3. Many members drink caffeinated beverages, but not coffee or tea (no surprise there)
2. Many members hate BYU, especially if they went there

and number 1

Many Mormons seem obsessed with nudity or revealing clothing.

1) I think home teaching is an utter waste of time for 80% of the ward. Why not focus more effort on the 20% who need good visits.

2) I feel guilty that pageants make me cringe. I feel even more guilty that they don’t move me like they seem to move everyone else.

3) Deseret Book offends all of my sensibilities. From the shrine of graven images to the walls and walls of sermons for profit.

4) In fact, I despise and loathe every attempt to take advantage of Mormon culture for money – novels, music, Book of Mormon action figures …

5) When my wife asked if our boys were getting old enough that she should be careful to cover up in front of them, I encouraged her to do the opposite. (She didn’t need much encouragement). What better place to learn what a human body looks like than in your family.

6) We use face cards (apparently like the rest of you heathens).

7) When my in-laws insist on blessing the food in restaurants, I don’t participate.
I don’t usually close my eyes during prayers when I watch General Conference on TV. But I do when I go to General Priesthood at the stake center.

9) I love the Church and don’t feel like a lemming.

10) (deep breath … muster the courage … admit it …) I took my family to a nude beach and it was one of the most innocent and wholesome things we’ve ever done. The wife and kids loved it. We’ll probably do it again. (… whew … I said it)

This is a Mormon blog. Are you sure you are even a member of our church?

Adults playing video games in church meetings is a pet peeve of mine. Why not just go home and play it on the big screen?

Brandt: I put the whole crying-thing in there because recently, one woman got up and started crying about her experience at the cannery. I almost started choking. And for back scratching? It makes me CRAZY. Nothing to me is better than a good massage but in CHURCH??? I can honestly say I’ve NEVER seen this done except in our church meetings and it’s quite common. WTH???!!!

I love to watch football on Sunday and I think we should cancel church on the Superbowl so the whole day can be truly devoted to its proper celebration.

I not only play with face cards regularly but have also gambled in real casinos spending only up to $25 dollars which my husband and I declared ‘entertainment money’.

I HATE it when people bless the refreshments (junk food) at activities by using the phrase “bless this to strengthen and nourish our bodies” (or any such phrasing…)

I cringe when people say they know this is the “only true church.” Also when I bear my testimony I go out of my way to say I know that any church that brings people to a better relationship with their Savior is good and has truth and that I just think our church as the most truth.

I am a member of the Relief Society Presidency and I don’t always do my own Visiting teaching and think that if you call someone on the last day of the month you both know it is only for statistics and not because you really love and care about them…

Wow…I didn’t realize I’d have so much to add…
I’m trying to decide if I feel better or worse…
Let me pour a nice cold glass of Diet Coke (the proven nectar of the Gods) while I contemplate the situation…

re: 6 – crying in fast and testimony meeting over something that’s not sad – I couldn’t help but laugh because that’s my wife’s grandmother to a “T”

re: 8 – scratching of the back during sacrament meeting – college married student wards are the worst for that – I am all about tenderness, even in church, but I do think it goes overboard

re: 17 – primary programs – I think these are seriously my favorite sacrament meetings of the year. I absolutely love the little flubs that go on during the meeting!

1. I hated seminary and won’t expect my daughter to attend it when she’s of age. I believe that teens need sleep and should concentrate on core subjects first. I also got kicked out of seminary when I was caught sitting in my car doing homework instead of going into class one too many times.

2. I don’t like our Mormon culture that preaches “obey obey obey” and like to use my brain more than blind obedience. And I question authority of all types, including those in the church.

3. I let my 7-year old daughter play with make-up, wear 2-piece swimsuits and spaghetti strapped tops, and lip synch to Snoop Dogg.

4. I proudly wear a bikini most of the time. I think the body is a beautiful thing and there is nothing shameful in wearing a 2-piece if that’s what one is comfy in.

