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The following article surfaced on my social media feed today: LDS leader insists religious identity deserves same protections going to sexual, gender identitiesThere’s a lot I could say on the subject. Most of it would get me into lots and lots of trouble. I’ll try and stay away from those thoughts… for now. What’s interesting is that the article contains quotes from L. Whitney Clayton about choosing to believe. He says things that conflict with some things that I’ve heard in the past, namely that people in a faith crisis should just choose to believe.
Quote:He said referring to religious belief as a simple choice demeans it and makes it harder for believers and nonbelievers to connect.
L. Whitney Clayton wrote:My point is that misconstruing religious faith as a mere choice or preference, as something that can be adopted and discarded at will, radically misconceives the nature of religion in the lives of millions of faithful people.
There’s language in the article that implies that people don’t simply choose to believe, yet that is often the advice I hear being extended to people that are experiencing a crisis of faith, choose to believe. I did a quick google search, LDS choose to believe, and wouldn’t you know it, the first hit was a general conference talk by [drum roll] L. Whitney Clayton
:crazy: ,Choose to BelieveI also take some serious issues with other points raised. Allow me to modify the quote above:
Quote:My point is that misconstruing homosexuality as a mere choice or preference, as something that can be adopted and discarded at will, radically misconceives the nature of homosexuality in the lives of millions of people.
And this from the article:
Quote:The LDS Church has openly supported LGBT rights in employment and housing. For example, it backed the 2015 passsage of a Utah bill that was hailed as a historic compromise that provided new protections for lesbians, gays, bisexual and transgender people while reaffirming religious rights.
“I believe that no democratic government that claims to value personal dignity and human rights can ignore the moral imperative to respect the fundamental right to freely, openly and peacefully exercise one’s religion,” Elder Clayton said.
Granted the past is the past (*cough* proposition 8 *cough*) but this feels like gaslighting. We’re condemning the actions we still engage in when the subject matter changes. I feel we continue to thumb our noses at legalized gay marriage in the USA by referring to it indirectly when talking about religious freedoms. I can’t speak for others but there’s a near constant background radiation of “study the crud out of the family proclamation so you’ll know gay marriage is wrong” in my area. We’re constantly reading that thing. It’s not rad (pun, sorry).
I’m also asking for help. I really don’t want this to turn political (not the mission of the site and all that) but the USA has the first amendment, it also has a Christian majority. I’m probably wrong but the USA feels like it is moving closer to becoming a theocracy. I’m just not seeing people losing their religious freedoms. What I am seeing is religion losing its influence in society but to me that’s different. If religion is losing influence I think religion only has itself to blame. I see people that advertise their religion defending truly heinous things, then wondering why people don’t respect their religion.
I did say I’d get into trouble if I kept talking.
It’s a tricky situation to navigate, for sure. I don’t envy church leaders. The big problem they are working against is this…and you brought it up…Prop 8 campaigns and past things said and published about how they talk about gay marriage…they can’t just forget all that and now say…
Quote:Hey…let’s just play nice with everyone and have equal rights for all. The past is the past. Today, please don’t infringe on
myrights. It just feels like they lost the vote, lost the campaign, and their fall back plan is to ask to be treated nicely now.
They should have thought of that need before…and from the very beginning, had prophets to see ahead and position the church in the most loving way possible to protect equal rights for all people, including gays. Did they learn NOTHING from waiting until 1978 to push for a revelation to change priesthood policy?
But they didn’t. To help their cause for what they thought was important on the Proclamation claims…they doubled down on being against gays and children of gay couples. They aligned themselves to other evangelist groups for support and power, and compromised kindness and charity in doing so.
I’m all for equal rights and equal treatment for everyone. But…that includes equal consideration of past behaviors and equal rights for all.
They are caught in a tough place to work from. But…they painted themselves in that corner…so…I don’t feel sorry for what they have to deal with.
The best way forward is acknowledge and own their past mistakes. That is the best way to show christ-like love and humility if you want to build trust and have an equal voice moving forward. Will they be brave enough to do that? Or cowardly cling to their “prophets don’t ever make mistakes?”
