Hi again... So I've posted here a couple times before! I'm not Mormon, have no Mormon connections, but my boyfriend is TBM. Being previously clueless about his faith (although I knew a little. Mormonism is frowned upon in my town) has gotten me completely addicted to this forum. He's talking a lot about his mission and though I try to be encouraging about his religious beliefs, I also ask little innocent clueless questions to try to get him to THINK about it. Example:

We're watching Sister Wives and he's visibly disgusted.
ME: Don't they consider themselves Mormon?
HIM: Yeah...
ME: Oh, they pray the same way as you guys! So, do they believe the same stuff as you, just with plural marriage added to it?
HIM: Uhm... I don't know.
ME: Didn't Mormon's in the 1800's practice bigamy but then when they got in trouble for it they changed the belief, and the fundamentalists stayed the same?
HIM: No. ...Well, yeah. But the pioneers practiced bigamy because many women were widowed, so the men were trying to support those women to protect them.

I just try to slip in little questions here and there to try to get him to look at things at a different angle... I'm STILL trying to figure out how to have the whole, 'I can't wait' mission conversation, as well as mustering up the courage to ask the innocent bystander non-Mormon question of, "didn't Joseph Smith kill two guys after he said he was going like a lamb into battle or whatever?" We'll see when I get the balls to do so... If after I drop these little hints and encourage him to research before he blindly agrees with everything the church feeds him and he still believes, that's fine by me, as long as it makes him happy. In my opinion though, part of being faithful to a religion is exploring all of your options and researching angles, not only listening to biased sources. Wish me luck on the mission talk... I'll let you guys know how it goes!

Listen, don't wait to get these answers. You are wasting precious time. If some of his Mormon answers will bother you then that must come out in the open now FOR DISCUSSION. Seriously, this is important. You won't want to be married to a Mormon who is going to love his church more than you.

You should just ask "why was Joseph Smith in Carthage jail when he was 'martyred'?" Then he can find out that polygamy had nothing to do with "poor little widows" like they tell you at church. There were just as many men as women in the church and polygamy even though he may think that only like 4-5% of people practiced it, it was really anywhere from 20-30% in the early days of the church. That's probably because Brigham Young and other leaders taught that it was essential to entering the highest degree of heaven and becoming a God.

Anyways if he just knew about the nauvoo expositer it would probably start him on a historical dig, and maybe he would learn a thing or two. Relatively few people know why JS was in prison when he died, and that he died in a shootout. None of the missionary age people do at least. Good luck.

I found out about the gunslinging on the mission and thought, "Damn why don't they teach that." I totally thought it was badass and taught it to many people, hence why I was always frowned upon. Screw that milk before meat bullpucky.

Okay, maybe respect for weapons comes from the fact that I still legally have a class 3 firearms permit in the United States. Do not let my other post confuse you, I have never been successfully prosecuted for a felony.

The problem is, I have no idea how to bring that up with him. I don't have the guts to be the one to make him question him believe everything he believes in, that he claims makes him happy... Even if it may 'make him happier' in the end or something...

than there were women, by a significant number too. Proven by US census reports and church records.

I'm actually surprised a TBM man would date a nonmo unless she was converting.

I'm not sure if this is even a topic up for consideration in your relationship, but do NOT marry a man who cannot think for himself. He will do everything he can to trap your children in this cult and you will be exempted from so many parts of their lives, including their weddings. His religion will ALWAYS ALWAYS come before his relationship with you and his children!

Keep trying to deconvert him. For some people it doesn't take much to crack their testimony, but for others they are too terrified to ever question and remain loyal to the lies they were raised to believe.

Yes there were more men but not by much. Not the way the church makes it sound. That was not the reason polygamy was started. That was my point. Sorry I should have clarified. When I was growing up I was told that polygamy was started because men went off to wars and died and so there were widows, and God allowed men to marry them because they were so righteous and nice. This is not really why Polygamy was started though. I'm pretty sure Fanny Alger had nothing to do with any war.

I think these are the numbers...

