Sorry, I realize it wasn't clear what I was referring to. You said your interactions with other theists who you disagreed with were "usually" unproductive. Was there an example that was insofar as you got them to change their mind about something in a useful way.
quote:Imagine a universe without natural processes, events, beings, interactions, energy? That is how I would have to imagine a universe without God. Or are you asking me to imagine God differently?
First of all, depending on your definition of "natural process" and "events" I can do that. (Actually, that particular set of criteria is pretty easy: just imagine a giant universe of lifeless architecture that popped into existence fully formed, and you're there).
I believe it IS possible that this universe is either a computer program or the product of a highly intelligent being's imagination. In the latter example, I am merely acting out the desires, either conscious or unconscious, of the imaginator, and whatever semblance of consciousness I have is borrowed from them). In both examples, the creator of said universe would be rather indistinguishable from God.
One I've accepted the definition of universe to include the possibility of "imagination" or "computer program," it's pretty easy to imagine alternate universes in which rules are vastly different. (I'd also note that I genuinely consider self contained computer simulations as well as imaginations to be "universes" of a sort. I'm also not sure that it is necessary or correct to draw lines that concretely divide one universe from another).
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quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: ... How is believing God wills something to be so racism? At the worst I could see it being a sort of tacit support of God's racist policies, but really what else can you do?
I think others actually covered the nonreligious angle. At risk of dog-piling, I would only say that even if you believe in a Christian god (or any god) that created racist policies and you follow them, that is basically a "I was only following orders" defence which is pretty weak.
We don't normally exempt the ground-level Klansman or apartheid-era South Africans who practised their policies simply because the head of their respective hierarchies decreed a racist policy.
I like how Douglas Kysar says it in Regulating from Nowhere:
quote: "Thus, rather than sublimate human agency to a standard of casual optimality, individuals must continue to navigate the world in pursuit of their own visions of human flourishing, attempting to do good, while plagued at every instant by limited information, limited control, and limited assurance of success for their chosen projects. They must recognize that no standard of normative ethics, however persuasively theorized, can eliminate the fundamental obligation to independently evaluate the variety of reasons that exist for choosing and acting at any given moment and, indeed, to be ready at any moment to generate reasons for choosing and acting that are uniquely their own.
No decision-making rubric can permit the individual to ventriloquize morality."
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There is no one example of a particular interaction that comes to mind as being production. I have a sense that there have been some cases where I have changed a mind regarding SSM for example, but mostly it is a more gradual process.
God is present in stone, air, water - the bonds that hold matter together. Asking me to imagine a universe with God not present in those things is asking me to imagine a different God. I could do that, but then we wouldn't be talking about what I believe.
Being indistinguishable (by us) from God is not the same as being God.
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My question is, is there a practical difference between believing in God as you believe it and believing that the stone, air, and water are simply stone, air and water with nothing particularly special about them. (Or at least, nothing special about them that suggests sentience). I'm not sure why asking you to imagine that requires you to imagine a different God before subsequently imagining that he doesn't exist, and I really don't see how imagining that rocks are just rocks is particularly hard, since you get to start with the knowledge of what a rock is.
I have no problem imagining a universe where God is present in all matter. (If we live in such a universe right now, I call that God evil, but that's a rather subjective word and not necessarily relevant to the debate at hand).
I confess I'm not having a lot of success imagining what it would be like to see the world in such a way that imagining a rock as just a rock IS hard. That IS an interesting exercise, but I really need a little more to go on than "it just is."