While I believe our wards will cling to this message from Elder Clayton as a reasonable and fair position…I feel they are ignorant to the whole history and landscape of factors that opponents to their position will be coming from…and therefore…members of our wards will be talking about the issues in ignorance, masked with a belief they are in the right, and anything else is of the devil and the evil wicked world that attacks our fight for God’s truth. They will miss the mark unless they own up to the past, and put it all in perspective.
They don’t have to change their position. They have a right to believe what they believe and to ask for rights to believe what they want. But…they should own their past words and deeds.
Because…believing is a choice, not a born, inherent, genetic characteristic. The whole plan of salvation is based on that principle of choice.
My hair color, my race, my sexual tendency, my ethnicity…those are things I navigate through without choice of their existence…just choice on what I do about it.
Faith is all about choice.
To suggest otherwise is to change doctrine.
I could go on…I should shut up now.
Some thoughts, but I caveat this by saying that I don’t agree with the Church on many topics, yet I support their right to have their view. So if it looks like I’m defending the Church’s position, I’m really just defending the Church’s right to have its position. This whole religious-freedom push that we have seen in recent years, in my mind, is just a way to assert that the Church does not seek and will not accept a requirement to allow SSM in the Church, either to be performed by the Church (in our chapels/temples) or by its members entering into SSM and still maintaining membership in the Church. I’m sure the Church feels, and I suspect that they are right, that it is only a matter of time before a very visible lawsuit is brought against the Church for not allowing a same sex couple to marry.
This places the Church in a weird vortex where they want to treat people with respect and they want to support the law of the land, but they don’t want to be told how to implement marriage in their own domain. In our shame-based society, it’s an unwinnable position.
You mentioned Prop 8. That was a bad look for the Church and a PR blunder, no doubt. Yet I always like to point out that California voters voted for Prop 8. It wasn’t forced on California by the Church. Members of the Church contributed time and money, and lots of California Mormons voted, but it is their right to do each one of those things. Prop 8 passed in California because of it got more votes, including among Black, Hispanic, Catholic, Protestant and Mormon voters.
A lot of people act horrified that religious people have so much say in this country’s elections. Yet every demographic has a bent in some direction. LGBT voters tend in certain directions, as do professionals, hourly-wage-earners, minimum-wage-earners, people in the military, people who live in one area or another, people in different age groups, people who golf, people who bowl, people who play video games, etc, etc, etc. What’s disturbing to me is that increasingly, people oppose others who have different views in an
ad hominemway. Someday, people will learn that dog-owners are less likely to support nationalized healthcare, and the next step will for social media to lash out against nazis, dog-owners, and religious nuts. CNN will run articles about how terrible dog-owners are. SNL will feature skits of bumbling dog-owners. The 2020’s Generation will tell each other how dumb and uncaring their Millennial parents were for allowing there to be dog-owners at all. Dog-owners will be shamed into keeping their love for dogs quiet. Finally, though, I do think the article and the Church’s Religious Freedom grandstanding of late are misplaced. It seems like instead of being the squeaky wheel, it’d be better to be an example of inclusion and acceptance (living the golden rule and hoping for karma (oops, I guess I’m mixing religious metaphors)). That’s, I’m sure, what the Church was doing in helping spearhead some legislation, but it falls flat when the Church then gets so us-vs-them.
On Own Now wrote:
What’s disturbing to me is that increasingly, people oppose others who have different views in an ad hominem way.
:thumbup: Good point. I like the dog-owner analogy.But don’t you agree the church has put themselves in a tough spot by being less accepting of differences in the past, the us vs them mentality as you put it?
Therefore…while I agree the church has a right to what they want to believe…they’ve not made it easy to take their word for their desire to treat everyone fairly. Don’t you think that plays into this?
Heber13 wrote:
But don’t you agree the church has put themselves in a tough spot by being less accepting of differences in the past, the us vs them mentality as you put it?
Yes, absolutely.Heber13 wrote:
Therefore…while I agree the church has a right to what they want to believe…they’ve not made it easy to take their word for their desire to treat everyone fairly. Don’t you think that plays into this?
