Elder Oaks Speaks On "the Boundary Between Church And State" (merged)

[Scott Lloyd]

Withdrawn.

Edited October 28, 2015 by Scott Lloyd

[Scott Lloyd]

Hey Skeptic Christian, considering you are mad at people you think won't read "a science book," what do you think about the Whole Foods culture? According to this article, Whole Foods is just as much pseudo science as young-earth creationism or the denial of global warming. But unlike those things, Whole Foods is the sort of pseduo science that appeals to political liberals.

 

By the way, did Jesus say anything about organic food or homeopathy?

[Meadowchik]

Politicians and statesmen must grapple with tough questions, painstakingly familiarize themselves with vital issues, and be decisive; but finally, an antidote to abusive government, to corruption, and to constitutional peril lies in private character. Humble people in prayerful homes will contribute immeasurably to a lasting constitutional government. And it should be apparent that consistent efforts in these areas will prepare us both to continually protect the Constitution and to prepare us for possibly a yet future rendezvous with our Constitution’s destiny.

 

Exactly.

 

Not that I promote anarchy, but as a way of pointing out the limitations of government: A perfect government can be rendered irrelevant by a wicked people, and a righteous people can create a utopia despite an imperfect government.

[TheSkepticChristian]

Hey Skeptic Christian, considering you are mad at people you think won't read "a science book," what do you think about the Whole Foods culture? According to this article, Whole Foods is just as much pseudo science as young-earth creationism or the denial of global warming. But unlike those things, Whole Foods is the sort of pseduo science that appeals to political liberals.

 

 I believe GM crops are safe because many scientific papers concluded that. I also believe GM crops are necessary. 

 

 

Why aren't you saying this to TheSkepticChristian? He's the one who's trying to shut down conversation because, according to him, Jesus didn't talk about religious freedom. We are merely turning his pattern of questioning back on him. As I said on the other thread, it's gentle mockery.

 

perhaps because he realizes that I am gently mocking you. Do I look like a sola scritura fan? 

The politics of religious freedom is not Christianity, it is libertarian politics. I am not trying to shut down the conversation, I am simply asking where is the Christianity in the politics of religious freedom? 

 

Christianity - Service, Charity, Baptism. and the right of business owners to discriminate because of their religion?

Edited October 28, 2015 by TheSkepticChristian

[jkwilliams]

Hey Skeptic Christian, considering you are mad at people you think won't read "a science book," what do you think about the Whole Foods culture? According to this article, Whole Foods is just as much pseudo science as young-earth creationism or the denial of global warming. But unlike those things, Whole Foods is the sort of pseduo science that appeals to political liberals.

 

By the way, did Jesus say anything about organic food or homeopathy?

No one group has a monopoly on pseudoscience. As you note, the anti-vaxxers are on no more or less solid ground than the anti-GMO folks. That they tend to be on opposite sides of the political spectrum doesn't seem to matter. I've never understood why opposition to global-warming science has become a conservative political issue or why anti-fracking has become a liberal one.

[TheSkepticChristian]

No one group has a monopoly on pseudoscience. 

 

that is why we shouldn't let our politics influence our Science. Many Conservatives, Liberals, and Libertarians make conclusions before looking at the scientific literature, many of them don't care about the science. 

 

GM crops are safe according to many Scientific studies. 

Edited October 28, 2015 by TheSkepticChristian

[jkwilliams]

that is why we shouldn't let our politics influence our Science. Many Conservatives, Liberals, and Libertarians make conclusions before looking at the scientific literature.

GM crops are safe according to many Scientific studies.

No argument here. Too many people choose ideology over reason and evidence.

[Scott Lloyd]

 I believe GM crops are safe because many scientific papers concluded that. I also believe GM crops are necessary. 

 

 

 

perhaps because he realizes that I am gently mocking you. Do I look like a sola scritura fan? 

The politics of religious freedom is not Christianity, it is libertarian politics. I am not trying to shut down the conversation, I am simply asking where is the Christianity in the politics of religious freedom? 

 

Christianity - Service, Charity, Baptism. and the right of business owners to discriminate because of their religion?

OK. So where did Jesus talk about global warming?

[jwhitlock]

 

No you can't because Jesus told us to help the poor. How are business owners helping the poor by discriminating because of their religious beliefs?

 

Where did Jesus tell us to "help the poor", as you're quoting Him?  It isn't anywhere in the scriptures. Are you making the rest of your claims up like you did this one?

[thesometimesaint]

The NT is replete with exhortations on how to succor the poor.

