The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church • Hacker News Board

Re: The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church

#451

Post by rayiner » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 3:37 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #385

rayiner wrote: post #373

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m thinking you’re reading “community property” more literally than I intended it—with the focus on “property” and not “community.” Obviously children are not property. But children are also not independent adults. They must be socialized. Legal codes all over the world, including the UN Declaration of Human Rights, recognize that parents have a right to choose how to socialize their children. My point is that commu…

I think the words you're using here are --- if not unclear, then at least "not carefully chosen to avoid offending this particular audience", but the point you're making is pretty straightforward, and it's not hard to think of comparable secular parenting decisions that we generally have no trouble criticizing parents over. But there's also a subtext here, which is that there's a distinction to be made between good-f…

> If there's institutional pressure to ostracize former members of a community, that's problematic.

I’m not sure, in 2020, I agree. I’m sensitive to the issue. The penalty for apostasy in Islam is death. But I don’t begrudge all the Pakistani cab drivers who try to convert me. They believe they’re doing me a favor. (I’m never the one to bring it up obviously. It always arises awkwardly when I mention that I’m from Bangladesh and then they assume I’m Muslim.)

Leaving religion out of it — nobody has a right to be accepted by a community. In a free society people can leave, but can they really demand a particular sort of treatment?

Re: The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church

#452

Post by GlenTheMachine » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 3:49 AM UTC

curiousgeorgio wrote: post #420

throwaway99199 wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok, IAANAtheologian, but I do read a lot and believe this aligns with most Protestant doctrine (faith+grace yields salvation which yields faith which yields works), but not with LDS or Catholic doctrine which essentially teach that works yield salvation, and if you lack works, you will not be saved. This is confusing, because there are many different passages that highlight different things. It seems easiest to look…

Interesting. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints' perspective is similar, but (in my opinion) a little more straightforward. Faith leads a person to do good works (because faith helps one understand God's love for us, and we in turn want to share that), but neither faith nor good works alone will give us salvation (we can't save ourselves, which is why Jesus Christ is the key). Salvation requires Christ t…

Both Mormons and Protestants get this passage wrong most of the time. I don’t know about Catholics.

Entry into the earthly Kingdom of God is based on the ancient suzerainty covenant, the covenant you as a citizen of a kingdom make with the ruler. You are accepted into the kingdom by swearing “faith” (eg fealty) to the suzerain. In return you are promised the protection of the suzerain; you receive the rights of a citizen in the kingdom.

The key insight here is that the meaning of the word “faith” has changed from “to have loyalty to” to “to have belief in”.

From the moment you swear fealty (“faith”) you are a full member of the kingdom. However, if you do not fulfill the obligations of a member of the kingdom (“works”) you can absolutely get yourself kicked back out.

So:

1) you are “saved” from the moment you enter the covenant, eg express loyalty to God; and you remain saved as long as you remain in the covenant. 2) works are not optional. They are the wages required to remain in the covenant.

Re: The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church

#453

Post by darksaints » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 4:03 AM UTC

ngngngng wrote: post #447

darksaints wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$100 billion in one fund. $32 billion accounted for in other funds [0]. Not to mention 2% of the land in Florida, several billion dollars in commercial and residential real estate. Who knows what else they're hiding. And 16 million members is fools' accounting. It doesn't account for the millions of people like me who don't go to church and yet are still members because I don't want to pay money to hire a lawyer to f…

> I don't want to pay money to hire a lawyer to force the church to take my name off the records. You literally just have to ask in writing. Send a letter to church headquarters in Salt Lake. But you already knew that didn't you? I swear ex-mormons are more devoted to getting people converted to their way of thinking than believing mormons are.

No, sending a letter in writing is not enough. Not if you don't want to be tracked down and harassed with reconversion attempts, or for them to contact your family members and friends to rat you out. The only way that has remotely proven to prevent such behavior from the church is to have it done by a lawyer.

But you already knew that didn't you?

Re: The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church

#454

Post by blueprint » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 4:15 AM UTC

x1oqw wrote: post #19

tomrod wrote: post #9

That is just what is uncovered in the investment market with one subsidiary. They also own 2% of Florida[0], huge land tracts in Argentina, Oklahoma and elsewhere, and attractive urban real estate in most major metropolises including apartment complexes in PA. They centralize donation collection of tithes and good will offerings such that about 8% stays back at congregations (based on personal observation as the fina…

It always surprises me that wealthy churches pretend to take Christ seriously, when Jesus was not very fond of amassing money. I get why the churches do it (of course they don't believe in Christ), but why do the exploited masses believe them?

I'm not part of any religion.

But can you provide some citations that show that is Jesus's own opinion rather than people's interpretation of something?

IF you're talking about the "leave your money and follow me" thing, I doubt he was talking about the money itself there. He said it was harder for a man to enter heaven with all his riches – but what if someone's virtue rose so high that they were able to enter heaven and then they encountered money – it would not have been true that they were virtuous if the money itself is capable of corrupting them. It's like saying that water corrupts someone. Wrong education (environment) does. Wrong education means that they stopped handing down the truth which was revealed by philosophy, lost the ability to make students able to see reality, and came to spread falsehoods, stories, logical derivations, and people's thoughts instead.

