Category: Doctrine

Blogger had a big ol’ hardware failure yesterday. But their feeling much better today and, as a result, we are back up and running. Thanks to those who emailed with concern!

On an unrelated note, I am now the #1 reference on google for “Faith Promoting Rumor”. Yea for me!

I am being given a tryout at BYU this fall in the religion department. Good or bad, it won’t necessarily turn into a job, but it could. Anyhoo, I have been thinking over my BYU religion class experiences, what was good and what was bad. I had two classes from religion professors, two from a language professor, and two from grad students. My first class was horrible, my remaining classes were better, because I got better at choosing them. I think this is the general pattern of most students. The class that I didn’t like had a heavy emphasis on memorization and moralizing. The others focused more on doctrine and patterns within scripture.

The question is: BYU grads or current students, look back on your experiences in religion classes. What worked for you and what didn’t? Please don’t mention names (possible future employment is important to me), but feel free to share crazy stories. Besides, we’ll have fun trying to guess who your talking about.

This past Sunday, our stake high council speaker said something that struck me as interesting. I should be clear that I am not a high council speaker basher and therefore I will not point out that this is a rare enough occurance to warrant its own post.

Instead, I will focus on what he said, sort of. In the course of his sermon, he brought up the miracle of feeding the multitude. Generally, when people talk about this miracle, they talk about how many people were fed. This speaker chose to emphasize the small amount of food.

Consider at how little food there was. A few loaves of bread and a couple fish. The implication of the miracle is that the people ate their fill and, explicitly, that there was plenty leftover. In the Gospel of John, this incident precedes Christ’s declaration that He is the bread, that we must eat his flesh and blood.

Going Synoptic, we are the leaven. We spread through the dough, raising it (or filling it with hot air). The scriptures consistently teach that the church in the last days will be small, but widespread. The truth we bear (or that we embody) will be spread to the ends of the earth. Like bread in a crowd.

Some people have argued that the threefold mission of the church is impossible. We are too few to spread the gospel to all the world or to teach it to every creature. We are too few to even get everyone baptized who needs it. They are probably right. But we have a precedent. Few, in the hands of Christ, become more powerful than many.

Welcome to the crowd.

Inspired mostly by your comments on my Emma post, but also because I am curious to see if this will be the runaway win that I think it will be I offer you:

HISTORICAL MORMON SMACKDOWN!

This week’s contestants: Emma Hale Smith and Eliza Snow Smith. Which of Joseph’s two most prominent wives do you think is the most important historical figure in Mormonism?

Emma, first wife of Joseph, subject of D&C 25, mentioned a few other times in the D&C, struggled with and eventually denied the revelation on plural marriage, first president of Relief Society, stayed in Nauvoo and eventually encouraged Joseph Smith III to participate in the founding of the RLDS (Community of Christ).

Eliza, a plural-wife of Joseph (I don’t know the order), wrote poetry and hymns, sister of a prophet, eventually a (sorta) general Relief Society president (first Relief Society secretary), apparently was cool with plural marriage and Brigham, gave blessings and generally acted in a manner that would not be smiled upon today.

Please vote and help us decide this most important question.

In the past I have heard people complaining about “Theological Twinkies,” several of which I am sure you are familiar with. The idea being that these stories are beneath us in some way because they don’t come directly from the scriptures or because they are overused. For some reason, people who use these things to help themselves feel the spirit or understand the gospel are to be condescended to because they don’t understand just how useless these stories are.

While I appreciate the concern, especially when the twinkies are teaching something that ain’t doctrinal, I am somewhat disturbed about the dismissal with which we treat people who like these stories. There is an us and them tendancy here that I don’t like. Sure, we may be able to see the holes in whatever version of the “Bridge” story we are hearing for the twelth time, But that doesn’t mean that it isn’t spiritually moving for the person who is sharing the story. Sure, Pres. Monson might tell the same stories over and over again. But that doesn’t mean that “The Touch of the Master’s Hand” can’t inspire someone lost in sin to repent.

I suppose what most people find offensive about twinkies is that they seem to dismiss the complexity of the gospel. God had no choice because the train was headed for the broken bridge. If it seems tough, don’t worry it will be worth it. These answers have some explanatory power, but they can also some across as cheap sentiment; a way to convey an emotion without actually experiencing it. I am sure that when undergoing some trial, the last thing I would like to be told is that it will be worth it.

I am a big believer in 2 Nephi 31:3:

For my soul delighteth in plainness; for after this manner doth the Lord God work among the children of men. For the Lord God giveth light unto the understanding; for he speaketh unto men according to their language, unto their understanding.

