Sorry this comment is so late, but it is pertinent to this particular article. You may be interested in a bit of lore that has been floating about my family for years. It seems we have an ancestor born Molly Sabin, who married a Reverend Spalding. He was an aspiring part-time novellist, and wrote a meandering account of the wanderings of the ten "lost" tribes of Israel, with them ending up in America. He would apparently bore his relations with readings from it, although, apparently, it was less than riveting. Nevertheless, as he struggled to find a publisher, his manuscript would languish from time to time in the hands of one publisher or another, and on one of those occasions went missing. Apparently, when the Book of Mormon was published a few years later, Rev Spalding's relations recognized it for an edited version of what they had been listening to for all those years.

I have no way of confirming this story, but it is an interesting one. On the other hand, if J Smith was relying on a manuscript that was already written down, he should easily have been able to recover any lost pages...so this account is not easy to reconcile with your story. Very interesting, nevertheless, and one wonders what human agendas the original Biblical authors were actually trying to do/prove with their words. Perhaps some of it originated as pure entertainment, and was only later adapted for purposes of social control.

Atheism fails at more than just that, but at least you understand that much.

I don't think I'd take too much comfort from the fact that atheism, per se, doesn't provide for much cohesion, John. We're not expecting it to. (For that matter, raw theism wouldn't, either.) On the other hand, philosophical systems are developing based upon atheism--or, at least, not based on theism--that will turn the trick.

And I'd like to echo bestonnet and ask what is it about atheism that you think fails.

Catholicism = A virgin birth, resurrection, pay as you go "purgatory"- is this really any worse than Mormonism? It's just that we have had thousands of years to get use to hearing that set of ridiculous lies, and the history is further away.

Not to mention that there are a lot more Catholics than there are Mormons and that the Catholic church was once dominant in the western world (which causes some of their bad ideas to still linger, even among those who are otherwise secular).

Then of course there is their bantustan in Italy.

Adam:

As far as your comment, I am sorry that you see all religions as bad.

If someone believes something that is wrong they'll probably act on it anyway, that tends to have undesirable results. Presenting something that is wrong as though it were the truth and you can't possibly question it is inherently bad, it also happens to be what religion does.

How could that not be bad?

Adam:

I appriciate the way that mormon's try and evangelizing, but it's too bad they not Catholic's with they type of fire...giving up (what is it 2 years??) of their life to spread their faith. That has merit.

Religious people tend to waste a lot of their life on pointless things like going to church, and here we have people wasting even more of their life on a falsehood and you think that's good?

Juan Felipe:

Me:

Adam:

I'm glad I am Catholic with 2000 years of solid teaching

When cults other than the Catholic church are criticised you might be but that feeling won't last when we come after your cult.

Now, that sounded like a threat.

Well it is, we will criticise the catholic cult just as much as any other and we will not hold back from showing that it is based on nonsense just because we don't want to hurt the feeling of a billion people.

John:

Atheism fails at more than just that, but at least you understand that much.

Such as?

Huh!

1: Are you sure you're not a PERL script?
2: How do you know?

Under the microscope of skepticism, I don't find any difference from an LDS church or the Catholic/Baptist/Lutheran, etc. church down the street. Is it appropriate to look at Mormonism with more scrutiny than the other monotheistic religions just because those religions have been around longer?

Not at all. I think that Christianity in general has plenty of truly bizarre beliefs. Mormonism tops them only because it starts with all the Christian beliefs and then adds even more on top of it all.

Plus, as I noted in my post Smoothing Out the Rough Edges, many religions start with initially bizarre, wild doctrines that gradually get reinterpreted to appeal more to mainstream sensibilities. As a relatively new religion, Mormonism hasn't gone through as many iterations of this process as other Christian sects. However, even with the LDS, the smoothing out has begun and is clearly visible: consider their pivots on polygamy or ordaining blacks in the priesthood. While researching this article, I also came across evidence that the LDS church is trying to downplay Joseph Smith's use of "seer stones" to translate the BoM, and is now teaching that he simply received revelations of the book's text without any external devices for assistance.

Atheism fails at more than just that, but at least you understand that much.

I'm starting to think that "leading with your chin" is your idea of strategy.

"And that, sadly, is where atheism fails. I don't know what the answer is, but I refuse to believe that cohesion only comes of delusion."

Atheism fails at more than just that, but at least you understand that much.

Why does an omniscient deity needs such a kind of intermediaries?

http://www.partiallyclips.com/index.php?id=1083

;^)

When cults other than the Catholic church are criticised you might be but that feeling won't last when we come after your cult.

Now, that sounded like a threat. Tough I would really like to see a belief related to the catholic branch of christianity. May I suggest the veneration of saints? Specially bizarre, it seems, is the belief that people in heaven can intercede for us and get a result that wouldn't have been achieved if we had prayed to God only. Why does an omniscient deity needs such a kind of intermediaries

As far as your comment, I am sorry that you see all religions as bad.

More wrong actually.

I appriciate the way that mormon's try and evangelizing, but it's too bad they not Catholic's with they type of fire...giving up (what is it 2 years??) of their life to spread their faith.

Yeah, it's always a good thing to spread unsubstantiated tall tales as fact to people in their own homes. Y'know, because people love to have others knock on their door and try to convert them.