내가 만든 우긴 것

Many of you have probably seen these memes I made, but I just thought that I would re-post them. Feel free to share them as you like. 

대한민국에서의 선교 사업

Having lived in Korea for thirteen years has been an experience (to say the least), and for the last five years, I have been on the path of faith and believe after coming back into the fold and walking among the sheep again. Letting Christ into my life helped all the cognitive dissonance shed away and a new light helped me grow each day. 

This adventure in Korea with Christ has been more interesting, because I am blessed to have a complete lack of shame and I feel that Missionary Work is the most important duty for the believer. Some say Temple Work and others Geneologic (I can never spell that word) and....well, there are a multitude of works to be done, and all of them are very important. But, I feel Missionary Work is king. 

And, in Korea, there is no shortage of Missionary Moments. More often than not, I have come across people reading what seems to be, at first glance, a Bible, like this guy. 

This guy was really focused on the chanting part of the 

Scriptures he was reading

But, he is not reading the Bible. His focus is all about the Buddhist Scriptures (보경) that he is holding. And, yes, Buddhism does have Scriptures (mostly Sutras), which are printed and bound in the same fashion as Korean Bibles, making it hard to tell (sometimes) if someone is reading the Bible or Buddhist Scriptures. Look at the next picture:

The binding and overall appearance of the two books

look exactly the same, don't they?

One of the old ladies is reading the Bible and the other is reading Buddhist Scriptures. Can you tell which one is which? (NOTE: The one on the left is reading the Bible). 

I've gotten to talk to Buddhist Monks and believers. My wife is even a Won Buddhist (a Korean sect of Buddhism), so I have read some of the Buddhist Scriptures.

And, oh, reading the Korean Bible is very difficult, because it is written in a hundred year old Chosun Dynasty form of Korean that is even difficult for Koreans to fully understand sometimes. But, regardless, I found a misprint in one Bible some years back. 

We're only human. We try but 

we make mistakes

I contacted the publisher and they gave me a thanks and a big gift certificate for their products (SCORE!).  

But, mostly, I read the Catholic version of the Korean Bible, because the language is much more simple, which is optimal for a non-native speaker like myself. 

I came to find out later about the vast difference in translation between the Korean Protestant Bible and the Korean Catholic Bible. They even use a different name for God. The Protestants call Him "하나님/Ha-na-nim," which translates as "The One and Only Respected One." This is opposed to the Catholic term "하느님/Ha-neu-nim," which comes out in English as "Respected Sky Being."

I took this picture during the Cherry Blossom season. 

This is the Korean Catholic Bible

Plus, I worked at a Catholic university for about ten years, so my view of religion was heavily shaped by the Korean Catholics; most notably, because I found Christ during that employment time, despite the massive presence of the J-Doves (I don't like the word "J-Dub," so I say "J-Dove) everywhere. 

Sometimes, they just leave displays of reading material. 

But, despite the Catholic school employment and the ever-present J-Doves, I went the LDS route. And, in my view, the LDS are just as weird as the J-Doves and Buddhists. Even the Korean Protestants are pretty extreme at times. 

They paint and letter their calls, play hymns loudly, and give free beverages:

I got a free Pepsi from these people. I saw them pretty 

near where I worked. They would stop and give out drinks

There is the trendy thing to do with the current coffee culture of Korea and build cafes in churches:

Churches even open up religious themed cafes near 

churches, too. 

Some will use bullhorns, signs, banners, and loud voices to get people's attention:

And, there are many of the doomsday churches who claim the end is near:

This guy was part of a large group

in downtown Daegu, all talking about

the RFID chip and how it is part of

Satan's plan

There are all kinds, and there are many faiths and beliefs and denominations around Korea. With this being said, with all the Buddhists, J-Doves, Protestants of many denominations, Missionary Work is very important, at least for the reason of giving people a better understanding of the LDS church. And, there are many strange ideas, misconceptions, and falsehoods about the LDS church running around the different groups.

