![\"Witnesses,](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2021\/05\/180668662_1101935680307387_2178886327853806795_n.jpg\")
<\/a>There are just two days left, including today, to take advantage of the opportunity to view the 2021 Interpreter Foundation dramatic film Witnesses<\/em><\/a> at no charge, which you can do here: \u00a0https:\/\/vimeo.com\/824199556\/ecefc622ed<\/a>. \u00a0On Thursday, 10 October, when Six Days in August<\/em> <\/a>opens in theaters, that window of opportunity closes. \u00a0I would, frankly, love to make Witnesses<\/em> freely available all the time. \u00a0And, someday, we\u2019ll do that. \u00a0But not for quite a while. \u00a0In the meantime, we\u2019re bound by contractual obligations not to do so.<\/p>\n Not quite forty-eight hours ago as I write, President Russell M. Nelson announced plans for seventeen additional temples, including one for Dublin, the capital of the Republic of Ireland. \u00a0The following article, written by Cian \u00d3 Broin, appeared in the Irish Independent<\/em>: \u00a0\u201cFirst Mormon temple to open in Ireland as part of major expansion.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0 Given the small Latter-day Saint population in Ireland \u2014 roughly the same as the membership in Norway, for which a temple<\/a> was announced in April 2021 \u00a0\u2014 I expect that the temple in Dublin will also be of modest size, like Norway\u2019s. \u00a0There\u2019s nothing particularly unusual about the article in the Irish Independent<\/em>, but the response to it in at least one sector of social media<\/a>\u00a0has been interesting:<\/p>\n The discussion there, such as it is, was launched by OperatorMaA, who, in the course of it, alluded to the \u201cfraud, misogyny, racism, sexual predation, and general gaslighting\u201d that characterize the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints<\/a> and described temples as \u201cproblematic.\u201d \u00a0I start, though, with his opening post. \u00a0Then I\u2019ve excerpted some portions of the exchanges that caught my attention:<\/p>\n OperatorMaA: \u00a0\u201cThe Mormons are building a temple. \u00a0Don\u2019t let them if you have time. They\u2019ve taken to announcing before permits are in place lately so you might be able to keep it from happening.\u201d<\/p>\n YoureNotEvenWrong: \u00a0\u201cFreedom of religion. Why would we be against another bunch of weirdos with stupid beliefs building a temple.\u201d<\/p>\n OperatorMaA: \u00a0\u201cFreedom of religion includes freedom \/from\/ religion. Let them worship, proselytize, sure. But building a temple can be actually damaging to the community, and the Mormons will bend the law for their benefit to put it there if they have to.\u201d<\/p>\n AnCamcheachta: \u00a0\u201cSecularism is far more important than the nebulous concept of \u201creligious freedom\u201d.\u00a0 France has the right idea, and if I was in charge I would go full-on Enver Hoxha on the Religious Orders.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n I pause here to note AnCamcheachta\u2019s endorsement of the policy toward religion that was pursued by Enver Hoxha, the former Communist leader of Albania. \u00a0As a committed Stalinist, Hoxha implemented state atheism and ordered anti-religious persecution against Muslims and Christians. \u00a0All 2169 mosques and churches in Albania were destroyed under his rule, while clergy who continued active and\/or declined to profess Marxism-Leninism were either arrested or obliged to go into hiding. \u00a0Not a few of them were executed. \u00a0To admire Enver Hoxha\u2019s policies toward religion and religious believers is a truly remarkable thing.<\/p>\n Irishsaus: \u00a0\u201cIs there a reason why we shouldn\u2019t let them? Just read the article & don\u2019t see what the problem is.\u00a0 Any Mormons I\u2019ve ever met have been really nice folk. I live near one of their churches and they are always out doing stuff helping in the community. I don\u2019t see what the problem is building another temple. \u00a0They\u2019ll probably do stuff in another community to help them too.\u201d<\/p>\n OperatorMaA: \u00a0\u201cThe individual congregational members are generally kind and helpful, doing their best to build community. \u00a0But they are a calvanist meritocratic colonizing religious dogma, with the extra steps of free masonry. \u00a0They fraudulently hoard their wealth for the benefit of their upper echelons, and leave leave next to nothing for their congregations. \u00a0I could go on.\u201d<\/p>\n Objective-Garlic-124: \u00a0\u201cWhat\u2019s bad about them\u201d<\/p>\n Original Ozlander: \u00a0\u201cThey\u2019re a dodgy religious sect. Their history is dubious and has been well debunked. Their beginnings are weird. \u00a0They also have the benefit of having literally billions of dollars at their disposal. \u00a0One could argue that their invented Sky Ghost \/All Seeing Benevolent deity is no or more less plausible than the Catholic Church who owns much more land in this country.\u201d<\/p>\n Operator MaA: \u00a0\u201cThe salient issue, that\u2019s pertinent for the topic at hand, is they\u2019re soul stealers. \u00a0The purpose of the temple is to perform what\u2019s called \u201csaving ordinances\u201d for the deceased. Individuals act as a proxy for their ancestors and others. These saving ordinances include baptism, receiving the holy Ghost, and the free Masonic practices of washing and anointing, and endowment. \u00a0I must be perfectly clear, The Mormon doctrine<\/a> does not claim that these ordinances are final. The belief is that individuals that are dead are assembled in a sort of purgatory if they had not received these ordinances during their life. When these ordinances are completed for them by their living proxies, it is said that the deceased have the opportunity to accept those ordinances or not. But the get out of jail free card that the Mormons claim, is that these ordinances are not forced upon the deceased. \u00a0That\u2019s obviously not necessarily true for the deceased. Depending on their religious beliefs when they were alive, they may have lost their entry into whatever afterlife they chose if the ordinance for baptism was performed for them. That of course grants the Mormon church<\/a> more power than they deserve, and so most people generally ignore it. It\u2019s still gross and disrespectful, especially when they\u2019ve been caught multiple times baptizing Holocaust victims as a specific example.\u201d<\/p>\n OperatorMaA: \u00a0\u201cInstead of helping the homeless community and contributing to programs to help, they built an expensive mall with high rise apartments with collected funds from their congregation members. City Creek is pretty, but it\u2019s ultimately a mall, and they own practically all the land in that city. Of course they\u2019re going to put their best foot forward in their capital. Head a few blocks south though.\u201d<\/p>\n Terrible_Way1091: \u00a0\u201cFreedom of religion is enshrined in our constitution though.\u201d<\/p>\n OperatorMaA: \u00a0\u201cThat protects their right to worship, it doesn\u2019t protect their right to break the law to get what they want, which is categorically what they do.\u201d<\/p>\n DontReportMe: \u00a0\u201cWhy do you care?\u201d<\/p>\n OperatorMaA: \u00a0\u201cBecause I used to be a Mormon, and I\u2019ve done my best to be quiet about it, but no more.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0 There are just two days left, including today, to take advantage of the opportunity to view the 2021 Interpreter Foundation dramatic film Witnesses at no charge, which you can do here: \u00a0https:\/\/vimeo.com\/824199556\/ecefc622ed. \u00a0On Thursday, 10 October, when Six Days in August opens in theaters, that window of opportunity closes. \u00a0I would, frankly, love to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":91385,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[19909,20638,2905,788,38052,641],"class_list":["post-107328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dublin","tag-ireland","tag-latter-day-saint","tag-mormon","tag-operatormaa","tag-temple"],"yoast_head":"\n<\/a>