Does God Only Help The Righteous?

[Anonymous]

I am not sure God helps any of us in the way we are told he will. There is an inherent conflict between our own personal agency (the reason we are all here) and the intervention of God in our lives. For example the other week I was chastised by my family for not fasting so that my brother-in-law could get a new job. My thinking is why would God help Charlie get a new job because we fasted? what if the other guy’s family fasted? are we more righteous? God can’t intervene or he takes away our agency or in this case the agency of the person doing the hiring.

I don’t believe God acts on anyone’s behalf. We are all blessed and we are all cursed. It is our choice on how we see ourselves in this life. We can focus on our “blessings”, whatever they are, or we can focus on our curses. What we decide to focus on will dictate how our life goes and whether or not we realize more “blessings”.

IMO, the reason so many of us state that we are more blessed today than we were in our TBM days is because we no longer feel the pull of the carrot and stick the Church/ members feed us. Once you are able to remove the need to “earn” blessings you can free you mind to recognize the blessings that you already have.

[Anonymous]

behappy wrote:

…Once you are able to remove the need to “earn” blessings you can free you mind to recognize the blessings that you already have.

Nice. :clap:

[Anonymous]

behappy wrote:

I don’t believe God acts on anyone’s behalf. We are all blessed and we are all cursed. It is our choice on how we see ourselves in this life. We can focus on our “blessings”, whatever they are, or we can focus on our curses. What we decide to focus on will dictate how our life goes and whether or not we realize more “blessings”.

Makes perfect sense to me. Dare I say logical.

[Anonymous]

Cadence wrote:

behappy wrote:

I don’t believe God acts on anyone’s behalf. We are all blessed and we are all cursed. It is our choice on how we see ourselves in this life. We can focus on our “blessings”, whatever they are, or we can focus on our curses. What we decide to focus on will dictate how our life goes and whether or not we realize more “blessings”.

Makes perfect sense to me. Dare I say logical.

DW and I have had this discussion many times and we always reach this same conclusion. That believing these fortunate events are blessings from a loving interventionist God does not alter the probability of fotunate events happening but just your perspective to them. But that perhaps this change in perspective will increase your sense of gratitude and also perhaps humility and isn’t that a worthy goal in and of itself…something we would want to instill in our kids. Also that this constant “glass half full,” silver lining, “God has a grander plan for my sufferings” approach to life might result in greater feelings of contentment and (dare I say) happiness. Who doesn’t want happiness?

[Anonymous]

cwald wrote:

wrote…

This what I was trying to say, but just didn’t do it justice. Being a good mormon is NOT the same thing as being “righteous.” Yet we in our culture way too often confuse the two. “Mormon commandments” ARE NOT the same as the gospel commandments. Is one really being unrighteous if they wear two sets of earrings, drink tea, skip church, never go to church, wear a blue shirt, refuse a calling, don’t do their home-teaching, don’t believe in the story of Noah, watch football on sunday, get a tattoo, smoke a joint, don’t call the leaders by their titles, get a vasectomy, don’t follow the CHI, read the Bible every day instead of the BoM, question the message delivered at GC, give some of your tithing to other charities besides the LDS church, bring rubbarb jello to the potluck instead of carrot jello etc etc.

cwald, I thought we agreed that you wouldn’t list all my “sins.” I like the way you said it though, excet that wasn’t rubbard in the jello!

I just love it when someone gets up in TM and states how glad they are that they live a “Righteous” life. If makes me want to laugh and vomit at the same time.

f4h1

[Anonymous]

hawkgrrrl wrote:

I think the practice of paying directly to HQ is more prominent in affluent wards (the affluent are a tax-savvy bunch).

HG Is their a tax advantage to paying directly to HQ vrs. the check in the envelope method?

f4h1

[Anonymous]

cwald wrote:

jamison wrote:

…President Hinckley in fact visited with the Dali Lama.

Really! I did not know this. Did he share ANY details of his visit that you are aware of?

