After a 6 month hiatus from LDS Dialogue and Discussion style message boards, I went back just now.
And I came back upset. I always get upset. I still haven't been able to figure out entirely why. Most of it, although difficult to articulate, can be summed up in the fact that I just don't like it when people try to point out discrepancies in the Church in an attempt to show it's gone astray. The conclusion seems to be that since a hole in the reasoning/logic exists, it cannot hold water.
But that doesn't hold water. I don't need to prove my faith to you. I don't answer to you. I don't even want to.
A previous post had me talking about I like to have things checked off, and how I like to have things approved by other people. It just goes to show how you strong I feel about my faith. Contrast that with how shaky I can be about nearly everything else.
My interest in apologetics is waning. I really don't think anyone's going to be convinced when they give me the problem and say "You solve this or I'll be forced to draw the conclusion that you're a dolt."
I'm not weak. I'm not spoon-fed. I'm not closed minded. I'm definitely not brainwashed, and I don't give a rip if you think otherwise.
The Church is true, the Book is blue.
P.S. -- If you are one of those people that tries to 'free my mind,' the common and popular tactics of forcing me to 'see through' my faith are misguided, inappropriate, and ineffective. If you really want me to leave the Church, you are doing a lousy job.
5 comments:
What site are you going to?
www.fairboards.org
They advocate open discussion, and many board members are cool, but there seems to be a handful or so who seem bent on making sure every LDS understands that their faith doesn't make sense and that it's completely illogical.
I feel my blood getting hot just remembering these yahoos. :)
I used to get fairly worked up about such matters, too, but I just don't anymore. A lot of it came when I admitted that there are a lot of valid questions to the truthfulness of the Church.
Put quite simply, there is not a lot of good evidence that what we claim happened here on the Americas actually happened. One good example is that every test so far has shown an Asian descent for the Native American population and not a trace of blood from the Middle East. While it's not impossible, people rarely disappear without a genetic trace.
There's also the issue of the age of the earth, all of which points to a veeery old planet, and evolution throws even the origins of the human race into a fairly clear picture. We bein' the development of monkeys. These are only a couple of examples, but they show that the Church doesn't have all the answers.
I've learned to just accept it. In some ways, it goes along with the argument of God's existence. Given His definition, it's not impossible for us to have no indication, physically, of His presence. It's not so bizarre that issues of faith and miracles are untestable, or even that many religious happenings turn out to be hoaxes. There's the fallback answer of "well, it's to test our faith", but I also think that we don't find much because we don't know how to look.
The Book of Mormon can still be true even if current evidence does not support it. God can still have created the world and us in His image (as opposed to the popular notion of us creating God in our image, a not unreasonable suggestion) even with the current knowledge. It is far beyond my ken as to how He did it, anyways.
I just accept that many tenets of my religion and belief will be untestable, unproveable. Thus, other people can reasonably come to find fault with it and doubt it. And if reasonable people can, then unreasonable people will. It would be nice if everything we found in archaeology, geology, astronomy, biology, and anthropology supported claims put forth by the scriptures, but if it were would I really have any reason to doubt? Would my need for faith be gone? I don't know.
All I do know is that everything good in my life has come from following the teachings of the Gospel, whereas nearly everything that has gone wrong in my life has been a result of me choosing my own way. That to me is too much of a coincidence for me to let it go.
You're right. Who knows? It's comforting to me at least that there's no solid set of faith. Everyone's got their "Wait a minute, what about this?" parts. The fact that we have them as well doesn't keep me up at night.
As for your statements on if or not everything we've discovered pointed toward a God and the way we believe in Him, I don't think that the problem would lay in whether or not you (or I) would need faith. I think the problem lies in what you would choose to do with that knowledge. If things unequivocally pointed to God, then we'd be forced to believe in Him. If things only kinda sorta pointed to His existence, then we'd be in a situation not like the one we have now. There are things that evidence God/Nephites/Book of Mormon/Jesus/whatever else, and there are things that don't. Putting them on the scales isn't the way you go about proving something that can't be proven, and I think that's what you're saying.
Feeling the way I do about evidence is what gets me aboout other people. If you're an atheist, what does it matter to you that I believe in God? Really, if no one's upstairs, why care if I believe? Do you walk up to every kid there is and say "Hey by the way, there's no Santa ya dork. Have you ever seen him? I checked your chimney, there's no way Santa could land a sleigh and fit down that hole. Where's your evidence?" What does it do? It's not like everyone who's declared themselves no longer Mormon or no longer God fearing has stumbled into some realm of blissful existence and knowledge. On the contrary, they're just as diverse in opinion and feeling as any other group of people.
Now I don't mind if an Evangelical/Muslim/Jewish/Hindu friend of mine says "This religion I have is fantastic. May I share it with you?" In fact, I love it.
I just hate it when people try to tear down my faith.
I meant to say 'not UNlike', 'not UNlike our situation'. Oops.
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