lostinwater

Thank-you. Well, i'm not an active member. That aside, i guess i leave the second coming - if there is one in the sense that most members think of it - up to God. Because so far, i'm not sure i've found many ways worse to navigate one's life than working under the belief that the world is on the brink of ending. Not saying anyone else views it that way - probably, most don't. i get the sense that you are quite balanced in that regard - which is a good thing.

Yes, absolutely agree. And also, that we've been predicting the end of the world too. i used to think that was something that developed after the renaissance. But right back to the time of Jesus and even before - it was the same. Everyone was convinced the end was nigh at hand. "The world is ripening in iniquity." "God will come and cleanse all the evil people." All the apocalypticism in the Bible - we think they were talking about our times. But at least the more i read about it, it becomes more and more obvious that they were actually not talking about our times at all - they were talking about their own. i wonder sometimes what will be the thing that the current generation throws their scorn towards. What will cross over the next "bridge too far". The odds of it not happening again seem too small to consider.

Just my opinion, but i think that while God has not changed, our images of Him have. How much stock we place in the bible especially is something i find more and more odd as i study the genesis of the bible more and more. A book compiled from the writings of 3 dozen (and a handful more whose names we still do not know) highly superstitious ancient people whose cultures, languages, and contexts we can barely comprehend. And these books specifically were selected from a canon of a hundred or more ancient texts by people in the dark ages (with much disagreement in the process) who had some pretty specific personal agendas they were trying to accomplish. And when we superimpose our modern sensibilities and the full force of God's supposed Will on a book with such human origins - i think you have something that looks like a cross between a beautiful postcard and a train wreck. i really do think that one of the things (among many) that Jesus came to do was to repair the world's view of God, when it had gone totally off the rails. It's important to remember that anyone can preface their unique mix of biases, bigotry, fears, and astonishingly profound wisdom with "thus saith the Lord". To a degree, we're all still doing that today.

That's beautifully said. Thank-you.

This account by a man - i believe he is a member. Or at least was. He fell asleep at the wheel and his wife and child died as a result. He had a dream where he describes the physical aspects of his encounters with his deceased wife and child. Linked to around the right time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75n34-bKnAc&t=27m30s

+1 My sister separated from her husband after more than a decade and 6 children. Right up until the time the papers were served, there was nothing that changed. When they were served, there was a lot of gnashing of teeth and attempts to manipulate her back into the relationship. And when it became clear that that was not going to work, change ensued. i have a lot of compassion for the husband - he had a pretty horrible childhood and his family is still an unending source of drama for him. But i am not sure anyone is better for sustaining the unsustainable. Create something sustainable for you and your son. Then, it's his decision on how to react. Obviously, there's a lot of messiness and confusion in the actual implementation - and it's never easy to know what the line is - but i'd at least be moving in that direction, and then just/walk things backs slightly if needed.

Here are a few. But i am not trying to tear anyone down here. Just trying to stand up with @JohnsonJones - because i think he is absolutely right that the narrative on race has changed - a lot. And it's *great* that they have changed a lot. Abraham Lincoln said some racist things by our standards. George Washington bent over backwards to keep his slaves. People are more than the worst thing they ever said. FairMormon actually is one of the best sources for a lot of these quotes. They have their own interpretations/justifications for what was said, but at least they do quote a lot of the common ones. My ability to link to much else without getting it yanked is limited (understandable). https://www.fairmormon.org/answers/Criticism_of_Mormonism/Online_documents/For_my_Wife_and_Children_(Letter_to_my_Wife)/Chapter_8 https://www.fairmormon.org/answers/Criticism_of_Mormonism/Books/One_Nation_Under_Gods/Use_of_sources/Mormon_Doctrine_and_race_issues

Not at all. Mostly because i think you are a very kind and compassionate person who doesn't call things out without good reasons. But also because i've found it generally good for my health when i go out of my way to avoid challenges with anyone whose profile picture is a multi-ton boulder rolling down a mountain and crushing everything in it's path....jk

Thanks @Carborendum Nobody on this forum, actually. And i really appreciate you pointing that out. The caricatures go both ways (with many Christians being caricatured as bigots - something i find very untrue generally). It's best for everyone if we call all of the caricatures out as the absurdly inaccurate things that they are.

