We all heard this one growing up in the church. My question is how does the average member even know how much they sacrifice? The average member sees these guy's mostly give talks at general, regional, and stake conferences. Also, when they visit missions. Most of the time these guys are out of site doing who knows what.

The church publications are basically public relations for these guys telling us how great they are. To be honest, I never saw one apostle or seventy do anything charitable or remarkable. I once was told to move away by President Hinckley's body guard so the old man could get out of a sacrament service.

If anything, they are celebrities and the church is a mini version of Hollywood with it's press, magazines, movies, and television shows existing for the soul purpose of building the image of the stars. The gullable fan base eats it all up and buys the hyped up product because all their peers are buying it too.

Someone on the board posted recently they saw Euctdorf shopping at some high end store in some fancy clothes driving a new Audi... Rock star man!

me thinks Dieter could be the one to show his cards someday... we can only hope

That wasn't Uchtdorf it was Charles "Beady Eyes" Didier. Emeritus Status Asshat.

Right. My TBM friend grew up in a ward with Gordon B. Hinckley himself. He told me, literally in a conspiratorial whisper, that he was not a very nice person. I leaned forward eagerly, "Like what for example? How was he not nice?" John said he refused to take his water turn and took other people's water regularly.

This may seem like nothing to you city people, but when you live in the country, a refusal to cooperate with the distribution of water was literally a life and death situation. It would be like refusing to share the air on your way up from a scuba dive. Or hogging the road and forcing someone else off into a ditch.

If people didn't get water for their crops, they could starve. Respecting the water turns was survival.

For a man like Hinckley to demonstrate such contempt for the rights of others makes you wonder why God chose him to lead the Church, doesn't it? (hahahahaha)

I asked how Hinckley ever climbed the ladder and John said it was all politics. He was ruthless and simply got rid of any competition.

His story makes no sense. Hinckley grew up in Salt Lake, went to the University of Utah, served a mission, and was in the employ of the Church from his mission until his death. There is no possibility of him having been an ass about watering fields - he was never a farmer.

Your friend has mistaken him with another general authority.

Tyson

The story is plausible. It's quite possible Hinckley--as a grown man--owned rights to the water from the canal that still runs about a hundred yards from my folks' house.

No, it wouldn't have been a matter of life-or-death; by the time I was a teenager (and one of my classmates was in a carpool where Hinckley took his turn), the water was used for vegetable gardens and such; I recall accompanying a neighbor very early one morning to "open the gates" so the water would flow down pipelines to distribution boxes where it would be diverted onto his garden.

The East Millcreek area (where Hinckley lived) drew water from both that canal and Millcreek, and Hinckley lived in that area at least until around 1990. My mother worked at a department store and used to wait on Marjorie Hinckley while he waited for her to complete her shopping.

I can't confirm whether he was a "good neighbor" or not on that one (I'm doubtful anyone would gossip much), but I did hear a story about some land the church wanted in Utah County when he was LDS President. It included a cherry orchard, and what the church really wanted was a cherry pitter the owner had invented (and kept as propretory rather than patenting). Hinckley is reported to have said during negotiations, "Then I'll deny this conversation ever took place, and you'll be ruined."

Now watch the MA&D crowd holler that the Cabbie is repeating hearsay stuff again...

SL Cabbie Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The story is plausible.
> The East Millcreek area (where Hinckley lived)
> drew water from both that canal and Millcreek, and
> Hinckley lived in that area at least until around
> 1990.

Not just plausible, probable.
I grew up in that area. 1960-1967 -- from the age of 4, my dad and I used to go "open the gates" so we could water our apricot trees and veggie garden. There were times we'd get there, and the gates would be "out of order," meaning somebody had gone out of turn and taken somebody else's water. I recall once, when I was 6, my dad saying it was probably somebody with church connections, 'cause if we tried that, we'd be hauled into jail :)

Water rights are a really big deal in Utah. My mother has water rights to this day in Central Utah. It's a rural area but she doesn't have a farm. The water comes about every 10 days and that is how she waters her vegetable and her flower garden. Water rights are huge to this day.

He was feuding over his shares with whoever was the water master at the time, even before the thing with his kids and school.

Just sayin' what Munchymomom sez--she reports, I decide kind of thing.

:-)

L. Tom Perry does have rock star status. Al Roker said it I believe it that settles it.

http://www.exmormon.org/mormon/mormon040.htm

Looking back, I sometimes wonder how I ever took these GA fellows so damn seriously. Funny and sad.

What I remember is a lot of rationalizing and explaining why the leaders tended to be so much better off than the average member: They prosper because they're so righteous, don'tcha know, and they have time on their hands now that they've grown their businesses and everything.

That's right, rich guys have more time.

This is another thing that struck me about the Packer Facebook group. They really genuinely seemed to believe that GAs are not compensated, and that Packer and the others are like these kindly old grandfatherly characters who only care about others and don't mind not getting paid and stuff. I got a strong reaction, going in with my line about old men stealing their money.

I guess they think Uchtdorf gets his tan serving in an outdoor soup line or standing in fields, preaching to migrant workers or something.

Hello, dude spends a lot of time on the golf course. And skiing, too, probably.