1850 total 11,380 male 6,046 female 5,334
1860 total 40,273 male 20,255 female 20,018
1870 total 86,786 male 44,121 female 42,665
1880 total 143,963 male 74,509 female 68,454
1890 total 210,779 male 111,975 female 98,804
1900 total 276,749 male 141,687 female 135,062

There are always differences in gender distributions. That is not why the church practiced polygamy. These numbers are not THAT different though.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/04/2010 10:54PM by evolution.

Fact is, there has never been a need for polygamy in this country -- unless young men want to start marrying women 50 and older in mulitiples. Somehow I don't see that happening -- not even if the women all look as good as Michelle Pfieffer (or however you spell that name) at 50.

Truer words were never said than what Vhainya said. The church ALWAYS,ALWAYS.ALWAYS comes first. I've been married to the same man for 38 years. When I left the church a year ago he decided I was not so important any more. Now it's my 4 tbm kids and the church. And the church,of course, does nothing to help the situation. It's a false church that divides families.

sorry to hear that "loveskids". Reminds me of a blog I saw where this lady recounts how she recently converted to mormonism from some protestant church. Her churched exed her and her husband divorced her, but man, you should have seen the grin on the face of the dude that converted her and baptized her. My wife thought it was an "inspirational story" ... I thought (and said out loud to DW) that this was a bunch of crap. The church just broke up a family ... for what? A FRAUD.

You don't have enough money to pay your mortgage and your tithing. The bishop counsels your husband to pay tithing and the "Lord will bless him." You take a second job to pay the mortgage, which means you can't finish your nursing course you were taking at night to improve your earning capacity. Your husband says you have little faith. You are furious because what seemed to be a harmless stupid religion is now affecting you personally. You are furious and your sex life suffers.

Your child needs an operation and you can only pay the copay if you put it on the card and make the payments with your tithing. He refuses and says to "call on the power of heaven." You demand that he subtract your share of the tithing....

He tells you the church now respects other churches, and he agrees that the temple stuff has been unrestored, and he agrees that polygamy has been unrestored, and the Trinity doesn't seem to be a big deal for either one of you, so you ask him if the two of you could find a church you both like and go to a standard Protestant denomination. It might save your marriage. He replies, "Are you kidding?"

Marriage is difficult enough without God's annointed ones interfering with the decisions you need to make for the survival of your family.

Sign me,

Word to the Wise for this one

that the obvious goodness of people with more "light" will convert you as you get to know the ward. You just need time...:)

RUN!

Yeah, not converting or marrying a Mormon (or anyone extremely physically/financially/emotionally invested in their religion), period. So that's a non-issue here. But I think I've finally figured out what I'm going to say to him about the mission + I'll never be Mormon talk. I've told him from the beginning "I don't think I'll ever be Mormon," but this would just be addressing the elephant in the room, so to speak. He's been talking about our future during and after his mission. I'm going to say something like this!

"Since you brought up your mission and our relationship a while ago and you're obviously thinking about the future, you deserve to know something sooner rather than later. I have no intention of becoming Mormon, ever. Becoming Mormon would be filling a void in my life that isn't there. It's not who I am and I'm sorry if this upsets you, but I can promise that it never will be."

Something like that... Soon... Before the holidays and our anniversary. Ha.

The sooner the better. I like how you plan to be direct in what you say. You have to be. But now you have to figure out if he believes you. YOU may find out after his mission lead balloon. What a waste of time that would be for you. I think this relationship has only a 50/50 chance of working out. And do you want you kids raised in the Mormon church at least part of the time if he is still Mormon after his mission? It would be a no brainer for me. I would never hurt my kids like that.

Should have said but it got deleted "after his mission he'd drop you like a lead balloon."

ivy Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> ME: Didn't Mormon's in the 1800's practice bigamy
> but then when they got in trouble for it they
> changed the belief, and the fundamentalists stayed
> the same?
> HIM: No. ...Well, yeah. But the pioneers practiced
> bigamy because many women were widowed, so the men
> were trying to support those women to protect
> them.

My BFF in high school was a Mormon boy who explained away polygamy the same way! I really want to talk to him now about the angel with the flaming sword and JS's marriage to a 14 year old and how he was marrying women who were already married to other men - but I posted some stuff that's probably considered Anti-Mormon on my Facebook page a while back and he's not responded to emails since then.

It makes me sad.