A religious C.V.

[BarbaraGordon]

That *is* a great testimony.

[UtahDan]

Originally Posted by cougjunkie

Here is a conversion story for you:
My dad grew up Catholic even attended private catholic school, my mom grew up with no religion or structure for that matter. My dad was 21 my mom 16 when they got married (they had been living together for about 3 years before they were married). My dad was a raging alcoholic, was never home in the first few years of my sister and my life he spent most of his time at the Bar.

When my sister was 5 years and i was 3, my sister developed tumors on her uterus and ovaries. Things became very bad, the doctors were not sure what was wrong or what to do. My sister also had some internal bleeding and became very sick. She was in and out of the hospital for several weeks. Finally the doctors decided to do a hysterectomy (sp?). So my parents 5 year old daughter was not going to ever have kids. They scheduled the surgery for the next morning. My dad went home that night, leaving my mom and sister at the hospital to get some clothes and things.

He was extremely scared and did not know what to do. So decided for the first time since he was a kid to pray. He got on his knees and he said that he prayed for at least an hour, begging god to heal his little girl. His said amen, and stood up and heard a knock on the door. He really didnt want to be bothered so he just ignored it, but the people at the door would not go away. He ignored it for about 10 minutes and finally he opened the door and standing there were two mormon missionaries (these missionaries are now very very good friends of our family). They told my dad they were LDS missionaries and that they had a message.

My dad who was very apprehensive of any religion invited them in it was about 8:30 at night. He sat their and listened to the first discussion and he said it just felt right, the missionaries went to set up another appointment for the next discussion and my dad asked them to stay and give it to him right then, they gave him all 5 discussions that night. He committed to be baptised that night as well. He asked them if there was anything he could do for his daughter, they told him that although he did not have the priesthood yet and could not administer a priesthood blessing that he could give her a fathers blessing.

He went to the hospital and gave my sister a fathers blessing, the next morning, the doctor had a premonition to run some more tests before the surgery, he took my sister in and all of the tumors were gone. She was completely healthy and did not have a single tumor on her body.

My dad quit drinking that night the missionaries came and has not had a drink since. My mom took the discussion over the next few days and they were baptised together a few weeks later. My sister is perfectly healthy with no ill effects. My dad doesnt like to tell this story because he said he almost doesnt believe it.

This is how my family was converted and why we believe the way we do.

Thanks. Maybe I'm wrong about there not being many miracles any more.

[myboynoah]

Wow. Thank you for sharing.

[BlueHair]

Okay. I may as well join the club. I was raised LDS, served a mission, married in the temple. All the standard Mormon stuff. I believe the church is mostly a good organization. I have serious doubts about much of the doctrine and what I view as misrepresentations by the church. I am, however, in no way anti-mormon nor do I spend any time trying to convince others to think like me. When cornered by over zealous people, I do let them know why I don't believe like they do. My religious views are most closely related to Deism. I believe in one God. I don't feel like I'm in any position to dictate to God. My belief is that God will bless me if he sees a need or if he just wants to. I consider organized religion to be based on hearsay. This does not mean that I think the LDS or any church is necessarily wrong. I just don't feel obligated to believe someone else's personal revelation. I believe there are many paths to God. I reserve the right to change my mind at any time based on personal revelation or experiences. To me, true religion is being good to my fellow men. I agree with Barbara in that regard.

[RockyBalboa]

Born in the church. Come from a big family where all the boys served a mission and one of the girls served. Was raised in a conservative LDS household. It's ironic cause for a time during the 70's my father...my VERY conservative old-school father was a Professor at Cal Berkeley. He's got lots of interesting stories about the clash of ideologies during his time there.

Though there have been a time or two where I've struggled with activity due to my own weakness and stumbles in failing to live according to the commandments that I believe in, my testimony because of those experiences has actually strengthened instead of weakened me and I'm grateful for that.

I'm on track to be re-instated to full membership in the next few months and look forward to returning to the temple then.

[BarbaraGordon]

Well, thank you for sharing, gentlemen.

I suppose you could say my beliefs lack intellectual rigor. But I've done the Calvinist intellectual doctrine thing. I found that to be a fun mind game, but spiritually unsatisfying.

Regardless of how many verses I would string together to make an argument, I could never truly convince myself that Christ came to establish an exclusionary sect in which believers go around harrassing others with giant Bible sticks.

I do not believe that it's really a make-up-your-own-God sort of world. But on the other hand, I believe the heart of Christ's teaching is much more straightforward and much more inclusive than many evangelicals would have us believe.