I've talked with many from different belief systems and life philosophies. I've learned from them and I hope that they learned some from me (which seemed to be the case pretty often). 

특별한 티셔츠

Every Thursday I teach at an elementary school in a different city. The first day of classes, I wore my Superman T-shirt. The Avengers movie series was big with the Korean elementary school kids (even though Superman and the Avengers are from different comic book universes), so everything was superhero related. 

The names of the superheroes came out differently from the Koreans, like: To-rr (토르), Shu-pa-man (슈퍼맨), I-yi-un-man (아이언맨), etc. I always wondered why the names weren't translated into Korean fully.  Superman could be 초인 (Cho-in), which actually translates as 'a great man; an iron man; amazing man." Iron Man could be 철철갑인 (Chul-chul-gab-in), which translates as "iron armor man." And Captain America could be 미국 대위 (Mi-Guk Dae-Hee) which is literally "Captain (of the Army) America." 

Anyway....

A few students in one class asked me if I was Superman.

"Yes. I am a super man."

"But, you are fat."

"Because I eat big dinners with Jesus."

"Jesus? Not Thor?"

"Thor rules Asgard. Jesus rules the world."

And so every Thursday I wear my Superman T-shirt and the kids always ask what I ate with Jesus (always a bread or fish dish).

I'm glad that Thor and the Avengers came out. I mean, Iron Man only rules over a company and Captain America is an inspiration for the soldiers, but the comparison of Thor to Jesus worked much better.

이단

I read an article recently. Someone shared it on Facebook and it caught my interest. Pastafarians can now legally get married in religious ceremonies. Bobby Henderson wrote the The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster which has turned into a religion, and he makes his claim to being a prophet; although, probably in a joking manner. You can download The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster here.

Henderson, the creator of the Church 

of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

This is on the heels of 'the greatest salesman in the world' J.R. Dobb's The Book of the Subgenius, which also caught on with the trendy pop-culture.  You can download The Book of the Subgenius here.

But, first came Malaclypse The Younger's Principia Discordia, and you can download the book here.

Malaclypse the Younger

And, there is The Book of Mu, which seems to be the most recent.

There were a lot of 'religious' texts that started as something different, but ended up as some kind of religious guidance. I've read these books and they all play on the absurdity prevalent in our lives and attempt to explain in some form or another, through parody or some form of explanation that is, probably unaware to the writers, a form of hyperrealism.

U.S. military soldiers can even claim their religion to be Jedi. I have heard from some in our ward that this is impossible, but I have seen it with my won eyes on the dog tags of a US army soldier stationed in Daegu. 

It makes sense. Die hard Star Wars, Star Trek, and Harry Potter fans find something spiritual in these works of fiction.

It is not that these guys set out to start a religion, but their ideas (absurd and fringe as they are) caught on with the trendy, post-modern world we live in nowadays. And, there have been those who purposefully wanted to start a religion for various reasons. There is the Church of All Worlds, which was founded by Oberon Zell-Ravenheart, who uses fiction, like Harry Potter as a basis for his church. He even recently started the Grey School of Wizardry. 

You can even read Anton LaVey's Satanic Bible.

Anton LaVey

LaVey's ideas are most unsettling, because they are accurate reflections of the way the world is moving towards. And, he came up with these ideas in the sixties. All in all, he has been one of the most insanely precise predictor of where society is heading. 

Now, I am completely against censorship and everyone should have their say and be able to write what they want. And, I am a huge supporter of reading any material which may be against your belief system or may be part of a fringe philosophy. I mean, if your faith is tested by reading one of these books, you probably didn't have much faith to begin with. Anyway, it is my opinion (and not shared by too many Jack Mormons) that reading anti-Mormon literature can be helpful for one's faith by providing a much wider viewpoint of the overall belief system we are part of and the literature shows different perspectives which we need to be exposed to, especially if we are to hope for better Missionary Moments. Even reading the Mormon splinter group's various 'divine' texts is enlightening, like: The Book of Jeraneck and The Book of the Law of the Lord. 

