beards. I know the missionaries can't , but what about other church callings? What about just teaching in the local ward? If it is banned or discouraged, how high up on the chain does it take effect? I know the apostles or president wouldn't have beards. I know it's a stupid question, but it's kind of interesting how the church controls everyday , should be private life. I'm finding out more true stuff about the church , just this past week or so, from finding this site, than my whole 12 years being active in the church.
Also , since I know these ex Mormon sites exist , I'm reading about things that recently changed in the church, such as members housing the missionaries , even though they still have to pay the church at least $400.00 dollars a month, then get this, taking turns cleaning toilets , on top of other callings and giving 10%, not counting fast offerings and other funds.
They can easily afford to pay someone who needs the money to do it. I feel sorry for the ones they fired.
My minds made up, I won't be going back now.

I think it's a corporate American thing. And since LDS, Inc. is really a business, only the clean-shaven can enter the hallowed boardrooms.

I had a guy in the Lingfield temple make a remark about my long hair and beard once. I only pointed at the big Jesus painting behind him and wished him a good day.

rt Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I think it's a corporate American thing. And since
> LDS, Inc. is really a business, only the
> clean-shaven can enter the hallowed boardrooms.

Yeah, a 1950's corporate America thing.
As usual, mormonism is behind the times.

I just spent 2 days in San Francisco at a corporate meeting, with the dozen or so people there representing a dozen corporations with a cumulative value in the 100's of billions.

It was mostly t-shirts and jeans and tennis shoes. Well over half of the men attending had beards. Lots of tattoos visible. The top two people, in charge of the biggest multi-billion $ corporation sponsoring the event, were women -- one of whom was pregnant and working (7 months along).

Mormonism gets nothing right. Corporate America moved away from the "IBM look" 20-30 years ago. At least.

There are several men in my ward with beards, but if they are called into the bishopric they are required to shave.

I was in the bishopric and grew one for a couple months at a time, occasionally, and really just to piss people off.

One male member would make a comment each time, "Is that a dead cat on your face?" as a sly way of saying it was a no-no. My response would be, "It's a beard...because I can." That was my way of saying that I'm not a sheeple like you.

Nobody ever told me I had to shave. Probably because they know I'm the type of person to laugh at them and tell them to piss off.

The day I was born the president of the Church wore a beard.

All through my career as a Mormon there were pictures of a
bearded guy who was supposed to have been PERFECT and who we
were supposed to work hard to emulate.

However, when I was 20, I was living in a foreign country going
to school. I lived in a garret apartment and there was one
source of running water (cold) for the entire floor. I grew a
beard.

I was told at the mission home, where I had been welcome to
"hang out" and use their empty class rooms as "study hall," and
where I was friends with many of the elders, that the mission
president had decided that unless I shaved off my beard, I
would not be allowed into the mission home except for Sunday
meetings which, I was informed, they were unable to ban me from
for wearing a beard.

So I shaved off my beard. The next week one of my teachers
(who wore a beard) looked at me and said, "Did one of your
female friends made you shave it off?"

"No," I said.

"Ah," he said, "the Mormons made you shave it off."

"yes," I said.

He shook his head and muttered, "Jesus had a beard."

Collected Works of Hugh Nibley, Vol. 9 (Approaching Zion), Ch. 2, p. 54:

"The worst sinners, according to Jesus, are not the harlots and publicans, but the religious leaders with their insistence on proper dress and grooming, their careful observance of all the rules, their precious concern for status symbols, their strict legality, their pious patriotism."

One of my top reasons for leaving TSCC right here.

One time a bishop reached across his desk and grabbed my beard saying this has got to go. For his trouble he got jerked clear across his desk and onto the floor. He never made that error again.

Many years before I left, I had a beard. A real good one. DW had asked me about cutting her hair (I like long hair) and gave me a choice: she would cut her hair or I had to grow a beard. I grew the beard. Anyway, I have a beard now (mostly grey and white) and plenty of men in non-LDS churches have beards.

I was never a conformist.

Have you ever noticed how many ex-Mo men grow beards? It can be just a trimmed five-day shadow or something more substantial.

