In the wake of John R’s impending excommunication, it would appear that the folks of Outer Blogness have been thinking quite a bit about worthiness lately. Both Gunner and Jonathan Blake try renewing their temple recommends online — and Jonathan improves on the T.R. interview by translating it into LOL-catz-speak. The translation improves the clarity a bit, but pirate-speak might have been a better choice.
Then we have John R’s character witness:
So I think my life is pretty awesome–I’m always trying something interesting and I generally love any new challenge. But you know what makes it even better? Having an awesome photographer-lover who’s recording it all along the way.
Hard to argue with that. Holly explains that John is right about what’s wrong with the temple, and expands on his “promising secrecy to an abusive adult” analogy, and Aerin also questions whether “keep these secrets, or else” was really part of Jesus’ message. And, for those who reach such conclusions about the temple, Exmormon for freethought wrote a thoughtful article on strategies for non-confrontationally explaining your unbelief to LDS family and friends.
Rebecca found a job ad that looked promising until she saw the Christian worthiness requirement at the end of the job application: “Please share of your personal faith in Jesus Christ.” Yikes, is that even legal? Daniel shares what jobs your LDS mission qualifies you for.
And who is qualified to be called a Christian anyway? Chris Smith reports on an Alabama Supreme Court case deciding this question legally, once and for all. Unfortunately for those who would like an answer, the report turned out to be a very, very subtle satire. Bridget Jack Meyers contemplates a Bible passage about how an unbeliever is made “holy” by having a believer for a spouse. When analyzing what that could possibly mean, she finds the LDS materials to be unhelpful since they “clarify” the verse to mean exactly the opposite of what it says! The LDS interpretations also explain that Christians don’t need to practice circumcision, which is odd considering how fond the Mormons are of circumcision…
In unrelated heresy and confusion, Heretic house proposes the greatest Star Trek Franchise ever! And Sarah Palin explains that socialism makes Jesus cry, but collective ownership of the means of production rocks!
Also noted: Becky took some beautiful photos of an old pioneer cemetery. Sideon saves spiders. And Andrew asks the believers about the same passage we discussed here last week! Their answers are a little different…
>>the report turned out to be a very, very subtle satire.
Ha! It’s ok, Carol, you can call it “bad” satire and I won’t take offense. 😉
Some very interesting posts here. Thanks for a great roundup, as always!
Actually, I thought it was kind of an interesting parallel — who can legally use the word “Christian” vs. who can legally use the word “married”. Apparently that was all that was decided by proposition 8: the right to use the word marriage on a legal contract.