- Aug 27, 2014
- 13,897
- 14,168
- Country
- United States
- Gender
- Male
- Faith
- Oriental Orthodox
- Marital Status
- Private
I don't want to discuss the topic on which the Mormon leadership ruled (homosexuality), only what it might mean in a Mormon context that the leadership of the Mormon religion very recently considered the stance that they had previously taken on the religious exclusion of the children of homosexuals to be in some sense received from the Lord (as per the Russell M. Nelson quote on screen in the video below @ 1:27), only to have even more recently reversed that...uh...'revelation' (?) or whatever it was.
This raises some question as to the notion of Mormonism's 'continuing revelation' and how it's supposed to work in real life, away from the Mormons' own belief that it is such a great thing and we're all poorer without it. It doesn't seem to be so, since it only causes confusion when things like this happen. We could ask: Did God change His mind, or did the Mormon leadership? How do you know that they weren't right before, and are wrong to change things so rapidly and drastically now? Or if they weren't right before, then why did they treat this policy as they did? Didn't God know what He wanted in the first place, and if so, why wouldn't He have just told the LDS leadership to say that, rather than to say the opposite first, only to change it very soon afterwards? Or is it that the Mormon God is very sensitive to the PR nightmare this policy had created for his 'restored church'?
It all seems rather convenient. I know that in Mormonism 'revelation' can change things from one time period to the next (though having it change this quickly seems rare), but I am wondering why God would be so quick to bow to pressure from the human beings he created? Could you imagine in the OT if God saw some of the Israelites worshiping the golden calf and decided "Well, I don't want to tell them to stop...they might not like that...I don't want people to be mad at me"? Or if in the NT, God decided to 'cancel' the crucifixion because He knew it would make some people sad or upset?
But maybe this isn't God at all...maybe this is the organization doing what it needs to do to protect itself from the wrath of the political lobby of the sexual minorities. That would make more sense, but then why wouldn't they just come out and say that, and leave their supposed 'direction of the Lord' out of it?
This raises some question as to the notion of Mormonism's 'continuing revelation' and how it's supposed to work in real life, away from the Mormons' own belief that it is such a great thing and we're all poorer without it. It doesn't seem to be so, since it only causes confusion when things like this happen. We could ask: Did God change His mind, or did the Mormon leadership? How do you know that they weren't right before, and are wrong to change things so rapidly and drastically now? Or if they weren't right before, then why did they treat this policy as they did? Didn't God know what He wanted in the first place, and if so, why wouldn't He have just told the LDS leadership to say that, rather than to say the opposite first, only to change it very soon afterwards? Or is it that the Mormon God is very sensitive to the PR nightmare this policy had created for his 'restored church'?
It all seems rather convenient. I know that in Mormonism 'revelation' can change things from one time period to the next (though having it change this quickly seems rare), but I am wondering why God would be so quick to bow to pressure from the human beings he created? Could you imagine in the OT if God saw some of the Israelites worshiping the golden calf and decided "Well, I don't want to tell them to stop...they might not like that...I don't want people to be mad at me"? Or if in the NT, God decided to 'cancel' the crucifixion because He knew it would make some people sad or upset?
But maybe this isn't God at all...maybe this is the organization doing what it needs to do to protect itself from the wrath of the political lobby of the sexual minorities. That would make more sense, but then why wouldn't they just come out and say that, and leave their supposed 'direction of the Lord' out of it?
