Should Latter-day Saints be Concerned about "Christian Nationalism?" - Part II

[Dario_M]

14 hours ago, The Nehor said:

The United States.

Yes the US. 🇺🇲

[Tacenda]

On 2/12/2023 at 3:53 AM, Dario_M said:

Why has @Smac93 always such long posts? I can not read all of that dear Smac. I don't have to much concencetration. And my English is not so well. 

But on the other hand you make me super curious when i road your openings titel you know. Then i really wanna know what this topic is all about dear Smac. 💜 Can you help me a bit allong?  

Btw i am om church right on this momment. God bless you all dear folks. ❤🧡💛🧡❤🧡💛🧡❤🧡💛🧡❤✝️✝️✝️

Dario_M, I'm so glad you discuss on this forum! ❤️

Edited February 13, 2023 by Tacenda

[Dario_M]

1 hour ago, Tacenda said:

Dario_M, I'm so glad you discuss on this forum! ❤️

Oh my oh my....  

You know.... I can't even remember that i have wrote this. 😱 I am absolutely not joking. I can not remember this. Now i read this back then i see that i have written this on Yesterday. While i whas in church. 

When i am going to a place where there are a lot of people who i know and i wanna make a good impression on them (like on a party or a church service or...well ..whatever place you can think about of, bevore i am going i take a dubbel dose of my medicine. It works good. But 1 of the side effects is that it makes me forgot 40% (or so) of everything that have happend on that moment later on. 

Oh my.... it's kinda a shock to read this back actually. I hope i haven't offended Smac. 💜

For the rest i had an amazing church service yesterday though. ✝️ It whas really nice. 

Edited February 13, 2023 by Dario_M

[Teancum]

On 2/12/2023 at 8:12 AM, Scott Lloyd said:

I firmly and unabashedly hold to those beliefs. If that alone constitutes being a “Christian nationalist,” you can add my name to the roster. 
 

I believe we should join with good people everywhere in resisting any movement to marginalize Judeo-Christian values in our society. 

THere is a difference between moving away from Judeo Christian values and shoving them down someone's throat.

[Calm]

3 hours ago, Teancum said:

THere is a difference between moving away from Judeo Christian values and shoving them down someone's throat.

Maybe you mean “resisting moving away from…”?

[Scott Lloyd]

On 2/12/2023 at 7:25 PM, Peacefully said:

Should our laws be based on both Jewish and Christian values or am I misunderstanding? Also, which Christian values? My upbringing was in Church of Christ which in some ways is much stricter than the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I’m not sure you would want our laws based on the beliefs of the C ofC. I think we need to define which Judeo-Christian values we are talking about. 

I didn’t invent the term Judeo-Christian values/ethics. It has been widely used in public discourse for the better part of a century. I use the term in its normative sense to mean the morals and values shared by the two world faiths, Judaism and Christianity. 
 

Rather than go into it at length, I’ll cite this Wikipedia entry:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judeo-Christian_ethics

Edited February 14, 2023 by Scott Lloyd

[sunstoned]

I'm all for Judeo-Christian values and ethics.  Taken in the broad sense (other than perhaps the label) most good peoples of the world follow them in some form or another regardless of the religion they hold. The disconnect with Christian-Nationalism is that it is not alined with many of those values. Starting with Judge not less you be judged. 

[Teancum]

13 hours ago, Calm said:

Maybe you mean “resisting moving away from…”?

Here is what @Scott Lloyd said:

Quote

I believe we should join with good people everywhere in resisting any movement to marginalize Judeo-Christian values in our society. 

He said we should resist marginalizing, or moving away from Judeo Christian values.  So ok. There is a big difference between resisting such and shoving it down their throat.

[smac97]

On 2/13/2023 at 8:27 AM, Dario_M said:

Oh my oh my....  

You know.... I can't even remember that i have wrote this. 😱 I am absolutely not joking. I can not remember this. Now i read this back then i see that i have written this on Yesterday. While i whas in church. 

When i am going to a place where there are a lot of people who i know and i wanna make a good impression on them (like on a party or a church service or...well ..whatever place you can think about of, bevore i am going i take a dubbel dose of my medicine. It works good. But 1 of the side effects is that it makes me forgot 40% (or so) of everything that have happend on that moment later on. 

