MORMONISM... MINGLED WITH MEMETICS

RUNNING THE LORD'S BUSINE$$

 

 

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INSPIRED LEADERSHIP

...propping up the house of cards

Discernment and inspiration

"Discernment," for those of you who don't know, is a "gift of the Spirit" that mormon leaders (especially bishops) are supposedly endowed with when ordained to their calling (i.e. "position" or "church job"). Discernment allows bishops and other mormon leaders to know the thoughts, intentions, and needs of their flock. "Inspiration" (as it applies to church leaders) is any decision or statement that a church leader makes that has been confirmed to him by a good feeling. In its quintessential form inspiration is an unexpected, illogical (at least superficially) decision that one feels "prompted" (i.e. by the Holy Ghost) to make and later turns out to be optimal in hindsight. Many stories of inspiration are circulated by General Authorities of the church in General Conferences.

The concept of discernment is also supported by popular legends -- memes. Anyone who's grown up in the Mormon Church has an intuitive feel for them, so I'll try my hand at making one up:

Bob had just turned 19 and was preparing to go on a mission. In order to go on a mission, he needed to attend the temple and receive his endowments, and in order to do that he needed to get a temple recommend first from his bishop and then stake president. During the course of the interview Bob's bishop asked him questions about his worthiness, to which Bob answered that he was, indeed, morally clean. The bishop felt something was not right, but Bob smiled and assured him that he was worthy. At the close of the interview as the bishop was about to sign Bob's temple recommend, he paused and said, "Bob, I don't know why, but I'm not feeling right about this... Are you sure there's nothing in your life that would offend the Lord if you were to enter His temple this day?" Bob's lips quivered and he broked down and began sobbing. "I shouldn't have tried to hide it from the Lord..." Bob told the bishop about how he had fornicated with a girl after a school dance a while ago. He didn't want to face the shame of having to put off his mission for a year because of fornication and didn't know how he would face his family and friends at church now. His bishop assured him that he would be blessed for confessing his sin before the Lord and the proper priesthood authorities and that this was the first step on a long road to repentence that he would help Bob with over the coming year. As the bishop counselled him Bob began to feel relief, and they were both touched by the Holy Ghost.

• Touching anecdotes like this are called "faith-promoting" in the Mormon Church. However, they are only faith-promoting to people within the mormon memeplex...

Stories such as this circulate wildly in mormonism and serve to prop up the house of cards in each mormon's head. The result of idiotic stories like this one is that believing mormons who have any "sin" on their conscience (at least 90% of believing mormons, by my estimates) experience guilt, apprehension, and just plain fear at interviews with priesthood authorities, which are supposed to take place several times a year, and even around their home teachers, who are supposed to come every month and also theoretically are entitled to a bit o' discernment concerning you. However, when church members conceal the dark truth (which usually entails masturbation, pornography, "unnatural" sex acts within marriage, licentious thoughts, and other abominations) they are almost invariably let off scot free... Actual cases like the one in my make-believe story are one in a million, yet they are circulated and embellished upon as if they happened constantly! The same thing holds true for miraculous "spiritual experiences" and sappy faith-confirming yarns.

• So much for discernment! Maybe God inspires bishops to let sins slide!

The number and strength of these inaccurate memeplex-preserving tales is an indicator of the delusiveness of a memeplex, since the further a memeplex is from Reality, the more elaborate mechanisms it needs to prop up its fairy tales. Among large religions Mormonism probably takes first prize on the sappiness index -- maybe even surpassing the Jehovah's Witnesses with their Watchtower and Awake.

Church administration

Like it or not, but church leaders are first and foremost managers. They've got to keep track of a staggering flow of records, reports, and requests from "those higher in authority" in this exceptionally structured institution we call a "church."

• Mormons even maintain that this same structure also existed in the early Christian church!

All the current Apostles I know of have had extensive management experience in their secular professions before rising to the top of the church hierarchy and becoming church icons reminiscent of the Soviet Politburo. These and other General Authorities are the official spokesmen (and a small handful of "spokeswomen") for the mormon memeplex. Their words and actions tend to enjoy the greatest replicative success at all levels of church structure.

• We can only assume that these folks also experience the most discernment and inspiration, as church folklore would suggest:)

Missionary work

Aaah... the greatest part of the Lord's greatest busine$$ on Planet Earth. Church leaders with their discernment, inspiration, and myriad other spiritual gifts have arrived at formulas for sharing the Gospel that mirror those used by effective salesmen for millenia... with one exception:

Mormon missionaries have The Spirit.

"The Spirit," or "Holy Ghost," for those of you who don't know or haven't yet been touched by its gentle rays, is the third member of the Godhead (after God the Father and Jesus Christ). The Spirit is the guy who gives you a good, peaceful, confident feeling (often in the vicinity of the bosom) when you think a thought that props up your current memeplex of choice.

• That has to be the most sacrilegeous definition I've ever heard... May lightning strike me dead on this very spot! :))

In other words, if I experience something that seems to confirm my beliefs and this is followed by a sublime thought like, "see, I really am on the right path after all and God is pleased with me, so I have nothing to worry about," then I will likely experience the sensation cultivated by mormons and called The Spirit. Among approved sensations are the following:

• a "burning in the bosom"
• a "quiet assurance"
• a "feeling of peace"
• weeping

Other manifestations of the Holy Ghost such as speaking in tongues, frantic dancing, trances, exclamations of "amen! amen!," levitation, or other supernatural phenomena have been systematically selected against by memetic evolution and can now only be found in other religions. But the mormons have honed and mastered their narrow niche of religious states, so expect to become an expert at social weeping and quiet assurance if you're thinking of becoming a mormon:)

• Gee whiz, I have certainly strayed from the topic of missionary work... but I would sure like to see a serious study on the phenomenon of "social weeping" (my term) among mormons.

So, armed with The Spirit, missionaries "go forth" and "preach the Gospel of salvation." Missionary work is a whole memeplex in its own right and deserves much more than these few paragraphs here. Maybe at a future date...