Threats To Leave The Church Over Controversial Topics.

[Alvino]

Depends on what it is. In the early days many of the stalwarts had issues with Joseph and ended up not being so stalwart and much of the membership left.

PR seems to be of more importance today,

I do believe in this day and age where people have developed the expectation that they deserve to be heard no matter what, that there is no real distance between the leaders and those they lead that can't be removed by an email or petition that some more effective means of communication that gives a sense of direct contact will likely need to be installed, whether it's by more surveys or something else.

We are considering mainly dissenting voices here and in that front communication between Church and membership is, as far as I know, hopelessly weak. FAIR and FARMS don't count.

[Alvino]

Well if the church changes policy because of threats of attrition and not guidance from The Lord I'm not sure that's how it should work.

Only if you have a rather rigid view of "guidance from the Lord." Someone may believe the people can be moved through guidance from the Lord to take such actions.

[Ticketyboo]

Although our unit had always had Sacrament meeting first, my councillors & I felt inspired to change the order around, with Sacrament last. It is still that way 8 years and two further Branch Presidents later.

I mention this because as soon as the change was implemented, the two previous BP's with whom I'd served, went less active. The one would drop his wife at Church with us, then proceed to the other former BP's home where they would have their own Sacrament meeting. Fortunately, as soon as I became aware of it, I was able to deal with the situation amicably and they soon returned.

Similarly, although they were only ever hypothetical questions, when our branch members were challenged to consider what could make them go less active, the causes ranged from a complete ban on caffeine (to include chocolate!), to the closure of our Branch forcing a Sunday journey of an 80 mile round trip to our nearest unit. By the end of the lesson all of the members conceeded that they would be less active.

[ERayR]

As Jeremy points out, some may do it out of real indignation.

But let's think about this more pragmatically. Don't you believe that if enough people were to say they would disavow the Church if so-and-so is done the institution would be pressured to change or modify things? There is strength in numbers.

And that is how apostasy happens.

[CV75]

I wonder whether you think the 'dominions of the saints' are decreasing now.

That is hard to say--in net, the growing membership is not decreasing (but then again the LDS Church / dominions of the saints have always been relatively small); in some places, yes, membership or faithfulness is decreasing. And in some places, they might also just have been or will be small from the start and remain so. I think the Book of Mormon reference to it is for the net status in the last days. There is an oft-cited remark about "maybe since Kirtland..." but I take this to be a different phenomenon than the dominions being small, since they were small in the first place.

I think my comment reflects more the idea that despite small numbers, integrity is a great strength against social pressure in great numbers.

[Alvino]

And that is how apostasy happens.

People threatened to leave the Church? I haven't read of any such examples. Definitely the Great Apostasy didn't happen like this (according to Mormon teachings) nor did other similar apostasies I've read of in the BoM.

Plus, as far as I know, people in scriptures have clamored for many righteous things, too.

[ERayR]

Definitely the Great Apostasy didn't happen like this (according to Mormon teachings) nor did other similar apostasies I've read of in the BoM.

Plus, as far as I know, people in scriptures have clamored for many righteous things, too.

You and I certainly understand some things a bit differently in some areas. I wasn't necessarily thinking of the "great apostasy" when I wrote that. More like personal individual apostasy. However, when you think about it it is all the little individual apostasies that add up to a great apostasy. As I read the BoM it appears to me that you might have missed something in the apostasy accounts.

[CV75]

You and I certainly understand some things a bit differently in some areas. I wasn't necessarily thinking of the "great apostasy" when I wrote that. More like personal individual apostasy. However, when you think about it it is all the little individual apostasies that add up to a great apostasy. As I read the BoM it appears to me that you might have missed something in the apostasy accounts.

...and if the only true and living Church were to change or modify things by being perssured by disavowing members, I think that would qualify as apostacy.

[Alvino]

You and I certainly understand some things a bit differently in some areas. I wasn't necessarily thinking of the "great apostasy" when I wrote that.

I know you weren't but I mentioned it to illustrate that arguably the biggest apostasy didn't happen in such a way. Just an example.

More like personal individual apostasy. However, when you think about it it is all the little individual apostasies that add up to a great apostasy. As I read the BoM it appears to me that you might have missed something in the apostasy accounts.

OK, now on this I did misunderstand you. I thought you primarily meant widespread apostasy. In the BoM the accounts of apostasies are about people wanting change in the Church, which is rather different from people threatening to leave it (which is what I don't recall ever reading in the BoM).

Edited January 26, 2013 by Alvino

[ERayR]

I know you weren't but I mentioned it to illustrate that arguably the biggest apostasy didn't happen in such a way. Just an example.

OK, now on this I did misunderstand you. I thought you primarily meant widespread apostasy. In the BoM the accounts of apostasies are about people wanting change in the Church, which is rather different from people threatening to leave it (which is what I don't recall ever reading in the BoM).

Read again looking at the fact that church and government were often intermingled. If you study closely, looking for it you might find the :biggest" apostasy was very much caused by such clamoring. Read Paul's writings very carefully.

