Apostasy is running rampant in Sweden with many prominent LDS families and leaders recently leaving the church over historical problems of the church that are becoming well-known there. In order to help these struggling members in Sweden, the LDS Church issued a document to the local leadership called 'The Swedish Rescue'.

These documents are circulating on the Internet on various Swedish Internet groups. Someone who knows Swedish translated it and sent it to MormonThink to share with other members who might find it of interest.

http://www.mormonthink.com/swedish-rescue.htm

Dianne Ormond
MormonThink.com



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 07/20/2012 11:11PM by Dianne Ormond.

Interesting article. It is all a domino effect. I don't think it will be stopping anytime soon.

Basically it's giving out the same old, "have more faith" response they've peddled all along. Didn't work then, REALLY doesn't work now.

Blah
Blah
Blah
Blah
Same ole same ole
How stupid do they think people are?????

Too bad someone couldn't have rescued my Swedish ancestors from TSCC a hundred years ago. Certainly would have made my life much nicer.

That's exactly what I was thinking as I read the post. Some of my ancestors--and many thousands of others--had pure, innocent belief that led them from their comfortable homes in Sweden to poverty, hardship, persecution and sometimes death...all in the service of a lie.

For the first time in a couple of months, I'm SERIOUSLY pissed off. If this page is based on real documents (and I want to see copies of them), then the church is actively, programmatically trying to manipulate truth-seeking members through guilt, half-truths, subtle insults (suggesting that a struggling member needs to attain a higher understanding of the church in order to prove their intellectual mettle) and unleashing an avalanche of unrelated information in order to obfuscate the real problems with church history and doctrine.

No honest organization would do this, especially not to its own members. Even if Joseph Smith was innocent of the charges against him--or even more sinned against than sinning--the current church is corrupt to the core if it handles research and questioning in such a manner.

My ancestors, too. Including a fourteen year old boy. Anyone else related to the Hermansons?

I wonder what other languages they plan to translate that farrago into? If Sweden sinks, can Finland be far behind!

It does my heart good to see that some of the old blood of Mormonism are having WTF moments now that the Suits can no longer control the narrative.

Thanks for posting this, Dianne

Cool. I spent my vacation in Sweden last year. Great country. In my two weeks there, I did not see a single public sign forbidding anything (like "No trespassing" or "No camp fires" or "No littering"). Mormonism has no business there, with its petty rules and commandments.

I agree with what they quoted from Hugh B Brown.
"We should study with an open mind and to approach new problems with no preconceived notions.
Doubt has its place if it can awaken an interest for us to seek and find truth in our own person.
Too many people in the world are willing to accept as true everything that is printed in a book or termination from a pulpit." I always started with the preconceived notion that the church was true. Once I opened my mind and considered it might not be it was amazing all the truth I found.

What they're posting would have More Cred if they posted pics of the originals (don't we insist on seeing to believe?).

+1000

Shouldn't it be problems with the lies the church sold them?

I like the the last part of the Q&A with the 3 levels of knowledge on church history. They admit that they want most members to stay at level A where everything is perfect and there are no problems. Then level B is where you start getting some more information and it is different than level A and you get mad. Then they say you have two choices. You can go back to level A or you can put in the time to become an expert in history and ancient Egyptian and early Christian history and various other disciplines and after you do you will realize again that the church is 100% true. If you are to lazy and stupid to put in the effort for that then you deserve whatever bad treatment they give you for being one of those awful B level knowledge people.

I love the name: the Swedish Rescue. It sounds like a sexual position.

If that translation is anywhere near accurate, my respect for Marlin K. Jensen -- who always seemed to me like a nice guy -- has dropped several points.

"The Church does not hide historical facts. In fact, it makes every effort to be open and honest about its past and current actions." Except anything having to do with details like church finances, the endowment ceremony, etc. Or just go to www.josephsmith.net and search for "polygamy" or "plural".

"We must preserve freedom of thought in the church and resist all attempts to suppress it." Oh, but remember that "priesthood leaders may need to take disciplinary action with those members who persist in publicly opposing the Church and its leaders."

And here's my favorite: "emphasize that faith is a conscious choice that each must make." I have found no faith tradition other than Mormonism which says you can CHOOSE to have faith. How, exactly, can that be done? Is there any other area of life where people can, or should, try to believe something by force of will?

In most Christian traditions, faith is regarded as a gift, and it is supported through revelation, other personal experiences, and/or reason. The idea of just trying to have faith would be regarded as nonsense.

+ 100,000

This appears to be the church's Swedish website. I've searched around and can't find anything (which is not to say that the document doesn't exist. It just appears to not be on this website.) Sounds like something that was just put out for church authorities?

http://www.jesukristikyrka.se/

Right, I realized that once I read it through. I did a web search for the original text in Swedish without success. Someone else may have better luck.

Tried too. Checked even mormonlady.se blog but didn't see them discussing this. Maybe I missed it.

Yup, www.jesukristikyrka.se is the church's official Swedish website...I didn't find the document on there either, makes sense that it would just be for church leadership. I wonder who the prominent LDS families/leaders are that have left the church...

Below is their answer to all the scientific conflicts-

"In the Gospel there is a principle of true science and true religion goes hand in hand. In the nick of time will eventually all questions to their answers.

Opportunity: Members can ... learn about the scientific method."

That is it! No, "Oh shit we came down on the wrong side of the evolution debate... sorry about that."

Just a suggestion that in the nick of time all answers will given. I don't see this making much difference- they don't list the problems and answer questions.

"Only that which comes directly from the Lord through divine communication is truth, everything else is interpretation. Therefore, prayer is directly to the Lord and the Holy Spirit whispers of priceless value to the personal revelation receive truth."

Grrrrr...so irritated right now. Truth is whatever the Prophet says, unless a later Prophet reverses the Church's position, and nobody can find out truth on their own, only interpretations.

I would like to bear my testimony that I know 2+2=4 is true, as I have prayed and received revelation that it is. 3+3=6, however, is only interpretation, as I didn't get a good feeling when I prayed about that one.

Also infuriating is the A, B and C categories, as dazed11 said. "If you're doubting, you COULD go and research all the history and archaeology and become an expert, but that would take a LONG time and would only prove we're right...wouldn't it be easier to just accept everything we say and go back to being happy?"

Sweden, Denmark and Norway admirably seem to have better BS detectors than lots of people. There are many happy atheists in those countries where pragmatism and rationality govern rather than crazy religions. I really would expect them to do as they have, more easily seeing through the silly ideas of Mormonism.

My, my--this document describes pretty much the events that led me out of the church. LOL!

Go tell a Swedish beauty to marry a missionary returned from Guam with no prospects for a career. See where that gets you.

No matter how they spin, the problems with Book of Abraham and ploydanry cannot explained away logically.


Yeah....TSCC is no longer like the giant stone in Daniel's dream...it's more like the statue made of various medals, crumbling down when hit by the giant stone of TRUTH.

I'd be interested in how the Swedish ex-members would react to the document.

Haha, good luck with that!

I'm pretty sure the Swedes are too busy enjoying their high standard of living, as well as listening to some awesome metal.

Bull sh8.
Since the 1981 maxim of BKP that "some truths are not useful", the church has disciplined numerous researchers who did nothing but publicize true but not useful information casting doubt on the church, in the church's own eyes. Many of them didn't even interpret the information, the church interpreted the info as hostile in itself and threatened the researchers with sanctions if the even TOLD it. What the f*ck is that if it isn't systematically hiding the church's history?

It is a flat lie that the church didn't try to hide its history. There are MANY specific examples of suppressing information.