Oh my.... it's kinda a shock to read this back actually. I hope i haven't offended Smac. 💜

For the rest i had an amazing church service yesterday though. ✝️ It whas really nice. 

Nope.  I am not offended at all.  I tend to write more because I want to explain not only what I think/believe on a given topic, but also why.  

Thanks,

-Smac

[Calm]

8 minutes ago, Teancum said:

Here is what @Scott Lloyd said:

He said we should resist marginalizing, or moving away from Judeo Christian values.  So ok. There is a big difference between resisting such and shoving it down their throat.

I agree. But you left out “resisting” in your comment and made the therefore odd and obvious comment about there being a difference between moving away and shoving down the throat.  It felt awkward enough that I, having nothing else to do in that moment, decided to point out the essential missing element. Now in the light of day, that seems very unnecessary. 

[LoudmouthMormon]

Hm.  Can I still support our missionary effort and hope and pray for the gospel to roll across the entire planet where all peoples will hearken to the message and everyone will bend their knee to the Savior and enter the waters of baptism, without being considered a Christian Nationalist?

I mean, I don't think it'll happen, at least not in my lifetime, but I hope/pray/support missionaries.

As for this stuff:

Quote

• The U.S. government should declare America a Christian nation.
• U.S. laws should be based on Christian values.
• If the U.S. moves away from our Christian foundations, we will not have a country anymore.
• Being Christian is an important part of being truly American.
• God has called Christians to exercise dominion over all areas of American society.

It would seem logical that once everyone is a baptized member of the church, everyone would be ok with most of that.  But not until that happens.  It's not like I want to pass laws that make people Christian.

 

Kind of like when people extoll the virtues of communism expressed in StarTrek, and I say "I'll be more than happy to give up capitalism as soon as we reach a post-scarcity economy based on magic boxes that make stuff for free."  I mean, it's ok to dream, but I don't want anyone to send me to a gulag, and I don't want to trample over any nonChristian rights or the constitution.

Edited February 14, 2023 by LoudmouthMormon

[Dario_M]

2 hours ago, smac97 said:

Nope.  I am not offended at all.  I tend to write more because I want to explain not only what I think/believe on a given topic, but also why.  

Thanks,

-Smac

Yes Smac but keep in mind that i whas not fully aware on the moment i wrote that down. Normaly i woulnd't be such a jerk you know. I feel quite ashamed. ☺

[smac97]

3 minutes ago, Dario_M said:

Yes Smac but keep in mind that i whas not fully aware on the moment i wrote that down. Normaly i woulnd't be such a jerk you know. I feel quite ashamed. ☺

No need for any of that.  Online communications can be easily misunderstood.

Thanks,

-Smac

[Dario_M]

2 hours ago, smac97 said:

No need for any of that.  Online communications can be easily misunderstood.

Thanks,

-Smac

How nice of you that you are so understanding about this matter. 

God bless. ✝️

Edited February 14, 2023 by Dario_M

[The Nehor]

9 hours ago, LoudmouthMormon said:

It would seem logical that once everyone is a baptized member of the church, everyone would be ok with most of that.  But not until that happens.  It's not like I want to pass laws that make people Christian.

 

 

You may not be cut out for Christian Nationalism then.

[Tacenda]

Listening to this, should be interesting.

https://radiowest.kuer.org/show/radiowest/2023-03-23/defining-christian-nationalism

[smac97]

3 hours ago, Tacenda said:

Listening to this, should be interesting.

https://radiowest.kuer.org/show/radiowest/2023-03-23/defining-christian-nationalism

As I noted in the OP:

Quote

The percentage of Latter-day Saints designated as "Adherents" {of 'Christian Nationalism'} is one of the lowest in the list of religious groupings, and less than half (5%) of the average of the groupings overall (11%).

So the lion's share is in the "Sympathizers" category (33%).  Let's take a look again at the five statements used in the survey to measure "Christian Nationalism":

1. The U.S. government should declare America a Christian nation.
2. U.S. laws should be based on Christian values.
3. If the U.S. moves away from our Christian foundations, we will not have a country anymore.
4. Being Christian is an important part of being truly American.
5. God has called Christians to exercise dominion over all areas of American society.