But it's only a partial exaggeration to say that beards are a rite of passage, a declaration that "I will now intentionally violate one of Mormonism's most stupid and arbitrary standards."

Amen.

I remember a bishops councillor that stopped shaving. He was having radiotherapy on his neck and the skin was to fragile to shave. Boy did he cop it every week. People would stare, people would tell him to shave, people would frown. He had to explain himself every Sunday poor guy.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/28/2016 08:02PM by blakballoon.

Something must have happened between the 80's and now. When I was on the HC beards were no problem. I wore non white shirts on speaking assignments and nobody cared. I even wore white sport coats in the summer and no one batted an eye.

Have you noticed that TBMs don't call each other by their first names? My TBM sister and brother in law always refer to church members as Brother this or Sister that. This was not the case in the 70's and 80's. In fact my SP specifically instructed me to call him by his first name because he didn't care for titles.

The early 90's were a great time to leave.

...I know a guy in the bishopric who grew a beard for the "TREK" thing last year. Then a week later, he was asked to shave it off. His wife was starting to like it - - - so this caused a major gossip stir in the ward. Finally the Stake President had to personally demand he shave the beard, or else he would lose his calling. So he gave in, and shaved....

If that is all it takes to get out of a calling, I am surprised that beards aren't more popular among Mormon men.

What the hell?

I thought it was only temple ordinance workers (and missionaries) who were 'required' to be clean-shaven.

My TBM cousin (although I've wondered how TBM he really is...he rides a Harley and took his TBM ol' lady to Sturgis on it) has had a mustache as long as I can remember and wore it thoughout his calling as a bishop in the S. Alberta Moridor (Hillsping).

RB

ps: I started growing my mustache in dad's car on the way home from Ricks in May of 1967. Haven't shaved my upper lip since.

In the south where I grew up, I had a bishop in the 80's that had long hair and a beard and no-one cared, A lot of us had long hair and beards and nothing was said about it.

Mormons are some of the most inconsistent assholes on the planet!!!!!

I just shaved my beard this week for the first time in years. I got tired of trimming the damned thing so it finally had to go. Now I have to learn the shave again without cutting my upper lip.

A couple of the Osmond brothers have beards, must be okay for them.

The Osmonds get a pass on everything. They are famous, which is virtually the same thing as getting the second anointing.

The other facet of this is incompetence. I don't think the Osmonds are particularly capable people; I can't see any of them with the intellectual or physical gravitas to be church leaders. Bishop? Maybe. But not much more, at least for some of them.

Take the microphone away and there's not much there.

Yeah, but that's different . . . they had the long-hair
exemption back in the 70s.

BIL is Elders Quorum president and was asked by bishop to shave beard when he took the calling, so he did and he had the beard for many years. Then this year he grew a moustache, and was asked by stake pres to shave it off...

I wonder what would happen if a bish or SP told a member to shave and he refused? Court of love? What if the congregation supported the decision of the bearded member to keep his whiskers? Mass court of love??

RB

ps: I wonder if it was suggested to Robert Kirby to shave his mustache for his calling in the Primary? I met him this summer and his 'stash is almost as bushy as mine.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/29/2016 12:11PM by Lethbridge Reprobate.

Say what you will about Lorenzo Snow, but dude rocked his growth, in my view.

If lorenzo were alive today, he'd have gauged earlobes and be puffing on a custom mech-mod vaping at .01 ohms.

I was making the progression up the leadership ladder, mostly because I was just doing what was expected of me, and was serving as the ward executive secretary as the bishops "term" was nearing completion. I had the feeling that bishop or counselor was the next rung for me and I absolutely did not want any part of that. So, I grew a goatee.
No one said anything but before the bishop was released he "demoted" me to teach the sunbeams.
Best passive aggressive thing I have ever done!

Grew a beard 10+ years ago, partly out of laziness, but mostly because I figured it would get me overlooked for a calling in the bishopric.

It varies in length from a couple of mm to zz top style. A couple of years back did a charity Christmas do cos the beard is snow white and I looked the part.