Just my opinion, but i think a lot of the fuel powering the strong rejection of homosexuality is based on the caricatures people hold towards those who practice it. Not the genesis of that rejection, but certainly a lot of the fuel. And those caricatures are getting dissolved quite rapidly - especially among the current generation, but in others also. It will be interesting to see how many religions (not just this one) react as homosexuality is increasingly normalized and integrated socially. As the fuel of revulsion and fear begins to run out. i'm not talking some much about this Church, but evangelicals more broadly. Personally, i am not sure this Church will ever be able to walk back their stance on homosexuality - even if they want to later. But if there's one thing i've learned about the gods many religions or even the bible claim to speak for, it's that they very frequently change their mind. And i'm not trying to put words in anyone's mouth. All these are just my observations - and i don't claim that they are anything other than that.

Thanks @Carborendum So this really isn't about trying to make a case for my interpretation of anything. i guess it's just my response to how i see the Bible being quoted (not anyone here specifically - though i've certainly been guilty of doing this in the past). And those points are just my attempt to provide a take-it-or-leave-it recommendation to look at the genesis and development of what is being quoted. If anything, this has been prompted by my own investigation and slap-across-the-face kind of surprise findings. i've spent most of my life having absolutely no idea on any of the points above. And that to me seemed almost mind-bendingly ironic given the amount of credence i associated with it. Anyways, i hope this wasn't take in the wrong light.

So this is not an attempt to tell people how to interpret things or to make a case for anything. But i'd really suggest that before anyone quotes a bible passage to prove a point, that they ask themselves: 1. Which of the Bible's 3 dozen or so known and unknown authors wrote it? 2. Was the person who experienced it the person who wrote about it? 3. How long after it occurred was it written about? 4. Who has copied it? 5. Who decided it should be included in the canon? 6. Who translated it into the language you are reading it in? (Recommend reading the Greek or the Hebrew). And then just remember that for much of the Bible, lifting a verse would be like lifting half a sentence from an unknown someone's personal journal/letters, that lived thousands of years ago, has been copied dozens of times, and then translated from an ancient language by someone who brought all sorts of personal biases to the interpretation, into a form that barely beat out the hundreds of other similar texts that came awfully close to making into the canon. i mean, because if we're lifting verses, we may as well lift the gems like Psalms 137:9, too. i get that people give credence to more modern day sources, and if you do that, that's fine. That's not really something that can be objectively argued for, or against. But at least for the Bible, i think it's worth the time to think about things like this. And i've got to give credit to @marge for all the links. She is nothing short of a Biblical Scholar - though i don't want to infer that she agrees with anything i say or believe.

i have found that for just about anything that really matters in life, it's my heart that has to change, not my mind. My mind just makes up intellectual justifications for how i feel about something. So i guess keeping an open mind is secondary to keeping an open heart. And that i think is manifested in how you treat someone who disagrees with you. And i think all of us can change how we feel about something. i've sure done some 180 degree turns in life - and i'd have sworn until i was blue in the face that *i* never would change. Someone is completely against homosexuality until their sibling comes out. Someone believes everyone with gender dysphoria are mentally ill sociopaths who are running around suing everyone until one of their closest friends reveals what they've been feeling for the past many years. People believe in God until they accidentally run over their child when backing out of the driveway, or see their family nearly starve to death because it hasn't rained enough for the past 3 years. Or lose a daughter to suicide, having received no prompting to get up and check on them. Or someone is against all gun control, until their child gets murdered.

i think this is largely true. From what i've observed, there are very few people who are gay that can stay emotionally healthy as members. Exceptions? Certainly. A lot? No, i really don't think so. And from what i've heard from sources i can't quote here is that there is a bit of a revolving door of people who are used as mascots of healthy gay members (with the best of intentions) - giving people completely unrealistic expectations. Just my opinion, of course. And again, i'm not pointing fingers. Not demanding change. If the policies stay the same, fine! If a gay person does well as a member, great! Go for it. But to force it - and continue to force it. i don't think you help the person, members, or please God. Though honestly, i wonder sometimes if any one of those three people are even on the radars of the most outspoken activists on either side. Usually, it's all about the evil other that has got to come around to another way of seeing things. Shame, really, because there's quite a lot of beauty on both sides.