5. I hated garments and cried for days after I first started wearing them. I then tapered off to not wearing them at all. Despite all my efforts of dressing modestly, nothing I could do would hide them enough and I felt like a freak if anyone saw me wearing them while changing at the gym.

6. I detest fast & testimony meetings and really hate it when people cry and things that really aren’t sad. It seems the eeked out tears are supposed to signify a greater level of spirituality but it comes across as bizarre and contrived to me.

7. I hated attending BYU and sometimes it felt down right cultish to me. I attended two devotionals and after that, took the opportunity to sleep in instead.

8. I give really dirty looks to anyone scratching their husband/boyfriend/brother’s backs during Sacrament meeting.

9. I never worry about a movie’s rating. And I watch what ever TV show looks appealing to me, having a particular soft spot for movies about high school (The OC, 90210, Dawson’s Creek, Gossip Girl).

10. I correct anyone who calls me Sister. And I call just about everyone by their first name.

11. I let the missionaries watch TV at my house.

12. I hate the wedding announcements that come with a photo of the happy couple wearing matching outfits.

13. I think it’s disturbing how young some of the LDS kids are when they get married. And start having babies right away.

14. I wish there was a junior sacrament meeting for the little kids. I believe that the noise level and number of screaming children kills any spiritual feelings I would otherwise have in church. And on days when I want a little pomp and circumstance, like Easter and Christmas, I go to church with a good friend, who is Lutheran. They have the BEST music and sermons! (PS: Also, I feel like our music often sounds like a funeral is taking place.)

15. I never wear denim to church (or nylons either).

16. I correct people who refer to my husband as the spiritual head of our home. Um, that would actually be me– he is a non practicing Catholic.

17. I mostly dislike the primary programs put on during Sacrament meeting. They’re only marginally cute and mostly one big chaotic hour.

18. I hate that most church members naturally assume women are SAHMs.

19. I go for long runs on the Sabbath and actually feel it’s an entirely appropriate activity– it clears my head, is good for my physical temple, and gives me an hour’s worth of peace.

20. I sometimes leave church for an hour while my daughter is in primary and get the grocery shopping done.

21. I never fix casseroles or anything with jello.

22. I don’t like visiting teaching or home teaching. It’s time I just don’t have and is better spent with my family.

23. I have more non Mormon friends than Mormon friends and don’t feel there’s anything wrong with it. While they all know I’m LDS, I don’t preach to them or try to get them to go to church with me. I respect their beliefs.

24. Some of my best guy friends are gay and I also think one in particular is one of the most Christlike people I know.

I’m a darned long song;
I’m way too long.
It’s like you’re singing two whole songs.
You sing me once then repeat again
I cycle back and never end!

I’m a darned long song;
I’ll make you yawn.
You’ll wish the electric chair’s turned on!
I’m like a torture chamber’s rack
I’ll make the terror suspect crack.

2) After practicing the primary program song, “We Listen to a Prophet’s voice and hear the Savior’s too,” for a couple of months with a primary chorister that lacked bra padding, I now can’t here that hymn without thinking, “We Listen to a Prophet’s voice and see her nipples too.”

3) Watching a primary chorister teach the children “Oh What do you do in the Summertime” involved her doing “air motions” to each of the activities described in the song. When she rushed way too fast through the motion to “swing in a tree up high”, it resembled…well, do it in front of a mirror and you will see.

4) I had negative thoughts when the Elder’s Quorum called to check on my home teaching for the month and I had to inform him that no one had given me an assignment.

5) I had negative thoughts when the Elder’s Quorum called to check on my home teaching for the month and I had to inform him that the partner he had said would call me (and guide me as a new member to the ward in meeting those families he was already familiar with) never did.

6) I enjoy eating green tea ice cream.

7) I have supported a couple of “stop the pop” campaigns in fighting obesity and diabetes and would rather see people give up their big gulps than their iced tea.
As a married couple, we remove our garments for intimacy. By our definition, intimacy ends the following morning and that’s when we resume wearing them.

