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jamison wrote:
Lately I have been downplaying my knowledge of the gospel. I do not want to research anything anymore. My quest at embracing knowledge, or so-called truth has ended. I’m not interested in academic, philosophical or religious discussions. I admit to going to church for the sake of going. In my thirties I was in the phase of all truth comes together, but realized the Church could care less about the pursuit of truth, but we are just to live a good Christian life, and not much emphasis is placed on Scripture except the Book of Mormon and Conference Talks.The problems I see:
1) Church is mediocre.
We have sensational claims, but our lives do not necessarily reflect a grand theophany like the life of Joseph Smith i.e. first vision.2) The Church unit or ward is a microcosm of an idealistic culture where do-gooders help one another. However if you are not reciprocating by doing good you may as well stay on the margins and enjoy the pathetic sidelines, and wonder that people think you do not care, are lazy or otherwise stuck up or indifferent. When the truth is you struggle to take care of yourself and family and when you decide to help out, someone else beats you to it, so why bother.
I re-read this, and felt compelled to agree with 1) and 2). Grandiose claims — yes!!! I hear them all the time, but there isn’t any evidence of it anymore. When was the last time we had new scripture? Sure, the people will claim “we’ve already got enough to live and we aren’t perfect, so we don’t get anymore”. But there doesn’t seem to be anything but faith to keep activity alive, from my perspective. And my own life is living testament that the grandiose claims aren’t even enacted on a basic, human level, in my experience. Your results may vary.
For #2, I find much of the service we give is programmed — obligatory. There came a point when I started resenting my life constantly interrupted by people who need things. When I once had the mistaken belief I could fulfill my musical ambitions in the church, it would happen regularly when I would have a group of church members together to play music and then SOMEONE from the church would call with an emergency — a lost kid, someone who had a broken pipe at home, a spouse wanting her husband home immediately to deal with a kid who didn’t want to go to church the next day — it happened regularly where a group of church members together was a recipe for a crisis. I finally gave up, and it was the best thing.
jamison wrote:
Some say the death of home teaching was welcomed, but now when you do not know who your home teacher is, who are you going to call? I believe the Church went too far by doing away with home teaching when it should have just been re-defined. Radical change is not good for older people, and new converts who are just trying to stay afloat.
I don’t see this as a problem. If someone has a need, they call their leader, the leader looks up who the home teacher is, and then the phone call is made to that person. There is a structure in place, and its necessary to stop the leaders from going nuts.
But the guilt tripping is still in place.
SilentDawning wrote:
I re-read this, and felt compelled to agree with 1) and 2). Grandiose claims — yes!!! I hear them all the time, but there isn’t any evidence of it anymore. When was the last time we had new scripture? Sure, the people will claim “we’ve already got enough to live and we aren’t perfect, so we don’t get anymore”. But there doesn’t seem to be anything but faith to keep activity alive, from my perspective. And my own life is living testament that the grandiose claims aren’t even enacted on a basic, human level, in my experience. Your results may vary.
If the community had to be perfect before it could receive scripture we wouldn’t have any scripture at all. Put another way, “I sure could use some contemporary spiritual direction. I wish we could go back to the day when all of us were perfect enough to receive it.”
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