Join John Larsen, Carah Burrell, and John Dehlin for an extensive exploration of the implications of the LDS Church’s Plan of Salvation.
Show notes:
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10 Responses
It’s interesting to me how reflexively pro-Christian and anti-Jewish this podcast consistently is, even though the hosts are post-religious. Blasphemy against the God of the Old Testament is routine and doesn’t raise an eyebrow. But blasphemy against Jesus (=the God of the Old Testament, in Mormonism) seems to hit a real nerve.
I guess even when you leave Christianity, you don’t necessarily give up the incoherent anti-Jewish myths you were taught all your life as a Christian–that the God of the Old Testament is mean and the God of the New Testament is nice.
On a more constructive note: I have another problem to add to John Larsen’s long list.
Females are born with all the eggs they’ll ever have. They don’t create new eggs throughout their lives.
If Heavenly Mother had to be resurrected with all the eggs she would ever need, she might have to encompass several solar systems, if not even more space (depending on how many eggs we think she needs).
If she’s going to keep producing offspring for eternity in the physical way, she’s infinitely large, and certainly doesn’t fit in the universe.
I’m obsessed with this episode’s dynamic 😂 Obviously love all three speakers individually, but John Larsen putting on his earnest TBM hat and John Dehlin turning into a teenage goofball and Carah, our QUEEN, tossing in the perfect quips and John and Carah snickering in the background the whole time is just the best 😂 Thank you all for doing what you do. This made my week ♥️
Another issue with the gestation period, is the doctrine of 1000 earth years being a single day to God….this would make a Kolob gestation approximately 273,750 years….
John, in this episode you mention that faith transition stories are still MS’s bread and butter. My observation is that we’re seeing very little of that over recent weeks/months in favor of stuff like this. Obviously you all have your own reasons for that, but I came here (and have contributed off and on) for the “bread and butter”. PLEASE return to that as there is no other forum like MS was (I loved the long form) where people tell their Mormon life story and how it transitioned over time. I am now re-watching ones I’ve seen already because I miss those so much. Please find some more Young’s and Pinson’s and Haleigh Everts’, etc, etc. I (and I’m sure many others) relate to those stories and hearing theirs helps me gain perspective on my own.
Thank you!
100% what Anna said. We’re on vacation in Kauai driving along the north shore taking my first drink of Aloha coffee and Larsen starts in on the 9 year old in the brothel and the rickets…. I mean come on …How are we supposed to swallow our coffee and stay on the fetching road with that??!! Funny funny stuff. And Carah is just so dang good. Mahalo y’all!
To be honest, this was likely the hardest Mormon Stories podcast to get through in all the years that I’ve listened. Please take the following as constructive feedback.
1. There was way too much interrupting by John D.
John Larsen appears to have a lot of prepared material and has a talk track that I assume was going to tie everything together, but the constant interruptions destroyed the flow, and ultimately made the arguments very disjointed.
2. The doctrine of the Plan of Salvation as described in the Podcast had many errors, and not just small ones – errors that crack the foundation of John’s arguments. Just to name a few of them:
a. The plan is not Jesus’ plan. God the Father presented the plan, and noted the need for a Savior. Jesus stood first and put forth his name as the one who would fulfil the Father’s plan.
b. I am not aware of doctrine that would say that each time God the Father or any of the other Gods participating in the Plan of Salvation would lose 1/3 of the pre-Earth spirits each time a cycle of the plan is initiated. That cracks the conclusion that the Plan of Salvation results in a majority of Gods children living in Outer Darkness.
c. You didn’t address that doctrine is not clear on whether or not there is progression between degrees of glory. There are plenty of Authorities who have stated or written in a belief of progression. The natural result of this is that the vast majority of God’s children will inherit Celestial glory at some point in the eternities.
Abortions and stillborns should not be counted as spirits. Mormon doctrine basically says that the spirit does not enter the body until just before birth. Two sources: (1) You cannot do temple work for the dead for stillborns or abortions. If a child is alive at birth you do baptisms, endowments and seal to parents. This must mean that the Church doesn’t believe that stillborns or abortions are real spirits (or worthy of salvation). (2) 3 Nephi 1:13 Jesus is visiting the Nephites in spirit the day before he is born. So his spirit must not enter the body until just before birth.
Contrary is Luke 1:41 which makes it sound like John the Baptist’s spirit was already in the womb some time before birth. However, since Mormons only believe the Bible “as far as it is translated correctly”, one can argue that modern revelation takes precedence over the Bible.
The conclusion is that Mormons should not be against abortion since a baby is not being killed. It has no soul until birth. The strongest argument is why then doesn’t the church do temple work for aborted babies and stillborns? They must not be real “people” or have real spirits.
I mis-wrote about children work for the dead. They are not baptized or receive endowment if died before 8 years old. But they are sealed to parents. Stillborns are not sealed to parents, so they must not have spirits.
I recently started listening to Mormon Stories. What I like about it, is that it brings people together with varying points of view in a respectful way. While I agree with a lot of the conclusions of this episode, I didn’t care for the snarky way that the content was delivered. A lot of us are just looking for answers and finding our own truth. Making fun of others, even though seemingly ridiculous, makes me want to listen less. Only posting because you asked for feedback during the episode.