[Roy]

I read in a book somewhere (sorry can’t be anymore specific than that) that qouted an old Apostle circa 1950’s complaining that the stipend he received from the church was a glorified retirement. The gist of it was that most of the “compensation package” was received in intangable blessings. Much can change in 60 years but that was my impression from that book.

[Roy]

Cadence wrote:

During tithing settlement the BIship as I knew he would told my family of all the marvelouse blessings assiciated with tithing. However since I knew this was coming I told him my take on it. I said I did not pay tithing expecting any kind of reward whatsoever. I simply paid becasue the church needs the money to operate and I attend church so I do not want to be a slacker and not carry my weight. In fact I told him that looking for a blessing for me personally was a dangerous thing becasue once there is an expectation of a reward I will most likely be disappointed when I do not recieve it. It is a dangerous thing I said to count on someting as intangebile as a blessing for tithing payment. I am much better off paying just becasue I wamt to help out. If some good comes from my donation to others so much the better. My reward would be to see others benefit from my offering.

This approch has taken the burden from my life of always looking for that reward for payng tithing.

As someone who had this very same dangerous and unrealistic expectation and had the rug pulled out from under me, I congratulate you on your more balanced perspective.

But I find myself wondering- If I wouldn’t approve of promised “marvelous blessings” as your bishop has done, nor would I approve of the “pay it or burn” approach of my bishop- Exactly what form of tithing motivation would I approve of? :crazy:

[Roy]

I just wanted to say that I really love the fair, articulate, and cogent postings on this thread. :thumbup:

[Roy]

Please do not confront him (even politely) in front of others.

1) I don’t think this would be good for your students. Maybe they aren’t ready to see differing interpretations, maybe it is the whole contention is of the devil 👿 thing.

2) From what I understand of church culture this might illicit a negative response from leadership. They might have been receptive to switching the bishopric member that comes to your class, or alternating, or having a Bishop refereed mediation about acceptable “diversity of opinion.” But after you make it more public, their collective back could be in a corner. Any concessions made then might be a tacit acknowledgement that Brother SilentDawning knows more about the Gospel than the Bishopric or even worse that many areas of the modern Gospel are speculative. 😮 :silent:

I urge restraint on this matter.

[Roy]

I would like to echo Bridget,

I too teach Gospel Essentials, but I do so in Spanish so it happens that there is less chance of interference. However, I am very empathetic to your situation. I don’t have any good answers but please know that I care.

[Roy]

cwald wrote:

That is assuming that JS actually had a visit. Even if we give JS the benefit of the doubt, according to JS own words, he had a “vision” which is very different than a visit, and that kind of experience would actually do this kind of thing that you described…(snip) …I believe JS did exactly that…he had a vision, and he used his prior knowledge and faith and reasoning to make the pieces fit in an attempt to make it all make sense. Perhaps in his mind he KNOWS — but that still does not make it factual. There are many people who claim they KNOW something and they actually believe they do on a personal level, but that doesn’t make it any truer or real .

You are exactly right but, you see, we are interpreting the accounts of people we have never met from a different time and we are using our own life experiences as a filter to understanding. However we view the first vision experience has absolutely no influence on what actually happened. Our doubts do not make it any less true or real. And what actually happened cannot be known (objectively) with the tools currently available to us. If God or an angel appeared to us to tell more, well that might drastically change our interpretation through new and added life experiences. But until then we carry on with the life experiences available to us.

Enoch wrote:

With Brian, I have to strongly agree that it comes down to what kind of truth you are looking for. Remember, for most of the world’s history people didn’t concern themselves with “what really happened.” Most people don’t even now, not really. How many people are aware that we constantly edit and spin our own memories?!

Enoch wrote:

I agree with you that agnosticism is not an oversimplification. In fact, think the limitations of our perception and cognition impels us to acknowledge we are all agnostics–just some more self-aware than others.

Old-Timer wrote:

DA, being open with the idea that one is making her best guess without really knowing is exactly what many agnostics would say they are doing – not denying either of the posibilities, but rather just stating their uncertainty.

If I was being a parser, which we all know I never do , I would separate agnostics into two groups: atheistic agnostics and deistic agnostics – obviously based on which way their tendencies lean. Do they think there probably is a God but just aren’t comfortable saying they know – or do they think there probably is no God but just aren’t comfortable saying they know? Either way, I’m fine with them identifying as agnostic.