I would be surprised to see Latter-day Saints affirming or favoring #1, #4 and #5.

I think Latter-day Saints may be more likely to affirm #2 and #3, largely due to "Christian values" being viewed generally as synonymous with what could be called "moral values."
...
Gotta love the gloss that the Trib puts on this.  The "sympathizers/adherents" totals for the above groups are:

• White Mainline Protestants: 33% / 65%
• Catholics (White) : 30% / 68%
• Catholics (Hispanic) : 23% / 76%
• Jews: 7%: 92%
• Members of other non-Christian faiths: 11% / 88%
• Unaffiliated Americans: 7% / 92%

The "Sympathizers/Adherents" versus "Skeptics/Rejecters" totals for the Latter-day Saints are 38% and 60%.  That is, we are one of the groups with "{m}ajorities ... {who} reject or mostly reject Christian nationalism," yet the Trib lists these groups as being "on the other hand" from the Latter-day Saints.

Nevertheless, the Church should continue to speak against the problematic aspects of philosophies like Christian Nationalism.

Thanks,

-Smac

[The Nehor]

32 minutes ago, smac97 said:

Nevertheless, the Church should continue to speak against the problematic aspects of philosophies like Christian Nationalism.

What are the non-problematic aspects?

[jkwilliams]

For some reason, this little video reminded me of this thread. Yikes.

 

[Pyreaux]

On 2/10/2023 at 4:32 PM, Calm said:

This reminds me of a survey that supposedly showed that Saints were big believers in reincarnation (my guess is because of confusion over the Preexistence). I wonder how much of this is a different understanding of what is meant. I know quite a few Saints who use Christian and Christlike interchangeably in casual conversation, for example.  Or “Christian” is so generalized for them they ‘hear’ “moral”, though if asked for clarification they don’t believe that the only moral way of life is the Christian one. They just haven’t needed to apply it to a different context. 

Aye, often I'm describing the Pre-Mortal Existence, some will think I'm talking about Reincarnation, "we existed before we were born'", or even "pre-incarnation". There are plenty of areas where our religion can be misunderstood.

There are several Book of Mormon passages about the Nephite land as a holy land maintained by principles of righteousness or else doom. Some could mistake that with the whole western hemisphere or US particularly, as unofficially, but in reality, a "Christian nation" or a sacred land, and it ideally should be (as the constitution is) based on "Christian values", including freedom, and to depart from them could lead to our country's doom, by virtue of its practical consequences, if not by divine decree.

Though, whatever sympathy we might have for some of these group's values, fortunately the Bishop's questions are against affiliation with other groups that go soundly against any one of our own values. White Christian Nationalism doesn't and never will make the cut. We've never been anti-religious freedom for other faiths, being on the receiving end too often. And we're not so much on board with the notion that its fate that Christians should have dominion over all areas of American society, at least not before the Millenium. We US LDS love our country, we're patriotic, though the church itself is more of a global, "stakes of Zion"-holy land these days.

Edited March 30, 2023 by Pyreaux

[Tacenda]

Ted Koppel was interviewed by Sean Hannity recently and his last statement was priceless and very true, was telling Sean this: "You have attracted people who have determined ideology is more important than facts."

https://www.tiktok.com/discover/ted-koppel-and-sean-hannity

Edited May 11, 2023 by Tacenda

[Damien the Leper]

The moment the US moves toward a theocracy and/or a theonomy is the moment God should burn the nation to rubble.

[bsjkki]

I don't think the Christian Nationalists would consider our church as Christian. We would also be on their figurative hit list. 

[The Nehor]

4 hours ago, bsjkki said:

I don't think the Christian Nationalists would consider our church as Christian. We would also be on their figurative hit list. 

We would be kept around until they didn’t need us anymore. After that the only question is if they burn us first or start with the Catholics.

[Hamilton Porter]

On 5/15/2023 at 10:08 PM, Damien the Leper said:

The moment the US moves toward a theocracy and/or a theonomy is the moment God should burn the nation to rubble.

That's the thing. The religious right always goes for shortsighted power grabs that end up turning people off to religion. If only they could see things the way we do.