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Just want to clarify something on the whole LDS church and blacks in the priesthood- which actually doesn't make the church look any better, but I think is an important distinction. Denying the blacks was not doctrinally based- it was policy. Two apostolic committees were unable to find any actual official revelation saying that denying the blacks the priesthood was what God wanted. Brigham Young changed Joseph's Smith's policy on that (based on all historical evidence) because he felt like it. Everyone else went along with it. Why it took 2 research committees and then prayer and revelation and 150 years for people to realize this was screwy is something that church members should examine and come to terms with. We believe prophets are fallible. In an ideal world, the first time the priesthood was denied to a black man, everyone should have stood up and demanded the prophet get firm, thus sayeth the lord revelation. But they didn't and God often lets us make our own massive hurtful mistakes (free will and all that). So, while LDS don't like to talk about it, doctrinally and officially, we have never actually believed God does not want black men to have priesthood, just that 150 years of Church leadership didn't. God not racist, man is and God let it go (which gets back to the whole philosophical meta question on God why does God let bad things happen).
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The White Whale, I think that, even for theists, this part
quote:They must recognize that no standard of normative ethics, however persuasively theorized, can eliminate the fundamental obligation to independently evaluate the variety of reasons that exist for choosing and acting at any given moment and, indeed, to be ready at any moment to generate reasons for choosing and acting that are uniquely their own.
is still true. "God says so" is not an excuse.
Raymond, it is the idea of "just" that is the problem. Rocks are not "just" rocks, people are not "just" people, oceans are not "just" oceans; they are sacred. Imbued with the Divine.
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I really do not understand in the slightest see how that has to do with the question.
The most relevant comparison I can think of is that I actually cannot in good conscious truly imagine a world where free will isn't an illusion. Free will as a concept is inherently nonsensical to me. But I still have hypothetical conversations about worlds with free will because most people assume it does, and the fact is, even for me, it IS a convincing enough illusion that I can reasonably "pretend" to imagine it well enough for purposes of discussion. And even if I couldn't, I can file it away in black box that says "makes sense somehow" and then proceed from there.
Free will has the benefit of being a pretty convincing illusion, but honestly rocks being "just rocks" shouldn't be that different.
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Hmm...how to explain it better. For me to imagine a universe where God isn't present, I have to imagine a God that is different. Which I can do but then we are no longer talking about what I believe about God so I am not sure why it would be helpful. Do you want me to pretend to have a different kind of belief about God? I am willing to do that but, I think that it may end up being more confusing than anything else.
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I *think* I understand what you mean but I also think it's silly. Can you imagine ANY universe without God, or just this one?
I mean, I can imagine plenty of universes that include plenty of different types of Gods of various natures that are ostensibly identical to this universe. I really don't get this is fundamentally impossible for you.
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I can imagine all sorts of universes. To imagine them without God is to imagine, not a different universe, but a different God. God is not just the God of this particular universe.
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quote:Originally posted by Raymond Arnold: The most relevant comparison I can think of is that I actually cannot in good conscious truly imagine a world where free will isn't an illusion. Free will as a concept is inherently nonsensical to me. But I still have hypothetical conversations about worlds with free will because most people assume it does, and the fact is, even for me, it IS a convincing enough illusion that I can reasonably "pretend" to imagine it well enough for purposes of discussion. And even if I couldn't, I can file it away in black box that says "makes sense somehow" and then proceed from there.
Raymond, why do you think free will is just an illusion? I would have expected you to think the opposite.
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Were you always unable to do so, or is this a phenomenon that came about after you arrived at your current set of beliefs? Or did you always have your current set of beliefs?
When you read about the mythology of different civilizations (real or fantasy)... how does that even work? Can you not think about Greek Mythology without superimposing your definition of God on top of it? I'm not asking you imagine on a fundamental level that would have ramifications on your own beliefs, just on the basic level necessary to have a conversation. This seriously should not be difficult in the slightest.
Can I ask you to imagine a change in your belief in God to "a belief in God who is otherwise identical to the one kmmboots believes in, except there's one particular universe that he ISN'T the god of?" (that frankly should have been implicit anyway, but I'll spell it out if necessary).
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Unable to do what? I have told you that I can imagine different gods and different universes. We could certainly have that conversation but we would not be talking about what I believe. That is okay if you think it would be helpful as long as it is clear that it isn't about what I believe.