Thank-you. Fair points. No, you aren't heartless. There's more to one side than a coin, and i readily acknowledge that. Just expressing an alternative point of view. i tend to think that is not what my brother was thinking or wanting, but i can't imagine disagreeing would do any good.

My brother has 6 kids and is self-employed. i think he has catastrophic health coverage, but he has more than enough liability before all that kicks in to put him back financially for a decade or more. A staunch republican (or was, before Trump), he told me once that his view of things changed radically one night when his child was sort-of ill and he had decide whether to go into the emergency room or not, knowing that he didn't have enough money to pay. i'm for universal healthcare in theory. There are quite a few nations where the citizens report overall satisfaction with their universal healthcare. However, In practice in the US, i'm not sure. i have a feeling like universal healthcare may work as well here as democracy does in Iraq. The theory is great (even ideal), but without people accustomed to the processes (something that takes a very, very , very long time), things don't work very well. i work with many people from India, and they express amazement that people actually follow the traffic rules here. That most people don't just blow by red lights. But it all only works if everyone following the rule is as much cultural as it is legal. Our hybrid system is an expensive monster. But it's moderately monstrous to most of both sides - rather than entirely demonic to one or the other. There are lots of outliers though - and i know those people really are destroyed financially by it. i tend to think the maxim that "For every problem there is a solution that is simple, neat—and wrong." applies here.

It also appears he fought a city council who weren't fond of him re-naming his kids to be "Rolls" and "Royce". It almost sounds like his pushing this has less to do with him getting something for himself and more just wanting to mock a group of people he considers to be insane. Maybe i'm misreading that though. Regardless of the motive, he has a right to do whatever he wants. It's sad that so many more reasoned voices get drowned out in click-baitable exceptionalism like this. Am i the only person who knows people who are transgender that are not looking to yank the tablecloth out from under society's supper to keep themselves warm? C'est la vie

Thank-you. Sounds like you'd be fine having this question asked of you - even in the context of determining your safety around children. And that's fine! From what i've seen, a lot of other people wouldn't and would respond accordingly. Some questions are 'loaded' - especially depending on the nature of the relationship they are being asked in, and under what pretext the person asking wishes to know the answer. Anyways, that's all i was trying to say.

i think others could understand @marge's point of view a bit better if they were to ask themselves a question like whether or not it is appropriate for a woman to ask a man she was dating sort of seriously who had served in war if he had ever killed someone - and if yes, explain the how, and the why, and where, etc.,. And maybe under the pretext that she needed to know this information to see if the man could be trusted to correctly discipline any potential children that might come along. People have a right to ask such questions - but i wouldn't be too surprised if the person you are asking feels deeply hurt by them, and responds in a way that reflects that hurt.

Thankfully, the people who wouldn't, almost always won't. Better for everyone. But perhaps everyone should substitute soldiers in war, or those who administer the death penalty, consider why their answers may be different, while remembering just what a broad range of motives get covered up by a society's near unilateral justification or lack thereof.

Amazing travel blog, @Scott At the rate you are going, i think you are going to run out of mountains. i enjoy hiking, but what you do takes it to a whole new level. Close to 100 summits a year!

Just that it had the PG rating label. i was too focused on the label and how that label related to who i thought i was and who i thought i needed to be to look past it. Really, i guess that was the problem.

