Zelder wrote:Great post consig. The #1 problem with apologetics is the contention that is so prevalent. The arrogant and contentious attitudes are driving people with questions and doubts on out the door. Even when people decide to leave it would be great if we could still be friends. Too many apologists make enemies with unbelievers.
Bushman has my total respect. He is a good man.
I think in some ways this is related to the Mormon idea that friendships exist only for pragmatic reasons.
We friendship non-members to teach them the gospel. If they are not interested, we drop the friendship.
Maybe the corrolary is that we are friends with members only so long as they believe like us and act like us. Should they cease being like us, our friendship similarly ceases.
These things ought not so to be.
I would like to understand how this attitude can be so prevalent in a church where no leader has ever actually come out and given these instructions in so many words.
All the Best!
--Consiglieri
If we are told "every member a missionary", is it possible that we are modeling our behaviour on the missionaries - I'm not saying that this is necessarily how missionaries feel, but it may be how their behaviour is perceived.
NOMinal member
Maksutov: "... if you give someone else the means to always push your buttons, you're lost."
consiglieri wrote: I think in some ways this is related to the Mormon idea that friendships exist only for pragmatic reasons.
We friendship non-members to teach them the gospel. If they are not interested, we drop the friendship.
Maybe the corrolary is that we are friends with members only so long as they believe like us and act like us. Should they cease being like us, our friendship similarly ceases.
These things ought not so to be.
I would like to understand how this attitude can be so prevalent in a church where no leader has ever actually come out and given these instructions in so many words.
All the Best!
--Consiglieri
If we are told "every member a missionary", is it possible that we are modeling our behaviour on the missionaries - I'm not saying that this is necessarily how missionaries feel, but it may be how their behaviour is perceived.
How else is their behavior supposed to be perceived? If missionaries and acquaintances drop me after finding out I'm not interested why shouldn't I feel objectified? Isn't it obvious from their behavior that I was not valued for me as an individual or even the vague "fellow human being" but as a potential convert, and when that was gone I wasn't worth associating with? With the door knocking missionaries this is easily accepted, but with people who present themselves as friends? It's just ugly behavior, it leaves a bad bad taste.
