tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2730636855717448971.post4868365882570048677..comments2023-06-10T03:06:39.748-06:00Comments on In These Gay Mormon Shoes: A Lesson in Respectfully Stating One's DisbeliefJonathan Adamsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03888679384571699094noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2730636855717448971.post-31296158579427687332014-12-01T17:20:52.498-07:002014-12-01T17:20:52.498-07:00Good point Jonathan. Christ would recognize what ...Good point Jonathan. Christ would recognize what he sees in the church today in what he saw in the Pharisees. Just try asking or mentioning a non approved question in church and see what happens. Joseph Smith would have the same problem. He said the prominent difference between mormonism and other faiths is that they put down stakes and say go no further, something he didn't subscribe too. The church today has laid all kinds of stakes down. Just try going further with a non correlated question and see what happens. Where does the holy ghost have room to inspire in such a rigid setting? Billy Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13159664743535883163noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2730636855717448971.post-85196179748076924612014-11-23T11:58:11.335-07:002014-11-23T11:58:11.335-07:00Andrew- Thank you for that thought-provoking comme...Andrew- Thank you for that thought-provoking comment. I really enjoyed reading and thinking about what you said and am glad you took the time to write. I've noticed in the past how, within Mormonism, most people get wrapped up in the truth of the "Church" or of the "Book of Mormon" or "Joseph Smith." You can't really blame people- the Church itself sets those things up as the foundation of a testimony of the gospel. "Read this book. Pray about it. If you feel good, it means it's true. If it's true, Joseph was a prophet. If Joseph was a prophet, the Church is true!"<br /><br />But as all that comes crumbling down, people are left scrambling to pick up the pieces rather than realizing that their religion wasn't really connecting them to God... it was connecting them to religion. Christ indeed rejected the religions of his day and condemned religious leaders. It is interesting that we have built a model of Christianity that seeks to replicate the very institutions Christ condemned. Jonathan Adamsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03888679384571699094noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2730636855717448971.post-88639393588853336642014-11-17T21:50:48.018-07:002014-11-17T21:50:48.018-07:00What stands out to me in BYU roomates' letter ...What stands out to me in BYU roomates' letter is a recurring theme of the word "Church." He goes on to say "I believed in the church" and mentions that word several times. Notice how God is entirely absent from the conversation. It's all about the religious experience of the ward, and of a mortal man a sinner himself Joseph Smith. Faith in the church isn't going to be sustainable. Nor is faith in a mortal man. Getting folks to follow a ward, or a mortal man, isn't adhering to the great commission. The calling to follow Jesus Christ the living God who was, is, and is to come, is an entirely different matter, there are no pews involved in that. There are no talking points. There are no matters of belief. Regarding the spiritual battle of this world, the last three words of the most famous 'spiritual human being' whether you call him God or not were, "It is finished." Not, "it is finished only if you believe." <br /><br />As for logic and reason, everyone should read Immanuel Kant's critique of pure reason and then come back to the conversation. Logic is limited. Albert Einstein said, "The eternal mystery of the world is it’s comprehensibility." Charles Darwin said, “I regret that I suggested a theory, and that gullible men gobbled it up, as though it were fact. I never intended that.” Martin Rees a British astronomer said, “It looks surprising that our universe is initiated by a finely tuned impetus almost exactly enough to balance the deceleration tendency of gravity. It’s like sitting at the bottom of a deep well and throwing a stone upwards just so that it comes to a halt exactly at the top. That’s our universe.” Roger Penrose, also a British scientist philosopher said, "If our electric magnetic force, 10 to the power 36, was slightly different, life could not have evolved anywhere. With the Geodetic effect , Nuclear force efficiency - the amount of energy released from the conversion of hydrogen to helium 0.07% - if it’s changed by one or two percent, we don’t get carbon and ‘the bang’ goes out." This is all to say that the best and brightest minds of our time in unison all point to one similar pausing point. That there is this deliberate shadow behind everything that science has observed. <br /><br />Lastly, to say that men who drove planes into buildings had any ounce of spirituality, even in an a metaphor, is absolutely disgusting. Timothy McVeigh who blew up the Oklahoma federal building in 1997 was over taken by pure evil. The students who shot up columbine high school were taken by pure evil. The preaching of Fred Phelps was over taken by pure evil. The ISIS terrorists in Syria that beheaded 19 people this last week were taken by pure evil. Hitler's war on Jews was pure evil. If anyone says only a cult would call those acts evil, is not accustomed to reality. We live in world where evil is present. Certain aspects of the Mormon church are not except from that reality. Spurgeon a famous preacher once said, ""If your religion does not make you holy it will damn you. It is simply pageantry to go to hell in." This is not a literal quote, this does not mean you will go to hell if religion doesn't work for you. Spurgeon's point is, that if you got lost in religion, you may end up kicking God out of the experience all together and never truly had a hold of Him in the first place. It's true for many Christians today. Drowning in rituals. Isn't it amazing that this Jesus addresses this in his day, and that it is echoing all the way to today. <br /><br />Most merciful God, Give us true knowledge of other people in their differences from us and in their likenesses to us, that we may deal with their real selves, measuring their feelings by our own, but patiently considering their varied lives and thoughts and circumstances; and in all our relations to them from false judgements of our own , help us to be one people through all the seasons of life. Amen " ( ~ George Ridding 1828)AlwaysTheLovehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06759811035553104651noreply@blogger.com