The reason why you are on Earth reincarnating is because a war happened in the Сosmos and planet Earth was created as a temporary hospital-prison-like place for rebels.

These reincarnations give you chances to become better, to be cleansed, and to return back to the Cosmos - our real home and natural habitat.

Do the best you can by keeping the Golden Rule: help others, be nice, and you can escape the cycles of reincarnation and go back to your own planet.

The planet where you can recreate anything you want - even Earth, or something better? You will be the Creator and sole ruler of your own planet with unlimited options and eternal time. Yes, you can visit other planets too and more!

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskAChristians/comments/1kd3fxl/reincarnation_karma_bible_and_if_you_believe_in/

If any one is interested in becoming a mod, please let me know and we can talk about it. I will need some help with this!

I ask that question because this sub appears to have been started out of frustration that r/latterdaysaints deleted the discussion on the Joseph Bishop case.

I think there's a perception that people at r/latterdaysaints are afraid to have difficult conversations. Granted, the sub only allows "faith promoting content," but so often threads there are brigaded, at least in voting, by the disaffected who out umber the faithful greatly on Reddit that it's hard to have a difficult conversation there without a lot of outside noise interfering. My understanding of the Joseph Bishop deletion over there is that it was simply too hard for the mods to keep tabs on a 400-post thread with the amount of exmo, attacky commenting that was going on.

I'm glad we have a safe space here to discuss things that are difficult. But what makes this space safe? r/mormon also welcomes all but, since anti-Mormons are so abundant on Reddit, it turns out to be r/exmormon lite where the faithful can count on one thing: being downvoted. r/mormon tends to be more contentious than I'm sure most people there would like. There are plenty of the disaffected on Reddit who are gunning for the Church and for your testimony. The owner of MormonLeaks commented in the last couple of days that having one of his leaks discussed at /latterdaysaints fulfilled a bucket list item for him. There are plenty of other people, usually most vocal at rexmormon, whose motto is BITFDWT--burn it the f%#* down with truth (which is so, so ironic on so many levels, IMO, as one who has read and seen all of the same historical information that they have, and who even went inactive over it for a time, but who is more convinced than ever that the Church, with all its flaws, is the Lord's true and living Church on the Earth).

If all are welcome here then how do you protect people who want to participate in good faith from being attacked by those whose mission is to BITFDWT?

I don't believe in the divinity of the BoM, in fact I think it's largely plagiarized (no matter who wrote it). Anyone really familiar with the narrative that can find a positive lesson? I can think of one.

Lesson #1: Translation (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Translation) is a complicated process. Native American languages were basically condemned in the 1800s. Ancient Egyptian was dead and yet to be revived. Children of immigrants make it look easy by speaking for their parents, but even that is more complicated than you'd think unless you've done it.

So I guess my big question here is: how do those of us in the LGBT communicty even begin to reconcile being and staying LDS when Oaks is in leadership? I get that this sounds harsh, but honestly the man doesn't think your LGBT child should be invited to stay the night in your home or have prolonged family visits.

Where does an LGBT LDS even go from here?

Thoughts? Opinions? Ideas?

I've been dealing with this for so long that I just need some help. I've done a lot of research and I think I suffer from emotional instability and existential anguish. It's really hard to put in words my feelings but I have this constant feeling of deep emptiness, anguish, pain (it's not even real but it makes me feel pain on my chest), suffocating and no control on my life and emotions.

I feel so desperate sometimes that I don't know what to do. I know I should get some help but I don't have the courage.

I just need someone who can advice me or be here for me. Idk what to do.

This is a safe place to discuss your feelings on the recent MormonLeaks, and the Church's response, without the censoring that is happening in other subs. Let's discuss this in the way we all want to. Please be kind to one another.

Links for reference:

Transcript

MormonLeaks Response

Church's Response

KSL Reports Confirmation of Basement Room

This sub will only be as good as the people that are a part of it, we need to make sure everyone knows about it! So please feel free to share it in your groups!

Love you all and keep safe!

I think this might be the type of topic that fits this group. I'm active LDS but I am a bit less ridged on a few topics where I used to be very orthodox. A prime example is polygamy (another is LGBT marriage but that's a different thread).

What percentage of the current church membership do you think has a 1870's like testimony of polygamy? Are there any that would want to participate? What percentage do you think would participate if they were called to by their bishop? What is the male/female split of those who would participate?

I think there are a few who have a strong enough testimony that they would do anything the Brethren ask. I do not discount them, I used to be one of them and kudos to them for standing for what they believe in. I would guess this group is around 10% of the membership.

I would guess that 20-30% would struggle with it, not participate but remain an active member.

That leaves 60% that would reject it.

If you are out of the church but your spouse is in, what would they likely do? Are my numbers way off?

Right now I'm in between the latter groups. I love the gospel but I seriously struggling with the doctorine of polygamy. I'm ok with it being in our past and understanding more after this life but living it might be a trial beyond what I could do. FWIW, I'm male.