Yes, but with reservations. I believe we live in a time when tolerance for individuality is extremely high in every area except thought, where tolerance for individual opinion is inexplicably extremely low. The order of the day is to be absolute in your opinion, to yield no ground, to make no compromise, and to take no prisoners. We here are uber-senstitive to the Church’s proclamations, but in all honesty, I think the Church is one of the more quiet voices in our present political swirl (Prop 8 excepted).I agree that because of Prop 8, the Church has painted itself into this corner. I would love for the Church to issue a statement that in retrospect, it overplayed its concerns and regrets its support of Prop 8. That it now supports SSM as a civil entity and supports equal rights for all people, and asks in return simply not to be forced to employ SSM within its own institution. I think that would be appreciated, understood and accepted.
On Own Now wrote:
I would love for the Church to issue a statement that in retrospect, it overplayed its concerns and regrets its support of Prop 8. That it now supports SSM as a civil entity and supports equal rights for all people, and asks in return simply not to be forced to employ SSM within its own institution. I think that would be appreciated, understood and accepted.
That would certainly be a show of strength and boldness to be meek enough to approach it that way…I also agree it would be appreciated and understood.
Also…I don’t think it will ever happen.
Heber13 wrote:
On Own Now wrote:
I would love for the Church to issue a statement that in retrospect, it overplayed its concerns and regrets its support of Prop 8. That it now supports SSM as a civil entity and supports equal rights for all people, and asks in return simply not to be forced to employ SSM within its own institution. I think that would be appreciated, understood and accepted.
That would certainly be a show of strength and boldness to be meek enough to approach it that way…I also agree it would be appreciated and understood.
Also…I don’t think it will ever happen.
Yeah, I forgot to mention that, but to borrow a line from one of our hymns that will likely stay, do I think the Church would ever say that? “Never, no never”.The church is certainly entitled to their opinion and the stances they take. I think the concern is when a particular line is crossed. People may be okay with a differing opinion but holding a differing opinion doesn’t seem to be good enough for some. Some people want to impose their will on others. In your dog example… historically the church hasn’t been the entity begging everyone to let people own dogs if they want to, they’ve been the entity that spends several million dollars and countless hours to get people to the polls to end dog ownership for everyone. They’ve been the entity that shoehorns “dogs ownership is bad” into many messages going out to the membership. They wrote a proclamation against dog ownership and thump it every chance they get.
Historically the church has been among those that cross the line. Not ancient, history; proclamation history, POX history. Now that the other side figured out how to use the stick suddenly it’s, “hold on a second, let’s play fair.” Which is fine. It comes across as hypocritical (to me), but it’s fine.
Couple that with me not seeing the church losing any freedoms and it becomes a head scratcher. I’m sure there will be people in the recent future maybe even people right now that challenge the church’s freedom to not do [fill in the blank] but in the current climate I’d say the concern over religious freedom that is truly in jeopardy is the freedom of non-Christian religions (in the USA). I appreciate that all of this might be an attempt to stay ahead of the game.
Human nature, limited perspective, limited knowledge, biases, etc., I don’t know. It just feels like the kind of thing that happens when the majority is suddenly faced with no longer being in the majority and being fearful that they will be treated the same way that they treated the minority group. And to balance that out a bit, the minority suddenly realizing that they may one day be the majority, forgetting what it was like, and end up becoming the oppressor.
Back to the title question, “Is belief a choice?” Like with just about everything (including sexuality/gender identity), religious beliefs a combination of nature/nurture, and a
*little*bit of choice (if any), in varying degrees from person to person. I’d reckon none of us would believe in Jehovah, had we never heard of Him. Our religious beliefs start when we are very little, mostly through what other people tell us. As we get older, our beliefs begin to reflect our experiences, but are also heavily directed by people we trust. As we gain more independence, our beliefs come through what makes sense and feelsright. And I can almost guarantee none of us would’ve found ourselves in a faith crisis, if we had different experiences (such as never coming across our difficult church history, or known a gay person, or had a feminist friend). Sure, sexuality might usually have a bit more “nature” to it and religion has a bit more “nurture”. But the reason I have a hard time knocking anyone for their religious beliefs, no matter how silly they can be, is that our past experiences are as much a part of our identity as anything. As long as they aren’t hurting anyone or enacting legal policies, we should defend religious beliefs, and not force anyone to act contrary to those beliefs.
