Real-life polygamists opine on Big Love

I love the show it does focus on sex a little to much for my taste but my wifes and I agree that it does keep God in the house unlike many people and TV shows in this sinning world. I am not Mormon but I still think that Jesus should be strong in anyone's home. Judge not least ye be judged

So George Costanza,

How bout that hot three-way/orgy scene? Was it everything you expected -- everything you were dead certain would happen?

whew

I'm also a Mormon and *not* a member of the break-offs of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The polygamists abuse marriage by forcing little girls to marry old men and practicing incest. The Church of Jesus Christ did not have the same secrecy and had policies regarding personal freedoms. The early Church's practice of polygamy amounted to only 5% of the population among Mormons. Women were allowed to say no *and* were allowed to divorce freely!! The modern breakoffs with their extreme polygamy does not reflect the current or early Church. Besides that, the BoMormon denounces polygamy in *most* cases. When it was done, it was tightly controlled on many levels and done humanely. I have no problem with *Big Love*, though, as long as it does not say it's about *the* Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I have a problem with the *people* who watch it and whose bigotry is emboldened.

GR:
You know every religion has taken it on the chin for something in its history, I wont waste time naming 100's of incidents. But I cannot help noting your canceling your HBO because it (BIG LOVE) is unnecessarily "damaging to my faith". You are going to such legnths for a show you have NOT EVEN seen???? I an not defending the show, dont take me wrong. But think about two things. Such additudes spoken in public only do nothing but publicize the show. The other is, and I am not being rude, but you feel that this would damage your faith even having not seen it, well, maybe your faith isnt as strong as you think.
HBO is a good channel, excellent documentaries and some fine movies.
There is also another option to consider. Change the channel!
Libby
Las Vegas Nevada

Open Letter to HBO,

I thought I would take a minute to express my concern over a new show in your line-up called "Big Love" I have not seen the show, so I can't speak much to its content. But I am offended by the show's premise of a Mormon in a polygamous relationship with multiple wives.

I am a member if the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. As you may be aware, this church represents the main body of Mormons throughout the world. And when most people talk about Mormons, they are really talking specifically about this church. As you are probably also aware, this same church abandoned polygamy in the 1880s.

There are apostate Mormons that do practice polygamy, primarily in Utah. But even if you take inflated estimates of up to 50,000 apostate Mormon polygamists and compare that to the main body of Mormons that do not practice polygamy, it is less than one half of one percent. Yet due to shows like Big Love, the perception remains that polygamy is rampant in the Mormon church, and that most Mormons embrace polygamy as acceptable, when the opposite is true.

The subject matter of your show distorts the reality about polygamy in my faith by narrowly focusing on an extremely small group of apostates. As a result, I do not think that I can personally support HBO as a patron of your network as long as Big Love is part of your lineup. I am therefore notifying my cable company to cancel my HBO subscription. Please understand that I am not making judgments about HBO or its intent in running this program. I am also not challenging HBOs right to broadcast programming such as this. But the end result is that it is needlessly damaging to my faith, and I believe the show as a whole to be in poor taste.

Sincerely,

GR
Leesburg, VA

Echo,

I'm not at all afraid of the notion that Jesus was fully human and experienced all the feelings and emotions common to humanity. I just don't buy the argument that an unmarried "rabbi" couldn't be taken seriously by common folk and those that the establishment had ostracized. The apostle Paul explicitly stated that he (Paul) was not married. I've heard that given his former religious station, he was probably married at one time. But he obviously accomplished his most effective life's work (with respect to Christianity) as a single man.

It wouldn't matter to me at all if Jesus were married, but he wasn't exactly bending over backwards to fit in with the common thinking of the times and in fact, the Jewish leaders killed him precisely for all the ways he "blasphemed" their religion. I'm not trying to prove he wasn't married, but I don't find it at all difficult to believe that he eschewed marriage.

Your "marriage at Cana" argument is interesting, but hardly persuasive. The beginning of the chapter says that Jesus was "called" or "invited" to the wedding. If he were the groom, he would be the one doing the calling.

Jim

Jim S,

Jesus followed the letter of the law to perfection. He denounced the local leaders as hypocrites, meaning that they where the ones who did not follow the laws, not he. He felt it necessary to be baptized, he found it necessary to follow all laws that where righteous. the simple fact is that he was called rabbi, which by Jewish actual law, could not happen unless he was married. No one would have taken him seriously unless he was married. Why isn't it mentioned? well, it was a given that he would be married, why would they need to mention something that in that time frame was totally redundant and assumed?

Restudy the marriage which he turned water to wine, and juxtapose it with what we know of Jewish law of the time. Mary was looked on to do the things that the grooms mother would do, and Jesus was looked on to do the things that only a groom would be required to do. why would either of them be compelled to do things that by tradition where the jobs of the Groom and Mother of Groom, if he where not the Groom, and she not the mother of the Groom?

-Echo (who finds it funny that people fear the thought that their living God could actually be human while he was... um... human.)

Jeremy,

The Jesus of the Bible claimed to be God, to be the only path to eternal life, healed the sick, raised the dead, and denounced the local religious leaders as hypocrits. And you think they would find his bachelorhood strange?

#2: I was born and raised in the "Real" Mormon church as you call it, and I find your post funny. "All Mormons know that Polygamy is wrong!" is that right? Or perhaps are you speaking from your own personal feelings. If the stock testamony taught to every sunday school child has any truth "I want to bear my testomony, i know this church is true, i know that joseph smith is a prophet.... " then the fact that J.Smith had [i believe] 14 wives, B.Y. had 30+ Lorenzo Snow, John Taylor... notice these are all Prophets? where they then, sinners?

Simply put, ALL MORMONS KNOW that in order to comply with the articals of faith, we hold ourself subject to the laws of the land, and as the law of the land bans the practice of polygamy, so too do we. I suspect that if that law changed, we would see just how many Mormons KNOW it's wrong.

Why play the (official/unofficial) Mormon card in terms of polygamy? Just about every single religion besides those of the Christian faith support/have supported polygamy. Traditional Judaism, Islam, the Eastern religions, etc. Christianity has enough issues just even coming to terms with the idea that Jesus himself was probably married (to one woman) considering a 33 year old Hebrew bachaelor in that era would have been considered pretty strange.

And Maher is correct; if gay marriage becomes legal, it opens the door to legalizing polygamy. Because as I stated above, most religions have supported the concept, as compared to gay marriage which most religions are either silent on or condemn.