There may be many who disagree with me about this, but I like to know what's out there, and it all (the fringe religious books, the LDS recommended literature, and the anti-Mormon books) helps me realize the benefits of the LDS Church and our place next to God better. And, it all has helped me have better Missionary Moments, because I can understand where others are coming from and so I can have a better conversation with them. 

몰몬교 연차대회

My Korean, Buddhist wife is doing as most Korean women would do when traveling or moving to a new place:  she is searching through homepages and hundreds of blogs to find out all that she can about Salt Lake City. Since we will be moving there and since she has never lived in America, this is a big deal for her. And, she really wants her older sister and niece to come and visit us in America. 

In 2017, maybe, her older sister and niece will probably come and visit, and they are already making plans for the trip. This is a far cry from what most men would do when travelling; but, hey, I like the preparedness. 

The other day, I was listening to the three talk about the vague beginnings of the travel plans. They were making kimchi and talking about Utah. My wife said to the two; in Korean, "There are two times a year you don't want to come because it's so busy in Salt Lake City. It's a Mormon event called 'General Conference.' On the net, people advised against travelling to Salt Lake City at that time for just travelling." 

Travelling to Salt Lake City at this time

would be a hassle

This took me aback. I have never mentioned General Conference to my wife by name, rather saying (in Korean) that the two General Conferences a year are 'special days where we watch videos from the Mormon higher-ups.' 

Does every Mormon in the US try and

come to Salt Lake City at these times?

Those who know my wife know that her first exposure to anything Christ and Mormon related was through me. Now, she, her family, and her close friends talk about Mormonism sometimes (usually in reference to me).

But, what got me was when my wife was talking about General Conference and travelling that day in the country. For her to know about that, there must have been some Korean blogs and travel warnings throughout Naver (the Korean Google) about how busy Salt Lake City is during General Conference. Some Koreans had to have tried to spend some days in the city and only realized how sparse the hotels were and how crowded everything would be. It was kind of a nice though that some travelers, bloggers, and netizens are spreading some information about Mormons and Salt Lake City throughout Korean cyberspace.

I then got to talk about what General Conference was to my Buddhist, Korean family. They are mildly fascinated whenever I talk about something new about Mormonism.

And I got to tell about how sometimes, people who are not part of the higher-up's get to speak, just like Peter Vidmar did.

외계인

A fellow teacher showed me this article and asked what I thought. I mean, why not ask the Mormon, who...is strange. 

I read the article and it was fascinating, but more for the realization of the thousand times the article had been shared (it is easy to tell how many times an article has been shared when reading it off a smart phone).

The article was about six alien species currently fighting for control of Earth. 

I answered; as I was reading, "What? No Kolobians?" 

 (I guess that is what people from Kolob would be called; I don't know...I just made it up) 

There were many teachers in the office. At the end of the semester, we are stuck in the office trying to finish grading. A few teacher's had quizzical looks at my words, obviously wondering what a 'Kolobian' was, and probably trying to remember what movie that might have come from. 

I explained about Kolob and shared my testimony after that. Many seemed fascinated by the idea and I showed them the verses:

And the Lord said unto me: These are the governing ones; and the name of the great one is Kolob, because it is near unto me, for I am the Lord thy God: I have set this one to govern all those which belong to the same order as that upon which thou standest.  And the Lord said unto me, by the Urim and Thummim, that Kolob was after the manner of the Lord, according to its times and seasons in the revolutions thereof; that one revolution was a day unto the Lord, after his manner of reckoning, it being one thousand years according to the time appointed unto that whereon thou standest. This is the reckoning of the Lord’s time, according to the reckoning of Kolob. (Abraham 3: 3-4)

My mind works in weird ways. I see an article about aliens and the first thing I think of is Kolob. Does this happen to anyone else?

Not like these aliens though. Kolobians, in my view,

would be more pleasant and full of light, but they 

would also share morals and ethics around the universe,

not science and technology (like most every alien encounter)