When reading Greek mythology (or other mythology) I see it as a record of an evolving human understanding of God and our relationship to God that has some truth and some falsehood. As I suppose someday people with a greater understanding will view our stories about our relationship with God.
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quote:Raymond, why do you think free will is just an illusion? I would have expected you to think the opposite.
Why? I'm curious what I might have said that indicated otherwise.
Basically, I believe either everything is completely deterministic (i.e. with perfect knowledge of everything and intelligence to analyze that knowledge, you can predict the future perfectly, including choices). OR, choices are random. If two people are physically and mentally identical and are raised EXACTLY the same way and exposed to EXACTLY the same stimuli, and they make different choices... what exactly does that prove? That people can mentally flip coins?
Either you're making your decisions based on reasoning and prior experience, or you're making decisions based on differences in your inherent nature (whether that nature is on the physical or spiritual level), or you're making decisions based on random chance. I honestly cannot conceive of what the word "choice" even really means, in a way that is actually meaningful.
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@kmmboots: I ask again, can you imagine a God who is otherwise identical to your God except not the God of one particular universe which follows the same apparent laws that ours follows?
I seriously cannot fathom how discussing the differences between a universe that follows your understanding and a universe that follows a different understanding requires us to not be comparing the latter to your actual beliefs.
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Sure. Why? I can imagine a God made of green jello. I don't know how it is helpful. I would just keep having to reiterate that it isn't what I believe.
But sure. What kind of God would it be helpful for you to have me imagine?
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I think I've specified it pretty explicitly by now what I'm asking. I'm trying to figure out whether you're just messing with me or not.
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No I am trying to be helpful. I just can't figure out what you are trying to get at or why. Generally, these kind of conversations end with the atheist participant asserting, "See how that doesn't make sense!" And I will say, "No kidding, but that isn't what I believe."*
Okay. So I am imagining a God who is not like the one that I believe in and is limited to one universe. Since immanence as well as transcendence is pretty central to my belief in God, what part of that should I limit? Is God still present in energy but not matter? Neither?
*And then the atheist will claim that I am not Scottish.
quote:Originally posted by scholarette: Just want to clarify something on the whole LDS church and blacks in the priesthood- which actually doesn't make the church look any better, but I think is an important distinction. Denying the blacks was not doctrinally based- it was policy. Two apostolic committees were unable to find any actual official revelation saying that denying the blacks the priesthood was what God wanted. Brigham Young changed Joseph's Smith's policy on that (based on all historical evidence) because he felt like it. Everyone else went along with it. Why it took 2 research committees and then prayer and revelation and 150 years for people to realize this was screwy is something that church members should examine and come to terms with. We believe prophets are fallible. In an ideal world, the first time the priesthood was denied to a black man, everyone should have stood up and demanded the prophet get firm, thus sayeth the lord revelation. But they didn't and God often lets us make our own massive hurtful mistakes (free will and all that). So, while LDS don't like to talk about it, doctrinally and officially, we have never actually believed God does not want black men to have priesthood, just that 150 years of Church leadership didn't. God not racist, man is and God let it go (which gets back to the whole philosophical meta question on God why does God let bad things happen).
I think Scholarette really explained this better than I ever could have.
I'll share a really good talk by a member of the church named Renee Olsen. She points out some of the same things Scholarette did. She is pretty humerous in some parts. She does not try to rationalize and explain away the stance the church took nor the members.
posted
I don't understand why you think I'm asking you to believe in a different kind of God at all. If I believe all matter is made out of atoms, by definition, but then I go and imagine matter made out of something else, I'm not changing anything about my definition of matter, I'm just imagining something else that is otherwise identical to matter so I call it matter.
I do get that your definition of "the universe" and "God" are fundamentally intertwined, but I don't get why imagining something that is otherwise identical to a universe but without God is an issue.
The answer to this question:
quote:Since immanence as well as transcendence is pretty central to my belief in God, what part of that should I limit?
is of course, "all of it," but I think that should have been obvious by now.