The social stigma attached to not taking your proper water turn is no doubt left over from the times farmers lost their crops or starved if their water was stolen "upstream". It was an honor system. Yes, of course, Hinckley grew up in Millcreek and the point was, he was not honorable. He was a shark. The cherry orchard scandal was a big deal and it was generally known that the owners were threatened to be "ruined" if they didn't sell the orchard to the church.

The scandal that sticks in my mind was the lady I met who told me her family had donated some valuable land on the East Bench to the church for tithing- they felt it was needed for a parking lot for the local ward. The ward bishopric thanked them, etc., and within a few months, lo and behold, an apartment building was going up on the lot. They looked up the owner and it was the son of one of the general authorities. When I talked to her, it had been 10 years, so that was back in the 80's.

Just a sample of the sacrifices.....

Doesn;t he read in the bible that liars won't enter heaven?
I guess that must've been one of the misstranslated items.

Her apartment was gorgeous and huge. His takes up the entire top floor. (Or rather, did.) She was a bit of a rebel and took us up the elevator to wave at his door. I thought it was so cool at the time.

... where about ten years ago, other residents included the widow of Ezra T's brother and the widow of Bruce R McConkie?

I was friends with a young guy whose grandmother had been married to the brother of Ezra T (as she called Benson). It was her second husband, and they got married in relatively old age.

CBS 60 MINS 1979 LDS GARN BAUM Part 1
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xd0asb_cbs-60-mins-1979-lds-garn-baum-part_news

CBS 60 MINS 1979 LDS GARN BAUM Part 2 25
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xd0ax6_cbs-60-mins-1979-lds-garn-baum-part_news

Hinckley's role in that one isn't mentioned, and my source was word-of-mouth, but I'm hopeful others may come forward. I see this was 1979, so Hinckley wasn't in the FP yet... As always, I'm grateful for facts, and I find the silence by Mormons on this one is telling...

And in the interest of full disclosure, I found this reply on Google, and the summary judgment of the appeals court... Scroll down past the faith-promoting African stuff...

http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=41a3615b01a6b010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD

http://cases.justia.com/us-court-of-appeals/F2/648/1292/130626/

Well, Brother Baum, if you're still around, I trust they didn't get your cherry pitter... As for what happened, as my friend Robert Kirby says, "Beats the heck out of me."



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/23/2010 03:48AM by SL Cabbie.

So Bro. Baum made a big deal over not being able to pay is damn mortgage on his property and was embarrassed that he had to be bought out by the church?

Since nothing was ruled in his favor I guess he was just bitter that he was not successful?

Was the conspiracy that the church told other farmers to not use Bro. Buam as a cherry processor and that in turn made it tough for Bro. Baum to make the income needed to pay his bills?

Can you just imagine what they were like toward members who disagreed with them, wouldn't sell what they wanted to them, or wouldn't give their daughters to them, back in the "good old days" of early Mormonism? Can you imagine what it must have been like pre internet, being non Mormon, when the majority of people living in Utah were LDS?

Thank goodness for 60 Minutes, the internet and the good people of RFM!

It's easy to detect when they lie. Des right, every time they open their pie hole.

ST

The General Authorities sacrifice so much of what the faithful have offered, and give to the building up of the power and influence of the General Authorities.

I like how you finished the sentence, JoD3:360.

Yeah, the GE's have to live in straw homes, walk 2 miles to the well to retrieve their water, hoe the fields, worry if Ebola will come to their village, etc. etc. etc.

I also liked the description given by a poster of Hinckley as being ruthless.

As I watched him lie about the Hoffman tragedy where terrible deaths occurred, to me it was like he was talking about some killings that took place in outer Mongolia. He could have cared less. And, then, of course, on television, several times, he lied just as easily.

Yeah, the GE's sacrifice so much of such things as normal integrity, honesty, and empathy that the shell that is left is am empty pile of bones.

What's with the zombie posts today? Strange.

They and our country's leaders sacrifice so much. If they sacrifice so much why are they out of touch with the public, the middle class(of what remains of it) and the poor?? It's like they live in their own upper class/ 1% world.

They get paid for their "jobs"... they get at least a six

figure salary.... they don't sacrifice crap for anyone.

That sacrificing stuff is a myth.

What is all the fuss? If you view the Mormon Church for what it really is, a six billion dollar a year corporation, and the big fifteen as the corporate board, then these guys are actually underpaid.

Most of these guys are seriously aged geezers, a lot farther along the age path than I am. And even at my age, I'm grateful to be retired. I wouldn't like to have to get gussied up in my Sunday best for a talk, a photo-shoot, a temple dedication or whatever else they do.

What if they are having a Bad Body Day and just don't feel like doing anything? I certainly have those days. Even for the kind of money they get, I wouldn't care for the obligations.

the year 2009 was very difficult to ex_sushi, yet 4 or 5 times felt/received contact to the deceased person, who died 2008, lds member, that helped ex_sushi very much....

that was around april 2009, while in tokyo temple, an endowment session, the thought came somehow, not from that deceased one, something like, seems president hinckley was defeated by the adversary/satan....

"Gordon Bitner Hinckley (June 23, 1910 – January 27, 2008)"