That would be an assumption. And if he already has or when he does, I’d strongly suspect he doesn’t make that public. I really doubt that he makes it out of this with his membership in tact.
McKenna Denson brings it; gets put down
- Thread starter Harambe
- Start date
With 30,000. Bishops, thousands of Stake presidents, mission presidents, and other similar callings that revolve and change constantly, statistics alone claims that some of them will make bad decisions or fall from grace so to speak. I’ve heard stories of leaders that make me shake my head and wonder if we are reading the same books. I’ve heard stories like this one that make me extremely sad that a leader didn’t step up and do more, do the right thing. These stories are still in the vast minority compared to the great people I’ve seen and met in person, and the positive experiences I’ve seen, heard, and read about. Once is still too many.
There will always be wolves in sheeps clothing when there are wolves and sheep in the world. We should trust our leaders but only as much as we prove their counsel as we go and keep our own eyes open. No leader is perfect, and many of the mistakes are innocent. We all need to pitch in and watch to stop the wolves and think of measures to stop them to protect the innocent and vulnerable.
Don’t just assume every decision or calling is inspired. Gain your own testimony of it. Also know good people put in positions of authority can fall for any of a variety of reasons. Opportunity can at times be the thing that breaks someone that’s been fighting off sin and temptations. I personally know for myself there is an adversary to the Lords work and name. Those who do His work, I have seen, receive more of he adversary’s attention and things get harder, with more pressure to break commandments. It’s not an excuse, just a fact in my mind.
Having a call be inspired doesn’t mean that person is perfect or won’t do something wrong. I have seen inspired calls go any direction. People are just given an opportunity, and many times the person extending the call does not know why, and many times there are other people that are more experienced around that are not called for some reason. The bottom line is that there are so many imperfect and flawed people trying to do their best that in my opinion you shouldn’t lose faith over people being people. God only has us imperfect weak people to work with.
People do stupid things. There will be more stupid things that happen probably. My question is, what will you do about it. Will you volunteer to stand up, take a leadership role, and do it right? Make a positive difference for people. Stand up for better decisions. Show people how from the front. I’m not even saying as bishop... just as whatever role is there, it could be anything.
It’s too easy for us to point out where someone messed up. Instead of this, let’s show them how to do it right.
Yes, I changed it from about leaders to us. I can’t change them, but I can change me and do it in a good way.
/talk
Exactly why they want to cover it up. It is too bad they have made all these truth claims that don't always hold up in our times.
My mother says she would continue being LDS even if it was proven to not be all it claims to be. And I believe her. It is the right place for her. It isn't for me for many reasons.
If being part of the church helps one to be your best self, then perhaps being a more nuanced believer (not taking everything literally) is the way to go if things like this cause doubt. Men have made a lot of statements for God that He might not completely agree with, because humans are infallible, especially when emotions and feelings are involved.
Sent from my HTC6535LVW using JazzFanz mobile app
Perhaps, but he did tell her on tape that he had not been punished even when he confessed things along the way. I don't know why he would have lied to her about that.
Sent from my HTC6535LVW using JazzFanz mobile app
freakazoid
Well-Known Member
Maybe I'm missing something here, but if this woman finally found the courage to out a rapist after 30 years, then more power to her. Also, what an absolute disgrace for any man to try and physically stop her from doing so. All that does is add credibility to the fact that religious organizations routinely try and cover this **** up. I understand that it's an awkward situation with kids listening, but too ****ing bad. If you don't want **** to come out in this way, stop covering it up when women do report such things privately.
And yes, there's no doubt in my mind that the Mormon church has covered up a lot of this type of dirty laundry over the years, much like the Catholics.
Again, I haven't taken the time to read all the details about this. I only watched the video up until the point those two *** clowns physically removed a woman who had to live with her nightmare for 30 years before she had the courage to do this. Good for her and hopefully it makes the church re-think how they handle these kind of issues.
freakazoid
Well-Known Member
What in the **** is wrong with you? This kind of **** routinely gets covered up when reported privately. Not too hard to imagine why a woman would feel like she had to do something like this, and it was probably the hardest thing she ever had to do in her life. What a Goddamn disgrace to victim shame like this. Get help.
I do not assume every calling is inspired. There is no way that every second assistant teacher to the deacon's quorum is a calling by heavenly messenger. And of course every human being makes mistakes. Any given calling in a ward, I feel that God really probably doesn't really care who fills it, as I believe it falls in the "any good thing is a good thing" category of answers to prayers (such as a lot of the things we pray just simply aren't earth-shattering, and I believer that often God expects us just to simply use our free agency and choose something).
