How Mormon are you?

[S.A.M.]

Being a good Mormon = being a good Christian = being a good whatever for most faiths. If you love God and love your neighbor and practice that love, you will be similar in the way you live your life.

I love that this forum is frequented by intelligent people with such a varied level of mormonness (or none at all), and all are accepted and valued (except the bots).

Giovanni,

Very interesting poll on where this forum's members place themselves.

[S.A.M.]

The fact that most people don't commit murder makes them all just a little bit Mormon. We need to build on this common ground! For murderers, well... maybe they like green jello.

Heh, yep it's the floaty carrots inside that drives some people insane. Adding your first sentence there as a title bar nomination...

[Whistler]

... I apologize? It's not mandatory. No one has to fill it out. Everyone does it of their own accord. I'm sorry if I offended or hurt you through this.

I think it's more like... my religion isn't a score chart. It might be fun to make it into a quiz or something, but ultimately, I think the Lord looks on our hearts. I'm not personally offended. It's more like I'm disappointed that you think your religiosity can be reduced to this list.

[Giovanni Schwartz]

My views on the subject may be a little more strict than the average person (let alone board reader), but I personally feel that the Lord gives us basic commandments, and AFTER we're doing all those, it's up to us to decide what we want to do, and what personally defines our spirituality. The way that I attempted to make this was strictly by church teachings. While I agree that a "score chart" may not be the best way to define someone's religiosity, I still believe that a score chart could potentially be an accurate indicator of what we personally are doing and need to be doing.

The reason I made this quiz is because of the marked change I noticed among the participants in this message board in the two years while I was gone. It seems that a lot of the people here seem to be a lot more cavalier towards specifically Mormonism, and religion in general than they were when I left. In the end, that was the ultimate purpose of this quiz--not necessarily to say "I'm better than 60% of the readers of the board because I'm more faithful to my religion," but more to let me see if there really was any rational for the changes that I saw.

Sorry if I come across as harsh in this or the intro to this thread. I tried to make it as clear as I could to explain my views and purpose for making the thread without sounding judgmental (and trust me. There was a LOT of judgmental edited out :p). Can we still be friends?

[Emiliana]

Giovanni, I think you're right that there's overall less religiousness here than there was when I joined, which I think was about the same time you left for your mission. I've never been Mormon. But two years ago I was far more religious (at least in a traditional sense) than I am now. Two years ago I was working in a ministry context almost full-time; currently I consider myself vaguely agnostic, although I practice elements of various Eastern spiritual traditions (such as yoga and Soka Gakkai chanting as well as attending churches of various denominations.

But I think I'm with Whistler to some degree. I am religious or spiritual inasmuch as I feel like it enables me to find peace within myself, which in turn gives me the strength to do a better job loving my neighbor. If I believed in a deity, I would think that devotion to that deity would take precedence over following all the rules.

I suppose your list/quiz might be an accurate measure of how well a person follows the commandments of your church. Obviously that's going to be a lot more important to you than it is to me, and that's fine. But I don't think any list can give an accurate measure of a person's true religiousness. A person could follow all those commandments without ever loving God or loving another person.

[Giovanni Schwartz]

Thanks for your kind response Emilia. I really appreciate it. I think you said exactly what this was:

I suppose your list/quiz might be an accurate measure of how well a person follows the commandments of your church.

My point of view is that in Mormonism, if you are not obeying the commandments, then you're not doing your part to God ("If you love Me, keep My commandments" Jesus, John 14:15). We believe that those things (the law of Chastity, the Word of Wisdom, etc.) are commandments of God, just like the ten commandments or any of the other things the ancient prophets said. Nevertheless, like you said,

A person could follow all those commandments without ever loving God or loving another person.

But (at least from my shallow, recently returned missionary point-of-view), if a person is NOT obeying the commandments, then (at least in my understanding of Mormon theology), he does not truly love God, as Jesus intended it.

(To mathematize it:

Conditional: "If you love God, THEN you keep his commandments"
Contrapositive: "If you do not keep his commandments, THEN you do not love God.")

So that's why I used the format I did to make the quizzy thingy. While it's possible that the 20s may not love God, it's much harder to measure an amorphous quality such as "love of God" to measure a quiz than it is to say "Are you doing this/that/those?"



