On one of the recent MG topics, I mentioned Joseph Smith was a sociopath, which I truly believe, and that senior leadership of the church tends toward sociopathology, which is evident in their stance to burn the kids to protect the club. MG went on to make one of his word salads about the Church leaders not being sociopaths while he was gearing up for another outing to avoid the Lord's command to serve a senior mission.
First, let's talk just a bit about sociopathology or anti-social personality disorder. From the webmd article:
Now, hold on. Let's go back to this poll. What was it that Evangelicals -- with Mormons coming in second place -- think shouldn't be foundational? Was it empathy? So, in other words, according to the most fervent believers in Jesus and holy writ, the thing that keeps people from being serial killers is bad, m'kay?webmd wrote:Sociopath is an outdated, informal term for someone who has antisocial personality disorder (ASPD). This disorder can cause you to lack empathy, which means you don't care about or understand other peoples' feelings. You might not feel remorse for bad things you do, and you might often take advantage of others for your own personal gain.
If only 45% of Bible thumpers believe empathy is foundational, then Jesus has personally failed. The consensus among EVs was, in my reasonable experience interacting with them as a missionary and even dating some later on, that the difference between the real Jesus and the Mormon Jesus is that good works flow after salvation, not as a means of obtaining salvation. Once saved, the Holy Spirit takes over and guides the person like a captain guides a ship through the stormy seas of life. What that means is that once a person gets Jesus as their personal savior to guide the boat, that they are twice as likely to look for religious and political leaders who are sociopaths to serve society.
The fact of the matter is that Jesus in his mortal ministry (prior to guiding people as the captain of a ship from heaven) was a thorn in the side of the institution. His message was radical empathy, "he who is without sin, let him cast the first stone." This doesn't mean the stone could never be cast -- he was without sin and so he was qualified to cast it, yet he didn't. The empathy is in the first move, to deeply understand where the person is coming from, without that first move, the second move to show mercy will never be available.
For religious conservatives, the first move is dangerous, you must "nip it in the bud" as they say, and so in the end, the presumed God, known as Jesus, got totally owned -- nailed to a cross by Pontius Pilot. Pilot was a no-nonsense administrator who was able to make the "hard decisions" and put down opinions before they got too loud by drastic means. Let severe punishment be a deterrent so we can keep the status quo with less work. In other words, Jesus is leading all these people like a captain guiding a ship to empower religious and political leaders who are much like man who ended him, if not worse, if you account for the times.