I agree with all that has been said and liked it so much that I choose to quote it. I would only add that while being self aware of uncertainty is generally a good thing, dogmatically insisting that because we don’t “know” then it is impossible to “know” is not.

[Roy]

doug wrote:

I find it interesting to note the difference in people’s positions expressed in private and from the pulpit. In a perfect world there would be no difference (maybe). Why are we so afraid of offending one group, and not others?

Hopefully you weren’t too upset by your bishop’s public statements. I think I’d tend to put more weight on what he said privately, and not just because I liked it better.

What makes it all the more ironic is that in the tithing settlement my Bishop specifically referenced this disparity. He said that there was a lot of truth in what we were discussing and sometimes our expectations as church members on God and the church are not realistic. He referenced the SP’s wife that died of cancer after repeated priesthood blessings. He said that from his experience God will almost never intervene except perhaps to comfort your heart but not to change the outcome.

Then he said, “You will not hear this from over the pulpit, many are not ready for it. It would be like you (me) trying to explain these concepts to your five year old daughter. She wouldn’t understand and it would only serve to confuse her.”

I sometimes think that the brethren (GA’s) are in a similar position. That they may understand the various positions more than they let on but that to be explicit from the pulpit might do more harm than good. Perhaps the best course of action would be to speak in metaphors- as Jesus said, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

[Roy]

Everyone has a framework/lens/assumptive reality with witch to interpret the world.

doug wrote:

Agnosticism is the position that the true, ultimate nature of things is unknown and likely unknowable. In that sense, I don’t see agnosticism as an oversimplification.

Remember that having a framework does not imply oversimplification, but it is necessary simplification. The brain doesn’t like to process random pieces of data so it looks for patterns. If it finds patterns or narratives then much of the raw data can be dismissed. Sometimes it looks for patterns where there are none. Sometimes it superimposes patterns and tries to make the data fit. The idea is that everyone does this in every area of life and it is not a bad thing.

Doug, you state that the ultimate nature of things is unknown and likely unknowable and you are probably right from your perspective and framework. But what about Joseph Smith? Would a personal visit from God and Jesus change the “Unknown and likely unknowable” position. I imagine it would.

[Roy]

I believe the classic apologetic response is that an Omni-perfect God is still capable of progression and achieving greater glory through the exaltation of his children. He does say afterall, that his work and GLORY is to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man. And Satan 👿 is accused of usurping God’s glory/power with his alternate plan to exalt everyone. Perhaps the glory goes to the originator of the plan….interesting… :ugeek:

[Roy]

My tithing stopped after the stillbirth of our daughter a year ago. In my tithing settlement conversation I had a good talk with my bishop about my philosophical struggles.

I told him that in some way I felt that my past behavior was part of the premium payment for God’s insurance program and when I tried to file a claim I found that there was no safety net. He spoke about how God might almost never intervene in our lives except through feelings of comfort through the Holy Spirit. He spoke of rebuilding our mental structures by finding a stake in the ground that is still secure and working from there. I added that the new structure should be flexible, not rigid, to hopefully better withstand future troubles.

He closed by saying that I hadn’t said anything heretical (I think he was relieved because he hasn’t met with me in the last year and everybody knows something is up), but that he still had to work within the framework and so had to relieve me of my temple recommend. I felt like it went well. (I was mentally prepared for the TR removal part)

But then three days later from the pulpit this same bishop referred to tithing as fire insurance and stated that if we didn’t pay we would be burned at the Lord’s coming. This is because we have made covenants to pay and if we break those covenants we are considered “liars” (which apparently downgrades us from CK material all the way down to the telestial kingdom). :wtf:

1) I think this is just my Bishop’s opinion.

2) I think this is an example of our applied (or misapplied) theology being much more lenient to those not of our faith than current members.

[Roy]

Enoch wrote:

Roy, I take it by your careful wording that you no longer hold to this absolutist position? With you, I see the value (and also danger and offense) of such a position, though I no longer hold to it. And really, such an exclusivist position isn’t that satisfying.

I read your referenced blog posting and found it compelling. I think that the “fullness of truth” is a major strength (draw) for the church and is at the heart of the restoration message. I also think this emphasis on the literal reinforces the faith of many.