[Alvino]

Read again looking at the fact that church and government were often intermingled. If you study closely, looking for it you might find the :biggest" apostasy was very much caused by such clamoring. Read Paul's writings very carefully.

I'm going to have to CFR you. "Study closely" is hardly helpful when we are talking about libraries of books (Bible and standard works). BTW, we are talking about people threatening to leave the Church,

[JeremyOrbe-Smith]

I think the bottom line here is that the D&C quite explicitly states that leadership (from you and I at the local level and right on "up" to the President) is not infallible, and that the minute anyone (at any level of the leadership "hierarchy") tries to use mere Priesthood authority as a way to justify their actions, that Priesthood becomes invalid. Not only shouldn't that type of authoritarianism work, it simply doesn't. Practices that cannot be defended rationally simply die out. Eventually, anyway; sometimes painfully. That's just the nature of the beast. You can't coerce true belief; given enough time, people will just abandon those who try to influence them in any way except through persuasion.

We're responsible for our own actions; we can't claim that if we knowingly go along with a leader's sins we'll be blessed because we were "sustaining" them. This is the point: "sustaining" someone doesn't mean squelching disagreements. Half the time, I think Revelation is simply a matter of recognizing a Good Idea from the "lower" ranks and implementing it at a wider level, so that Good Ideas at a local level are absorbed into larger and larger circles through the official channels whose job it is to preside over wider stewardships. Should this process of culture-change be characterized as "threatening"? Apparently only if one disagrees with the proposed revision of understanding.

But why shouldn't it simply be a recognition that Moroni 10:8 is still a valuable scripture? That "there are different ways that these gifts [of God] are administered"? We believe that God will yet reveal many great and important things to the Kingdom, and that we're supposed to teach each other out of the best books. While it may be comforting for some to look to an infallible leadership, placing themselves in a system in which all directives come in a top-down fashion, I think the principle of continuing Revelation is meant to shortcut that kind of easy complacency.

Brigham Young said that he never received one particle of intelligence except through Revelation, "no matter whether father or mother revealed it, or my sister, or neighbor. No person receives knowledge only upon the principle of revelation, that is, by having something revealed to them. [...] Who reveals? Everybody around us; we learn of each other. I have something which you have not, and you have something which I have not; I reveal what I have to you, and you reveal what you have to me. I believe that we are revelators to each other [...] upon natural principles, upon the principle of natural philosophy."

And James Talmage said that "faith is not blind submission, passive obedience, with no effort at thought or reason. Faith, if worthy of its name, rests upon truth; and truth is the foundation of science.’’

It's obvious that many things that are no longer taught were once deemed to be essential parts of the Gospel, and were preached from the pulpit (I don't need to explicate the usual controversial stuff, right?). Labeling it "folk-doctrine" to try to distance ourselves from it doesn't really help much, even in perfectly accurate cases like race-based restrictions on the Priesthood. The reason is that everyone is keenly aware that discarding past teachings brings up the question of whether or not what we are hearing today will be altered in the future. The reason for that to be worrisome ("How can you trust them, then?") is that the typical understanding of what a religious leader is has been conditioned by premises rooted in Classical and Medieval absolutist thinking, in which a "true" Prophet is a given God's sockpuppet, dictating infallible Truth.

That seems not only unworkable to me, but dangerous. But why should a fallible leadership be seen as a bug? It's a feature! We have a leadership which can (and should) evolve constantly, responding to new understandings in the wider culture! That's how the Church can be classified as "living."

Like President Stephen L. Richards said, "I fear dictatorial dogmatism, rigidity of procedure and intolerance [in the Church] even more than I fear [...] other devices the adversary may use to nullify faith and kill religion. Fanaticism and bigotry have been the deadly enemies of true religion in the long past. They have made it forbidding, shut it up in cold grey walls of monastery and nunnery, out of sunlight and fragrance of the growing world. They have garbed it in black and then in white, when in truth it is neither black nor white, any more than life is black or white, for religion is life abundant, glowing life, with all its shades, colors and hues, as the children of men reflect in the patterns of their lives the radiance of the Holy Spirit in varying degrees."

If, then, I were to register my disagreement that hair length and lack of earrings or tattoos has anything whatsoever to do with righteous actions -- and that trying to enforce dress codes to the Puritanical degree we currently do is actively harmful -- should that be characterized as a "threat" to current teachings? (Even if I pointed out old Bishop Woolley, with his fantastic beard and hoop-earrings?)

