Anyways, glad to finally get a piece of the real avisitor, even if it was cantankerous and angry.

I am not witnessing to you. I did not call this blog a wilderness. The only one making presumptions here is you. Good grief.

You want real? Ok! Let’s get real.

Children tend to openly make fun of people who talk differently or act differently, or believe in things that they don’t. They don’t know much about the world except that they hate change and anything that makes them emotionally uncomfortable must be bad.

Teens mock people behind their backs and smile to their faces. They avoid people who talk differently or act differently. They know everything about everything, they reinvent themselves and their world constantly and anything that makes them emotionally uncomfortable is someone else’s fault.

Mature adults know that the world is full of people who talk and act differently, and they learn how to appreciate and sometimes celebrate those differences without compromising their values. They realize how little they know and they truly want to learn more and become better people. They welcome change because it gives them new opportunities to learn and grow. They understand that emotional discomfort is part of life, isn’t necessarily bad, and most often indicates that something in their lives isn’t as it should be.

I may be crazy but I tend to seek out mature friends. Currently, most of them are people who love truth and wisdom in any form they find it-be it one profound sentence or an extensive block quote from a general authority. When my friends learn something true or discover something they think has inherent value, they’d rather share it and look stupid than be guilty of not passing it along for others to benefit from. My friends don’t openly insult strangers and they rarely presume things about people because they’d rather wait until all the evidence is in and judge righteously, than be guilty of slander or liable against an innocent human being.

We may have less in common than you thought, and if your real life is nothing like mine, I am truly sorry for you.

In other words, you need to communicate with us like a real person. Quit calling everyone to repentance and start being a human.

You pretty much have to follow the conversation to read me correctly, and even then…. My comments in this thread have (for the most part) been a) in defense of minorities who exercise their constitutional right to demonstrate publicly, no matter what their cause might be and b) to point out the hypocrisy of fighting against some forms of bigotry while embracing others.

As far as our individual obligation to stand as witnesses of God in a blog, or in the wilderness, or anywhere else (rather than living in our “caves”) I will end by pointing out the words spoken in General Conference just weeks ago by Elder L. Tom Perry:

“…missionary work becomes the responsibility of each of us as soon as we have been warned, verses 7–10 of section 33 teach us to open our mouths.

Verse 7 leaves no doubt in anyone’s mind who has memorized section 4 of the Doctrine and Covenants that the Lord is talking to us about missionary work: “Yea, verily, verily, I say unto you, that the field is white already to harvest; wherefore, thrust in your sickles, and reap with all your might, mind, and strength.”

“Then comes the injunction—three times—to open our mouths:
“Open your mouths and they shall be filled, and you shall become even as Nephi of old, who journeyed from Jerusalem in the wilderness.

“Yea, open your mouths and spare not, and you shall be laden with sheaves upon your backs, for lo, I am with you.

“Yea, open your mouths and they shall be filled, saying: Repent, repent, and prepare ye the way of the Lord, and make his paths straight; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (vv. 8–10).

Generally speaking, folk only adopt the airs of the one crying in the wilderness if they assume that they are in a wilderness. It’s not nice to call this blog a wilderness.

Look, you don’t like me. You don’t have to. I am prepared to continue to turn the other cheek. But I am curious as to why you are so angry with no apparent cause? What prompts you to respond to the sincere opinions of fellow members who speak the truth to the best of their knowledge with “thou fool!”?

As Latter-day Saints we have been commanded to strive to be of one heart, one mind, one purpose, so I’m fairly certain that we should be more in agreement with each other than in opposition. I’m even more certain that the Lord’s command to His Saints regarding His prophets is to follow them-even in the difficult stuff like laboring all of our days “crying nothing but repentance” to this generation.

If you are my brother, and you believe in the same Lord and gospel that I do, then my sincere wish is to reconcile our differences, whatever they may be.

FWIW- When I speak of a return to the principles and values of the Founding Fathers, I mean the ones that they reached consensus on, fought for, and incorporated into our national documents. I also automatically assume that when someone else refers to the “principles of the Founding Fathers” that they are talking about the ones they held in common, as a group.

I KNOW that they all held diverse opinions on many issues, and that the reason there were so many discussions and debates was because it took them a very long time to reach a place where they were mostly in agreement (to the extent it was possible) on the final product.