My experience with Jehovah’s Witnesses is when my husband’s former girlfriend tried to steal him away from me. I got my revenge when I saw her last year and I was thin and cute and she was fat and wrinkly.

My experience with Catholics was a good one. I had many Catholic friends and once had an appointment for lessons to begin a conversion process. But when I went, the priest wasn’t there and I found out he’d actually fallen in love with someone and left the priesthood (true story).

Don’t you think many Catholics do practice birth control?

The Unification Church makes their young members go door to door selling stuff and lie to people about why they’re doing it.

My experience with the Unification Church has been incredibly positive. I served part of my mission in a city with quite a few of them: one was a neighbor and his teenage son, and they were great people; another was a prior investigator who had had spiritual experiences both with our church and with the Unification Church, and while he got a bit defensive he was a good man and had a great family–his teenage children were very friendly to the missionaries. I don’t know anything about door-to-door sales, and I’m sure there are some bad apples, but I respect the members I met.

Another one not mentioned–Muslims. Restrictive diets, often restrictive clothing requirements, and they face a great deal of persecution for their beliefs (at least in the Western world).

I noticed on my mission that religious people were less likely to feel offended when we showed up at their door. The more religious a person was, the more likely they were to talk with us. I’d say that probably half the people who invited us into their homes were religiously active (compared to less than 10% of the population of that country).

In a million years I would never insult them by sending the Mormon Missionaries to the their homes.

I’m a little confused by this statement. Why would you consider it an insult? If you believe they are truly devoted to finding Heavenly Father, wouldn’t you want to at least give them a chance to learn of the restored gospel? Maybe they are devoted to their religion because it’s the only one they know. Maybe their faithfulness has prepared their hearts for hearing about continuing revelation.

I guess writing off missionary work because they seem ok where they are, seems a little off to me…

I’m down with the anti-holiday thing.

There are some sects that don’t allow medical care, but believe on relying solely on prayer. One person I know of will refuse to see a doctor under any circumstance, but will see a dentist.

When I was talking about Catholic, I was referencing the Roman Catholics. I should have kept writing out Roman Catholic instead of switching to short-hand. The Roman Catholics are the old school, original style. The RC I know think “modern” Catholics aren’t following the Church at all. They would never dream of sending their children to a modern Catholic school, too liberal in its thinking.

#6- I wouldn’t send the missionaries because they haven’t asked for them. We talk about our religions and what we believe, but with an eye toward camaraderie, not conversion. If anyone wanted to jump ship, of course I would introduce the missionaries. I just don’t expect that and I am 100% OK if they don’t. As I joked with one of them, “We don’t need to convert you. We’ll get ya in the next life.” Luckily, he has a sense of humor and didn’t take offense. I think I would have if the roles were reversed.

“Seventh-Day Adventists are strict vegetarians. They also don’t dance. (I love meat and dancing.)”

I’ll do you one better. I won’t dance unless I’m eating meat.

#1 – “Even though I may disagree with some of their practices, I respect those who have the willpower to live their religion.”

That’s what I’m saying. Some of my friends live really, really hard lives of total submission for their religious beliefs. I do respect them for it. I also wouldn’t want to be them.

I think a lot of your “information” about other religions is wrong. There is no difference between “Catholic” and “Roman Catholic”. Mennonites are a diverse group and your assertion that education ends at the 8th grade is mistaken. Roman Catholics use Natural Family Planning primarily as a way to prevent pregnancy. I’m not sure what you are trying to accomplish with this post. But knowing how annoying it is to me when I see ignorant bloggers holding forth about Mormons when they know very little about us, I think we should be more careful.

When I was talking about Catholic, I was referencing the Roman Catholics. I should have kept writing out Roman Catholic instead of switching to short-hand. The Roman Catholics are the old school, original style. The RC I know think “modern” Catholics aren’t following the Church at all. They would never dream of sending their children to a modern Catholic school, too liberal in its thinking.

I’m afraid this is a false distinction. Roman Catholics make up the vast majority of Catholics that accept the primacy of His Holiness the Pope. The “Roman” part refers to the rite of mass to which they adhere (of which there are currently two authorized forms: the Novus Ordo [the revision which arose post-Vatican II], and the Forma Extraordinaria [according to the Roman Missal extant in 1962]). There are other Eastern Catholic churches, with distinct rites, but still in full communion with the Pope, and who thus share the same official teachings regarding contraception. There are, of course, other Catholic traditions, such as the Old Catholic Church, not in communion with the Holy See, who have different beliefs regarding a range of practices and doctrines, including the subjects of birth control and homosexuality.

In summation, the Catholics mentioned in comments #1 and #9 are, indeed, Roman Catholics. They’re just bending or ignoring the rules. The friends you mention in #12, living in zion, are probably just what are popularly termed “traddies,” a growing minority within Catholicism, definitely encouraged by the current Pope (see, for instance, his motu proprio, titled Summorum Pontificum, which increased the availability of the Forma Extraordinaria).

