Did you watch the PBS Frontline / American Experience piece on the Mormons last night? Your reactions?

Answer 1

My reaction: OMG, I want a transcript or a DVD to watch it again.

What is up with...
--The Classics Professor who wrote papers on the church using church documents only to get letters from the state church governing council asking her to stop publishing and talking publicly about her papers....Then she appears before a council of all men, and cannot have her own representation...Then the after some answers she gives, they tell her she cannot speak...Then they take about 20 mins to come to a decision....Tell her she's ex-communicated and basically is not going to go to heaven, but want to tell her she did well and shake hands with her.... WTF?(excuse my French)

--The man whose 42 year old wife who had gestational diabetes, together come to the decision that they should have another child because they felt they had another child spirit out there...after she dies of a blood clot related to her giving birth...someone asks him if he had it to do over...He has to think about it???? Hello?...your wife died as a direct result of giving birth and you have to think about whether you'd do this again given a chance?

--7 some odd billion dead people have been researched by volunteers genealogically and have been baptized...The records take up a mountainful of space and GOD KNOWS how much time went into this.... GOD KNOWS what good could have been done by these volunteers to help the living outside this mountain-full of ancestry.

--At least one Jewish man was choked up talking about his pride in being Jewish, and his total mortification (I'm hoping that's a word) thinking that his relatives and friends who died in the Holocaust because of their Jewish heritage might now or later be posthumously be baptized Mormon. He shuddered to think that some relative close or remote might 200 years from now think it a good idea to have him baptized, against his will, Mormon. GOOD GOD!

--All that happens in the Temple, Stays in the Temple. (Viva Las LDS.) And you gotta have a recommendation to get into the Temple. Thank God, God isn't going to ask for my CV and three letters of recommendation, to get into heaven, at least in my beliefs. Sounds like when you go into the Temple it's like being in a fraternity or the Shriners/Masons/Elks or other secret societies.

--My Forever Family. What happens if you are: (heaven forbid): Divorced, Remarried, Gay, or (gulp) barren? What then?

--The Three Threats to Mormonism according to Elder Packer (I distinctly remember his name): Gays, Feminists, Intellectuals. I hear a new version of "We Three Kings of Orient Are" coming on... If those were really threats, we should be so lucky.

I think that PBS did an excellent job. It makes me want to know more. You couldn't make up any better reading.

As fascinating and utterly flabbergasted I am by the Mormon beliefs (it's like looking at a huge accident scene, and immensely unbelievable), it is tragically and monumentally sad.

God knows the Gospel of Jesus Christ did not include all this stuff. Heaven help them....soon.

Answer 2

The show was fairly well presented and documented. I think it presented the ridiculous nature of the Mormon's arguments that Joseph Smith and Brigham Young were profits of God in a realistic format. There are many questions about the LDS church and answers that need to be explored further. The duplicity of the teachers was also obvious, one leader saying he had no idea that Mormons were striving to be gods and the interviews with seemingly average Mormons pointedly stating that their goal was to become gods. Additionally, doesn't any body in the Mormon church wonder what has happened to all that money? Why is it necessary for the Mormon church to have such a bankroll? Do they plan upon taking over the entire financial system?

Too many questions for one old man...
David in Madison

Answer 3

I watched it. I heard that it was going to be a "puff" piece for the church and it was. The church should be very happy with it,it made the church sound great. It conveniently didn't say any of the negatives about the church. Of course, the LDS may not like it because it talked about some of their history. When it comes to the history of their church, they head for the hills.
Part 2 made it sound like the LDS are the only ones who love their families and want to spend time with them. You can have family home evening and be atheist. You can do family scripture study,home school, go to church, and family home evening being any religion.

Answer 4

sounds like a funky dad. i would not possibility everybody looking out and him being embarrassed in any way and alter his innovations approximately being so cool with you. Mormons probable would not approve yet i think of it may be extra of a humiliation than a punishment that he could get. Now if it replaced into stable beer you would be able to contemplate whether he's conscious somewhat some thing approximately it, stable matters of debate.

Answer 5

I thought it was sexist toward the women of the Mormons.I thought it ridiculous to excommunicate people for voicing their own opinion,or being gay.I think they think they are the "perfect" religious group,and the rest of us do not deserve to go to Heaven.And whats up with not letting non-Mormons go to their children's weddings,that are Mormons?

Answer 6

didn't watch it but we use to live up there...
I still remember seeing on the Salt Lake news several of those guys in trouble for marrying girls as young as 11 and 12... I also not getting the job I wanted solely due to me not being Mormon... glad I don't live there anymore...