If I think women (and men) should be able to wear pretty much whatever the heck they want to Church without mere fashion being taken as a sign of "disrespect", and that beautiful old paintings shouldn't be messed with just to conform with current "modesty" standards, is that a "threat"? If I think there's no particular reason garments should be quite so standardized (recalling that the early saints simply made their own), is that a "threat"? If I point out that in the '30s, leadership considered phasing down the wearing of garments into a "Temple-only" practice (and that maybe that's a good, practical idea), is that a "threat"? If I note that the Temple script has changed many times, and that we could help some people considerably by making a few modifications to the current sexist language (not some essential doctrine, mind you, but mere phrasing), should that be considered a "threat"? If women received the Priesthood in the early days (as the historical record seems to show, depending on how one understands a few key phrases), is it a "threat" to point out that an authoritative call to start ordaining them tomorrow -- so that we could have female Bishops and Prophets -- would go against no doctrine and could indeed be seen as a "Restoration" of a lost part of our own Restoration?

Note that the opposite of every one of these viewpoints is current in our culture as well, and yet are not considered "threatening" by those who promulgate them. Note, also, that even though quite a few of these "contrary" viewpoints are about pretty trivial things (fashion?), they are nevertheless seen as "dangerous" by worryingly large numbers of Saints because they have been characterized as "not following the Brethren." I just can't agree with that, and I have to keep saying so if I don't want to let stand the impression that our current practices cannot be questioned by faithful members.

Edited January 26, 2013 by JeremyOrbe-Smith

[Rivers]

Brigham Young said that he never received one particle of intelligence except through Revelation, "no matter whether father or mother revealed it, or my sister, or neighbor. No person receives knowledge only upon the principle of revelation, that is, by having something revealed to them. [...] Who reveals? Everybody around us; we learn of each other. I have something which you have not, and you have something which I have not; I reveal what I have to you, and you reveal what you have to me. I believe that we are revelators to each other [...] upon natural principles, upon the principle of natural philosophy."

I really like this quote. It goes along very will with the 13th article of faith. Seeking out everything that is good and virtuous from all available sources is a fantasitc concept. The only problem is that we apparently don't all agree on what is good, virtuous, praiseworthy, etc.

Edited January 26, 2013 by Rivers

[bcuzbcuz]

in case you missed it!

[media=]

Thank you, Duncan. Loved it!

[Scott Lloyd]

[canard78 was responding to this from Saints Alive: "read the feedback on Sis. Dalton's talk on some other sites"]

Apparently on this board even the MDDB tone of discussing the topic is too much for the sensitivities of our readers. It's already locked. That lasted a total of 5 hours.

Perhaps making a thread abusive is a good way of getting a thread locked and thereby conveniently burying an uncomfortable topic that some self-appointed amateur 'apologists' would prefer to be buried and ignored.

I hadn't expected to see that thread locked so soon either, and I can't say I can identify the specific reason why it happened, beyond the very brief explanation given by the moderator, who cited "multiple offensive comments."

But before we conclude that it was all due to "self-appointed amateur apologists" who were guilty of "making a thread abusive," I think it worth pointing out that the last post on the thread just before it was closed -- the one made by canard78 -- was the first one to play the gender card. This was mildly surprising to me, as it had been canard78 who earlier issued the admonition to keep the posts civil so as to avoid the thread being shut down. Had the thread not been closed before I could respond, I might have pointed out that it was a woman, Sister Dalton, whom we were defending. I might have posed the question: Is a woman somehow less deserving of being defended because she is championing a traditional role of motherhood and because she holds a prominent position of leadership in the Church? Is such a woman so undeserving of defense that males are regarded either implicitly or overtly as being sexist because they dare to defend her?

Perhaps the fact that Sister Dalton had been subjected to an unseemly degree of dog-piling on that thread was reason enough, all by itself, to close it.

Having said the above I acknowledge that canard78 has announced his intention to take a break from the board and that he likely won't see this post. I regret that he probably won't be around to respond. I would have posted this earlier, but I only just now saw the post to which I am responding.

Edited January 28, 2013 by Scott Lloyd

[cdowis]

I'm going to have to CFR you. "Study closely" is hardly helpful when we are talking about libraries of books (Bible and standard works). BTW, we are talking about people threatening to leave the Church,

FWIW, one cannot request a CFR for a personal opinion or interpretation. The poster simply quotes themselves as the source.

You can request clarification.

Edited January 28, 2013 by cdowis

[Bill “Papa” Lee]

You think we should turn fire hoses and dogs on them also? Talk like that is why people leave.

I just noticed that when they wanted to make Spock a bad guy they gave him a goatee like me. When I read about MMM I wept. Edited January 28, 2013 by Bill “Papa” Lee

[Damien the Leper]

Why do people always threaten to leave the church when a controversial statement is made or discovered? Are they hoping the threat will cause the church to change?

I know I'm a little late to this discussion but I wanted to share my thoughts. First, it is silly to make a threat based on ignorance. That says more about the person making the threat than the institution the threat is made against. Second, the church is what it is. The church has changed and will change however it (I mean God... ) sees fit. It's really not worth stressing about.

[Alvino]

FWIW, one cannot request a CFR for a personal opinion or interpretation. The poster simply quotes themselves as the source.

You can request clarification.

he was talking about Paul's letters and some of the BoM stories mentioning that so-and-so happened (after all, he said "read again").

but, whatever.