Sound and fury

[_The Dude]

Personally, I'm with Abman on questioning the nature of the Atonement. Now that I'm out of the mindset that takes the Atonement for granted, I too am at a loss to explain how Jesus could be a scapegoat for us all. What is this "eternal Justice" thing which required Jesus to suffer great pain for a brief time in order to get some teenager out of going to Hell for jacking off? How are the atrocities of Adolf Hitler erased from the balance sheet of this eternal Justice because someone else, Jesus, was executed by the Romans in 33 AD in Jerusalem? It really doesn't make much sense. It simply doesn't make much sense that one person could endure suffering on behalf of someone else, and for Justice to accept this.

Guys, guys, if it made sense then it would not sufficiently test your faith. The absurdity is part of the plan, to make it just hard enough for you to be challenged on your path to godhood. Originally there was more absurdity. For example it was originally planned that Jesus would suffer in Gethsemene and on the cross and would have to chop down a forest with a pickled herring, but in God's wisdom it was determined that the herring step was just too non-sensical to ask people to take it seriously, and so Heavenly Father decided to stick with the abbreviated Atonement as we know it today. It is sufficiently non-sensical to try your faith, and so, all is going according to the eternal plan.

[_cksalmon]

From the outside, I watch the Evangelical/Mormon back and forth on MAD and elsewhere. I see them arguing about which version of Christ is correct (and which part of hell the believer in the "corrupt" version is headed for), the meaning of grace, the potential of humans for divinity (or not), and a host of things that apparently are incredibly important for these guys. "Where in the Bible do we learn that Jesus is Jehovah, but not Yaweh or Elohim?" an Evangelical demands today.

I sit back on the sidelines and I wonder why any of this matters. As a believer, I always thought the gospel was about doing and being, not about espousing some esoteric point of doctrine. Who cares whether Jesus is part of a Godhead or a Trinity? Who cares if Satan was Jesus' "brother"? Aren't there more important things to do, such as feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting the imprisoned?

I guess it can look pretty silly to an outsider. My underlying point in such debates is that the LDS religion exalts man (by making him of the same species as and the literal offspring of God), and that (to my mind) right-thinking Christianity espouses a radically-other God who is fundamentally different than humankind.

Granted that I'm weak enough psychologically to need some God-figure up in the sky, I find it more fulfilling to reverence a sovereign deity, unanswerable and unrelated to man, mysterious, productive of deterministic outcomes, and utterly in control of absolutely all things.

Sure, it's silly, but it's my silly. And it stands in antithesis to the LDS doctrine of God. That's important to me.

I certainly don't expect the distinctions to be important or even interesting (except perhaps sociologically) to those who reject the idea of God.

I'm cool with that.

Best.

CKS

[_Runtu]

I guess it can look pretty silly to an outsider. My underlying point in such debates is that the LDS religion exalts man (by making him of the same species as and the literal offspring of God), and that (to my mind) right-thinking Christianity espouses a radically-other God who is fundamentally different than humankind.

Just to clarify. I did not say that these beliefs are silly. What I said was that arguing over it seemed pointless and silly.

Granted that I'm weak enough psychologically to need some God-figure up in the sky, I find it more fulfilling to reverence a sovereign deity, unanswerable and unrelated to man, mysterious, productive of deterministic outcomes, and utterly in control of absolutely all things.

Sure, it's silly, but it's my silly. And it stands in antithesis to the LDS doctrine of God. That's important to me.

Fair enough.

I certainly don't expect the distinctions to be important or even interesting (except perhaps sociologically) to those who reject the idea of God.

I'm cool with that.

Best.

CKS

I don't reject the idea of God. I'm kind of hoping He is there, after all.