“It's Not About The Sex” My Ass
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Mormon Church: Waddyamean women don’t sort of have priesthood?

10/30/2015

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Mormon Church: Women have
​priesthood kind of sort of

PicturePhoto from ordainwomen.org
On the heels of excommunicating Kate Kelly and others for pressuring church leaders to ask God if it’s okay to ordain women to the priesthood, last week the Mormon Church published yet another online essay, this one asserting that, well, in a way, Mormon women already hold the priesthood, at least, to an extent, sort of.

To see women using their sort-of priesthood, asserts the essay, you need look no further than inside Mormon temples, provided, of course, that you are permitted inside, where women perform for women* an “initiatory ordinance.” The policy undoubtedly exists to reduce the discomfort of having a stranger touch your bare skin inches from parts you wouldn’t normally allow a stranger’s hands near unless the stranger first took you out to dinner and the next day sent you flowers.

Note this attempt at slippery language, about two-thirds of the way into the essay:

“In some respects, the relationship between Latter-day Saint women and priesthood has remained remarkably constant since Joseph Smith’s day.”
The astute reader will recognize that the use of remarkably to modify constant admits that there have been changes.

​And indeed there have been. Early Mormon women performed priesthood ordinances not just inside but outside of the temple. That’s why women perform priesthood ordinances in a number of Mormon splinter groups like the TLC, the polygamist cult in which author Joanne Hanks spent seven years of her adult life. It’s one of many ways in which such groups more closely resemble the original church than does today’s mainstream version.
* And men for men.
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Mormon Church says there’s a Mrs. God

10/24/2015

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Hi Mom!

Mormon Church: God Has a Wife

In the latest of a series of essays designed to take belated ownership of inconvenient issues as if they had always been out from under the rug, yesterday the Mormon church officially acknowledged that there is indeed a Mrs. God.

The notion of God’s having a better half is something of a “yeah, so?” to anyone well acquainted with Mormonism. Mormons have been singing that there’s a mom in heaven in their musically interminable hymn “O My Father” since 1845. 

​The doctrine of a Mrs. God follows from the church’s revelation on polygamy, which says that to attain god-status one must enter into “the new and everlasting covenant of marriage.” Ergo, on the not unreasonable assumption that God has attained god-status, we can infer that God has a wife, ergo, we have a heavenly mom.

What’s more, God is most likely a polygamist. After all, the same revelation establishes that polygamy, too, is a requirement for god-status. Ergo you most likely have heavenly aunts. Oddly enough, the essay doesn’t bring that up.
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We couldn’t find any renderings of Mrs. God, so here’s one of Ceres, who is just as real.
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Celebrating our 100th Amazon reader review

10/15/2015

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“It’s Not About the Sex” My Ass just received its 100th reader review on Amazon

Heartfelt thanks to all who have submitted reviews. Below, in reverse order, are reviews 98-100, which came in since our September 20 post. To read them on the Amazon.com website, click here.
#100
​★★★★☆
Good quick easy read 

Review by 3+1, October 11, 2015
​• This book is about a woman and her husband who start out monogamous enter plural marriage and then come out the other side (back to monogamy) It's a good easy read. Funny at times, sad at others but definitely a little enlightening.
#99
​★★★★★
Yes, she drank the Kool-Aid, but at least she spit it out! 

Review by Dietcokeanion, October 8, 2015
• Finally, someone speaks the truth about all that FLDS non-sex pap. It has always cracked me up how straight faced polygamists are when it comes to acting like having multiple sex partners isn't a motivating factor. Good Lord! Of course it is! Joanne Hanks spills the beans about her own journey to the Kool-Aid line, and has a sense of humor that makes it real.
#98
​★★★★☆
Couldn't put it down
 ​
Review by an anonymous Kindle reader, September 29, 2015
• ​
I was intrigued by the title and description of this book, so decided to give it a go. I finished the entire thing in one night because I couldn't put it down. I found the insight into the cult mentality from a personal perspective very interesting, and the humor and raw honesty refreshing. I would buy it again.
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A folkloric miracle in the works

10/13/2015

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Purported miracle art

Will this silliness assume a place as
a miracle in Mormon history?

GIVEN AS THIS blog is to sarcasm, there is nothing funny about an elderly person’s frailty. Which, we think, makes the story at hand something of a travesty.

Regardless of whether one accepts Thomas S. Monson as a prophet, not even the coldest heart could have resisted experiencing a pang on seeing the 88-year-old Mormon church leader falter toward the end of his remarks at the church’s general conference last week. Touchingly, his counselor Dieter F. Uchtdorf, by comparison robust at 74, hovered discreetly behind at the ready to catch him if need be.

This picture of pathos has been followed by farcical events.
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Moment of pathos: Thomas S. Monson falters. For Standard Examiner article and video, click here.

A 5-year-old girl drew a picture (above) of Monson flanked by, in her words, “two guys.” A day later at her mother’s prompting, the girl said, “They were covered with sprinkles.” It was and would have remained cute had it not been for what ensued, namely, Mormons cluttering the social media with reports of the “miracle” that a child saw angels bearing up their beloved prophet.

It is an easy thing, albeit unwittingly, to find meaning where it is not and to put words in a child’s mouth that were not. Not even professionals are immune. To this day, innocent adults are in jail because a social worker unwittingly elicited manufactured, damning tales of abuse from children.
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We couldn’t resist.
It is an equally easy thing for faith-promoting rumors to grow out of control. Years after Mormon church founder Joseph Smith’s death, a rumor began that Young had transfigured into Smith for a few moments during the ensuing, ugly succession contest. It wasn’t long before 101 people attested to the event in writing. No matter that at the time not one newspaper or personal journal entry mentioned it; the so-called Transfiguration of Brigham Young is long ensconced as a miracle in Mormon lore.

​It is more than possible that a continuing parade of parents will likewise elicit a vision of Monson’s angels from their own children. Soon, what should have remained an unremarkable scribble may well become equally ensconced.
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God tells Jim Bakker what to wear

10/7/2015

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Why God doesn’t end hunger or 
prevent war: he’s busy picking out
underwear for televangelists

We shall let televangelist Jim Bakker speak for himself:
“I went to get dressed, and I pray about what I wear — I really do. I know I look stupid sometimes, but the last time God told me to wear a color was red, and what happened that day? The stock market crashed.

“Today, God said, ‘I want you to wear all black. Even my shoes are black. My underwear is black. My socks are black.”
Bakker is one of sundry doomsday preachers predicting that God will destroy the world any day now. That, apparently, is why God told Bakker to wear black. Why God told him to wear black underwear, however, remains something of a mystery. Short of Bakker doing a striptease on his show, how could that serve as a sign for the world to see?

Oh, and you can prepare for the apocalypse by stocking up on food that Bakker just happens to sell.

Readers of “It’s Not About the Sex” My Ass may recall the TLC cult member who prayed each morning to know which socks God wanted her to wear. God always took time to answer, just as he did for another TLC member who, when shopping, needed God to direct him to buy the right box of cereal.

And, it turns out, God helps Jim Bakker dress. Divinely directed minutiae is not the exclusive province of polygamist cults. Who knew?

This may provide an answer to the age-old Problem of Evil. Maybe God would intervene in evil and suffering if only we didn't keep him busy picking out socks, cereal, and Jim Bakker’s outfit.
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