Guys, I'm so worried about coming off as arrogant or supercilious right now. PLEASE let me know if I do. I go back through all of my posts to edit out anything that I think may come off wrong or contrary to what I REALLY mean. I also don't mean to come off as defensive. So if I do, smack me upside the head, okay?

[Marduk]

I've abstained from this quiz, because honestly, the point which you are trying to prove is really irrelevant. I think a lot of the direction this board has taken in the time that you've been gone has been due to my influence, and so I'll try to illustrate my purpose in such, and I think you'll begin to see why I've said what I said.

I think we've not so much become less religious, or seen mormonism as less relevant, so much as we've been more willing to take a critical eye to our behaviors and natures, both individually and culturally. Instead of simply assuming that everyone attends church and sees that as a given, but we analyze what we get out of church and why we choose to go. Or if some choose not to go, that reasoning and idea is explored as well.

The problem with quantifying in this way is it leads to a very specific result, and I doubt it is the result you want. When we concentrate on hardcore orthodoxy in forms and patterns, we learn about inculcation in culture and social norms far more than personal devotion. Simply put, you don't have all the commandments listed, just the simplest to quantify (thou shalt not murder, as opposed to be ye humble.) So since you are taking a small fragment of those commandments, your conditional cannot possibly be proven.

tl;dr: the hypothesis "If you love God, THEN you keep his commandments" necessitates full analysis of all commandments (which naturally brings all persons up short, but how short?) Full analysis of all commandments is impossible to quantify (unless you are God) hence such conditional becomes irrelevant to abstract.

[TheAnswerIs42]

See, and I think you are fine. I noticed the same trend. Especially lately, with the makeout thread. So I was really curious to see the answers. For me personally, I have gone down one of your notches in the last couple of years, but I am starting to think I want to move back up. So I appreciate the chance to think about what makes me "Mormon" or less so. I'm not sure I see why this is such a big deal- it isn't a temple recommend interview, just an anonymous poll. If you don't like the exact quiz he made, rate yourself from 1-20.

[NerdGirl]

Okay, so, to me you are not coming off as arrogant at all. I think this is a potentially very interesting conversation that we could have here, if we all agree beforehand to not take offense by the stuff we might say here.

I'm not entirely sure how to sum this up in an organized way, but I would say that my perspective on faith and religion has certainly changed (it's been evolving throughout my life, really), so it's not surprising to me that you would disappear for two years and come back and see a difference in that. Well, I don't know how much of a difference you see in me specifically because I don't know if I post enough on here about those kinds of things that you would notice. But we'll go with it anyway and I'll tell you what's been going on with my faith.

I would say that I've been going through a fairly major faith transition in the past year in particular, although it's not a transition away from the church or away from God. The one (and probably only) thing where I absolutely cannot agree with what the church teaches is homosexuality. I do not believe that it is a sin to be gay. But that's nothing new, although I think I have become more open about it. But what has really happened to me in the last year (and being in medical school has been a large part of it, because I've seen a lot of things that most people don't ever see) is that I've come to see the things you list as commandments as being much less important than things like how we treat other people and just being honest and compassionate and trying to serve others. And I do mean less important and not unimportant, because I still do all of those things (to the extent that I ever did, anyway - I'm not doing them less, but I wasn't doing them perfectly to begin with).

I just really have come to see following the checklist of sabbath observance and whatever else as insufficient to produce salvation. Of course, that's kind of an absurd statement, because nothing we could possibly do other than believe in and follow Christ is sufficient to produce salvation. But I had sort of an epiphany where I realized that I was putting on a pretty good show of Mormon-ness while doing very little to help the poor and needy and use my talents to improve the condition of humanity. And that is really what my faith transition have been - I haven't started doing the easily-defined commandments any less, but I am trying to focus on what some have called the weightier matters because I realized that God expected so much more of me than simply reading my scriptures and not drinking coffee. To the extent where I would say that I was doing all of those things and looking to all concerned (aside from a definite swearing habit and a few extra earrings) like a perfect little Mormon girl, while at the same time feeling that I wasn't coming anywhere near doing the things that God was actually asking me to do.

