Book of Mormon - not much Mormonism

Another issue I had as I would make my way through The Book of Mormon for the umpteenth time was that there wasn't a whole lot in there that looked or felt like the Mormon Church I was a part of. I think the most Mormon parts came in Moroni when he gives us the sacrament prayers verbatim and when he denounces infant baptism. There's no talk of our Pre-Earth Life, the War in Heaven, the three kingdoms of glory, temple washing and anointings, the endowment, eternal marriages, eternal families, baptisms for the dead, Spirit Prison, children and teen males participation in worship services, the Aaronic Priesthood, the Melchizedek Priesthood, a Relief Society type organization, any discussion of female participation at all, bishops, youth leaders, etc.

The religion of The Book of Mormon better represented a day and age when any man feeling "called of God" could set to preachin' and declarin' repent'nce and baptism, and that was about all you needed. Commit to Jesus and walk in his ways, AMEN!

It made it hard to take seriously the claim that The Book of Mormon was written for our day.

They "prophesied concerning us and our future generations" (2 Ne. 4:2)... or did they?

Miracles - out miracled

 It's hard not to wonder where God is in your life when everyone else seems to have really awesome miracle stories and your church's just kind of suck. I met a man once who had a dream of two skyscrapers covered in fireballs a mere two days before 9/11. Admittedly the guy didn't know what the dream "meant", but why the hell didn't our true prophet Gordon have that dream so one of his sidekicks could interpret it? Then there was a guy who saw God and got his symbol (apparently a phoenix or a peacock) tattooed on his back. Not even our highest priests hanging out in the Holies of Holies discussing who doesn't get the Priesthood next dare say they saw something as miniscule as the imprint in the carpet from Jesus' feet. Buddhists have found Buddha's permanently impressed in rocks!

We've got nothing. We have lost car keys showing up. We have avoided accidents. We manage to find our soul mates from the Pre-Existence. We like to think we get weather on demand. We get well-blessed food. We maybe have really weird old women bearing testimony about feeling the presence of a ghost in the temple. We don't have many healings. It's all pretty meh.

God, at least send us some seagulls to save save our picnics from ants and yellow jackets. We're just not impressing anyone these days.

Special Witnesses of Christ

I loved the Church film Special Witnesses of Christ while on my mission. This film was totally heavy shit that the peoples of the world needed to brace themselves for. The men in the film were the awesomest dudes on the face of the planet who enjoy amazingly close relationships with the big JC! They took orders from HIM! And here they are on film bearing their "special witnesses" of Christ's reality. Do you know what "special witness" means? I think it's supposed to mean that you've seen Jesus - that you're so badass he's actually paid you a visit. You know what "apostolic testimony" means? I think it means that you've been hand selected as one of his top twelve (or fifteen). Whatever it means, I know it doesn't mean you have the same vague hope that Jesus was really the Son of God that your average member has.

Okay, so I mostly loved it. I have to admit I found a lot of it unsatisfying and particularly troubling. Why? These special witnesses don't say much at all despite having over an hour to do so. They just regurgitate Bible speak and Bible stories and Jesus "facts", but they don't actually give us anything personal that might actually be called a testimony or witness. There is nothing special about what they say

Why are they holding back? Why don't they give us some personal Jesus story for us to ponder? Why don't they elaborate on their relationship with the Savior of the World? Why does this film not live up to its title at all? I watched this so many times, each time looking for an apostle in these men. I wanted to see it. I already believed it was there. Why couldn't I see it?

Could it be that they have no real "witness"? Is their testimony as banal as everyone else's? Are they just spewing lame scripted shit because they have nothing authentic to say?