7 replies to this topic

[BCSpace]

A very interesting and true analysis by an "unbeliever":

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http://www.spectator...believers.thtml

‘Faith’ means faith. Doubt is not faith. Faith is not seeking but finding. Real Christians, Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus and Jewish believers are being patronised by kindly agnostics who privately believe that the convictions of those they patronise are delusions. A lazy mish-mash of covert agnosticism is being advanced in defence of religion as a social institution. But ‘whatever floats your boat’ is not the wellspring of Judaic belief. The God of the Gap is not the God of Islam. Jesus did not come to earth to offer the muzzy comforts of weekly ritual, church weddings and the rhythm of public holidays.

.....

This does capture what a lot of us love about the Church of England. The question is, does it capture what Jesus Christ asks — requires, commands — of His followers?

One of the reasons we can be pretty sure Jesus actually existed is that if He had not, the Church would never have invented Him. He stands so passionately, resolutely and inconveniently against everything an established church stands for. Continuity? Tradition? Christ had nothing to do with stability. He came to break up families, to smash routines, to cast aside the human superstructures, to teach abandonment of earthly concerns and a throwing of ourselves upon God’s mercy.

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Beware (I would say to believers) the patronage of unbelievers. They want your religion as a social institution, filleted of true faith. It is the atheists, who think this God business matters, who are on your side.

As an unbeliever my sympathies are with fundamentalists. They seem to me to represent the source, the roots, the essential energy of their faiths. They go back to basics. To those who truly believe, the implicit message beneath ‘never mind if it’s true, religion is good for people’ is insulting. To those who really believe, it is because and only because what they believe is true, that it is good. I find David Cameron’s remark that his faith, ‘like Magic FM in the Chilterns, tends to fade in and out’, baffling. If a faith is true it must have the most profound consequences for a man and for mankind. If I seriously suspected a faith might be true, I would devote the rest of my life to finding out.

As I get older the sharpness of my faculties begins to dull. But what I will not do is sink into a mellow blur of acceptance of the things I railed against in my youth. ‘Familiar’ be damned. ‘Comforting’ be damned. ‘Useful’ be damned. Is it true? — that is the question. It was the question when I was 12 and the question when I was 22. Forty years later it is still the question. It is the only question.

For those of you unfamiliar with recent religious history, this filleting is exactly what has happened to a variety of Protestant denominations starting mainly in the 50's and 60's.  It really does not matter what someone else thinks if something is true.

[TAO]

While I like the point he is making about how we can't give up our values, I would disagree with him that 'useful' is not important.  Usefulness relates to everything.  Before we can determine the truth, we have to determine if it is useful or not.  A useless truth isn't any good for us, really.  What's important is that we have useful truths, that actually matter and have an effect on our lives.

Edited by TAO, 21 March 2012 - 09:56 PM.

[Libs]

BCSpace, on 21 March 2012 - 07:35 PM, said:

A very interesting and true analysis by an "unbeliever":



For those of you unfamiliar with recent religious history, this filleting is exactly what has happened to a variety of Protestant denominations starting mainly in the 50's and 60's.  It really does not matter what someone else thinks if something is true.

In regards to the schism of many Protestant denominations, I'm pretty sure that has nothing to do with wanting a "social club". What often causes schisms is a disagreement over what is believed to be true.  

It appears to me that God calls people to many different paths and possibly they are all "true"...or true for those who follow that path.  Truth is not so much in "belief", but in what kind of person our beliefs create.  (IMHO, of course)

Most churches have changed over the centuries, even the LDS Church.   Change is not always a bad thing, nor the people who seek it.  Often it can be for the better.

Edited by Libs, 21 March 2012 - 10:11 PM.

[BCSpace]

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In regards to the schism of many Protestant denominations, I'm pretty sure that has nothing to do with wanting a "social club". What often causes schisms is a disagreement over what is believed to be true.

I'd have to say that's true for the majority of Protestants that have allowed homosexuality, women in the priesthood, and the nonDivinity of Jesus, as examples, to be upheld.  But the reality is that in the 50's and 60's, small numbers of "nonbelieving" ministers and preachers, often fresh from college and the new ideologies of the day, who did believe in the "social club" and filleting of doctrines began to influence and teach them in those directions.

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Most churches have changed over the centuries, even the LDS Church. Change is not always a bad thing, nor the people who seek it. Often it can be for the better.

Sure.  But the LDS Church hasn't really changed in doctrine since the days of the Restoration which means the LDS Church so far has been immune to diverging frm the truth and I think it will remain so.

Edited by BCSpace, 22 March 2012 - 12:10 AM.