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Okay. An imaginary universe without God would - again - have nothing "in" it. NO matter, no energy. Or I could imagine that God is different - the sort of superman in the sky kind of god that I argue against - and imagine the universe the way you are imagining it.
Either one of those a helpful starting place?
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Or you could just imagine that there are two types of matter, one of which is defined as "including God as you see it" and one that isn't.
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Yes, remarkably like what I said in my initial post. At this point I don't feel like going back and reposting the actual question, since it looks like your version of God, matter, and "imagine" are all defined more for the purpose of frustrating atheists than for the purpose of actually building a coherent and useful belief system out of, and I don't feel obligated to do the work required to have a conversation about them. But if you feel like answering the question I originally asked, I would still appreciate it.
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re: atoms - depends. I can also imagine them made of jello. (For more practical purposes, let's say "small chunks of indivisible but jiggly material"). I can also imagine the ramifications of this: the whole world would be jiggly. Or I can imagine a jello world where the jello is so tiny and mysterious and bound by strange forces such that it's effectively identical to the real world. And maybe that's the world I live in. But if so, I don't care.
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DO you not yet see the problem with your original question? Which I did answer.
quote:what differences would you expect to see between a universe in which your interpretation of God exists, and a universe with no God?
quote:the obvious answer is that the universe wouldn't exist at all without God.
Since then I have been trying to get you to ask questions that actually recognize my understanding of God. It is like you are asking me to imagine water without hydrogen atoms but with something just like hydrogen atoms. BUt God is even more fundamental to the universe than hydrogen is to water.
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I started by trying not to put words in your mouth, because the answer that seemed most obvious is: "there is no difference." Which is all I wanted to know. You do not think God has interacted with the world in any way that we cannot explain via scientific phenomena that does not in any way hinge on God existing? Is that correct? If it's not correct, I seriously do not understand what you're talking about and you're going have to explain it without using the Socratic Method.
If my understanding IS correct, well, okay. I don't understand how it improves your life beyond what your life would be like if you just assumed these things all had natural causes and you had your own obligation to be ethical because being ethical makes the world a better place, period. As long as you're happy and not harming one, I don't care that much. If it actually DOES help you persuade people doing harmful things not to, well, okay. But since it hasn't seemed to work all that well anyway, it seems to me that "I want to believe things that I already believe are good. So I do. You should want to want to believe things that are not harmful according to my own definition of harm, and then go believe those things" is the sort of argument that a) probably will not persuade anybody, and b) reinforces habits of bad logic.
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A variant of the original question (which seems to be should have been fairly obvious, even if I didn't spell it out), is "what is the difference between what you believe and what I believe." I don't know if that makes your answer any different.
Edit: with (again, I think obvious) subtext of "I believe the world is a rational place, created and maintained by natural, nonsentient processes that have no vested interest in the human race."
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quote:It may not *guarantee* a superior status, but it sure as hell indicates one. Come now Blackblade, do not be so obtuse as to deny that excluding blacks from the priesthood, actively, imbued whites in the Mormon church with a superior status
I'm not being obtuse Orincoro. People keep trying to give priesthood a property that does not exist, namely, "If you've got it, you're a member of some super club that has all these benefits both physical and spiritual." I've never once thought or was taught that because I was ordained to the priesthood that I was better or enjoyed a higher status than those who have yet to believe. I've always viewed the priesthood as a responsibility and an authority. When you are in Utah, nobody asks if you are a member of the priesthood.
BB, I don't even know where to begin with you on this. You are determined to be right no matter the implausibility of your claims. It's frustrating actually.
This idea you have that the responsibility and authority of priesthood doesn't confer a higher status on those who can attain it? I don't know what to say, I call complete and utter BS on you and anyone who claims it not to be so. That's a claim in contradiction of every fiber of my reasoning. It simply does not hold. First, because if it were so, blacks would never have agitated for a change, but secondly because if it were so, you and every other white mormon would still advocate the exclusion of Blacks from your clergy.