I might agree that this “exclusivist position isn’t that satisfying” but (as this site can attest) the loss of that position is anything but satisfying. The initial freefall from the all or nothing mentality is terrifying. There are often real consequences for our relationships to real people. After the initial shock, some move forward and struggle to adapt with varying degrees of success. If the safety of being a traditional believer isn’t truly satisfying, what is? And perhaps more important, can we get there from here :

Enoch wrote:

I prefer to see the Church as the “best system out there”

I too have thought this, but then I wonder- is it really? How would I know? What metrics am I using for comparison? If being a TBM isn’t fully satisfying and being a NOM isn’t fully satisfying, is there a better way? In the end, for me, it is just a mental exercise. Even if I had access to raw accurate data from different systems and I could trust myself to rate them objectively… the barriers to exit from my current system are just too high.

So in the end, I come back to doing the best I can with what I have and a feeling that most others are doing the same.

[Roy]

DevilsAdvocate wrote:

Personally, I think many atheists and agnostics will never see the light no matter what experiences they have. For example, if they see a ghost they will probably interpret it as a hallucination because that’s what they already expect to be the case ahead of time.

I think part of the problem here is simplification. We as humans tend to simplify the world in order to understand it. A billion random variables don’t sit well with us and so we come up with a framework to conceptualize it. I like the term “assumptive reality” for this framework because it self discloses that this framework is based upon assumptions. Having such a framework is generally required to be a happy, contributing member of society.

In your example the Atheist has an assumptive reality that assumes that ghosts don’t exist.

The religious or spiritual type may have an assumptive reality that assumes an afterlife and therefore a spiritual presence for deceased persons.

When the stock market goes up or down – pundits try to extrapolate a cause. If causes can be known then these things can be regularly predicted. Unfortunately so much depends on chance and that brings us back to the billion random variables. Even when we try to dissect what happened in the past economy- we can’t fully understand. We can so often only reach our best approximation (or even imitation) of understanding. How much less accurate are we at predicting these events?

If market forces and individual investor behavior muddy the waters of “cause and effect”, It gets much more complicated when we move back to theology and we attempt to understand our place in time, space, and relevance amongst a billion (or perhaps trillion, is gazillion still a word?) random variables.

If I have included generalizations/simplifications in this post- I can’t help it, my brain is just wired that way. We are prone to our weaknesses even in attempting to describe our weaknesses. :crazy:

[Roy]

I need to ponder more on this subject before I am able to apply these tendencies to myself. However, I am prepared to offer some observations.

1) I dated a girl in High School that had much bitterness against my Mom and the Church. I remember consciously avoiding talking about either to prevent negative comments. But to no avail, she would literally say, “If your Mom was here she would say {insert condescending judgmental statement].” I could scarcely believe that out of thin air she would conjure up my mother and imagine her to say hurtful things that would in turn feed the bitterness. Why?

2) I love what Bridget brings up about trying to act from a position of love. I need to work on that.

3) Finally, in speaking of communities – I have spoken to several persons in leadership positions in other churches that are quite envious at how much the individual LDS person regularly does for the local congregation. In visiting other churches (for various durations), I feel drawn to get involved (almost like having a calling). Additionally, I volunteer for the local Park & Rec. program and Children’s Pioneer Club. My LDS upbringing seems to have made me a better contributor to the community.

[Roy]

Or perhaps this may be your fall into grace….

I too welcome you to our little group.

You didn’t say much about your family and I can respect that. For their sakes, don’t make any sudden movements. Truth is elusive, but people are real – and some of them are depending on us to help them form their worldview or assumtive reality.

This reality (the assumtive reality) is not true but it is a necessary framework with witch to build happy, productive lives. As a father myself, I know that you want that for your children.

Again welcome :wave:

[Roy]

I remember a conversation with a non-Mormon friend some years ago. He was saying that the Mormon belief in being the only true church and the implications that other churches are varying degrees of false is offensive.

I replied that no offense is intended but to believe otherwise would “water down the religion.”

“A religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has power sufficient to produce the faith necessary [to lead] unto life and salvation” Lectures on Faith

To reduce the Mormon path from THE path to “a good path” would cut the heart out of the religion.

R. Bushman said something similar about downgrading the B of M to “a good book or inspirational fiction.”

I lived and defended this logic and I understand why it is so important to many today.

Truth is slippery and as you have already noted – what counts as evidence of truth changes depending on your confirmation bias. We as humans continue to search for meaning. Meaning in most cases cannot be proven true or untrue.

To say it another way, perhaps it is more productive to seek after meaning and worry less about truth. Meaning is more flexible. The meaning I find in my life does not detract from you or anyone else. In the end if I can have a meaningful life without ever figuring out the entire true/untrue dichotomy, it will still have been a life well lived.

:thumbup:

[Author]

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