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Good article Heber. I think this summary of the talk is a how I see sin and god and religion in general. Nothing about obedience and prophets and a whole set of cultural commandments to memorize and follow.
Quote:At the final day, I suspect God will ask me two questions. The first, “What have you done?” will be the more easily answered. To the second, “Whom have you become?” I earnestly hope I can reply, “Like thee.”
THIS rings true to me. This is the kind of religious belief/theology that would keep me active. We need more of it coming from SLC, and we need more of it NOW.
cwald wrote:THIS rings true to me. This is the kind of religious belief/theology that would keep me active. We need more of it coming from SLC, and we need more of it NOW.
I hear ya!! More of this, and less of toe-the-line rhetoric!Totally. Doug, your quote/definition was spot on. What does sinning…?
What does missing the mark…?
What does missing the point…?
What does spacing out on the entire purpose of our mortal existence…?
…have to do…
…with guilt?
…with offending God?
…with cleanliness?
Something, I guess, at least in some way. Perhaps. But only in a manner of speaking.
When you go to Disneyland, do you have guilt if you don’t make good use of the visit? Is an enlightened parent sad or offended because his child doesn’t “get” the idea of the trip to Mickey’s Kingdom? Are you unclean because you mistake Disneyland for a real town? No. You may want to go again, but you aren’t an outcast for your having missed the point (sinned) while you were there.
Tom Haws wrote:Totally. Doug, your quote/definition was spot on.
What does spacing out on the entire purpose of our mortal existence…?…have to do…with guilt?…with offending God? When you go to Disneyland,
do you have guilt if you don’t make good use of the visit?Is an enlightened parent sad or offended because his child doesn’t “get” the idea of the trip to Mickey’s Kingdom? Are you unclean because you mistake Disneyland for a real town? No. You may want to go again, but you aren’t an outcast for your having missed the point (sinned) while you were there. I understand the idea that there is more to sin than guilt and there are subtle sins of omission where we could have done something we didn’t. However, this idea of missing the point of our entire mortal existence brings me back to Cadence’s skeptical point-of-view that maybe there is no sin and consequences are the main thing we should be worried about. How do we really know for sure what the point of our mortal existence is supposed to be? Suppose we listen to some guru that is convinced he knows what the point is that tells us exactly what we are supposed to do in great detail but it turns out he was wrong?
In that case, the consequence is that we have wasted a significant amount of the only life we really know we have for sure in pursuit of some fabricated meaning that did not really exist. That’s why I prefer rules or “commandments” that provide value on their own for people in this life without needing to wait and see what the consequences in the next life will be. If I don’t see and understand the reason for some dogmatic rule out of nowhere then as far as I’m concerned it is nothing but an unnecessary inconvenience.
DevilsAdvocate wrote:The real problem is that what Mormons think is a sin is not necessarily what God or most non-Mormons would probably consider to be a sin in many cases. In fact, I have a hard time imagining why anyone including God should really care if someone drinks a cup of coffee.
I agree DAMy problem is that I was taught for 38 years that sin was acting against God’s will. Only to learn that It may not have been God’s will at all. What am I left with? A very high degree of mistrust, and a cynical and critical view of the cause that once I championed and defended. What is sin? I may know more of what it isn’t than what it is.
f4h1
Ooof! The DA and F4H1 just hit where it really hurts. I’m totally understanding you guys, and only a miracle (The Miracle) will heal us. It gets better. DevilsAdvocate wrote:How do we really know for sure what the point of our mortal existence is supposed to be? Suppose we listen to some guru that is convinced he knows what the point is that tells us exactly what we are supposed to do in great detail but it turns out he was wrong?
You can’t do that. And in Stage 4 you know you can’t do that. If you meet the Buddha on the road, you have to kill him. No more guru for you you. We have to see God with our own eyes and not be ashamed of it. We have to find out personally the universally true point of our mortal existence. Nobody can do it for us. Isn’t that liberating and exhilarating?
Fatherof4husbandof1 wrote:My problem is that I was taught for 38 years that sin was acting against God’s will. Only to learn that It may not have been God’s will at all. What am I left with? … What is sin?
Yeowww! That’s heavy and I am hearing you, f4h1. I know the pain. It gets better. The promises are true. You are free now. Rejoice in that and look upward and forward with a brightness of faith. (And I think you know I am not talking about anything particular to any church or religion. I’m talking about the Way, the Truth, and the Life.)
I was at a non-Church conference a while ago, and one of the presenters made the comment that “There is no such thing as accurate definitions — only useful ones”. Fatherof4husbandof1 wrote:What am I left with?
After reading more of all your great posts and thinking about it a little more……. I have 0 faith, and would have 0 commitment if I were not a father of 4 and a husband of 1. That is what I am left with, and that is 100% of my commitment.
f4h1
Fatherof4husbandof1 wrote:Fatherof4husbandof1 wrote:What am I left with?
After reading more of all your great posts and thinking about it a little more……. I have 0 faith, and would have 0 commitment if I were not a father of 4 and a husband of 1. That is what I am left with, and that is 100% of my commitment.
f4h1
Well that’s all fine and dandy – except you posted it on the wrong thread.
🙂 Old-Timer wrote:My own definition of sin is, basically, the definition in James 4:17.
Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.
Iow, it’s not doing something I feel I should do. (Just to be clear, ALL things can be phrased this way. Murdering someone is not doing something I feel I should do – the “something” being abstaining from murder – or, from a more “enlightened” perspective, not loving someone enough to avoid murdering them.)