Do answer me this: the church leaders must be priests, correct? And the church leaders, I'm sorry to take this as an absolute given, enjoy a higher status in the church than those who are not leadership. You might as well claim black is white as deny that- there is no institution on Earth in which that would not be true.
quote:
quote:It was *immediately* changed? It was changed 150+ years after the church was founded
That's not what I mean, what I mean was there wasn't a gradual shift in attitude amongst members of the church, and one day the pressure reached a boiling point and the leadership had no choice but to capitulate. Instead the prophet invited the heads of the church to discuss with him the issue, and after everyone concluded discussions, they prayed about it and all simultaneously came to the same conclusion. Even Bruce R. McConkie who had become the face of the idea that blacks cannot hold the priesthood wrote,
"There are statements in our literature by the early brethren which we have interpreted to mean that the Negroes would not receive the priesthood in mortality. I have said the same things. . . . All I can say to that is that it is time disbelieving people repented and got in line and believed in a living, modern prophet. Forget everything that I have said, or what President Brigham Young or President George Q. Cannon or whomsoever has said in days past that is contrary to the present revelation. We spoke with a limited understanding and without the light and knowledge that now has come into the world. We get our truth and our light line upon line and precept upon precept. We have now had added a new flood of intelligence and light on this particular subject, and it erases all the darkness, and all the views and all the thoughts of the past. They don't matter any more. It doesn't make a particle of difference what anybody ever said about the Negro matter before the first day of June of this year [1978]. It is a new day and a new arrangement, and the Lord has now given the revelation that sheds light out into the world on this subject. As to any slivers of light or any particles of darkness of the past, we forget about them. We now do what meridian Israel did when the Lord said the gospel should go to the gentiles. We forget all the statements that limited the gospel to the house of Israel, and we start going to the gentiles."
McConkie I do not think can be called a racist. He bore no ill-will towards blacks. He didn't backslide or talk badly about blacks or start a conservative clique in the church that felt we should go back to the days of them not having the priesthood. Sentiments like that have never existed in the Mormon church.
quote:And also, please, there is no possible way that there was no resentment against blacks in the Mormon church. There was. There is and has been resentment against most people in most churches, blacks most particularly and especially.
Yes there is a way. Despite your beliefs to the contrary, religion can sharpen people's virtues and eradicate their vices. Are there Mormons who have been racists? Of course! But racism has never been encouraged or sustained in the Mormon church, nor has it ever been given quarter. There was no reason to resent blacks.
BB: "It was prayed about and immediately changed"
me: "it was *immediately* changed?"
BB: "Well, it was changed after a long process and a building up of pressure until there was no possible solution other than to change it."
I suppose by your metric, the Berlin wall came down "immediately," never mind the 45 years of pressure leading up to that event. The problem here BB is that you are being terribly dishonest, either with us, or with yourself, about the intentions of your beloved church and the people in it.
But then, when I call BS on your claim that there was no resentment in the church against blacks, you admit, of course there are "individual" racists, but that the church is not racist. Hmm. IF the members are racist, and the members make up the leadership, and together they all make up the church... dot dot dot.
quote: Now either Mormons are extraordinary in that they have this ability to as a culture completely abandoned feelings and precepts at the prophets say so. Or racism was not a motivating factor in their beliefs regarding blacks and the priesthood and so doctrinally when the issue was clarified, there was no emotional baggage in the way.
False dichotomy. Option C: you are wondrously, enchantingly, breathtakingly naive about your church and your fellow church members.
When confronted with a century and a half of racist exclusionary policies in your church, you would rather believe that the church did it all somehow as if a racist thought or idea never flitted through any of its members' minds. As if they did it out a purely kind hearted misunderstanding, as if they invited blacks into their homes, poured them a cup of warm milk, and said, "Ah jeeez Mable, I wish we could give you the priesthood, but see the book says not to, and we need to pray about it cause aw shucks, we're awful confused!" And they *just* so happened to change that policy when it became politically inconvenient to maintain it. Riiiight. I was born on a Wednesday, but it wasn't last Wednesday.