Re: The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church

#455

Post by darksaints » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 4:20 AM UTC

lcall wrote: post #429

darksaints wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you need to understand is that Thomas Monson, who was an employee of the church (notorious for their extremely low pay) for his entire career, had an estimated net worth of $14m. That is excluding the church owned property that he gets to use free of charge, including private jets, cars, and homes. This is excluding free income sources such as free university for all family and extended family members. Outside o…

I'm curious where this info could come from. Like, cars? The quote I heard from one GA (in a newspaper) was "you give them your life, and they give you a car." I once or twice rode in a Church-owned pool car to go to software-dev meetings in another city. And private jets? I read that the late (and wealthy industrialist) Jon Huntsman loaned his own jet to Pres. Hinckley some during those years (for his travels as Pre…

Some research courtesy of your exmormon community:

https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/45h0je/when_the_b...

https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/bpiftw/800000_to_...

https://www.reddit.com/r/exmormon/comments/cvbh8q/impress_yo...

https://archive.sltrib.com/story.php?ref=/lds/ci_8271793

As far as free university, I know because I went to school with one of Christensen's sons and he told me.

Re: The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church

#456

Post by ngngngng » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 4:32 AM UTC

darksaints wrote: post #453

ngngngng wrote: post #447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't want to pay money to hire a lawyer to force the church to take my name off the records. You literally just have to ask in writing. Send a letter to church headquarters in Salt Lake. But you already knew that didn't you? I swear ex-mormons are more devoted to getting people converted to their way of thinking than believing mormons are.

No, sending a letter in writing is not enough. Not if you don't want to be tracked down and harassed with reconversion attempts, or for them to contact your family members and friends to rat you out. The only way that has remotely proven to prevent such behavior from the church is to have it done by a lawyer. But you already knew that didn't you?

My dude, you've obviously spent hours on hacker news trying to defend your belief system (or lack thereof). Just let it be, if you don't want to be Mormon anymore, then don't. Your inability to live with your decisions is painfully clear by the time you invest trying to publicly justify your choices.

Move on like the dozens of people I've known that just sent in a letter and have not been harassed since.

Edit: Also, the part you edited out wasn't as clever as you hoped, glad you removed it.

Re: The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church

#457

Post by supportlocal4h » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 4:35 AM UTC

darksaints wrote: post #241

gwilliams wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't get wealthy from it. Those who work for the church full time (with the exception of missionaries) receive a stipend to cover their living expenses and not much else.

> They don't get wealthy from it. We have no way of knowing that, because the church keeps their finances shrouded from public view. Not even members that have paid 10% for their entire lives have a view into how the money is spent. What we do have is a few leaked pay stubs showing actual amounts, and leaked memos acknowledging the existence of, but not quantifying, other forms of compensation. We also have some tang…

Didn't he grow up in a wealthy family? Multiple homes, etc, back in the 30s?

Re: The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church

#458

Post by darksaints » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 4:59 AM UTC

ngngngng wrote: post #456

darksaints wrote: post #453

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, sending a letter in writing is not enough. Not if you don't want to be tracked down and harassed with reconversion attempts, or for them to contact your family members and friends to rat you out. The only way that has remotely proven to prevent such behavior from the church is to have it done by a lawyer. But you already knew that didn't you?

My dude, you've obviously spent hours on hacker news trying to defend your belief system (or lack thereof). Just let it be, if you don't want to be Mormon anymore, then don't. Your inability to live with your decisions is painfully clear by the time you invest trying to publicly justify your choices. Move on like the dozens of people I've known that just sent in a letter and have not been harassed since. Edit: Also,…

Mormons spend tons of time proselytizing. Does that mean they're unable to live with their decisions and that they're trying to justify their choices?

I know you want me to just move on and stop criticizing your church but no thanks. I'm not going to give it a rest. I'm invested in the destruction of the cult that made my life a living hell. If the mormon church really wants to be the kind of church where people leave quietly, they have to change the way they treat people. No more lies and deceit would be a good start.

Re: The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church

#459

Post by dmix » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 5:00 AM UTC

caymanjim wrote: post #450

knicholes wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno. One has to deal with the random crying, the questions of "Why haven't you baptized your children? I want to spend eternity with my grandbabies!", "They need primary!", etc. Then there's the endless gossip at family activities when you're absent about how you're leading your family to hell.

> I dunno. One has to deal with the random crying, the questions of "Why haven't you baptized your children? I want to spend eternity with my grandbabies!", "They need primary!", etc. Then there's the endless gossip at family activities when you're absent about how you're leading your family to hell. This is every family, with slight variation.

Yes, this doesn't sound very far from my grandparents who were catholic who loved bringing that stuff up randomly.

Maybe it's harsher and more serious. We were able to just ignore them and "that's just the way they are" type thing.

Re: The vast but little-known fund of the Mormon Church

#460

Post by dmix » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 5:03 AM UTC

gherkinnn wrote: post #42

x1oqw wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It always surprises me that wealthy churches pretend to take Christ seriously, when Jesus was not very fond of amassing money. I get why the churches do it (of course they don't believe in Christ), but why do the exploited masses believe them?

I find a lot of people invoke Christ, but have little to do with his teachings. Amusingly, his ideas align more with beliefs held by “the young left” than by “the old right”. (Yesyes, bad terms but you know what I mean) And yet the real-world allegiances are inverted.

Have you read the full bible? The Jesus stuff might be more on the liberal end but Christianity in general is very much socially conservative.

Especially the old testament.

In genesis whenever god made a covenant (like made Abraham the main dude) it always came with God giving them great wealth (sheep and an abundance of land) as well as leadership of entire areas. At least the early stuff, the leaders/prophets were hardly the poverty stricken Jesus story.

A lot of that poverty narrative became a greater part of Christianity with Saint Francis of Assisi in the middle ages which help push the helping the poor angle as mainstream image of the church.

But otherwise you can find plenty of evidence of great wealth leaders in Christian history. Not just in the centuries of mass wealth accumulation in the Holy empires and the Catholic church.