Here is what I ask of everyone, regardless of religious beliefs:
-Do not declare war.
-Do not assault anyone solely because of differing religious/ideological beliefs (even “Nazis”).
-Do not force anyone to do something against their religious beliefs (go to war, bake a cake for a gay wedding, pledge allegiance to the flag), with the exception of paying taxes.
-Do not teach religion as science.
-Do not enact laws and policies, which goes against scientific consensus, on the basis of religion (global warming, GMOs, vaccines)
Restrictions I encourage:
-Preventing people from harassing/harming/assaulting or otherwise taking action against those with opposing religious/ideological beliefs (as opposed to “not doing something”)
-Preventing discrimination in employment/compensation/housing on the basis of religious/ideological beliefs.
-Preventing people from forcing others to “not do” what is both legal and what they want to do (i.e. a court office manager preventing their staff from issuing marriage licences)
nibbler wrote:
I really don’t want this to turn political (not the mission of the site and all that) but the USA has the first amendment, it also has a Christian majority. I’m probably wrong but the USA feels like it is moving closer to becoming a theocracy. I’m just not seeing people losing their religious freedoms. What I am seeing is religion losing its influence in society but to me that’s different. If religion is losing influence I think religion only has itself to blame. I see people that advertise their religion defending truly heinous things, then wondering why people don’t respect their religion.
The USA could never turn into a theocracy. Even with a “Christian Majority” there are too many disagreements and differences in doctrine for any one denomination to rise to power. More and more denominations are popping up every year. Even though I fully disagree with a lot of them, I think we should be grateful for the opposition. It’s a balancing act… when one ideology swings to far in one direction, it needs a counterbalance. And then, when things start swinging too far in the opposite direction, there’s a counterbalance for that too. Eventually we arrive an equilibrium; that’s where we see progress. We’re headed in a good direction, Nibs. Don’t lose hope.
The USA has been a WASP “soft theocracy” for a long, long time. I don’t have time to go into all of the reasons that is true, but we aren’t out of the woods yet. Much of the current political struggle is to keep us from changing back into a clearer WASP theocracy than the recent diversity movement has produced. Having said that, we shouldn’t take this thread any further into that issue. It probably is okay to create a new thread about theocracy, as long as we can walk the fine line between how it fits our mission and having it turn into a political debate.
nibbler wrote:
I think the concern is when a particular line is crossed. People may be okay with a differing opinion but holding a differing opinion doesn’t seem to be good enough for some. Some people want to impose their will on others.
I get it, it’s just that I don’t think the Church crossed the line with Prop 8. Give me just a second to try to explain this. First, look at this timeline.– 2000 – California voters pass Proposition 22, ensuring that marriage would continue, as it always had been, to be legal only between heterosexual couples. “Only marriage between a man and woman is valid or recognized in California.”
– 2001 – since the dawn of humankind, the first nation legalizes SSM (Netherlands)
– 2008 – By the beginning of 2008, the only nations ever where SSM had been legalized: Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Canada, South Africa.
– 2008 – In May, the California Supreme Court declares Proposition 22 to be unconstitutional (CA).
– 2008 – Prop 8 put on the ballot in California to add the above phrase from Proposition 22 to the CA constitution.
– 2008 – The Church backs Prop 8, not through direct contributions, but by encouraging members to make contributions and volunteer time.
– 2008 – Candidate Barack Obama states his opposition to SSM.
– 2008 – November, Prop 8 passes, 52% to 47%.
– 2009 – California Supreme Court backs the legality of Prop 8 (as a constitutional amendment).
– 2010 – A Federal Court declares Prop 8 to be unconstitutional (US), but a stay was in effect until review by US Supreme Court.