I call total utter BS on that line of bologna.
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quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: Paul Goldner: A policeman has authority you do not, does that make him a better human being?
False analogy, there are more opportunities for attaining a higher social status in public life than in a church. Weak dude, weak.
If you were a cop and the other guy was a police lieutenant, then yes, he would be conferred with a higher status than you in the realm of policing.
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quote: As long as you're happy and not harming one, I don't care that much. If it actually DOES help you persuade people doing harmful things not to, well, okay
quote: I don't understand how it improves your life beyond what your life would be like if you just assumed these things all had natural causes and you had your own obligation to be ethical because being ethical makes the world a better place, period.
The reason is usually 'death is way scarier otherwise'
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posted
It's so funny to watch people having this conversation with Kate for the first time. It's like you can almost classify the Five Stages of Befuddlement.
Raymond: Kate doesn't believe in God as you understand the term. She believes in the Universe, and calls it God. This annoys pretty much anyone else who finds a need to use the word God. Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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quote:Either you're making your decisions based on reasoning and prior experience, or you're making decisions based on differences in your inherent nature (whether that nature is on the physical or spiritual level), or you're making decisions based on random chance. I honestly cannot conceive of what the word "choice" even really means, in a way that is actually meaningful.
Why are those the only three options? Why not a mix of all three, or more? Perhaps I make choices based on my physical nature which are guided by my lifelong experience and reasoning, but I may make different choices at different times based on the context in which I must make that decision or on the combination of choices I've already made to reach that point. Or maybe I'm tired and I make a choice different from what I might have made were I rested.
Personally I find the deterministic view defeatist and largely useless. It may indeed be possible to perfectly predict the future provided you could accurately and adequately analyze the entire universe, but as I find it unlikely in the extreme that that sort of analysis will ever be possible I don't see where that helps any.
And even if we did live in a deterministic universe, we must live as if we didn't, as if we were responsible for our choices and the results of those choices.
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Tom, I was really expecting one of you to have warned him. (I almost sent you a PM to come over and warn him.) See, Raymond, you could have skipped right to the "Kate isn't Scottish" part.
Also, not quite true. Lots of people use "God" the same way I do and Tom is leaving out the personal relationship/transcendent part.
quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: It's so funny to watch people having this conversation with Kate for the first time. It's like you can almost classify the Five Stages of Befuddlement.
Raymond: Kate doesn't believe in God as you understand the term. She believes in the Universe, and calls it God. This annoys pretty much anyone else who finds a need to use the word God.
But he could have been "the one."
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Orincoro: You're welcome to your opinions, but don't expect me to want to spend a lot of my time conversing on this subject if I don't feel like those I'm discussing it with are so utterly convinced I'm a charlatan.
quote:BB, I don't even know where to begin with you on this. You are determined to be right no matter the implausibility of your claims. It's frustrating actually.
I don't think I've ever been accused of this once in all my time on hatrack, and I doubt it's because everybody was just too polite to speak up.
quote:This idea you have that the responsibility and authority of priesthood doesn't confer a higher status on those who can attain it? I don't know what to say, I call complete and utter BS on you and anyone who claims it not to be so. That's a claim in contradiction of every fiber of my reasoning. It simply does not hold. First, because if it were so, blacks would never have agitated for a change, but secondly because if it were so, you and every other white mormon would still advocate the exclusion of Blacks from your clergy.
I'm not parsing this very well. For one, I can't know how I would respond were blacks still not allowed the priesthood because it was changed just a few years before I was born. I do know that when my church was supporting proposition 8 I didn't agree with the decision or support the legislation, it was a hard decision for me not because I thought I was wrong, but because I was unsure how my church was right.
quote:BB: "It was prayed about and immediately changed"
me: "it was *immediately* changed?"
BB: "Well, it was changed after a long process and a building up of pressure until there was no possible solution other than to change it."
