April 3, 2008

Dear Family and Friends,

The Dallas Ex-Mormon March Meetup
JWInfo.org is finally up! Please visit, sign our Guestbook, and pass the word around… especially to your Jehovah’s Witness friends. I want to thank my brother Steve for hosting JWinfo.org as well as CourageousChristiansUnited.org through his EasySite.com business. If you are looking for an easy, cheap, and quick way to get a good looking web site, please check out EasySite.com.

There are a couple of interesting developments with Tara’s family to report. First, I finally got “into it” with Tara’s uncle Steve. He used to be LDS, but is now an atheist. He and his agnostic wife, Jody (who also used to be LDS), are quite dear to us. He actually gave Tara away at our wedding, since Tara’s dad died when she was a teen.

One night Steve mentioned how he thought that speciesism (think racism except with species) was a horrible thing. I told him that Tara, Maddy, and I just read the other day how Jesus taught we were more valuable than many sparrows (Luke 12:24). Then I used an example from common sense—what do you save if you have a minute to go into your burning home? Do you save Jody or one of the cats? He said, “Both.” I told him there are obvious situations in which you can’t do both. He then said this was a trick of language, and that nothing exists except language. Now we really started to get at the basis of this sickening philosophy. I told him that the table we were sitting at and love, for example, exist quite apart from our language of it. He didn’t buy it. It started to get too uncomfortable for Jody, so she and Tara went into the other room. Because it was getting tense, I told Steve that I loved him and went to hug him, but he pushed me away! He first wanted to talk this over some more. He then told me that his was an “inclusive” philosophy that wouldn’t make judgments. But I told him that he just made a judgment against me and excluded me! I also told him that it’s appropriate for us to morally and legally exclude rapists and terrorists, for example, and that even Jesus taught that we are to make righteous judgments in John 7:24. Then Steve told me that there are no facts. So I responded, “Is that a fact?” He said, “There’s no truth.” I retorted, “Is that true?” We played this game for a while, but it was getting old pretty quickly. He then told me how much he and Jody appreciated me, and how good I have been for Tara and Maddy. Then it was “hug time!”

The second development with Tara’s family is the email dialogue she got into with her Mormon grandpa. Tara did a great job at patiently presenting the facts to him… particularly the complete lack of DNA evidence to back the Book of Mormon claim that vast populations of Native Americans were Israelites. Her grandpa never dealt with the evidence, but sadly responded in classic LDS ad hominem fashion: “Dear Tara, I'm amazed at how smart you are. If You will keep taking what ever kind off drug or whatever it is you are on you will be so smart you may never die. I can see that it is easy to make the rest of the family mad at you if you want to preach your religion even to the caring of signs in protest at some of the gathering places where the Mormons meet.”

With this family interaction in mind, please see my recent CCU blog on Charles Schulz (creator of the Peanuts cartoons) and his interaction with his daughter who joined the Mormon Church.

Outside the Dallas Lake Highlands stake center (3-31-8)
I also was able to do some ministry with my step-daughter Maddy in front of a huge local stake center that was hosting Gladys Knight and her Saints Unified Voices choir. LDS were using this as an outreach event. I was so excited beforehand that my hands were shaking! Maddy did a great job with her new sandwich board, distributing tracts, and going off on her own to talk to people. She even came to me to get a Bible and Book of Mormon to share with some LDS missionaries who thought Cain’s mark was a curse of dark skin! She also lovingly shared with an older LDS gentleman how LDS were going to hell. True to form, LDS missionaries were trying to preoccupy me, and continued to walk in front of me, on public property, to block me from visitors that might receive my material. When I began to preach to the crowd lined up to get in, the missionaries kept trying to interrupt me, a car alarm would go off whenever I preached, and when that got to be too annoying, LDS started to sing their hymns. Satan hates when the truth gets out!

