Mormons Losing Members Over Anti-Gay Campaign

While the Mormon Church hierarchy was responsible for organizing millions of dollars and thousands of hours of manpower to pass California's Proposition 8 and Arizona's Prop 102, the church's tactics haven't sat so well with some of its members--including families, members with Mormon heritage going back 150 years, and gay members---who began speaking out in July on the website signingforsomething.org.

Many have public resigned from the church, citing reasons like these:

*I think the church has no right to assume the inner thinkings of its members and take such an open stand of any political issue.

Read the whole story here.

Comments

[carsntrucks]

This really bothers me, if it's true. What a drastic move for a group that really doesn't care about them beyond their financial and symbolic support for their made up constitutional right to marriage.

[Sarahmay57]

Don't worry, they'll make new ones!

(Now THAT'S a church. Looks like a Disney cartoon!)

[JackNasty]

If only Mormons used their magic underpants for good instead of evil.

[BeasleysMom]

The Mormons I know and once liked are losing me as a friend.

[olda]

Nothing but a cult losing members who cares.

[ericmiami]

Who cares how many leave? That just means more Magic Underpants for the true believers.

[rmetz74]

Good.

This is the only way to get through to entrenched organizations like churches (or governments, or corporations.) Until people stop giving them money and support, they have no reason to listen.

[abbeyroad]

WHO voted "yes" is not the issue at hand.
it's WHO was behind this proposition.

-- THE MORMONS lead the pack.

-- THE MORMONS were the prop. 8 foot soldiers.

-- THE MORMONS donated the most money.

-- THE MORMONS made it happen.

and those same latter day devils have been all over the blog sites, posting about how the african-americans voted, trying desperately to point the finger at the african-american community (the same tactic they used toward the indians during the meadow mountain m*ssacre) --- but it's not going to work.

(i noticed that all the defenders of the LDS signed up to the huffington post in nov. 2008).

who voted is irrelevant.
the spotlight stays focused directly on the LDS.

[Cybersquirt]

Uh, without the YES votes the Props would have never passed..

[abbeyroad]

if you people would take the time to actually READ the resignation letters on the site, you'll clearly see that about 90% of the resignation letters are from STRAIGHT MEMBERS.

www.signforsomething.com

[Bitsko]

Why should HuffP0 let facts get in the way of a sensationalist headline?

[Cybersquirt]

the headline says nothing about the orientation of the members. what are you talking about?

[harriettubman]

It absolutely amazes me that some people truly believe they're going to change thousands of years of ancient scriptures that people call religion. Complain all day but slapping crosses out of people's hands and picketing churches will resolve nothing. It will continue to polarize the very people who voted against Prop 8. No dialogue, no education, no change. There has to be dialogue for change.

[OrleansCatalan]

First - The Book of Mormon isn't even 200 years old.

Second - We changed "thousands of years of ancient scriptures" when:
- we allowed inter-racial marriages.
- we allowed no-contest divorces.
- we outlawed slavery.
- on and on and on...

FYI

[Cybersquirt]

"slapping crosses out of peoples hands"

Funny.

[realityczech4u]

harriettubman was refering to the elderly woman who was attacked by homosexuals at one of their protests. Nothing funny about that.

[Tommygun2146]

I can sum up the Mormon church's credibility as a serious religion in two words: "Magic Underwear".

[Foucek]

No different than the Hari Krishnas, or the moonies....just a cult.

[rkimball]

why are protests directed at lds,only. 70% of black churches voted down prop 8. hispanics,asians & other groups also played a hand. the gays should be protesting black churches in watts. they a cowards because they know they get their keesters kicked in watts so the go after soft targets.

[nibblybits]

Even 10 y.o.'s know that the "they did it too" excuse is pretty lame. If LDS didn't want the publicity or the backlash, they probably shouldn't have contributed $20 million in church funds for the effort or sent down an edict that every church member was required to fight for Prop 8.

As for me, I've decided that I don't recognize LDS as a real church or Mormonism as a real religion, at least until LDS comes to recognize gay marriage as real. From now on Mormons are just crazy cultists who have been brainwashed to a heretic belief system. Won't change my mind about it.

Oh, and if there's some sort of funded effort to de-recognize LDS as a real religion, I'm ready to open up my checkbook.

[rkimball]

lds wan not the only ones to contribute. contributions came from very deep pockets all over the nation. this is a state vs gays issue not lds vs gays. the people have spoken. take up another election. maybe it will pass the next time.

[quadman]

Actually, it was less than $3000 in church funds. The 20 million figure came from individual LDS member contributions.

[45245]

good glad to hear it

[Tommygun2146]

How many black churches had the elders sit down with each member and say, "okay, based on your income, you are 'donating' $5,000 or $10,000, If you don't, you'll be excommunicated."?

[rkimball]

it was the popular vote that defeated prop 8, not the monetary contributions.

[quadman]

LOL! You actually believe that tripe don't you?

[harriettubman]

I guess ANY black church in CA will do to apease you huh? Whether they had anything to do with Prop 8 or not. Sounds like some hostile white group straight out of Jim Crow.

[stepintothelight]

Sorry Mary ... This lie has already been rebuffed by the actual numbers that came in. 12.8% of the complete California voting population could not have had this overwhelming affect. Go crawl back in your rethuglican closet for eight years and practice your wide stanced positions. We have enough to deal with in cleaning up the divisiveness your ilk created in the last 8 years. Stop trying to split America. Why do you hate Americans so much?

[TheBlackCat]

In 2002, I was a Catholic born and bred in Boston. When the clergy sex abuse scandal happened, it was devastating.

What disturbed me even more, however, was the Church's response to this tragedy and scandal of epic proportions. After Cardinal Law's resignation, I expected some massive program to reach out to parishioners and rebuild that broken trust. But instead, their decision was to deflect deflect deflect. All of a sudden the church threw itself head on into the fight to stop gay marriage here in Massachusetts, which they thankfully were unable to prevent.

The problem was that it would be a long , arduous, and painful journey for the Church to look inward and try and heal the damage. It was MUCH easier to point the finger at someone ELSE'S "sins" and try and redirect all the rage and frustration that the Church had brought upon itself to the homosexual community.

While this tactic may have worked just fine among the older generations of Catholics, the Church lost many younger Catholics, like me, who were outraged by this thinly veiled "bait and switch" tactic.

Now we see the Mormon Church with increasingly bad publicity due to their inability to reign in the fundamentalist sects of their religion, is looking to do the same thing. They realize how monumental a challenge it would be to reform and unite their OWN faithful, so instead they cast their stones over to the gays.

[45245]

so they get rid of the gays........it is a start

[YellowDogInRedCounty]

Oh yes, I recognize that philosophy. Next it's the Jews, then the Catholics, then the African Americans, then the Hispanics, then the Asians....pretty soon it will just be YOU and when they come for YOU there will be nobody else to help.

[roshni]

Excellent. I hope they have to pay taxes as well, since they are preaching hatred from the pulpit.