The Second Mindfulness Training

Reading Thich Nhat Hanh's Five Mindfulness Trainings, and despite him being a Buddhist and all, the Spirit whispered to me that he's probably taken out his endowment at some point (think "time, talents, and everything with which the Lord has blessed you or with which he may bless you" as you read this!):

"Aware of the suffering caused by exploitation, social injustice, stealing, and oppression, I am committed to cultivating loving kindness and learning ways to work for the well-being of people, animals, plants, and minerals. I will practice generosity by sharing my time, energy, and material resources with those who are in real need. I am determined not to steal and not to possess anything that should belong to others. I will respect the property of others, but I will prevent others from profiting from human suffering or the suffering of other species on Earth." The World We Have, pp. 11-12 (alternate version here)

OK, so it's not totally LDS but the Spirit's still telling me a lot of Mormons could really get behind this. It's like, you know, one of those those fragmented bits of truth out there in all religions that fits so neatly into the whole entire Truth found within the doctrine of the Church, right? Make sense to me (kind of). Except for the fact that here it feels like Buddhism has something to add to Mormonism, rather than Mormonism adding to Buddhism.

Where in Mormon doctrine do you find explicit prohibitions of exploitation of people, animals, plants and minerals? When was the last time you heard a prophet or apostle tell you to oppose anything causing "the suffering of other species"? The best we have is an awkward statement in the Doctrine & Covenants about how the U.S. Constitution "should be maintained for the rights and protection of all flesh" and how slavery (in the U.S.) is bad. Even if we want to believe the Second Mindfulness Training and the verses in D&C say the same thing, the truth is Thich Nhat Hanh says it way better.

So I'd like to bear my testimony that Thich Nhat Hanh is a partial prophet who should change his ways and be baptized by true authority and be saved, and that Buddhism can sort of be right sometimes but never as right as the Church I was born into. Nham oh Jheses Christh, ahmen!

Heavenly fatherliness #10 - Tidying up

According to popular wisdom, a good father helps with household tasks.

God, the Father of All, clearly never raises a finger to help keep our home, planet Earth, clean; it's totally and entirely our responsibility to clean up after ourselves and try to maintain things in pristine condition. Maybe we could say something like "hey, God teaches us correct principles, lets us govern ourselves, and gives us the strength to exceed our capabilities," but that's not exactly leading by example, is it?

The funny thing is that believers will often be the first to say that the state of things couldn't be worse. In fact, according to many believers, God's been telling us the world's going to burn at some point, which seems to send a message that sounds something like "kids, I'm not doing shit to make this place better because I'm just going to torch it in a few years anyway." What kind of father would do something like that? God's the worst.

*These attributes represent the popularized and popularizing thoughts of Ask Men’s Jullian Marcus, examiner.com’s Tanya Tringali, and Open Talk Magazine’s Glenn Silvestre as per their respective articles on what makes a good father.

Environmentalism and conservationism

Despite Mormonism teaching that we humans are the stewards of the Earth, most Mormons (especially leaders*) say fuck all about being more responsible when it comes to the environment. Mormons are about growth, they're about big houses with big yards (in the middle of the desert) for big families, they're about big profits to pay for big houses and big families who can pay the Church with big tithing checks. Utah Mormons especially tend to be politically conservative and extremely critical of troublemakers like hippies and tree-huggers and just about any environmentalist type.

I remember having numerous arguments with fellow Mormons about how members should be much more concerned about the environment than they are and each time the Mormon argument came down to something like this:

"Well the world has to get worse before it gets better and besides Jesus will set things straight at the Second Coming." In other words, let's not worry about it.

Setting the tone for less-than-environmentally-conscious landscaping.

I knew it was coming every time, and it only made me more and more pissed off. How could I be part of a group that thinks like this? How could the Creator of the world be leading these people? I have to confess it made me doubt.

*Only this year, after some asshole youth leaders from Highland, Utah toppled a rock formation in Goblin Valley State Park, did the Church finally make a statement in favor of conservationism.