I think he told him we would take care of the paper work for him once he was on the other side? :angel:

f4h1

[Anonymous]

cwald wrote:

SamBee wrote:

Actually yes it is. To follow Christ, IMHO is to let go of your ego Buddhist style. If you haven’t, you’re not. I think you’re probably mistaking people who claim to for those who do!!! (Lots of the former around, few of the latter)

I’m not following you. What do you mean.

To follow Christ, as someone once said is “thy will, not my will, be done”. In other words, we’re supposed to replace our selfish desires with one to emulate Jesus, which includes helping the poor and looking after the sick, instead of chasing money and pneumatic blondes.

[Anonymous]

SamBee wrote:

cwald wrote:

SamBee wrote:

Actually yes it is. To follow Christ, IMHO is to let go of your ego Buddhist style. If you haven’t, you’re not. I think you’re probably mistaking people who claim to for those who do!!! (Lots of the former around, few of the latter)

I’m not following you. What do you mean.

To follow Christ, as someone once said is “thy will, not my will, be done”. In other words, we’re supposed to replace our selfish desires with one to emulate Jesus, which includes helping the poor and looking after the sick, instead of chasing money and pneumatic blondes.

Maybe we are just mincing words here, but to claim that a Buddhist like the Dalia lama, or any good devout Buddhist, needs to replace “his selfish desires and become like Jesus — helping the poor , looking after the sick instead of chasing money etc” doesn’t make sense to me. They already do that better than most – EVEN many good Christians. IMO, it’s egotistical to claim that one has to do all these good works IN JESUS NAME. I don’t know. I’m still not understanding your point on this, but that’s alright.

[Anonymous]

I read Sam’s “let go of your ego Buddhist style” as saying that Buddhists are good at letting of their egos, so we need to do so, as well (Buddhist style). I”m not sure that’s right, but that’s how I read it.

Sam, care to clarify a little more? 🙂

[Anonymous]

SamBee wrote:

Actually yes it is. To follow Christ, IMHO is to let go of your ego Buddhist style. If you haven’t, you’re not. I think you’re probably mistaking people who claim to for those who do!!! (Lots of the former around, few of the latter)

SamBee wrote:

To follow Christ, as someone once said is “thy will, not my will, be done”. In other words, we’re supposed to replace our selfish desires with one to emulate Jesus, which includes helping the poor and looking after the sick, instead of chasing money and pneumatic blondes.

cwald wrote:

Maybe we are just mincing words here, but to claim that a Buddhist like the Dalia lama, or any good devout Buddhist, needs to replace “his selfish desires and become like Jesus — helping the poor , looking after the sick instead of chasing money etc” doesn’t make sense to me. They already do that better than most – EVEN many good Christians. IMO, it’s egotistical to claim that one has to do all these good works IN JESUS NAME. I don’t know. I’m still not understanding your point on this, but that’s alright.

Trying to read SamBee’s mind, I think what he meant is that “real” Christians should act like Buddhists as far as rejecting selfish (ego-driven) desires. It doesn’t sound like he was ever trying to say that Buddhists will be condemned for supposedly doing the right thing for the wrong reasons (attempting to achieve Nirvana, good karma, etc.). I personally don’t believe any good person will be condemned over technicalities like this; it just doesn’t make sense if we want to assume that God is just.

My main objection to Buddhism is that I think they go too far in some cases similar to Catholic monks and I just don’t believe this is really the best way to reduce suffering at this point. This kind of strict monastic asceticism probably made a lot more sense thousands of years ago than it does now because it looks like it was mostly a way to escape the typical human concerns of family, business, politics, warfare, personal security, etc. and live a more peaceful, worry-free, introspective or service-oriented life. However, with all the medical and technological advances we have now self-imposed poverty, celibacy, strict diet, etc. is just not going to alleviate any suffering whatsoever for me, it will only add more pointless suffering for no good reason.

These extreme ascetic ideals and the notion of “real” Christians leads back to the question of just how much “righteousness” is ever good enough to supposedly not lose the spirit, be condemned, etc.? Where do we draw the line? Personally, I just don’t know about the idea that if some righteousness is good then more righteousness would be better (for the majority). I thought that’s what grace and the atonement were for because people shouldn’t realistically be expected to be anywhere near perfect.

