guy sajer wrote:Which, taken all together, makes somewhat ridiculous any doctrine that eternal salvation/exaltation requires that individuals, as wonderfully diverse and complex as they are, to arrive at a single pre-determined conclusion as to what constitutes "truth."
But we believe in absolute truth, and that a necessary element of real faith is familiarity with certain aspects of it. If you don't agree that's fine, but don't tell us what we're allowed to believe about the nature of truth.
I'm not telling you what you're allowed to believe. I couldn't care less what you believe.
I'm merely commenting on the unreasonableness of what you believe.
One difference between you and me, however, is that I have no expectations that one's eternal well-being is dependent on reaching the same conclusions about truth that I have.
But the conclusions that I push are the ones that the church pushes, not my own speculation and assumption.
Regardless of the source, they are still unreasonable beliefs.
That and the utter irrelevance of Mormonism in the grand scope of human affairs (one cannot overstate how comprehensively irrelevant Mormonism has been and is in the everday lives of 99.999% of humanity) should give someone as perceptive as you at least some pause in asserting that Mormonism represents objective truth in any sense, and it should give you at least some pause in asserting the justice of holding people eternally accountable for believing in it.
God . . . "who mouths morals to other people and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, . . . and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites this poor, abused slave to worship him ..."
for what it's worth, I agree (not surprisingly) with WK, Liz, and others that Romney has been quite dodgy in his responses to journalists. As to whether this is "lying," I think that's somewhat arguable and debatable, however I think there is no question that his responses have most definitely been deceptive, and have not provided anything even remotely resembling a clear picture of LDS belief. It seems clear to me that Romney is engaging in a sort of "politically correct" whitewashing of doctrine in order to aid his campaign. Either that or he is, on some level, embarrassed about the Church. In any case, this sort of "spin doctoring" has been going on for a long, long time, sanctioned for various reasons including "sacred not secret"; "milk before meat"; "I don't know that we teach that"; "we don't throw our pearls before swine"; etc., etc., etc.
guy sajer wrote:Which, taken all together, makes somewhat ridiculous any doctrine that eternal salvation/exaltation requires that individuals, as wonderfully diverse and complex as they are, to arrive at a single pre-determined conclusion as to what constitutes "truth."
But we believe in absolute truth, and that a necessary element of real faith is familiarity with certain aspects of it. If you don't agree that's fine, but don't tell us what we're allowed to believe about the nature of truth.
I'm not telling you what you're allowed to believe. I couldn't care less what you believe.
I'm merely commenting on the unreasonableness of what you believe.
One difference between you and me, however, is that I have no expectations that one's eternal well-being is dependent on reaching the same conclusions about truth that I have.
But the conclusions that I push are the ones that the church pushes, not my own speculation and assumption.
Regardless of the source, they are still unreasonable beliefs.
That and the utter irrelevance of Mormonism in the grand scope of human affairs (one cannot overstate how comprehensively irrelevant Mormonism has been and is in the everday lives of 99.999% of humanity) should give someone as perceptive as you at least some pause in asserting that Mormonism represents objective truth in any sense, and it should give you at least some pause in asserting the justice of holding people eternally accountable for believing in it.
The really hilarious thing is that we've got hardcore TBM Loran on another thread claiming that Mormonism is "objective truth" because it somehow totally transcends logic.
Mister Scratch wrote:for what it's worth, I agree (not surprisingly) with WK, Liz, and others that Romney has been quite dodgy in his responses to journalists. As to whether this is "lying," I think that's somewhat arguable and debatable, however I think there is no question that his responses have most definitely been deceptive, and have not provided anything even remotely resembling a clear picture of LDS belief. It seems clear to me that Romney is engaging in a sort of "politically correct" whitewashing of doctrine in order to aid his campaign. Either that or he is, on some level, embarrassed about the Church. In any case, this sort of "spin doctoring" has been going on for a long, long time, sanctioned for various reasons including "sacred not secret"; "milk before meat"; "I don't know that we teach that"; "we don't throw our pearls before swine"; etc., etc., etc.
The million dollar question is: To what end?
I ask you to point to one doctrine that he has explained incorrectly.
harmony wrote:No photos, no witnesses, no video, no nothing. And we're supposed to just take your word for it? (Do you ever listen to yourself?)
I should know better than to insist that Christ visited the Galilee shortly after his ascension without photo documentation. Thank you for clearing that up.
Just to add my own personal anecdote to the other topic being discussed here:
I asked my wife what her understanding was of AAA, the 2nd coming, millenium.
She said it was her understanding that Christ would return to AAA as part of the 2nd coming. I asked her about Jerusalem, mount of olives, etc. and she hadn't heard that part.
for what it's worth...
WK: "Joseph Smith asserted that the Book of Mormon peoples were the original inhabitants of the americas"
Will Schryver: "No, he didn’t." 3/19/08
Still waiting for Will to back this up...