I don't know how you are translating our conversation as such, it's almost the polar opposite of what was said. I never meant immediate as in when Brigham Young died it was immediately reversed. I meant immediate in that from my understanding there were not tons of discussions going on, or defections in the church, but rather it was a problem, the prophet prayed about it and *bam* immediately the policy changed. Health care in the United States would be the opposite of what I'm talking about. It was brought up several times, discussed for months, and years, killed, brought back, rinse repeat.
quote:But then, when I call BS on your claim that there was no resentment in the church against blacks, you admit, of course there are "individual" racists, but that the church is not racist. Hmm. IF the members are racist, and the members make up the leadership, and together they all make up the church... dot dot dot.
Alright, fine. By that definition Mormons are all racists, all sexist too.
quote:I call total utter BS on that line of bologna.
Your fun little farce of an option does nothing to further the conversation. If you think I'm a liar or hopelessly ignorant than we have no cause to continue discussing. I think it's regretful that to you what happened in the Mormon church is indistinguishable in terms of feelings to say what happened in the Southern states in regards to segregation just twenty years earlier.
I also don't believe you want my church to make decision you deem as correct. It doesn't make you happy, all it does it make you resent us more. Instead of appreciating an apparatus that does allow the church to improve and become better, you cynically call it power politics. As if Mormons are no longer willing to bleed and die for their beliefs, but instead are gutless cowards who practice their vices until they find it politically expedient to do something about them.
There's no, "I'm glad Mormons don't practice racist policies anymore." You just move on to the next perceived malicious belief while simultaneously railing on past mistakes. You don't want to like my religion, and you are unable to dislike my religion and yet retain respect for me as a person.
I know you're going through a really hard time Orincoro. Every time I'm on hatrack I think about your father, and wish I could do something to make your situation better. But instead I have to admit I have nothing you want. I want to be friends with you, because we do have things in common, such as music.
I know I'm trying to do a dance that is making me look silly. I don't agree with my church in regards to denying black's the priesthood. What I don't believe is that everybody in the church up until 1978 every time they thought about blacks at best poo poo'd them and at worst utterly hated them. Brigham Young evoked the name of God when he told the Utah legislature that blacks could not have the priesthood. Our leadership takes that sort of language extremely seriously. If you are going to change a policy like that either Young or Kimball has to be wrong, and that to me was the largest reason black's were not granted the priesthood. The church leadership decided Young was wrong, and hasn't looked back.
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BlackBlade, I think you are oversimplifying the history of blacks and the priesthood. There were numerous other meetings and apostles like Hugh B. Brown were annoyed at the waiting and procrastinating on the decision. My black lds friend, who did leave the church, did lots of research. Also, check out blacklds.com I think for some nice resources on the history from people who support the church, but still discuss the policy.
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quote:Originally posted by scholarette: BlackBlade, I think you are oversimplifying the history of blacks and the priesthood. There were numerous other meetings and apostles like Hugh B. Brown were annoyed at the waiting and procrastinating on the decision. My black lds friend, who did leave the church, did lots of research. Also, check out blacklds.com I think for some nice resources on the history from people who support the church, but still discuss the policy.
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@kmmboots: I knew that Tom periodically says "kmmboots is only not an atheist insofar as she calls the word 'atheist, 'Christian.'" So yes, I was reasonably sure I knew what I was getting into, but you had never actually explained it to/in-front-of me and I didn't want to be putting words in your mouth without having you explained yourself. I was hoping you'd clarify that in the first post rather than posting coy evasions for a page. Obviously you can define God and the Universe however you want, but if you're going to use words that are pretty much unrelated to how most people (atheist or theist) use them, I think the responsibility is on your end to, A) clarify what the words mean, B) acknowledge that you're using completely different words that happen to sound the same to avoid equivocating.
My bafflement wasn't (isn't? Still unsure) what your beliefs are, but why/whether you're deliberately being unclear about what you're talking about. The answer to my original question seems to either "nothing" or "there's a heaven in mine" depending on whether we're including afterlife as part of the sense experience, and you could have just said that.