I feel that the church would have you believe, however, that the higher the calling, the more directly divine intervention had something to do with it. If you found out that a newly appointed apostle was a sexual predator, how would that make you feel? I don't think that the President of the MTC (or even a Bishop or Stake President for that matter) is really that far down this scale. I would hope that a good amount of inspiration went into these callings. Of course there will be Stake Presidents who don't get or don't follow their inspiration, and so you will have Bishops and the like called who probably shouldn't have been. We know that any organization run by men will be subject to the foibles of men, as JS points out in the outset in the D&C. However, when it gets into things like Mission Presidents, General Authorities, and the like, I would hope that an organization that is supposed to represent the eternal Father of Heaven and Earth would have more direct intervention from the one whose name the church bears.
I have seen this a few times in my life, in both my personal experience (as in people I directly know) and second-hand.
My BIL is a bishop, as I think I have mentioned here before, and he and I have had this conversation. He was part of an Elder's quorum when a Stake President was accused of rape and sexual misconduct. The local authorities were notified, by the accuser, not by the church. He eventually copped to a plea and did something like time served and probation, or whatever. And the church did...nothing. Literally nothing. He continued taking the sacrament (the man was in my BIL's ward), attending the temple, etc. No repercussions, to this day as far as we have heard (honestly I haven't asked my BIL lately, I think I will text him about it), and this event was nearly a decade ago. (I think I actually wrote about this one on here before, not sure)
What message does that send? Does that mean that God has withdrawn His support of the church when He allows that kind of blatant disregard of His laws among the leaders of His church? If not, how is it explained? As others have pointed out, these are not isolated instances.
I still cautiously hope that everything will turn out as it should, as I do believe that God has a higher knowledge than we do, he can see the whole puzzle while we are trying to make sense of a few disjointed pieces, so to speak. But how these will fit together is definitely beyond me at this point.
I’d have a lot of doubts about confession. This is a guy who, at best, is preying on women less than half his age, while married and while their religious leader, and engaging in some kind of sexual behavior with them. That’s best case scenario. I’m not certain how much credibility I’d be willing to grant someone regarding a supposed confession. I’d imagine his confession likely sounded a lot different than what was discussed in the recorded conversation. Not infrequently, people “confess” enough to feel a small sense of shame, and to alleviate guilt, but without actually revealing the real crux of the issue. That’s a fairly common phenomenon, and I don’t know that I’d ascribe some level of altruism to this individual quite yet.
She confronted him before this personally. It’s been a national story. It’s the subject of an ongoing lawsuit. When she traveled from Colorado to this congregation in Arizona on open mic night, she wasn’t breaking news to the ward.
I agree with this take. I do not think they should have physically tried to remove her from the pulpit. I do, however, understand the feeling they probably had that made them want to get her to stop. It was undoubtedly uncomfortable for all, and I could see, in the heat of the moment, a misguided leader or simply a friend of the family or relative or whatever move to stop her. It isn't that weird, while it was inappropriate imo.
As others have brought up, was this the correct avenue for this kind of thing? I honestly don't know. If it were just her baring her soul and reaching some level of catharsis or closure, that is entirely valid. However, the presence of multiple cameras and then the dissemination of the videos as almost propaganda seems to add an air of disingenuosness (is that a word?) to the whole thing. Cheapens it, tbh, imo. Was it done for her to confront her accuser, or for her to get attention. Maybe it was to bring attention to the topic so it doesn't get swept under the rug, could be and I am willing to give the benefit of the doubt. Still seems agenda-driven and a that is a bit off-putting, tbh.
However, I fully support her right to confront her accuser. The statute of limitations on things like this needs to be abolished. If you sexually abuse someone you should be made to pay for it, whether it happened while you were 20 and get caught at 80. You had 60 intervening years of peace, while the victim had years of pain you caused.
Thanks for posting and responding.
I don't know if we will ever know why the Savior called an apostle that would betray him, or in Joseph Smith's time there were apostles and other leaders that did some very wrong things. It would be difficult today to handle if an apostle did something like this or the equivalent.
I know what I know, and people doing extremely stupid and hurtful things will not change that, but it is disturbing and efforts should continue to be made to stop these things from happening as much as we can. Pretty much impossible though, because people will do what they want to do and find a way, especially if addicted.
I guess things like this will further increase the gap between believers and non believers. If the Gospel is about faith, these difficult questions increase the need for people of faith to have consistent spiritual experiences, or we will lose our faith when confronted with the messed up things that happen in the world, especially the messed up things that can and have happened involving church members or church leaders.
Myself, I keep my faith in the Lord and have had enough experiences and experience to know I need to continue to have them to stay strong in this changeable world. Many things don't make sense, but on the flip side, many things do, and as I learn more and understand the Gospel more and my role, it brings peace despite all of the bad around us. I do think we as Church members need to stand up for right more than we do, I think we need to encourage people around us to turn to God and do better in a positive way (not holier than thou), and I think we need to step in and stop things like this from happening if we can. Not just as leaders, but as friends and neighbors, and family (I hope this is not the case). I think we show more love by stopping this sort of stuff if we can, unfortunately much of it happens "in the dark" with nobody around, and I don't know how to stop that.