[Kenngo1969]

Are you saying that the elders of Israel will not step forth to save the Constitution when it is hanging by a thread because, as the 12th Article of Faith states, "We believe in being subject to kings, presidents, rulers, and magistrates, in obeying, honoring, and sustaining the law," and because, as you pointed out, Jesus Christ once said that the Jews should render unto Caesar what is Caesar's?

 

I do not think that saving the Constitution will involve anything like the elders of Israel "assassinating a few U.S. Supreme Court justices" or "importuning our senators to impeach a few of them," nor do I think we will save the Constitution if we "simply stop obeying laws with which we disagree."

 

With your incredible lineage and roots in the Church, and that magnificent education on the Constitution, you do believe that the elders of Israel will step forth to save the Constitution when it is hanging by a thread, don't you?

I think Elder Oaks's grasp of these issues is much, much better than yours.  Even if I didn't think that, he's a prophet, seer, and revelator whom I have covenanted to sustain while you are not, so I will continue to disagree with you.  (For the record, while I do sustain him, I do differ with Elder Oaks on at least one relatively minor issue relative to the Constitution vis-a-vis gay marriage: I'm not nearly as sanguine as he apparently is that the Obergefell majority's magnanimous granting of privileges to people of faith to continue to "believe" and to "teach" as they wish with respect to gay marriage offers sufficient protection of free exercise, and I believe that many of those who agree with the majority in Obergefell will, rather than being content with their victory in this case, continue and intensify their efforts to marginalize religions and their adherents.   

 

And I seriously doubt that Elder Oaks hasn't consulted with his brethren in the Quorum of the Twelve (particularly the "law contingent," composed of him and Elders Christofferson and Cook) about participating in events such as the one where these remarks were delivered, and about what he should say in essentially representing the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in such a forum. Elder Oaks' keen legal mind trumps your comparatively ill-informed bloviating on these issues, and those of the three of them ... Elders Oaks, Christofferson, and Cook, respectively ... certainly do.

 

Further, I sense you got your widdo feewings hurt when I played the Church experience and legal education cards, respectively.  I can tell you how to avoid that in the future.  Ready?  Here is the secret: While you're welcome to disagree with their conclusions, don't question the faithfulness of your interlocutors whose interpretation of the Constitution happens to differ from your own, especially when such arguments run counter to the teachings of a member of the Quorum of the Twelve (and especially when at least two other members of the Twelve likely agree with him).

 

I'm certainly glad to know that you don't support assassinating or (except in rare cases) impeaching U.S. Supreme Court justices, but, failing those two options, voting for presidential and senatorial candidates whose constitutional visions more closely match our own (and who will, thus, choose and confirm nominees, respectively of whom that may also be said is our only option).  Again, you, me, Kim Davis, Elder Oaks ... everybody is free to believe as he or she wishes and to advocate for those beliefs in virtually every other forum in which he or she is not acting as a public official.  The only thing he or she is not free to do is to enforce a private interpretation of the law which is contrary to that which a majority of U.S. Supreme Court justices has handed down. And Kim Davis is certainly free to practice civil disobedience, which involves openly defying a law which one believes to be immoral, while thereafter willingly submitting to the consequences of that choice.  Kim Davis apparently wants to claim civil disobedience while doing only the first of those two things.

 

I note your conspicuous silence in response to my query about why you seem to favor certain constitutional provisions (the First Amendment) over others (Article III).  And if you're not suggesting assassination or impeachment, on the one hand, but you're not content simply to work to swing the legal and political pendulum in a direction you (we; and I should emphasize that: as I said, I disagree with the Obergefell majority) do favor by supporting like-minded presidential and senatorial candidates, what, exactly, are you proposing be done?

[Tony Frank]

I think Elder Oaks's grasp of these issues is much, much better than yours.  Even if I didn't think that, he's a prophet, seer, and revelator whom I have covenanted to sustain while you are not, so I will continue to disagree with you.  (For the record, while I do sustain him, I do differ with Elder Oaks on at least one relatively minor issue relative to the Constitution vis-a-vis gay marriage: I'm not nearly as sanguine as he apparently is that the Obergefell majority's magnanimous granting of privileges to people of faith to continue to "believe" and to "teach" as they wish with respect to gay marriage offers sufficient protection of free exercise, and I believe that many of those who agree with the majority in Obergefell will, rather than being content with their victory in this case, continue and intensify their efforts to marginalize religions and their adherents.   

 

And I seriously doubt that Elder Oaks hasn't consulted with his brethren in the Quorum of the Twelve (particularly the "law contingent," composed of him and Elders Christofferson and Cook) about participating in events such as the one where these remarks were delivered, and about what he should say in essentially representing the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in such a forum. Elder Oaks' keen legal mind trumps your comparatively ill-informed bloviating on these issues, and those of the three of them ... Elders Oaks, Christofferson, and Cook, respectively ... certainly do.

