Prophecy Watch

Special underwear and interesting things you didn’t know about Mormons

If a member is guilty of serious transgressions (say fornication), he or she gets excommunicated.

Published

11 months ago

March 17, 2018

Most clergymen are distinguished by the collar, flowing priestly robes and other symbols of office. Not Mormons. A suit will do. But they do have priestly garb: white underwear.

But did you know that religious ceremonies and covenants necessary for eternal exaltation can only be made within a temple and not an ordinary church and that the African continent only has three temples; in Ghana, Nigeria and South Africa?

The Mormon temple is also not the sort of place everyone can walk in and worship.

A serving member deemed worthy is interviewed by the presiding bishop and if found fit, is issued with a card that allows him or her entry into any temple in the world. Remember that white underwear? That’s what you wear to the temple- beneath your suit or dress, of course!

Among Mormons, you also don’t just wake up, admit yourself in a theological college and declare yourself a pastor, evangelist or prophet.

The articles of faith are clear: Priesthood is conferred to any worthy male member of the church by one who has authority. It is the elders who, upon observing you, decide that you are worthy of priestly office.

But whereas all worthy male members of the church hold the priesthood, that does not make them priests.

Church deacons can be as young as 12 years old. And something else… Members who have that responsibility, say bishops, are not paid!

“The church operates a voluntary lay leadership. These people are called by one in authority and sustained by members,” says Dr Evelyne Jepkemei, Kenya’a church’s public affairs director.

If a member is guilty of serious transgressions (say fornication), he or she gets excommunicated.

So important is marriage among Mormons that young male missionaries are encouraged to find a spouse as part of the journey through priesthood.

Mormons also believe that families can be ‘sealed’ and remain together forever.

President Munene explains: “The family is ordained of God and marriage between man and woman is essential to His eternal plan.”

Women do not become priests, but a man’s priesthood is considered incomplete without a wife.

Unlike other Christian faiths, the Mormons believe that men will be punished for their own sins, and not for Adam’s transgressions, or the sins of our forefathers and that our forbearers, who did not subscribe to the Christian faith, will get a chance to hear the gospel in the spirit world and then decide whether or not to accept the gospel.

Living members do vicarious baptisms on their behalf to complete the ordinance of baptism if they choose to accept the gospel.

Their Bible is also different, because apart from the Old and New Testament, it incorporates three other books: the Book of Mormon (written by the founder of the church), Doctrine and Covenants and the Pearl of Great Price.

And oh…Mormons pay tithe quietly in the bishop’s office.

Adapted from The Standard

Hell and Heaven

Irish Parliament Passes New Law to Legalize Abortion

The new laws make abortion legal and unrestricted in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy, subject to a medical consultation and a cooling-off period. Terminations after 12 weeks would be permitted only under exceptional circumstances.

Published

2 months ago

December 14, 2018

GLOFIRE

Ireland’s Prime Minister has hailed a “historic moment” for women in the country, after a bill to legalize abortion passed through the final stages of parliament.The bill is now set to be signed into law by President Michael D. Higgins, following a marathon debate in parliament’s upper house Thursday, and will come into force in January.Two-thirds of Irish voters agreed to amend the constitution and allow women to access abortion in a momentous and emotionally charged referendum in May.Prime Minister Leo Varadkar thanked the bill’s supporters on Twitter and commended Health Minister Simon Harris for steering it through parliament. The bill passed through parliament’s lower house, the Dáil, last week.The vote would “end lonely journeys, end the stigma and support women’s choices in our own country,” Harris said on Twitter Thursday.

Just over 200 days ago, you, the people of Ireland voted to repeal the 8th so we could care for women with compassion. Today we have passed the law to make this a reality. A vote to end lonely journeys, end the stigma and support women’s choices in our own country
— Simon Harris TD (@SimonHarrisTD) December 13, 2018

But its passage also prompted vandals to target a regional office of Ireland’s governing party Fine Gael overnight, writing “baby killers” and “Herods” on its wall.”I was so disappointed to see this morning (Friday) that my busy constituency office in Sligo has been vandalized and defaced overnight,” Tony McLoughlin, the assistant government whip, wrote on Twitter.”We live in a proud democracy and despite anyone’s opinion on any referendum, this behavior can never be condoned,” he added.

After the vote, Harris paid tribute to “the campaigners who fought for 35 years to change a nation, to change hearts and minds,” the UK Press Association reported. “I want to thank the minority who fought the battle in here when it was convenient for the majority to ignore.””But today, I think mostly of the thousands of women who were forced to make the journey to access care that should have been available in their own country,” he added.Around 3,000 Irish women annually have traveled to Britain to terminate a pregnancy in recent years, according to UK government figures.