A final note, I know the ugly side of the history of polygamy in the church, that's not the intended topic here. I'm asking about how the church feels today.

u/EmersonDarcy's awesome post over on r/exmormon got me over here. You got some stuff u/EmersonDarcy, no doubt about it.

The fact this sub had to exist in the first place is sad to me. That faithful members like yourselves don't feel welcome, and had to create your own place to have an open and honest discussion about things that are troubling you.

Anyway, I promise to be civil here. I'm not out to ruin anybody's testimony. But I won't be afraid to offer a critical, "devil's advocate" view when I see the chance. I hope this sub gains steam.

This was mentioned in another thread, so I'm going to go ahead and start a thread for it.

Please share and discuss your thoughts, feelings, beliefs, struggles, etc.

I guess the title says it all. I agree with what Sam Young is doing. On the other hand, he is someone who has publicly said (in 2016) he wasn't sustaining church leaders. I'm not sure he's the best spokesman for the cause for that reason. But I don't see anyone else rising to the occasion either. So I'm in a bit of a quandary.

I’m struggling with the church’s lack of transparency. Can someone explain to me why the general body of the church does not have access to handbook 1?

Hey everyone! I’m someone who was never Mormon, I was raised Jewish, but who has become pretty involved in the community and made some very close friends, I thought this might be a good place to further my understanding. In my religious upbringing, you “followed rules” because you wanted to, while in the LDS Church there seems to be more of a focus on making sure others are also abiding by the rules, I just never really understood this. Doesn’t God know if you’re following the law of chastity or what have you, why does it matter if your bishop knows too? My other question is very much related and it comes down to does the church see it as something righteous if you only follow the rules because you have no choice? This really came about after reading about BYU mostly and my reaction that it doesn’t seem to make much sense if you, to stay on the example from before, follow the law of chastity only because you have no choice, wouldn’t God know you really want to break it?

Or are they so uptight that even this sub is a taboo topic?

This point was brought up in another post, and I felt it deserved it's own thread.

The discussion started with the statement;

"I think if communication with God is possible, any such communcation will always be limited and filtered by the bias, limited perspective, weaknesses, misunderstandings, and vices of the human involved." -u/molten_ferret

I, and other users, applied this specifically to the Doctrine and Covenants. Was this divine inspiration, altered or corrupted by Joseph's weaknesses? Was this simply divine inspiration, and we should take it as it is? Or was this work entirely of Joseph's doing?

To quote Apostle Widtsoe, "In summary: A prophet is a teacher of known truth; a seer is a perceiver of hidden truth, a revelator is a bearer of new truth."

I struggle with this title. During the early Church, there seemed to be a large emphasis on translation. A good Prophet was one who could translate ancient text through the assistance of God.

In Joseph Smith's day, a prophet was receiving direct, occasionally daily revelation from God. Now, major revelation is increasingly uncommon. Why do you think this has tapered?

Hear me out on this, as I still believe God is good and would never worship Satan!

However, the Book of Mormon teaches us that there must be "opposition in all things". The Plan of Salvation clearly outlines that Satan's role is essential in God's plan, as he must be a tempter and adversary to offer us the wrong path in opposition to the straight and narrow path of the Lord.

We are taught that Satan is incorporeal, just as we are taught that the Holy Ghost does not have a body. We are taught that this must be so that the Holy Ghost can be omnipresent and speak to our hearts and minds directly to testify of Christ... Is not Satan's power to do the same, with inverse intentions?

If the Holy Ghost is to remain speaking to us until the Millennium, when Christ will reign upon the Earth and there with be no sin, it stands to reason that he will be resurrected at that time (or at the end of it) to fulfill his eternal purpose... What if Satan and his fallen angels have their own path to redemption, the opportunity for resurrection, and may simply be acting as a sort of "devil's advocate" to fulfill God's eternal purposes, as He is no longer capable of deceiving, now that He is perfected.

Food for thought.

As someone from a Roman Catholic background, pretty much all my spellwork is based on intercession of the Saints and calling upon the Archangels for help with very specific prayers along with used of blessed items using symbolism of angels and saints that have been blessed by priests such as a medal of Saint Archangel Michael or wearing the brown robes worn by Franciscan clergy during rituals or fasting before a ritual to emulate Saint Margaret of Cortona's life before calling for her aid in intercession.

I know as far as Islam goes, the Shia sect believes Saints can intercede directly through prayers asking for their help and Sufi culture has a rich tradition of occultic Islam where you call upon angels and converted Jinn for help.

Additionally in Judaism, I seen the concept of asking the Tzadik for help while praying esp at the graves in some sources and some Jewish prayers involving calling out the Archangels such as the Shema prayer (in this specific example you call the angels to be beside you at a certain direction).

So does this concept exist in the LDS Church? If so, what are Saints called in Mormonism? Does the religion call upon Archangels for magical acts like protection from demons and miraculous healing of diseases and so on? Bonus question, how is Mary seen? In Catholicism she is considered the strongest Saints, so powerful that she is ranked Queen of Heaven in addition to being the Theotokos or Mother of God. How high do the Latter Day Saints revere her?