 

Further, I sense you got your widdo feewings hurt when I played the Church experience and legal education cards, respectively.  I can tell you how to avoid that in the future.  Ready?  Here is the secret: While you're welcome to disagree with their conclusions, don't question the faithfulness of your interlocutors whose interpretation of the Constitution happens to differ from your own, especially when such arguments run counter to the teachings of a member of the Quorum of the Twelve (and especially when at least two other members of the Twelve likely agree with him).

 

I'm certainly glad to know that you don't support assassinating or (except in rare cases) impeaching U.S. Supreme Court justices, but, failing those two options, voting for presidential and senatorial candidates whose constitutional visions more closely match our own (and who will, thus, choose and confirm nominees, respectively of whom that may also be said is our only option).  Again, you, me, Kim Davis, Elder Oaks ... everybody is free to believe as he or she wishes and to advocate for those beliefs in virtually every other forum in which he or she is not acting as a public official.  The only thing he or she is not free to do is to enforce a private interpretation of the law which is contrary to that which a majority of U.S. Supreme Court justices has handed down. And Kim Davis is certainly free to practice civil disobedience, which involves openly defying a law which one believes to be immoral, while thereafter willingly submitting to the consequences of that choice.  Kim Davis apparently wants to claim civil disobedience while doing only the first of those two things.

 

I note your conspicuous silence in response to my query about why you seem to favor certain constitutional provisions (the First Amendment) over others (Article III).  And if you're not suggesting assassination or impeachment, on the one hand, but you're not content simply to work to swing the legal and political pendulum in a direction you (we; and I should emphasize that: as I said, I disagree with the Obergefell majority) do favor by supporting like-minded presidential and senatorial candidates, what, exactly, are you proposing be done?

 

You apparently do not want to address the elders of Israel saving the Constitution, and this is the second bombastic, arrogant reply that you posted. Congratulations! You are the first person to make it to my ignore list.

[Tony Frank]

Here is an old Ensign article on the hang by a thread idea. https://www.lds.org/ensign/1976/06/i-have-a-question?lang=eng

What do we know about the purported statement of Joseph Smith that the Constitution would hang by a thread and that the elders would save it?

D. Michael Stewart, Brigham Young University, Department of History The documents show that Joseph Smith did prophesy a number of times that the United States and the Constitution would be imperiled and that the elders would have a hand in saving them. The first known record of the prophecy dates to July 19, 1840, in Nauvoo, when the prophet spoke about the redemption of Zion. Using Doctrine & Covenants 101 as a text, he said, “Even this nation will be on the verge of crumbling to pieces and tumbling to the ground and when the Constitution is on the brink of ruin this people will be the staff upon which the nation shall lean and they shall bear the Constitution away from the very verge of destruction.” (Joseph Smith Papers, LDS Church Historical Archives, Box 1, March 10, 1844.)

There are also other documents in Church History files that show that five different early Saints recorded some remarks by the Prophet Joseph Smith on this same prophecy, perhaps voiced by the Prophet a number of times in a number of ways after 1840. Parley P. Pratt wrote in 1841 that the prophet said, “The government is fallen and needs redeeming. It is guilty of Blood and cannot stand as it now is but will come so near desolation as to hang as it were by a single hair!!!!! Then the servants goes [sic] to the nations of the earth, and gathers the strength of the Lord’s house! A mighty army!!!!!! And this is the redemption of Zion when the saints shall have redeemed that government and reinstated it in all its purity and glory!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” (George A. Smith Papers, Church Archives, Box 7, Folder 5, January 21, 1841.)

James Burgess related that the Prophet, while addressing the Nauvoo Legion several miles east of Nauvoo in May 1843, said that “the time would come when the constitution and government would hang by a brittle thread and would be ready to fall into other hands but this people the latter-day saints will step forth and save it.” (James Burgess Journal, 1818–1904, Church Archives, vol. 1—found among loose sermons.)

Orson Hyde recalled that the Prophet predicted that “the time would come that the Constitution and the country would be in danger of an overthrow and said he, if the constitution be saved at all, it will be by the Elders of this Church. I believe this is about the language as nearly as I can recollect it.” (JD, 6:150.)

In a Pioneer Day celebration in Ogden in 1871, Eliza R. Snow said, “I heard the prophet say, ‘The time will come when the government of these United States will be so nearly overthrown through its corruption, that the Constitution will hang as it were by a single hair, and the Latter-day Saints—the Elders of Israel—will step forward to its rescue and save it.” (Journal History, MSF 143 #28, July 24, 1871.)

Jedediah M. Grant, during the dark days of threatened invasion of Utah by a federal army, referred to the Prophet’s utterance as he addressed a Mormon Battalion gathering in Salt Lake City, February 6, 1855.