Adapted from CNN

Jesus is Coming

Scientists are Proposing we Tackle Climate Change by Dimming the Sun

Published

3 months ago

November 24, 2018

GLOFIRE

Scientists are proposing an ingenious but as-yet-unproven way to tackle climate change: spraying sun-dimming chemicals into the Earth’s atmosphere, reports CNN.

The research by scientists at Harvard and Yale universities, published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, proposes using a technique known as stratospheric aerosol injection, which they say could cut the rate of global warming in half.

The technique would involve spraying large amounts of sulfate particles into the Earth’s lower stratosphere at altitudes as high as 12 miles. The scientists propose delivering the sulfates with specially designed high-altitude aircraft, balloons or large naval-style guns.

Despite the technology being undeveloped and with no existing aircraft suitable for adaptation, the researchers say that “developing a new, purpose-built tanker with substantial payload capabilities would neither be technologically difficult nor prohibitively expensive.”

They estimate the total cost of launching a hypothetical system in 15 years’ time at around $3.5 billion, with running costs of $2.25 billion a year over a 15-year period.

The report does, however, acknowledge that the technique is purely hypothetical.

“We make no judgment about the desirability of SAI,” the report states. “We simply show that a hypothetical deployment program commencing 15 years hence, while both highly uncertain and ambitious, would indeed be technically possible from an engineering perspective. It would also be remarkably inexpensive.”

The researchers also acknowledge potential risks: coordination between multiple countries in both hemispheres would be required, and stratospheric aerosol injection techniques could jeopardize crop yields, lead to droughts or cause extreme weather.

The proposals also don’t address the issue of rising greenhouse gas emissions, which are a leading cause of global warming.

And despite the conviction of the report’s authors, other experts were skeptical.

“From the point of view of climate economics, solar radiation management is still a much worse solution than greenhouse gas emissions: more costly and much more risky over the long run,” said Philippe Thalmann of the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, an expert in the economics of climate change.

David Archer of the Department of Geophysical Science at the University of Chicago said, “The problem with engineering climate in this way is that it’s only a temporary Band-Aid covering a problem that will persist essentially forever, actually hundreds of thousands of years for fossil fuel CO2 to finally go away naturally.

“It will be tempting to continue to procrastinate on cleaning up our energy system, but we’d be leaving the planet on a form of life-support. If a future generation failed to pay their climate bill they would get all of our warming all at once.”

Adapted from CNN

Prophecy Watch

Kenyan clinic loses $2m in US aid over Trump abortion policy

Family Health Options Kenya has been forced to close one of its 14 clinics and curtail services at others due to US funding cuts amounting to Sh200 million ($2 million)

Published

10 months ago

May 3, 2018

Zachariah Moses

Kenya’s longest-established family planning clinic has lost 60 per cent of its budget for defying a Trump administration policy forbidding women’s health providers from offering information or services related to abortion.

Family Health Options Kenya has been forced to close one of its 14 clinics and curtail services at others due to US funding cuts amounting to Sh200 million ($2 million), Washington-based National Public Radio (NPR) reported on Wednesday.

UNSAFE ABORTION

The loss of aid is leading some pregnant Kenyans to resort to unsafe measures, FHOK reproductive health nurse Melvine Ouyo told the US radio network.

Desperate to terminate unwanted pregnancies, these women and girls go to “curtain clinics” — clandestine settings that lack trained doctors and nurses, Ms Ouyo said. Others use crochet needles, added the nurse who works at a clinic in Kibera.

As an example of the help FHOK provides, Ms Ouyo cited the case of a young orphan girl whose uncle had repeatedly abused her sexually.

When the girl became pregnant at age 13, she was determined not to give birth to a baby that would be the product of incest, Ms Ouyo related.

“This girl comes to you suicidal,” the nurse told NPR. “She had already attempted unsafe abortion. She had taken herbs given by friends. Her friends referred her to us, and she was able to access safe abortion services.”

President Trump’s promulgation and expansion of what critics term a “global gag rule” could also prevent FHOK from delivering services unrelated to abortion.

HIV treatments, cancer screenings, post-natal care and vaccinations are among the services Family Health Options may be unable to provide due to the $2 million budget cut.

Deeply impoverished Kenyan women and girls are not seeking care from FHOK clinics because they are unable to pay the small fee the carer now charges to compensate for the loss of US funding, Ms Ouyo said.

Mr Trump and other Republican presidents dating to the 1980s have used the so-called gag rule to spread their anti-abortion policies to developing countries.

One day after taking office in 2017, Mr Trump ordered reinstatement of the rule that had been rescinded by President Obama.

But there is evidence that the ban on services or referrals fails to reduce the incidence of abortions—and may actually have the opposite effect.

A Stanford University study found that rates of induced abortions rose sharply between 1994 and 2008 in African countries most affected by the rule.

SOURCE: Daily Nation