So two years ago I might have been like a 17 on your scale, but while I thought I loved God, my actions (or more like inactions) in certain areas were certainly not showing it. I might have dropped down to a 14 or 15 now, but I think God is much more pleased with my minuscule efforts than he was back then, because I am trying so much harder to love and help more of his children.

Sorry if that turned this into a much more serious thing than you were ever intending, but I think you raised an interesting topic with your last post.

[krebscout]

Oh Nerdgirl, with the exception of the swearing and the piercings (I'm SO righteous), I could have written this word for word (and by "could have" I mean...if I wrote as clearly and articulately as you do). My faith transition has been going on for about three years, and it's had some ups and some pretty big downs...but thank you, thanks for getting it the same way I get it and clarifying it along the way.

[NerdGirl]

Aww, thanks, krebscout, I'm glad you thought that was articulate!

Gio, another thought I just had - you've just come back from two years of literally spending all of your time serving other people (in addition to doing all of what I'm going to call the "checklist things" for lack of a better term and without intending to pass them off as trivial). So my perspective is that I'm having this faith transition where I'm realizing I need to stop worrying about the checklist so much (not stop doing those things but stop seeing them as the ultimate and only point of my faith) and focusing much more on loving and serving others, it's quite obvious to me that your perspective is very different than mine, because you just took two years out of your life to love and serve others full time. You obviously were doing much more than following the checklist while you were on your mission, whereas I've been trying to completely change my life after having the realization that I had become so complacent in my checklist-following that I was completely neglecting things that were much more important.

[Whistler]

Gio, I'm not offended or annoyed by you personally. Just religious and psychological reductionism, as a rule, has always bothered me.

I had a roommate one year who was relief society president. Mysteriously we started getting 100% visiting teaching. One month I didn't have time to visit one of my teachees (and she was pestering me about it, and this girl was out of town, so no visiting was happening). I got upset with her wanting to count my call as visiting teaching, to the extent that I told her there was no way she could count it and if she reported 100% I knew she'd be lying. I was cruel to her, but I still feel strongly about it.

I don't know why; maybe I feel guilty for all that time I spent as a data technician in the counseling center, reducing people and their problems to scores on tests.

It's interesting how the Boardboard has changed. I'm more of a liberal Mormon than I was two years ago, even though I'm 100% Mormon according to your test. I rely on all of you to help me be more open to experience. But like everyone, I have my little sensitivities.

[krebscout]

Some of what you're seeing, Gio, might be the evolution of a safe community for less orthodox Mormons. The Board attracted a lot of more liberal-minded Mormons (or created them), the Board Board was spawned from that, and as we see other people let their guard down, others come out of the woodwork, or flock to birds of a feather. It's also a process that a lot of people our age seem to go through.

[bobtheenchantedone]

NerdGirl, I also am identifying a LOT with what you said. Especially because I am still right smack in the middle of figuring things out. Just yesterday I had a good little breakdown due to trying to reconcile being an outwardly "good Mormon" while still staying true to what I really believed was right. More and more I am learning that what is of much more importance is staying to true to what I believe is right, no matter how much of a "good" or "bad" Mormon it may make me seem. I am still working on the strength to deal with those who would question my faith for what I believe (that's a funny sentence) but thankfully I have a wonderful example and support in Marduk.

It's funny, but I just told my sister tonight that while my mother and others think Marduk has led me astray from the truth of the Church, I was actually pretty much inactive when I met him and have only grown in the gospel through knowing him. Without him to tell me that what I was thinking was actually in tune with the doctrines of the Church, I probably would have left a couple of years ago, driven mad by the culture. And while it may not seem so from how I talk (I may have been the most... suspect? in the makeout thread), I am more able to describe myself a strong Mormon now than I ever was in my life.

And that's why I never even tried to answer this poll. Not gunna play this game.

[Giovanni Schwartz]

The problem with quantifying in this way is it leads to a very specific result, and I doubt it is the result you want.

You know, I suddenly found this ironic: I originally made a thread that was "Are you Mormon?" The options were "Yes. Yes, but not active. No." But then I was coerced by someone *cough*Mico* to make a "50 shades of Mormonism" quiz. So, what you said is right. This is not necessarily the result I wanted. I feel that it's perhaps gives people a clearer space to work with, when they qualify themselves into one of the categories in the original thread, but as you say, it's still not necessarily the best way to go about doing this.

tl;dr: the hypothesis "If you love God, THEN you keep his commandments" necessitates full analysis of all commandments (which naturally brings all persons up short, but how short?) Full analysis of all commandments is impossible to quantify (unless you are God) hence such conditional becomes irrelevant to abstract.