“What did the Prophet Joseph say? When the Constitution shall be tottering we shall be the people to save it from the hand of the foe.” (Deseret News Weekly, January 19, 1870.)

On various occasions, Joseph Smith referred to the Constitution, the country, and destiny of the nation; and there is clear evidence that he anticipated future peril. Furthermore, he pronounced the prophecy at various times and places. Perhaps he himself interchanged the simile “on the brink of ruin,” “hang by a brittle thread,” “hang by a single hair,” etc., to describe the anticipated crisis. It is also clear that the redeemers or rescuers of the Constitution were to be either the Saints generally or priesthood officers specifically.

Since no particular time was given for fulfilling this prophecy, members of the Church have often wondered about its timing. The prophecy clearly indicates a single, identifiable episode yet to come. However, it is helpful for us to constantly be on guard against threats to the central elements of the Constitution. It is not wise to sit by and think that the protection of the Constitution is the problem of someone else at some other time.

In support of this view of “constant vigilance,” it is most instructive to note that Church leaders have seen the Constitution imperiled a number of times. Brigham Young, reflecting on the prophecy of 1868, expressed: “It would not be many years before these words come to pass.” (JD, 12:204.) President John Taylor in 1884 declared: “It may be nearer … than some of us think.” (JD, 25:350.) President J. Reuben Clark, Jr., warned in 1942: “Whether it [the Constitution] shall live or die is now in the balance.” (Conference Report, October 1942, p. 58.)

Students of history and the Constitution know that the Constitution has been imperiled a number of times in its history and has been saved a number of times both by vigorous political action and by vocal public opinion.

Thus, rather than simply wait for the one time when the Constitution shall hang by a thread, Latter-day Saints must continually be vigilant. Our commission to save the Constitution is, like salvation, a continuing task, and Church leaders have pointed out the tools available: analysis of constitutional principles, personal study of the history of our nation, reading the Constitution to children at home and in schools, teaching them self-sacrifice—the principle that makes freedom possible—teaching them their obligations as mature citizens, recognizing and resisting ideologies that threaten constitutional principles, and developing loyalty to principle rather than to men or parties.

Politicians and statesmen must grapple with tough questions, painstakingly familiarize themselves with vital issues, and be decisive; but finally, an antidote to abusive government, to corruption, and to constitutional peril lies in private character. Humble people in prayerful homes will contribute immeasurably to a lasting constitutional government. And it should be apparent that consistent efforts in these areas will prepare us both to continually protect the Constitution and to prepare us for possibly a yet future rendezvous with our Constitution’s destiny.

 

Thanks!

[Kenngo1969]

You apparently do not want to address the elders of Israel saving the Constitution, and this is the second bombastic, arrogant reply that you posted. Congratulations! You are the first person to make it to my ignore list.

[jwhitlock]

 

I've never been called bombastic.

 

I'm jealous.

[Calm]

Well done.

[Calm]

I've never been called bombastic.

 

I'm jealous.

Pretty cool, isn't it.

[jwhitlock]

The NT is replete with exhortations on how to succor the poor.

 

Since TSk doesn't seem able to tell me where Jesus said that we need to "help the poor" (he used those words specifically in quoting Jesus), maybe you can tell me where it says that.

[jkwilliams]

I've never been called bombastic.

I'm jealous.

I am duplicitous and two-faced (aren't those the same thing?). Bombastic would be nice. I am sure Ken is crushed.

[Kenngo1969]

I've never been called bombastic.

 

I'm jealous.

"Learn from the Master, you must, my young padawan." 

[jwhitlock]

Pretty cool, isn't it.

 

If someone called me bombastic, it would replace "Creates Beasts Of The Earth" in a heartbeat.  Something like "The Bombastic One" has a nice, classy ring to it.

[Kenngo1969]

You apparently do not want to address the elders of Israel saving the Constitution, and this is the second bombastic, arrogant reply that you posted. Congratulations! You are the first person to make it to my ignore list.

 

 

 

 

I've never been called bombastic.

 

I'm jealous.

 

 

Well done.

 

 

Pretty cool, isn't it.

[Kenngo1969]

If someone called me bombastic, it would replace "Creates Beasts Of The Earth" in a heartbeat.  Something like "The Bombastic One" has a nice, classy ring to it.

I realize you'll probably conclude that "Padawan to The Bombastic One" doesn't have that same ring, but ...

[jwhitlock]

I am duplicitous and two-faced (aren't those the same thing?). Bombastic would be nice. I am sure Ken is crushed.

 

So, which one of you is posting now? 

[jkwilliams]

So, which one of you is posting now?

As always, the evil one, of course.