The problem with setting the bar unrealistically high as far as who is “righteous” or not is that it will push many people to the breaking point and then instead of some reasonable amount of righteousness what we will be left with instead is almost complete unrestrained selfishness. In our case, the end result of many of these strict rules is many Jack Mormons and ex-Mormons that will no longer listen to anything the Church says and some of them are probably inclined do the exact opposite of what the Church suggests for no other reason than to be defiant as if almost everything the Church says you should not do is likely to be fun (makes sense to me).

[Anonymous]

DevilsAdvocate wrote:

Trying to read SamBee’s mind, I think what he meant is that “real” Christians should act like Buddhists as far as rejecting selfish (ego-driven) desires.

Okay, If that is the case I can live with that. I think the Queen’s English is getting in the way of our communication.

I guess I was not hearing that, and it probably stems from the conversation on here last week when “one who will not be named” made the comment on this thread that “only Jesus Christ is righteous,” which, IMO, is probably one of the most asinine comments every posted on this board — right up there with BY is responsible for the murder of dozens of innocent people since he ordered the MMM.

Anyway – here is the definition of righteous if anyone would like to argue the matter further.

Quote:

Righteousness (also called rectitude) is an important theological concept in Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. It is an attribute that implies that a person’s actions are justified, and can have the connotation that the person has been “judged” or “reckoned” as leading a life that is pleasing to God

Quote:

My main objection to Buddhism is that I think they go too far in some cases similar to Catholic monks

I agree. But I’m not sure I agree entirely with your point. So Buddhist and Catholics monks go to far, and have missed the boat, but I’m not sure I am willing to dismiss the religion entirely on the fact that many of it’s leaders are fanatical fundamentalists. Perhaps we could place the LDS church in the same category. I think the religions themselves lead one to righteousness, and CAN teach valuable truths ie “the gospel” – even Buddhism – but many folks take it too far, and they get caught up in trying to outdo one another and even themselves in JUST HOW RIGHTEOUS CAN YOU GO. This is a problem in all religions – even/especially in the LDS church.

Quote:

These extreme ascetic ideals and the notion of “real” Christians leads back to the question of just how much “righteousness” is ever good enough to supposedly not lose the spirit, be condemned, etc.? Where do we draw the line? Personally, I just don’t know about the idea that if some righteousness is good then more righteousness would be better (for the majority). I thought that’s what grace and the atonement were for because people shouldn’t realistically be expected to be anywhere near perfect.

The problem with setting the bar unrealistically high as far as who is “righteous” or not is that it will push many people to the breaking point and then instead of some reasonable amount of righteousness what we will be left with instead is almost complete unrestrained selfishness. In our case, the end result of many of these strict rules is many Jack Mormons and ex-Mormons that will no longer listen to anything the Church says and some of them are probably inclined do the exact opposite of what the Church suggests for no other reason than to be defiant as if almost everything the Church says you should not do is likely to be fun (makes sense to me).

Now on this comment – I agree 100%.

[Anonymous]

Fatherof4husbandof1 wrote:

HG Is their a tax advantage to paying directly to HQ vrs. the check in the envelope method?

f4h1

It’s not the where, but the how that brings tax advantages. The local ward would not be able to take a stock donation, for example.

[Anonymous]

Quote:

Maybe we are just mincing words here, but to claim that a Buddhist like the Dalia lama, or any good devout Buddhist, needs to replace “his selfish desires and become like Jesus — helping the poor , looking after the sick instead of chasing money etc” doesn’t make sense to me. They already do that better than most – EVEN many good Christians. IMO, it’s egotistical to claim that one has to do all these good works IN JESUS NAME. I don’t know. I’m still not understanding your point on this, but that’s alright.

Actually as far as the Dalai Lama goes, I think he does have a few issues. I think in his current closeted set-up he has very little notion of what the Tibetans who stayed behind are having to put up with. His view of Tibet still seems cosy IMHO, and he tries to handle China with kiddie gloves. The Dalai Lama spends a lot of time in comfortable opulence, surrounded by well-wishing celebrities, while his people are thrown into concentration camps and beaten with electric cattle prods. But that’s enough of that, I’m not really discussing him.