However, we have to be at least trying to keep all the commandments. Sure, we're going to slip up sometimes, but if we are conciously saying "Yeah, I'm not going to keep this commandment anymore. I'm going to focus on something else instead" then I don't think we're quite getting the benefit from the commandment we DO decide to keep, because it's at the expense of another one of God's requirements.

See, and I think you are fine. I noticed the same trend. Especially lately, with the makeout thread. So I was really curious to see the answers. For me personally, I have gone down one of your notches in the last couple of years, but I am starting to think I want to move back up. So I appreciate the chance to think about what makes me "Mormon" or less so. I'm not sure I see why this is such a big deal- it isn't a temple recommend interview, just an anonymous poll. If you don't like the exact quiz he made, rate yourself from 1-20.

Yes. Thanks for your support, friend. I appreciate it.

I just really have come to see following the checklist of sabbath observance and whatever else as insufficient to produce salvation.

On it's own, yes. However, I nevertheless see it as absolutely necessary in order to do so, although it (like you said) is not ALL that you have to do. Simply the most quantifiable for the purpose of this quizlet.

You obviously were doing much more than following the checklist while you were on your mission, whereas I've been trying to completely change my life after having the realization that I had become so complacent in my checklist-following that I was completely neglecting things that were much more important.

I'm sorry if I misunderstand you, but it seems that you're qualifying some commandments as more important than others? Could you please clarify? I'm really interested to understand what you mean.

I'm more of a liberal Mormon than I was two years ago, even though I'm 100% Mormon according to your test.

Once again, I apologize for accidentally trodding on your pet peeve. Although I find it interesting that you say this in this way, like Mormonism and liberalism would seem to be mutually exclusive. Well, not really mutually exclusive, necessarily, but at least somewhat incompatible. (I think I know what you're saying, but [as we've proved on this board] they're not really incompatible at all.)

Some of what you're seeing, Gio, might be the evolution of a safe community for less orthodox Mormons. The Board attracted a lot of more liberal-minded Mormons (or created them),

Bingo, I think. I also think it's interesting that Marduk put the blame on himself for the shift. Hate to break it to you, buddy, but you're not that important.

More and more I am learning that what is of much more importance is staying to true to what I believe is right, no matter how much of a "good" or "bad" Mormon it may make me seem.

I'm curious: Where do you all think the Mormon social stigma that makes someone a "good" or "bad" Mormon comes from? Any thoughts on what may have caused it to evolve beyond the bounds of pure doctrine? Any thoughts on what REALLY makes a "good" or "bad" Mormon? If you (collectively. Not picking on bob.) had made a quiz to potentially define what exactly represents "good" or "bad" Mormon, what would have been your qualifiers? What would you have done differently? Can you think of a better (or more accurate) way to represent the data field that I think I'm going for?



I also feel that I'm being slightly understood. Maybe. Or maybe I'm just crazy. But from my point of view, the most important things to being a good Mormon are obeying the commandments (including the ones NOT specifically mentioned in the quiz--serving others, paying fast offerings, etc. are still important). I personally can't imagine doing something that is specifically against a commandment, while simultaneously defining myself as a "good" Mormon, or a "better" Mormon than I was when I WAS obeying all the commandments. Thoughts?




Holy Long Post, Batman!



tl;dr: I think that the commandments are necessary to our eternal salvation, no matter who we are, where we are, what we're going through, or what we're doing. A (wo)man's gotta do what a (wo)man's gotta do.

[yayfulness]

I was going to say something about a transition I've been having in my own life, but then I realized that my life has really been nothing but a repeated alternation of transitions and complacency, so it's not like this is anything new.

The most important commandments are love of God and of fellowman. All other commandments are subservient to those two, in that same order, and all are derivative of them. Keeping all other commandments while ignoring these two is following the law and forgetting the Lawgiver. And it's the Lawgiver who saves us, not the law.