As I see it, God recognizes that there are many different people and many different understandings of spirituality. What works for me, wouldn’t work for someone else and vice versa. Therefore, God can and will use twinkies to help those it whom it will help. I don’t think anyone argues with that.

Instead, my question is: does the identification and categorization of twinkies do anything but fan the flames of our own pride? While writing this I caught myself falling into the same “twinkie” them vs. “real-gospel” us idea that I have been complaining about. How do we account for people who approach God and the Spirit in ways that are foreign to us, in ways that we may consider beneath us? If nothing else, it certainly indicates that I (who cop to having this attitude occasionally) have got a lot to learn.

Finally, in the interest of full disclosure, I do like the occasional Michael McClean song (just to further establish my own hypocrisy in all this(and occasional poor taste)).

Career center creates competitive collegians

Ham-handed headlines heighten humor, as alliteration always ables absurdity

I don’t have a Benson quote for this post (although I did read Beware of Pride this morning and felt a bit like I do when I read Alma 5 (chastened)). Instead I have a concern regarding the usefulness of past prophets?

Why do we feel like we can set aside the counsel of past prophets? Admittedly, we don’t ususally look at things this way, but we tend to get so caught up in the interests/inspired counsel of the current prophet that we just don’t seem to ponder the former prophets like we used to.

Does continuing revelation make us a denomination that will forever be living in the now? Possibly.

And please, don’t talk to me about the “Presidents of the Church” manuals. I appreciate them (heck, I may actually love the things)). But the powers that be have sifted through all the prophetic material in order to find the stuff that the current president (and the guy in charge) think is important. I don’t think that we are always getting a representative sample of the actual concerns of the past president (which is fine, we shouldn’t necessarily expect the beliefs and problems of 40 to 150 years ago to match ours).

So, we get the following: President Benson’s concerns were (perhaps) inspired by a much more literal reading of the Bible than President Hinckley’s. President Benson’s rhetoric is therefore much more millenarian thatn President Hinckley’s. President Hinckley never explicitly says (nor implicitely implies) that President Benson was a wacko John Bircher (at least on the millenarian front). Yet, because President Hinckley’s emphases are elsewhere, we feel like we can safely ignore what President Benson had to say (or, at least, set it aside). So, we’re no longer millenarian (also, there’s the cold war thing).

Is this a fair description of the process? Is this appropriate? If not, what can we do about it?

Is there anything we do in an average Block meeting that isn’t to some degree the spreading of the philosophies of men, mingled with scripture? (Certainly that is what we are engaged in here on the ‘nacle).

I think that the sacrament doesn’t fit this category and in many cases prayer doesn’t either. Is there anything else?

Should something be done about this? If so, what could be done about this? Also, is this why people say that the sacrament is the real reason why me meet on Sunday?

Fourth Grade Teacher Apologizes For Joseph Smith Comment

And you thought Elder Packer was protective of Mormon history.

Is millenarianism dying the slow death in LDS culture? Jeff’s comment here stung me a bit, because I thought that I was just as millenarian as the next end-of-time freak. I admit to taking both a literal and an abstract approach to the Second Coming in part because, rhetoric aside, I am not terribly convinced that the end is all that near. But then, I read quotes like the following (from Pres. Benson, natch):

I testify that as the forces of evil increase under Lucifer’s leadership and as the forces of good increase under the leadership of Jesus Christ, there will be growing battles between the two until the final confrontation. As the issues become clearer and more obvious, all mankind will eventually be required to align themselves either for the kingdom of God or for the kingdom of the devil. As these conflicts rage, either secretly or openly, the righteous will be tested. God’s wrath will soon shake the nations of the earth and will be poured out on the wicked without measure. But God will provide strength for the righteous and the means of escape; and eventually and finally truth will triumph. (“I Testify“, October Conf, 1988)

Am I just clueless? Am I marrying and giving away in marriage? Is my lamp low on oil? Am I procrastinating the day of my (food storing/72-hour kit preparing/gold hoarding) until it is everlastingly too late?

Does it seem like the the Brethren have given up on this front? Sure there are usually one or two talks in conference that reference the Second Coming, but it sure seems like there was more emphasis back in the 70’s and 80’s.

Which brings me to my point: was modern millenarianism an LDS (or generally Christian) way of dealing with the Cold War? I am not saying that the Second Coming ain’t coming, but rather did the ratcheting up of political tension during the Cold War lead us to believe it was coming sooner rather than later. Hence the urgency that we had then, as opposed to the lack thereof today.

Would this explain why it doesn’t seem so important today, in spite of the popularity of Left Behind and such?

Or is this merely a matter of us having been duped into complacency by the International Jewish Conspiracy?