Meeting with Bishop: Faith is a Choice

[_quark]

Happy Thanksgiving!

Last night, my wife and I spent a little over an hour in the bishop's office. It was a formal meeting where he desired to understand what caused us to stop going to church. I assume he also intended to share his feelings and beliefs with us, which is to be expected.

Twenty minutes into the conversation, the bishop asked us about our belief in the Bible and God. I told him frankly that I don't believe in either one then explained that I find beauty and meaning in religious acts of worship and teachings. He seemed surprised and followed my statement with a question about what caused "my testimony to be crushed after all that I had grown up with and learned over the years." I wanted to argue that nothing was crushed but rather, I feel much was expanded and that I have come out of a cave. I didn't think it would help to say it so I held my tongue.

Anyway, he made a comment at minute 38 that I found interesting. Here is an excerpt:

Bish: "Tell me, how is your life? Because when your beliefs have changed so dramatically, it has to impact choices that you make - the way you live your life, and the way you are raising your kids. It's probably much different now than it was 3 years ago."

Me: "Hmmm, I don't think so. We still work with our children to be responsible, get their homework done, don't disrespect us, be kind to others."

my wife: "We have chilled out quite a bit. But I see the way we chilled out as healthy."

10 minutes later, he asks, "[Looking at my wife] How do you raise your kids? Do you teach them to believe in God, or... [looking at me] do you expound your beliefs to your children at home... how do you do that?"

Me: "We encourage them to ask."
my wife recounted a recent experience with our son in which they talked openly about God.

The bishop ended with a sort of punch line, and take-away message: "faith is a choice." He followed up with a reading of some verses in 1 Corinthians speaking of Jesus.

I came away with this discussion feeling god. I'm glad we didn't refuse to meet with him. I'm glad he knows at least some of what we have gone through. Most of all, I think it helped my wife and I gain a little more closure between our religious differences between the two of us. In all, it was a healthy experience.

I've been thinking about his "faith is a choice" comment. I looked this phrase up on the Internet and was surprised to find an LDS talk among the first Google hits: http://LDS.org/general-conference/2010/ ... s?lang=eng

From this talk, we find this quote:

"Yes, faith is a choice, and it must be sought after and developed. Thus, we are responsible for our own faith. We are also responsible for our lack of faith. The choice is yours."

I see a lot of problems with this idea. First and foremost is that it deflates the religious experience to nothing more than a mental switch whithin each of our brains. It does not regard our environment and what we observe. How sad! Who is this God that can't act on us? Can't this God cause anything to happen to us regardless of what we choose?

In conclusion, I think most people that claim "faith is a choice" really don't mean it. If they stopped for a second to think it through, they would realize there is much more to it than a choice. I didn't just wake up one day and say, "Goshdarnit, I'm going to not believe in the church anymore." Information was laid before my eyes and ears and I did my best to form an opinion. I'm always open to change my opinion given better information that comes before my 5 senses.

[Guest]

Faith has to be termed a choice, and one for which the individual is wholly and exclusively responsible without benefit of supporting physical evidence.

This is because if it were allowed that observation, experimentation, physical evidence, logic, or reason were in any way linked to, or necessary for, the development of religious faith (especially the Mormon variety), it would be in very short supply in the information age.

Wait - it is in short supply - Mormon faith is present in adequate amounts less than 2% of the US population.

[_Themis]

"Yes, faith is a choice, and it must be sought after and developed. Thus, we are responsible for our own faith. We are also responsible for our lack of faith. The choice is yours."

I see a lot of problems with this idea. First and foremost is that it deflates the religious experience to nothing more than a mental switch whithin each of our brains. It does not regard our environment and what we observe. How sad! Who is this God that can't act on us? Can't this God cause anything to happen to us regardless of what we choose?

In conclusion, I think most people that claim "faith is a choice" really don't mean it. If they stopped for a second to think it through, they would realize there is much more to it than a choice. I didn't just wake up one day and say, "Goshdarnit, I'm going to not believe in the church anymore." Information was laid before my eyes and ears and I did my best to form an opinion. I'm always open to change my opinion given better information that comes before my 5 senses.

It's all inconsistent. Your bishop will think it's a choice when it suits him, and then teach later that it is a gift of God. Funny that neither one makes any sense.