– 2013 – US Supreme Court, in a 5-4 decisions says that the proponents of Prop 8 didn’t have proper standing to bring the case before the SCOTUS, effectively finalizing the overturn of Prop 8, though the SCOTUS didn’t rule on the constitutionality question.
– 2013 – SSM legalized in France.
– 2014 – SSM legalized in England.
– 2015 – SCOTUS rules that SSM is a protected right, legalizing SSM in the US.
– 2017 – SSM legalized in Germany and Australia.
I point all this out to show that at the time of Prop 8, the question was not settled in the world at large, in the US or in California. It had only been seven years since the Netherlands became the first nation to legalize SSM, and it was still another seven years before it would be legalized in the US. The question of Prop 8 was whether SSM was legal or no, and to say that the Church crossed the line would also mean that all countries but five had crossed a line, that black voters in CA crossed a line, that Hispanic voters in CA had crossed a line, that the CA Supreme Court crossed a line, that Barack Obama crossed a line, that the US, France, Germany, the UK, all of the Middle East, South America, Central America, Asia, Australia had crossed a line.
All I’m saying is that it’s easy to point the finger at people who have a different opinion and cry ‘foul’. But they have a right to their opinion the same as anyone else.
I don’t think the Church should have been involved and I think it was unfortunate. But it was/is within their right. A common mantra among ‘progressives’ is to decry religious people imposing their views on others. But, that’s sort of what democracy is.
That’s a great timeline for context, OON. On Own Now wrote:
I don’t think the Church should have been involved and I think it was unfortunate. But it was/is within their right.
What is within their right, and what is “right” are 2 different things for sure, and of course…as you were alluding…in hindsight it is easy to look back and point fingers. I guess it is within our right to do that too.
There were a lot of unfortunate things about Prop 8 and many people left the church over it (right?)…how people in the church handled it and how they tried to get support for a cause they believed in…and how it was housed within the church leadership and tied to how much faith you have in prophets and authority…it got messy. It still is messy.
When the church essay on the priesthood ban was written…they mentioned how racism was a part of the culture church leaders grew up in, and therefore, some church leaders were racist. They acknowledged it…and clarified some wrong teachings that were used by some leaders to justify their reasons.
I guess just because slavery wasn’t illegal at the time, doesn’t make it right for the church to escape a policy built on racism. And we regret the church wasn’t more at the forefront of social change on the issue. That history plagues us still.
I guess what I’m saying is that we don’t give the church a pass, even if the context does help us understand that the church is not alone in opposition to the changes that will surely be coming. They have the right to do that. They may hold out and be one of the last areas on the globe to progress to new accepted norms.
They have the right to do that. But it’s sad to watch. And I have the right to believe differently.
The frustration I hear from nibbler, and I share it, is that on Sunday there will be members whose faith in their leaders will claim there is only ONE WAY that God sees these issues…and will not allow opposing views within our own congregations.
So…if they want the equal rights…then give me the right to openly support SSM without fear of being shunned by my tribe. Practice what they are literally preaching.
Any time some email from the ward leaders or some speaker in SM or some sunday school class claims there is only ONE WAY to view this issue…the church leaders should be actively correcting that behavior in our church and protecting the rights of everyone to choose to believe what they want (similar to how the church tries to stay neutral on political parties). Otherwise, they are really only interested in protecting their rights, and Elder Clayton’s message is lost as a valid “equal rights” message. I fear they are doing it wrong…again.
dande48 wrote:
Back to the title question, “Is belief a choice?”Like with just about everything (including sexuality/gender identity), religious beliefs a combination of nature/nurture, and a
*little*bit of choice (if any), in varying degrees from person to person. … Sure, sexuality might usually have a bit more “nature” to it and religion has a bit more “nurture”. But the reason I have a hard time knocking anyone for their religious beliefs, no matter how silly they can be, is that our past experiences are as much a part of our identity as anything. As long as they aren’t hurting anyone or enacting legal policies, we should defend religious beliefs, and not force anyone to act contrary to those beliefs.
