Are you still Catholic? If so, go fuck yourself.

I had a full scholarship because of my ACT score anyway. For the first two years that is.

Federal Farmer disagrees: Dumb.

I'm sorry, FF, I'm not letting you dodge the matter. Were this a persuasive paper or essay, you wouldn't be getting good marks. Pointing to the Wikipedia article on cults doesn't advance your argument; presenting the evidence you've gathered (even if from Wikipedia) in your own words does.
Furthermore, hinging your argument on how Mormons revere Joseph Smith and Brigham Young only works as supporting evidence at best (and, to note, the RLDS and Church of Christ: Temple Lot offshoots don't consider Young to be a valid prophet at all). And advancing incorrect information (Mormons referring to God as 'High Father') undermines your credibility. (It's 'Heavenly Father', a name/title that is not unique to Mormonism.)

I'm an ex-Mormon. I know full well what the church's history is, and the shenanigans it does. I agree the church is a cult, but it's not for the reasons you put forth. This cult is now an established religion, and even Scientology is approaching that point.

If you're not willing to use critical thinking and fail to put forth a convincing argument, you're only going to reinforce the board's meme that you're still in high school, which you're clearly not.

If you haven't heard it, you might want to check out this podcast. Dude is hardcore when it comes to ferreting out obscure bits of Mormon history. He's even managed to dig up shit that the church thought was securely buried in the archives. I've got the feeling that when he's published his book on Mormonism and Joseph Smith, it's going to be explosive.

I'm not going to quibble over the "cult" moniker either. That said, it bears repeating that from the perspective of Orthodox Historical Christianity, their Theology Proper, Christology, Pneumatology, Bibliology, Soteriology, Ecclesiology, and Eschatology are all extremely heretical.

Mormons can claim to be Christians all they want. I'm certainly not going to lose any sleep over it. But, if they're Christians, I'm a literal, physical baseball.

Hopefully the Mormons won't think of themselves as the literal, physical bat :/

you're a baseball? Hopefully all the batters you are thrown against during your lifetime strike out. Worst case of course some juiced up youngster hits a stitching busting 500 footer over the fence!

You're not helping your case, @Federal Farmer.

I accept your concession.

I gave my explanation already and you already agreed that they are a cult. What else do you want?

Logical thought would be nice.

Here’s one article about it. It’s almost a decade old, but makes some good points.
https://www.google.com/amp/amp.slat...cares_it_s_their_weird_and_sinister_beli.html

Another
https://www.mormoncult.org/

Just doing a basic google search, seems like a lot of people think it’s a cult.

Critical thinking and stronger evidence to back your arguments.

Better start.
I'll set aside the second link's antagonistic vibe from the url alone (which undercuts the site's claim to be fair, objective, and unbiased), what do you take from their arguments and evidence?
You can even cite the South Park episode -- no need to link it -- what's your take on it?

I'll have more thoughts later, but typing on my phone isn't conducive for making @Asyncritus type posts.

We have the Pope visiting us this weekend and it's expected to bring Dublin to a standstill. I have to do two airport runs in the middle of this.

Apparently he's going to meet with some of the victims of child rape. I haven't heard anything about him visiting the mass graves though.

To be fair, I doubt Fuhrer Ratzinger would have done that.

Are you ready for round three? St. Louis is digging in. https://www.npr.org/2018/08/24/6414...ags-investigation-of-sexual-abuse-accusations

"we have nothing to hide." except THE SAUSAGE apparently! Damn I'm witty.

Or he could turn the abusers over to the authorities and let them handle it. Just a thought.

Lots of optics this weekend. Apparently he called the abusers "pieces of shit" or something of that sort in private meeting - which you'd think would be unbecoming for a Pope. But its long on words, short on action. Significantly, he refused to give any sort of apology - since as an admission of guilt, that carries legal consequences.

And yet he refused to discuss Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò's claims.

Of course he won't respond to claims of covering anything up. The Pope is kind of the President Of The Catholic Church. Hes going to give lip service (no pun intended considering kiddie sex) to his voters/supporters that keep him in power, but not at the cost of incriminating himself. Anyone who thinks that when a religion gets this big it's not just a corporation/political party is fooling themselves. They are a great example of being "above the law" and to think that he is god's middle-man to millions of people speaks volumes about religion in general.

BTW speaking of religion it's tempting (but not too classy) when someone says "thoughts & prayers" to respond with "hold the prayers, double down on the thoughts instead."

Bullshit. Once chosen, the Pope rules absolutely. Infallibly, even, according to dogma. He could persecute child abuse immediately and fully if he so chose. He chooses not to.

True, but there would certainly be resistance to such actions from church officials. They are, after all, quite willing to spin his positive seeming statements into something that reinforces their current position. Not that I think Frankie's inclined to actually do anything pedophile priests.

For me, that's the part that's the most damning.

This is a vast international criminal problem that's made even worse by an even more vast international criminal conspiracy to cover it up. If it were any other organization than a church, Western Governments would be falling all over themselves to investigate and get to the bottom of the issue.

I have only heard a little about this. I heard it was a graveyard, not a mass grave. The claim was that by Irish law it used to be an unwed mother automatically lost her child to the church who ran all the orphanages and that some children in those orphanages did die for various reasons over the years so the church maintained graveyards. Are you claiming the church ran mass executions of orphans in Ireland?

I have never understood that rule either. Other religions allow their pastors, priests, leaders ,or whatever they are called, to marry and raise families.

Yep. The human drive for sex, for companionship, is one of the most powerful instincts we have. To suppress it in such a way invites disaster.

Seriously, did the Catholic Church learn nothing from the Prequel Trilogy?

You wanna know the real reason?
And it has nothing to do with sex.
Land holdings.
If priests are married, they can leave their shit to their wives, but if they're celibate, the church can scarf it all up.
Insidious greedy bastards.

Yes, but traffic was shitty for you, right?