All of this just goes to show something my brother once said: “Catholics have a doctrine of Papal infallibility, but most of them don’t really believe that. Mormons have no doctrine of Prophetic infallibility, but most of them don’t really believe that either.”

#19 – For women who don’t cut their hair, when lice outbreaks happen they buy 4x as much as normal and spend days combing it out.

Um I was born a Mennonite. They are very diverse. There are Mennonite Universities and colleges. My mom grew up Mennonite and went to a non-Mennonite college. She also never wore the bonnet some wear (nor did any of our relatives). I never heard of any Mennonite I was related to refusing to go to the Dr or dentist. Also, there are Mennonites who even serve in the military as medics or other non-combat positions. I’m sure you are correct about certain sects of Mennonites, but certainly not all. Lumping all Mennonites together is the same as lumping LDS and FLDS together.

in #12, LIZ wrote: “If anyone wanted to jump ship, of course I would introduce the missionaries. I just don’t expect that and I am 100% OK if they don’t. As I joked with one of them, “We don’t need to convert you. We’ll get ya in the next life.” Luckily, he has a sense of humor and didn’t take offense. I think I would have if the roles were reversed.”

Let’s have a thought-experiment, and reverse the roles. Suppose you’re a devout member of some Christian religion other than LDS. You have an LDS friend here in mortality. Eventually, you kick the bucket and get to the spirit world. A little bit later, you find out that the Mormons were right after all; you accept the fullness of the gospel in the Spirit World, and wait patiently for your proxy temple work to be done.

Sooner or later, you’re going to run into that person who was your LDS friend back in mortality. What are you going to say?

How about: “You KNEW?!?!? You didn’t just believe, but you knew that your church was true? WHY DIDN’T YOU TELL ME?! I thought you were my friend?”

That’s why we have to figure out how to politely and respectfully share the gospel with our non-LDS friends. They’re going to kick our butt in the spirit world when they find out we knew and kept that information from them.

#26, 27 – All my non-member friends in the next life will be saying, “Huh. I guess you were right.” And I will happily introduce them to the Spirit World Dept. of Missionaries.

And I hate that story. It is annoying to put guilt on someone because they have non-member friends who aren’t interested. My friends all know I Mormon and if they want more info., I’m happy to give it. Other than that, their life choices of worship are between them and Heavenly Father.

What if he and all the others telling that guilt trip story are right? I’m so screwed.

“What if he and all the others telling that guilt trip story are right? I’m so screwed.”

Probably not. My response to being invited on that guilt trip would be, “Well, now that you’ve accepted the fullness of the gospel you are an heir to all that the Father hath. If you’d accepted it a little earlier you’d be an heir to–surprise, surprise!–all that the Father hath. Stop blaming me for depriving you of nothing. Now go chat with Alvin Smith about learning the ropes up here.”

If you would have accepted it in mortality, you’ll be just fine up there.

Your “I Thought We Had It Hard” article shows you are incredibly ignorant, grossly negligent in trumpeting “facts” and spreading rumors and misrepresentations about the beliefs of other religions without bothering to engage in proper and responsible research to substantiate your claims in your slanderous and snotty self-righteous public posting.

I was raised a Seventh-Day-Adventist, my grandpa was a Seventh-Day-Adventist minister and his daughter (my mother) has been friends with a devout Mormon woman for nearly 40 years. Her children were my earliest childhood friends. A simple Google search of scholarly articles would show you that only around 50% of Adventists follow a vegetarian diet. Yet you snidely remark that ALL Adventists must suffer a vegetarian diet. I was raised a vegetarian from birth and myself and others raised similarly have NEVER felt deprived in life because we don’t eat meat. How can you miss something you’re not accustomed to eating or find disgusting? It also shows arrogance and cultural insensitivity and bigotry to presume that those from nations like India who have citizens following religious principles their whole lives which cause them to forgo eating meat are ENVIOUS of people like YOU who get to fill your belly with animal flesh. GROSS! My grandpa, the minister, became a vegetarian even BEFORE becoming INTRODUCED to the Seventh-Day-Adventist religion because he worked at a meat-packing company and was disgusted with what he saw there – such as cancers being cut out of slabs of cow meat.

LASTLY – my roommate is a MENNONITE. Her FATHER is a medical doctor who started a medical clinic in a poor rural area in the mountains of Arkansas. ALL SIX of his children had formal and advanced education through college. My roommate is a nurse as well as are some of her other sisters. She also has a brother who’s a doctor and another who’s an accountant. My roommate’s Mennonite mother was also a nurse working side-by-side her Mennonite doctor husband (they are both in their early 90′s by the way so it’s not as if they are an exception uniquely influenced by modern society).

My roommate’s parents and her family traveled and lived in third-world countries in Africa and Latin America to provide medical health services to needy populations.

YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED of yourself for carelessly spreading lies and ridiculing others’ religious beliefs. You are a self-absorbed, ignorant, person who should get YOURSELF educated and learn about the people in the world around you rather than pat yourself on the back while you live in your little Mormon bubble.

You are a sorry representative for your faith.

Krista