I think DA understands what I am getting at. The clothing contests, the one-upmanship, the uniformity we sometimes encounter in the LDS – all this needs to go, and be replaced by folk trying to be more like Jesus.

For me, there’s very little to object to about Jesus as portrayed in the Gospels. His message is politically radical – maybe too much so for most “Christians” – and caring, it cuts through hypocrisy like a knife, and shows it within all of us. He tells us to be kinder to each other… it is an ideal which is worth living up to, even if we do not get it right every time.

Quote:

My main objection to Buddhism is that I think they go too far in some cases similar to Catholic monks and I just don’t believe this is really the best way to reduce suffering at this point. This kind of strict monastic asceticism probably made a lot more sense thousands of years ago than it does now because it looks like it was mostly a way to escape the typical human concerns of family, business, politics, warfare, personal security, etc. and live a more peaceful, worry-free, introspective or service-oriented life. However, with all the medical and technological advances we have now self-imposed poverty, celibacy, strict diet, etc. is just not going to alleviate any suffering whatsoever for me, it will only add more pointless suffering for no good reason.

In the West, we currently bury ourselves under trash. Piles of it, big piles of trash… electronic trash, badly-made-clothing-but-with-designer-label trash, automobile trash, cultural trash (of every description) etc etc

I don’t hold myself up as a good example – because I’m not in dozens of ways – but I have tried to abandon some of these modern hang-ups. I do not wear clothes with a fancy label, I just wear clothes. I keep my electronic gadgets to a minimum without being Luddite, and on an average week I watch less than an hour of TV a day (maybe two or three at the weekend). I have a car, but it is a practical one, and I don’t spend vast amounts accesorizing it – I use it for transport, little else.

As for the cultural trash, I attempt to cherry pick the culture I expose myself to, and enjoy it more. I get more reading done because I watch less television.

I feel happier with this lifestyle in some ways than intensive partying, because intensive partying means spending a lot of money and doing things I’ll regret in the morning, or perhaps even later in the night.

[Anonymous]

cwald wrote:

Quote:

My main objection to Buddhism is that I think they go too far in some cases similar to Catholic monks

I agree. But I’m not sure I agree entirely with your point. So Buddhist and Catholics monks go to far, and have missed the boat, but I’m not sure I am willing to dismiss the religion entirely on the fact that many of it’s leaders are fanatical fundamentalists. Perhaps we could place the LDS church in the same category. I think the religions themselves lead one to righteousness, and CAN teach valuable truths ie “the gospel” – even Buddhism – but many folks take it too far, and they get caught up in trying to outdo one another and even themselves in JUST HOW RIGHTEOUS CAN YOU GO. This is a problem in all religions – even/especially in the LDS church.

SamBee wrote:

…In the West, we currently bury ourselves under trash. Piles of it, big piles of trash… electronic trash…I don’t hold myself up as a good example – because I’m not in dozens of ways – but I have tried to abandon some of these modern hang-ups…I feel happier with this lifestyle in some ways than intensive partying, because intensive partying means spending a lot of money and doing things I’ll regret in the morning, or perhaps even later in the night.

I wasn’t really trying to dismiss anything entirely; actually I think Buddhists have some good ideas and some bad ideas just like Catholic monks, Mormons, etc. I don’t really expect to find the answer to everything important in any single tradition or creed anymore not even Christianity even though that is my favorite that I know of. Another thing I like about Christianity is that if Jesus, Paul, etc. said something I agree with many conservative people are more likely to listen to it than my own ideas but if I try to quote the Dalai Lama or Buddha some people will think I’ve gone completely off the deep end. Seriously, they’ll think what’s next?, yoga, Wicca, and Atlantis Crystals?

I’m not saying this is necessarily fair or right but sometimes I would rather just pick my battles and trying to defend or promote Buddhism is not one of them because I just don’t believe it will really cure suffering in this life the way it claims it will. Sure you could say that maybe Christianity won’t deliver salvation the way it claims either but at least we won’t know for sure until we are dead and in my opinion most Christians wouldn’t have lost all that much if anything on average because of their belief in it even if they are wrong.

[Author]

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