Maddy
Please pray for all the non-Mormons who went to that event. One lady came out to encourage me that the Christians were listening to me and taking note at what was happening. Another lady, named Tonya, told me that she was in the Christian broadcasting business for years, and was tired of all the hypocrisy she witnessed. She has never seen effectiveness like she has in the LDS Church. In the few minutes I had with her, I gave her the Jesus Christ/Joseph Smith DVD, and reassured her that the crazy doctrinal beliefs of Mormonism are still alive and well today.

My heart breaks for the Mormon people, but it breaks more for my own brothers and sisters who get hoodwinked into this cult. Dr. Richard Land, president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, confirmed what I have observed in my interactions with Mormons off the street: “There are now more Mormons that used to be Southern Baptist than any other denomination.” And here in the south where this denomination is prevalent, Mormons are growing at a faster rate than in any other part of the United States! If you believe like I do that Mormonism is a spreading cancer, then we need to redouble our efforts to help people affected by it.

Currently, we are averaging about 23% of the monthly funding needed to get us back to Utah. We have a long way to go. If you believe in this mission, then we need your help! Please see our “Invest” page on how you may partner with us.

The other week I called a long-time friend of mine to solicit his support. I haven’t talked with him in a few years. He couldn’t believe it was me calling, since the LDS missionaries had just left his home! He thought I might be calling him from across the street or some place close by. He had received our ministry info packet earlier, but had not done anything with it. He told me that sometimes God speaks in mysterious ways and sometimes He speaks in obvious ways.

I also need your help in getting back to the yearly Manti, UT pageant in June!

Thank you so much for your concern, financial investments, and prayers for this ministry, and for those trapped by false religions and philosophies.

Rob Sivulka
President, Courageous Christians United
MormonInfo.org
JWInfo.org
[email protected]

****PRAYER REQUESTS****

1. For more speaking venues
2. For guidance in fundraising
3. For more members to join our Ex-Mormon Meetup recovery group

****MAILBAG****

your doing the work that the rest of us should be doing
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On your [MormonInfo.org] home page, where you compare lds doctrine with "christian" doctrine, you state that Mormons believe that Christ did not die for all sins. On the contrary, We believe that Christ atoned for all the sins of mankind. There is forgiveness from every form of sin, except the "unpardonable sin" which is unrelated to every sin you listed as unforgivable on your website. When moses lifted up the brazen serpent the children of Israel who simply looked were saved. The same with Christ applies: if you simply look to him for salvation your sins will
be forgiven.

I hope you can clarify your website so as to not mislead the pure and simple seeker of truth.

Sincerely,

a humble mormon

[I responded:] I'd rather listen to the authoritative LDS sources that I cite to back up what I say than some random LDS who overlooks them.
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Well, my wife and I made some copies of "Seven Differences Between Mormonism and Christianity", I passed them out to houses in my neighborhood, this makes about 35 homes. I haven't heard anything yet. I know that a lot of them are LDS. My daughter and I will spend some time in the next track homes this Saturday doing the same thing, it’s a bigger neighborhood, also, as I drive thru Boise, Meridian, Nampa and the 84 freeway, I can see plenty of people looking at Mormon info. org sticker! I will be in Southern California April 10 thru the 14th to lecture in Theology, then on Mormonism as well. God bless Rob. I will make copies of the tracks you gave me and take them with me as free information for further reading for the college students. Take care bud.
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Hey Rob!!
I didn't know you deal with the JW's so extensively. What an awesome site! Thanks for the sneak peak. You know, you ARE verrrrry Courageous to cult members. As a former, I realize how deep the paranoia programming can be when I look at the pictures and how bold you are at saying WHO you are and WHERE you are. The cult people you witness to, have GOT to think you've just gone AGAINST every "BIG" powerful "system" by being so obvious. There's always a "they're gonna git ya" mentality...and this must be an awesome chink in the armor that encourages them to look further... almost like it's safe to go out of the invisible fence line!!

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