[_Hoops]

This is because if it were allowed that observation, experimentation, physical evidence, logic, or reason
.

Which are your own faith promoting devices. But those are somehow better because..... well, they're yours.

[_DrW]

This is because if it were allowed that observation, experimentation, physical evidence, logic, or reason
.

Which are your own faith promoting devices. But those are somehow better because..... well, they're yours.

Hoops,
In case you have not yet figured it out (after all of our delightful exchanges on the subject), I place very little value on faith (unfounded belief).

Faith is a poor substitute for knowledge. This is especially true considering that it takes so little additional effort to go from unfounded belief, to belief based on physical evidence, to logical and reasoned interpretation of that evidence - resulting in real knowledge.

Best of all, no magic is required.

[_quark]

Oops, I meant to say I came away feeling good not feeling god lol. But you never know, maybe I felt both!

I need to add, during his punch line address, his tears were flowing. I remember thinking how interesting it is that at that very moment, this man was experiencing a moment of heightened worship and I was witnessing it- in real time.

Also, I was disappointed that he never once touched the subject of our relationship with each other (my wife and I). It was made pretty clear in the course of the meeting that I was done with church and my wife is open to the idea. Once that was established, the bish was laser focused on "how can I get her to church?" it would have been refreshing to hear him ask, how are the two of you doing through all this?

[_Ceeboo]

Hey quark,

how are the two of you doing through all this?

Without question or exception, this is the most important, worthy, concerning, and most precious and valuable thing on the table. (in my opinion)

(No reply concerning the rest of your post as I am not LDS, nor do I think any of it is nearly as important as the part I pasted.)

Peace,
Ceeboo

[_quark]

.

[_LDSToronto]

Also, I was disappointed that he never once touched the subject of our relationship with each other (my wife and I). It was made pretty clear in the course of the meeting that I was done with church and Dear Wife is open to the idea. Once that was established, the bish was laser focused on "how can I get her to church?" it would have been refreshing to hear him ask, how are the two of you doing through all this?

You know, now that you mention it, my bishop was the same way. He knew my wife was a lost cause, but he was not concerned one bit with her, our relationship. The thrust of the whole discussion was, "How do we make sure LDST stays in church"

Thanks for pointing this out.

H.

[_mikwut]

Faith is a choice, it is an attitude and a predisposition towards reality revealing itself to us. It is oriented commitment towards reality. Faith can consist of hope, love and a trust towards a reality that we commit ourselves to. It seeks understanding within a fiduciary framework. Its basis (at least in a Christina understanding) is grace and our experience as whole persons in all the complexities and movements of reality upon us as persons.

Tangential to faith and not to be misunderstood as synonymous with it is belief, which is not a choice. Our propositions are forced on our minds by evidence, we cannot choose to believe the moon is made out of cheese. We cannot choose for the historical and propositional beliefs of the Mormon church to be factual when the evidence presents them as not. But, faith is NOT simple banal facticity - faith is a trusting orientation towards reality.

Mormonism unfortunately has a disproportionate amount of propositional beliefs that often get confused with faith, 'J.S. saw god in a wooded area' is a proposition that often within Mormonism improperly defines one's faith, but it is a belief not faith. Often when Mormons leave the church they keep this propositional understanding of faith and don't distinguish between faith and belief. When someone comes to a factual determination that the historicity of the Mormon church is not as they previously were taught or understood - faith isn't the issue - propositional facts are. I didn't leave my "faith" when I left Mormonism, I left certain beliefs that were no longer tenable for me based on the evidence.

This is also why the scientism you see so clearly in DrW's posts are often found in former Mormons, his statements - "Faith is a poor substitute for knowledge. This is especially true considering that it takes so little additional effort to go from unfounded belief, to belief based on physical evidence, to logical and reasoned interpretation of that evidence - resulting in real knowledge. Best of all, no magic is required." This makes no sense when faith is properly oriented and understood. It is simply an admission (tacitly) by DrW that he has no understanding of faith proper, he only understands beliefs. That's OK, because part of faith is a committed sense towards reality as it discloses itself to us and empirical reality is part of reality.

Faith is more closely related to judgment and discernment than it is to knowledge - it is more concerned with understanding than with putting facts in a bag - that we all do based on our current experience, education and knowledge but what we do with our facts in a bag (beliefs that are not chosen) is closer to what faith is.

my best, mikwut