[LeSellers]

One of the insidious social doctrines of the day is that "the church" (whichever one or group of them the speaker is concerned about) has, as its sole raison d'être, to provide care for the poor and needy: a combination of FEMA* and AFDC^† without the coercive power of taxation to fund itself and its endeavors.

* Federal Emergency Management Administration, the "lead" federal version of the Red Cross that wasted billions of dollars on Katrina "recovery" still under weigh now approaching a decade on. (For our non-USmerican readers)

^† Aid to Families with Dependent Children, the permanent dole for women who don't know who their children's fathers are; originally to bridge the time until anti-Social inSecurity's survivor benefit kicked in, but whose eternal nature proves that no government bureaucracy ever dies. (For our non-USmerican readers)

I am not saying "the church" has no business caring for the poor and the needy: it is an important part of religion in general, and central to true religion in particular (see James 1:27). But it is not the only reason for its existence. True religion is about salvation. Absent that, FEMA is a more efficient (not more effective) organization.

We could hypothesize that one motivation for this diminution of the role of "the church" to its role of charitable institution is to make it irrelevant in the world of the modern welfare state. And, once "irrelevant", why should it exist at all? This hypothesis finds support in the fact that the irreligious "left" does not contribute to private charities as the religious right does. (I have not seen numbers from the irreligious right and religious left, as will not comment about them.) Ted Rall, the socialist cartoonist, wrote an article advocating that people not help the Red Cross or other private charities in the aftermath of Katrina because a country like USmerica shouldn't have to rely on private charity when the federal government can just step in. He argued that it is only in backwards countries that private charity should even exist.

If my hypothesis is correct (which I would not advance were I to think it in error), then the reduction of "the church" to a mere charity is one plank in Satan's platform. He takes a good thing, the charity of the church, and warps it into a tool for his nefarious purposes. Unable to create anything on his own, he twists God's methods to evil. This distortion is just another front in the eternal war of good vs. evil. It's an additional way Lucifer seeks to make all men miserable like unto himself.

It's one more manifestation of how the apostates* have undermined the church, whichever church that may be.

* President Monson's adding "Care for the Poor and the Needy" as the fourth mission of the Church does not violate this premise: he did not remove, for instance, "Perfect the Saints" when he did so. Also, see the first sentence in my second 'graf. James' definition of "pure religion and undefiled" still stands, but we ought not forget the last clause: "to keep himself unspotted from the world".  He, too, knew that service is the way we become godly (= godlike), and that's what "salvation" is about.

Lehi

[Libs]

BCSpace, on 22 March 2012 - 12:03 AM, said:

I'd have to say that's true for the majority of Protestants that have allowed homosexuality, women in the priesthood, and the nonDivinity of Jesus, as examples, to be upheld.  But the reality is that in the 50's and 60's, small numbers of "nonbelieving" ministers and preachers, often fresh from college and the new ideologies of the day, who did believe in the "social club" and filleting of doctrines began to influence and teach them in those directions.

I think the issues you mentioned are more about opinion than hardcore "truths".  I would see the issues of women in the priesthood and acceptance of homosexuality as a big plus, and a step towards truth, not away from it.

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Sure.  But the LDS Church hasn't really changed in doctrine since the days of the Restoration which means the LDS Church so far has been immune to diverging frm the truth and I think it will remain so.

What about polygamy and blacks in the priesthood?  Do you not consider either of those doctrinal?

[thesometimesaint]

I think it was Jesus that had something to say about those that walk by the beggar saying be full, and doing nothing about it.

If the unbelievers do good, how much more good are the believers to do?

[BCSpace]

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I think the issues you mentioned are more about opinion than hardcore "truths".

I think you'll find them to be long held and studied truisms.  A recent example:

http://www.nationalr...ion-mark-tooley

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I would see the issues of women in the priesthood and acceptance of homosexuality as a big plus, and a step towards truth, not away from it.

The truth as taught by the LDS Church goes in the opposite direction on both of those. Hence, beware the unbeliever.

The LDS Church does not seek to ordain women and it's doctrine clearly defines gender roles that do not include priesthood ordination for women.  There has not been a change in the doctrine on homosexuality.  It has never been a sin to be tempted and yet to practice the lifestyle remains sin and homosexuals are expected to remain celibate if they can't have normal relations with a spouse the opposite sex if they want to have the full blessing of the Church up to and including membership.

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What about polygamy and blacks in the priesthood? Do you not consider either of those doctrinal?

Yes, both doctrinal.  But where is the change?  We are merely in different phases of both that have long been known and understood.  For the ban, this is the "long promised day" (OD 2).  For plural marriage, it has long been understood from the scriptural example that God has authorized it from time to time and reserves the right to authorize it again (Jacob 2:30 et. al.)