Maybe it gets a little murky on some areas and topics…because some social issues are crossing boundaries of faith in God vs socially how we treat our neighbor, and there are not clear demarcations. Certainly we start to see the freedom to believe and preach according to our religious ideals becomes the “hurting anyone or enacting legal policies” like when children can’t be baptized because their parents believe a certain way, and the church doesn’t agree with that. They are hurting people, and that is the problem. When the hurt gets big enough and impacts enough people…change can happen.Maybe I see 2 different things:
1) The church has the right to teach and preach what it wants, (ie. polygamy is God’s law)
2) until it crosses the line to a level of discrimination or unlawful behavior. (ie. The government forbids it and will seize all assets, and then church revelation changes the teachings and beliefs by choices made by leaders to avoid jail).
Defending or changing beliefs is a part of being in a society.
When is it enough hurt from religions having their freedom of belief? When is the policy necessary to defend? What is hurt by changing the policy?
Cultures are shared beliefs, and some beliefs are based on religious traditions and interpretations at the time that people choose to agree to. They are not inherent parts of individuals’ identity. They are a chosen set of beliefs.
It takes effort to change beliefs…but we have a missionary force out there trying hard to do that very thing each day to others. We want the right to do that.
I think it is pretty clear the church teaches that belief is a choice, and we should practice how to learn and choose what we believe and get revelation about it. And we are implored throughout the scriptures to choose higher ways and not rely on the arm of flesh.
In fact, we teach our youth in the FSOY:
Quote:We feel glad when we make good decisions. This includes choosing to be morally good and obedient.
On occasion, courage means to be with and stand by our friends. Other times it means that we have to stand a little apart, not judging them or feeling superior but choosing the right by doing something different.
[snip]
Belief is a choice. “Believe in God; believe that he is, and that he created all things, both in heaven and in earth; believe that he has all wisdom, and all power, both in heaven and in earth; believe that man doth not comprehend all the things which the Lord can comprehend” (Mosiah 4:9).
When we choose to believe, we understand and see things in a different way. When we see and live that way, we are happy and joyful in a way that only the gospel can bring.
I guess it shouldn’t be triavialized, it should be respected, but we should be embracing choice … nibbler is frustrated because it feels choices in what to believe are dampened in our congregations:
nibbler wrote:I feel we continue to thumb our noses at legalized gay marriage in the USA by referring to it indirectly when talking about religious freedoms. I can’t speak for others but there’s a near constant background radiation of “study the crud out of the family proclamation so you’ll know gay marriage is wrong” in my area. We’re constantly reading that thing.
Nibbler, I don’t want to put words in your mouth…but…it seems they are wanting choices and freedoms that help them, but they don’t want freedom of choices that make it feel like people can do whatever they want…and it isn’t balanced…it is one-sided when it suits them. So…it feels wrong at times in church. Don’t you think? How would you say it better than that?
Just to reiterate what I said in the first lines of my first post above: On Own Now wrote:
Some thoughts, but I caveat this by saying that I don’t agree with the Church on many topics, yet I support their right to have their view. So if it looks like I’m defending the Church’s position, I’m really just defending the Church’s right to have its position.
Prop 8 was a bad idea. It was also quite uncharacteristic of the (modern) Church to leverage its power for a ballot measure. It painted the Church as unfeeling and it also reinforced to many members within the Church that hardlining is God’s way. I also feel that the Church’s number one issue has been and continues to be protection from having to accept SSM within its own ranks. As I said before, I think the Church should just come out and say that, and I think if it does so respectfully, it’s hard to imagine much of a backlash even in today’s environment. Instead, the Church keeps trying to solve this politically and it’s just not a good look.As I’ve said on this site before, I don’t even agree that a SSM prohibition is defensible as doctrine. Furthermore, I think the Church should be on the forefront of acceptance for the downtrodden, as it is with immigration issues, for example. It just all seems like such squandered possibilities, all for the purpose of never giving in.
It’s so strange that the Church has learned and improved so much with relations outside the confines of the Church and is viewed almost universally as made up of first-rate neighbors who are happy, healthy, productive and agreeable… except on this ONE topic. In a very real sense, it feels like how the RLDS Church was defined by more than a century by what it opposed.
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