I had what I consider to be a fundamental realization about a month ago. I could live a perfectly sin-free life, but if I did not develop a meaningful relationship with God, it would be meaningless and I would not be capable of being saved. On the other hand, if I develop a close relationship with God, even sin can be overcome. This isn't to say that I'd have license to sin. Any sin is a personal affront to God; a betrayal of His trust, if you will. It can prove an obstacle to such a relationship, but it can be forgiven. And if I truly love and respect God, I will do my best not to betray His trust. However, it's become increasingly apparent to me that while avoiding sin for the sake of avoiding sin is hardly a bad thing, and doing good for the sake of doing good is certainly a good thing, neither one can save anybody. Love of God is the only saving motive, the only transforming motive.

The fundamental problem with both of these polls is that, while they can be interesting and even sometimes useful (we wouldn't be having this discussion otherwise), they completely miss their objective and in fact are incapable of reaching it. It is difficult to the point of impossibility to judge anybody else's relationship with God. Yes, there are external indicators of how that relationship is doing, but there are so many incredibly complex and essentially invisible variables that I can never say anything definitive. In fact, I find it incredibly difficult even to judge my own relationship with God. I rely on revelation for the assurance that I am in fact going in the right direction. Only God really knows, though. If I can barely quantify my own relationship with God in definite terms, how can a necessarily simple and fairly impersonal poll ever hope to be accurate?

[Marduk]

Hrmm, Gio, not to toot my own horn, but I think you'd be surprised as to what I do for this board.

On topic, absolutely some commandments are more important than others. We can look at them in relevance based on how well they correlate with (as yayfulness has aptly pointed out) the only two commandments that, in essence, are worth anything. That is to say, if a commandment is crucial, it will, by definition, help us to better love our father and better help us to love one another. I think all commandments do this, the question is to what degree. Certainly this is relative to each person and is dependent on what specifically one needs in their life at that moment (hence the saying that the most important commandment for you is the one you are having the most trouble living at the moment.)

This is why any sort of system that gives a set point for a commandment followed falls flat, because it can't possibly percieve the extent to which a given commandment is assisting someone in living the two crucial laws. You say "I personally can't imagine doing something that is specifically against a commandment" and I think this demonstrates where the thinking fails; the most important commandments usually involve what we DO, not what we DON'T DO.

Even though I find the entire activity distasteful, you've asked how one might do things differently, so I'll humor you. My questionnaire might ask individuals to rate themselves on questions such as "how often do you get angry with family members?" or "how much time do you spend helping others?" or "do you feel you have a personal relationship with God?" or "how often do you pray for the welfare of others?" or "how much do you do on a daily basis to increase in love for your loved ones?" or "how quick are you to forgive those that wrong you?" or "how well do you treat those that serve you?" or "how attached are you to your worldly possessions?" or "how prideful are you? (this question, of course, being one of the most difficult to honestly assess.) I think these questions of vast more importance than "how often do you go to church?" or "do you pay tithing?"

And Krebscout, I don't really think the board proper has that many people (and hasn't had that many people) I would really consider very unorthodox. That's just my opinion though.

[mic0]

Gio, I guess I shouldn't have coerced you. It was only a slight prodding though! Also, I was thinking about how you pointed to the makeout thread as something that surprised you, and it reminded me of something I read once (on the Board!!). I will go quote it over there so as not to derail this thread.

Also, probably the original poll would have sufficed, I just wish there had been an option for "it's complicated." Also, I'm really impressed reading about everyone else's experiences, even just the few details you describe here. Thanks for sharing!

[mic0]

Oh, one last thing! One time I went to an atheists in Provo meeting (it was too many people for me, but interesting to go once), and one guy and I gave ourselves self-perceived percentages of Mormonness. Something like, I felt like I was ~40% Mormon at the time, and he felt like ~30% Mormon at the time. It was interesting.

[yayfulness]

Another thought, inspired by Marduk's comments: I can't speak for other people, but I, for one, tend to judge others' dedication to the Lord and the Gospel by whatever measure of my own dedication I perceive to be the weakest or in the greatest danger at the time. This ignores the fact that what I struggle most with and is therefore, in a sense, most important to me, may not be most important to other people.

As if I needed more good reasons not to judge others.