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Blacklds is a really good website with some great research on the subject.
The article that I posted in my previous post from Renee Olsen mentioned Gospel music and she had made a joke about it. It kind of made me laugh a bit. I've met Gladys Knight few times and she has a choir group here in Las Vegas, and they sing LDS hymns in an upbeat gospel tempo. They began to travel a few years ago, so if you ever get a chance to hear them, you should.
Orincoro, could you clarify what you meant by this statement?
quote:
And the church leaders, I'm sorry to take this as an absolute given, enjoy a higher status in the church than those who are not leadership.
My father is the bishop of his ward, and before he was asked to serve as bishop he hoped he wouldn't. LDS church leaders are not paid, but are expected to care for the well being of all the members residing in the ward / stake/ area/ church they are responsible for.
Church leaders don't get any status, special privledges, pay, or anything for that matter. What my father HAS received for being a bishop includes: Headaches, colds, loss of sleep, loss of time with his family, etc. He does it because he was asked to, and because he genuinely loves the people in the ward and their well being.
I suppose people will call him bishop even after he is released (He's been bishop for about 6 years now) but that isn't something that he or any Bishop really cares about.
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Honestly, Raymond, I answered your questions as best I could given that the questions assumed things that aren't true. And I tried to explain that. My definition of God is hardly unique even among Christians. Buddhists, Hindu, Native American spirituality, the Sufi form of Islam all have elements of a similar idea of God. Look up "panentheism". It will give you at least a starting place.
"Heaven" is almost as problematic a term as, for me, it is a condition of being in relationship with God rather than a place in the sky with pearly gates and dead relatives. So, no, I could not have answered your question that way. Nor do I believe the answer is "nothing".
I am not being deliberately obtuse, but these are big complicated things and I won't warp them (and thereby give wrong information) by simplifying them.
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On any other day I would have found the exchange amusing. Today I really shouldn't have been on Hatrack at all (homework to finish) so it ended up feeling like wasted time, but that was my fault.
I do realize saying "totally random definition" was wrong. I have looked into pantheism in the past. I understood where you were coming from. I still disagree that there was any reason to say that you can't compare your worldview and mine without jumping through a bunch of linguistic hoops. Assuming your version of pantheism means anything significant at all, it should be a distinct worldview from mine, even if the only differences are things that can't be directly detected (or at least validated) by us in this life. I think "it's more complicated and subtle than I can convey over an afternoon forum chat" is an okay answer, but I take issue with your saying that you can't compare one worldview's ramifications to another without somehow changing the first one.
quote:"Heaven" is almost as problematic a term as, for me, it is a condition of being in relationship with God
That's how my Lutheran friend uses the term. Yes, it's approximately how I was assuming you'd use the term.
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quote:Personally I find the deterministic view defeatist and largely useless.
Why is that "defeatist?" Is it necessary to war against inevitability?
I'm not warring against inevitability. I'm rejecting it as being, well, inevitable.
The various flavors of determinism, boiled down, say that what I do is beyond my willful control. I do what I do because of how I was raised, or my genetics, or my community, or by unstoppable cause and effect starting from the very first action. I see that as a way of avoiding responsibility for one's actions. It's not my fault, I had to do it the way I did because there was no other way. I am not responsible for my actions because I had no free will. It was inevitable, therefore I cannot be fairly judged for it.
Since my personal definition of maturity requires that a person take complete responsibility for his or her actions -- one of the big reasons I am not a Christian, by the way, as both the concepts of Original Sin and the scapegoat are abhorrent to me -- determinism seems to me to be a very dangerous philosophical path to take.
The closest I might come would be compatabilism. I do believe in a mechanical universe, a cause and effect universe, and I do think it's true that a person's actions are largely determined by the options provided to them by genetics, upbringing, experience and culture. But I also believe humans have it in them to overcome those things in the face of new events and surprise you.
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hahaha, wow. there are so many problems with the idea of being a catholic panentheist, i bet. It can't be in accord with the teachings of the church.
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