Funny you should mention walking out for PG movies. i actually would ask the teacher or substitute to leave class whenever a PG movie was shown. had a band teacher that was rather fond of Mr Holland's Opus and Forrest Gump - and i spent more than a few days red-faced in the library because of those movies. i actually believed that my staying and watching them was a moral failing. No doubt, i came across as a very self-righteous prick. In reality, i was just horribly embarrassed. The subtle differences between word sets like law and justice, knowledge and wisdom - seem to all point to some kind of an inner acknowledgment that the hard and cold facts have to be fed through something else that is so complex and nuanced that it cannot be fully written or delineated - to make them come out more reasonable. i think each of us interprets the so-called cold and hard facts in a way that let us survive without going crazy. It's probably better to just validate them and show genuine interest in their point of view, and then be kind and live yourself in the way you believe. Anything else usually ends up being something their subconscious is blocking out because they simply can't deal with it then, or things that just convince them that you (and by extension your point of view) is mean, cruel, unreasonable, and every other negative term available - and fully deserves to be summarily rejected. Perhaps let God do the changing, and just try and create a loving environment in which change can happen. And then perhaps be a little more ready to doubt that we, ourselves, with 1 out of 7-billionth part of the total experiences in this world right now, actually know what ought to be changed for anyone other than ourselves. Or if you want to feel what i am trying to say, watch the Bells of St Mary's....

This is a topic of great interest to me, of late. i just finished a biography on Paul of Tarsus by NT Wright. Very interesting listen. Highly recommend. i'm becoming more and more convinced that our religious texts are not unlike the people in religions, or even religions themselves. Imperfect but very powerful tools. And that the tools are *very* easy to misuse. That when we superimpose our modern sensibilities upon words whose meaning has been largely obfuscated by differences in culture and context - and then fed through the translation meat grinder a few times - that maybe we need to be a little more humble in the way we decide what was meant. i don't know that i can look at the bible in a binary true/false way any more. The whole thing came from dozens of difference sources. And those sources were just as confused about how they got their revelation as we are about how we get ours. That there are a lot of theological disagreements running through the text because different people who disagreed with one another wrote different parts - and that we are still confused now, because there wasn't consensus then. Many of the books, we still aren't sure even who wrote them. There is pretty wide consensus from what i've seen that at least some of the letters attributed to Paul (the one we know) - weren't actually written by him. And then it was a rather conflicted group of bickering churchmen that decided which ones should or should not be included in our popular canon. Anyone who struggles with the blood-soaked passages of the OT, i'd highly recommend going through a lot of the history of the books themselves. Lots of difference sources - take no single person's interpretation as fact. It's helped me a lot. i can view the things that just seared my conscience in a much more compassionate light - and see that God was still having to work through some amazing but still deeply flawed people thousands of years ago - just as He has to today. And that many of those flaws made it into the Bible Yes, this is all just my opinion - and of no more worth than any of the other 7 billion plus opinions floating around.

Thank-you. Fair enough. i have a feeling like arguing with you in any way, shape, or form wouldn't do any good. Though you know, i felt very much similar to you once. i *knew* - objectively *knew* i was right. That "those people" and "their filthy despicable lifestyle" was wrong. That they were trying to spread their lifestyle, and had to be stopped, put down, silenced. But God has a way of cutting a person down to size - and that's certainly what happened to me. i'm not saying that there aren't some really horrible situations involving same-sex marriage. There are. i'm not saying there aren't people who are missionaries of the same sex lifestyle and who push it in every way they possibly can - to entirely inappropriate audiences. There are. But i've believe that no ideology or group of people have a monopoly on stupidity, overly aggressive marketing, extremism, hypocrisy, and bigotry. And that the quickest way to losing your ability to love someone is to generalize them to whatever concepts we have about their "tribe". That's certainly what i had done. i had grabbed a giant brush and painted a scarlet letter on the chests of millions of individuals, and so felt entirely justified to spew forth my self-righteous indignation - never once considering that my fiery rhetoric was likely pushing many into the dark and hopeless corners which i was only too happy to condemn them for inhabiting. Or if not pushing them into, at very least doing a disastrously successful job of pushing them back into. i still wonder how many people might have actually believed i was right when i attempted to tell them how God felt about them and how they lived - when really, i was just telling them how i thought that God felt about them and how they lived. i pray that most were wise enough to ignore me. Looking back, the ones who were - they were so busy trying to survive and do their level best that even myself at the time would have had a near impossible time distinguishing between them and a Mom or Dad whose sister or brother respectively came to help them out take care of the kids for a weekend. Anyways, i would recommend you actually ask some of these kids and their parents and observe them. Maybe each of you could teach the other something (because i think you have some valid points), and both sides would walk away a little better, with a lot less misunderstanding and mutual disrespect floating around. Seems like that would make the world a better place.