My wife, sceptical when I first grew one, will now not let me shave it off, although she does complain about the scratchiness when it is too short, particularly around the upper thighs :-)

Beards denote wisdom, which is why they are seldom seen on members of the Celestial Circle...

I don't know, I'm seeing more and more Facebook pics of active TBMs with beards. Used to be that they'd make them shave if they had any kind of leadership position, but doesn't seem to be that way anymore. I think they just have too many battles to fight with the millennials who want justification for some of the petty bullshit rules, that they know they can't push them too far. They're leaving fast enough as it is.

I had a beard for ~2 months after being called into a bishopric as a counselor. shaved it off due to institutional pressures. I had a beard the entire 7 years i served as a clerk and the 2 years I served in EQ.

shaving the beard is a test to see how "church broke" you are and will follow even the smallest rule from those called above you.

Is the female equivalent wearing clumpy, total body covering clothing?

Plus no make-up, no bright colors, no long hair, and no earrings.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 08/31/2016 09:19AM by rhgc.

Early Mormon leaders wore beards largely because it was the fashion then. It does seem, however, that beards are once again a fashion item. Will they then come back into favor even with Mormons? As a side note, like most fashions not everyone is suited to the look. IMV relatively few men look really good with a beard. I think it has to do with chin and face shape. Case in point of a bad beard is the SanFran quarterback so big in the news right now. His looks just scruffy to me.

Have you ever tried a beard? Or hairy legs?

Why be "different"? To be yourself! If that's 'different'... even if it's the same as everyone else... just so long as you lead, they will follow... or languish in disbelief, fester in misunderstanding and smother in unhappiness... to use ldsPEAK.

Keep learning the truth (something not taught - or practiced - in LDSdom). Maybe someday you can teach "the church", even if only by example.

My husband has had a mustache for about 20-some years. His job wouldn't let him have a beard but the mustache was okay So he started growing a beard when he retired. I like him with a beard. Very sexy.

I like him without a beard. That's sexy too.

When I retired a few months ago, I tried to think of something cool that said "I'm free" that I could do comparable to a guy growing a beard.

Haven't thought of anything except growing my leg hair or armpit hair. Anybody got any better ideas? I don't like those.

1. Dye your hair.
2. Wear clothes which don't cover your shoulders.
3. Get diamond earrings.

Ooh, ooh, ooh!
I like number 3!

Hey, thanks!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/03/2016 11:38PM by Doxi.

I think it's just a way of trying to assert power, however arbitrary and stupid. Like what if the higher ups started telling you what underwear to wear, and then insisting it be ugly and uncomfortable? oh wait...

I wonder if a potential Relief Society President would be asked to shave her beard......

I worked with a guy that decided to grow a goatee. It grew in thick and bold. Only problem, it was dark on the sides but white/Gray in the middle.

He thought it looked very distinguished until a co-worker told him to tell his wife to quit douching with bleach.

The goatee was gone the next day.

I have a couple TBM nephews whose dad is bishop, sporting big bushy beards. I think it is becoming a fashion.

Don't know how it can be a problem in the church given Jesus and Brigham. Why would God change standards?

I'm an old guy and all my life, I've never had a heavy beard. Not sure if it's genetic or what, and I've never had to shave a lot.

That meant that I could go at least a couple of days or more without shaving. I don't shave now more than 2X a week and that's when I'm standing in the shower, where my facial hair gets nice and soft. When I was being TBM in Utah, up until my last day of activity in 1996, I always shaved on the weekend to go to church. I did have goatees and full beards on and off and no one in the church ever said a word.

The only thing that drives me crazy is the hair in my nose and my ears. That came right from my dad; I used to think it was so gross when I was younger. I have to buy an electric trimmer about once a year to control that. My 4 year old granddaughter likes to stand up by me on the sofa and pull my ear hair. She laughs.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/03/2016 11:31PM by memikeyounot.

It is up to the stake president. I was in a bishopric with a beard, my uncle was called at 60 years old and was told that he had to shave his 38 year old mustache.

Joseph Smith didn't have a beard because he wasn't a man.