I believe this mostly because I accept the idea of being judged by how I live according to my conscience – which is the “pure Mormonism” definition of how we are judged, imo.
….
….. I understand the potential problems with such a definition, but I also believe the distinction between “transgression” (the broad category of things that are contrary to the will of God – or “all things that are wrong”) and “sin” (the sub-set of transgressions that we choose consciously to do – meaning we have to see them as wrong) is central to the concept of an Atonement – since we are told we will be punished ONLY for our unforsaken sins and not for Adam’s transgressions (which I interpret to mean the mistakes we make in ignorance as a result of what we inherit through being born into mortality).
I tend to agree with Ray’s comments above. For me it is all tied up in cognitive dissonance. If you act contrary to how you feel you should, you will feel it. You have two choices at this point, you can repent and return to your original path or deviate and find a new path that works for you.
I think the important thing is to evaluate the path and to choose and own it. I agree that in the end it is less about what you did and perhaps more about who you have become. I think the path you choose has an influence on who you become. What do you want your life to have been about.
Then it becomes “to thine own self be true.” You get to make the most of yourself in any direction you want and the “sin” is where you sabotage your efforts in becoming your ultimate you.
P.S. Cwald…is oral sex really a sin?
😥 Roy wrote:…
I think the important thing is to evaluate the path and to choose and own it. I agree that in the end it is less about what you did and perhaps more about who you have become. I think the path you choose has an influence on who you become. What do you want your life to have been about.
Then it becomes “to thine own self be true.” You get to make the most of yourself in any direction you want and the “sin” is where you sabotage your efforts in becoming your ultimate you.
Great thought Roy. I love Shakespeare. Yes, I like the comment… I might add to it only, “The choices we make dictate the lives we lead, to thine own self be true.”
Roy wrote:P.S. Cwald…is oral sex really a sin?
😥 Good question Roy. Not to me, but it certainly is considered to be a sin by MANY LDS members.
I know it WAS a temple recommend question for married adults in 1982- ?.I know that MANY GA’s have specifically stated that it was, and MANY more have stated that “unnatural sex acts” were a sin in the context of oral sex in marriage. Quote:The First Presidency has interpreted oral sex as constituting an unnatural, impure and unholy practice…
http://www.i4m.com/think/photos/mormon-oral-sex.jpghttp://www.i4m.com/think/photos/mormon-oral-sex.jpg” class=”bbcode_url”> Obviously, it is no longer part of the TR questions, and it’s not mentions much anymore. So is it a sin or did the GA’s get it wrong, or did they just quit talking about it because it caused too many causalities within the church? I don’t know – but none of the options are going to make me feel better about how our leaders handle these kind of issues that is really not their business and probably has nothing to do with the gospel, and where they just express their personal opinion a make it a binding “commandment” on 14 million people.
It is still a huge taboo in much of the LDS culture. Just another reason why I have such a difficult time with our culture and traditions, and really don’t see much reason to believe and follow many of the commandments that make really no sense to me accept to determine obedience and loyalty to the church and it’s leadership. That does not work for me any longer.
DevilsAdvocate wrote:That’s why I prefer rules or “commandments” that provide value on their own for people in this life without needing to wait and see what the consequences in the next life will be.
DA, I also see the value in prioritizing things that are more of a “for sure” thing, like consequences which are more sure to impact my daily life.However, where is the need then for faith, if you can always see the consequences clearly? What if a sin has eternal consequences that we can’t clearly see now vs a sin that only has a 2 yr impact on my earthly existence? Would it not be worthwhile to consider eternal consequences, even if they take more effort to try to understand?
cwald wrote:It is still a huge taboo in much of the LDS culture. Just another reason why I have such a difficult time with our culture and traditions, and really don’t see much reason to believe and follow many of the commandments that make really no sense to me accept to determine obedience and loyalty to the church and it’s leadership. That does not work for me any longer.
I agree with you, cwald, unquestioning loyalty does not work for me any longer either. I will reference one of my favorite quotes again on this:
Quote:there are so many “shoulds” and “should nots” that merely keeping track of them can be a challenge. Sometimes, well-meaning amplifications of divine principles—many coming from uninspired sources—complicate matters further, diluting the purity of divine truth with man-made addenda. One person’s good idea—something that may work for him or her—takes root and becomes an expectation. And gradually, eternal principles can get lost within the labyrinth of “good ideas.”-Pres Uchtdorf
Perhaps some things categorized as “sin” by well-intentioned leaders in the past, have run their course and no longer address the “weightier matters” or the eternal principles based on today’s experiences. If the church continues to call it a sin, I am not one to dictate their classification to them, but I become less concerned with it and more concerned with the principle it was trying to teach and how I can adapt that into my life. In true cafeteria style…I simply choose to leave it in the buffet for others to choose if they so wish. Others can call it what they want (sin or whatever), but God knows my heart, and my actions according to my own conscience:
Quote:AOF 11 We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may.
cwald wrote:“The choices we make dictate the lives we lead, to thine own self be true.”
I heartily agree with your addition Cwald.
As far as the oral sex stuff I came of age around 2000, so there was never anything explicit said to me about it. I can certainly testify that, not having known this was frowned upon, I never felt any guilt, or departure of the spirit or any of that. I had understood that your intimate relations with your spouse should be sacred and leave room for the spirit. I had interpreted that as being against bondage, S & M, etc. I guess it would depend on the couple as to whether they feel oral sex as an impediment to feeling the spirit.
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