9) I encouraged the idea of continuing our ward’s support of community cub scout programs rather than starting our own pack with extremely small numbers.

10) I enjoyed the occurrence years ago in a singles ward when a member of the ward brought his college choral group to perform in sacrament meeting and after the closing prayer, they performed Ave Maria while still in the chapel. I found it humorous when the bishop, who later discovered that something improper may have occurred, assailed during our ward council the performance of the song “Via Maria”, as he put it.

1. If I never work in Primary again, I’ll be a happy girl (despite my mom-of-young-kids status)
2. I argue with anyone who says “I don’t know who said it, but ANYWAY….” just because I can and because usually these people are the ones to stretch their “quote” so far from its original that it’s almost unrecognizable.
3. I’m uncomfortable (but not unwilling) confiding in any male authority figure.
4. I declassify certain swear words for regular use and don’t feel guilty about it.
5. I hate BYU. I went there and feel justified in hating it.
6. I hate people that love BYU. Because I’m petty like that.
7. And on a similar note, anyone that quotes from the BYU standards to prove ANYTHING has just lost his/her argument. Automatically.

John,
Does your love and concern begin and end with Mormon teens only or does your worldview extend beyond the LDS sphere?

Here’s another lead singer of “questionable moral standing” you may enjoy: http://youtube.com/watch?v=380C_nVJotY&feature=related

You’re not the only one. (That’s the reason why they put a pause in there at just the right points so that we, i.e., those of us who had the “true” endowment, can loath those who are not so privy.) You’re just an Abnormalist, along with all the rest of us Abnormalists!

I attend evangelical Christian services on Easter.

I follow my husband’s advice on garments.

I don’t follow his advice on anything else.

During RS I find friends with problems they need to urgently discuss, and I take them out to my car where we talk and cry and sometimes go for a Coke. (sisterhood)

I count the above as Visiting Teaching.

BUT:

I still (surreptitiously) make the old signs that have been removed from the Temple Ceremony. Don’t know what that’s all about. Guess I just like being weird. Does anyone else do that?

“2. I don’t let my wife put devotional MormonAds or other Mormon kitsch on the walls of our home,”

“I think MomronAds are a travesty that are just catchy phrases for people to smile at.”

There is nothing wrong with MormonAds. You just need to find the right ones to hang up:

http://www.divinecomedy.net/?p=mormonadz (some are BYU specific, but most are really funny).

It’s that secret Coke recipe.

I knew Coke was evil!

10. I love tiramisu and rum cake–always have, even as a kid when my parents didn’t like me ordering them as dessert and my mom would suggest I try to walk a straight line after.
9. I never attended Homemaking while it was called Homemaking, and only attended Enrichment when I was called as Enrichment Leader. I refuse to allow crafts into my home and have never attended a pampered chef party.
8. I multi-task during church and have proposed a sacramental drive-thru for vacations (“5 to go, hold the dry council, but we’ll take the youth speakers on CD if you have that”).
7. I do not like any food for which the base ingredient is Campbell’s cream of mushroom soup.
6. From March to October, I wear a bikini almost non-stop all weekend, changing for church and to go out to eat.
5. I have been known to use a few German words now and again. I was semi-proud when my son exclaimed today “What the crap?!” when he saw some bad grades posted on his teacher’s web site. Train up a child . . .
4. I think “LDS Literature” is an oxymoron. Also not a fan of The 5 People You Meet in Heaven or any of those Christmas Box-type books. Basically, I hate books that use cheap sentimental manipulation to wring tears out of you over poorly fleshed-out fictional characters.
3. I am a fiscal conservative, social libertarian, global warming skeptic. But I recycle and use solar heating on my pool.
2. I have never felt guilty about working outside the home (even though I have 3 kids), despite my dad’s best efforts to guilt me.
1. I am practically marinating in diet coke.

Kinda makes me wonder which devotionals are worse – BYU’s or BYU-Idaho’s

I vote for BYU-Idaho