The Second Mindfulness Training

Reading Thich Nhat Hanh's Five Mindfulness Trainings, and despite him being a Buddhist and all, the Spirit whispered to me that he's probably taken out his endowment at some point (think "time, talents, and everything with which the Lord has blessed you or with which he may bless you" as you read this!):

"Aware of the suffering caused by exploitation, social injustice, stealing, and oppression, I am committed to cultivating loving kindness and learning ways to work for the well-being of people, animals, plants, and minerals. I will practice generosity by sharing my time, energy, and material resources with those who are in real need. I am determined not to steal and not to possess anything that should belong to others. I will respect the property of others, but I will prevent others from profiting from human suffering or the suffering of other species on Earth." The World We Have, pp. 11-12 (alternate version here)

OK, so it's not totally LDS but the Spirit's still telling me a lot of Mormons could really get behind this. It's like, you know, one of those those fragmented bits of truth out there in all religions that fits so neatly into the whole entire Truth found within the doctrine of the Church, right? Make sense to me (kind of). Except for the fact that here it feels like Buddhism has something to add to Mormonism, rather than Mormonism adding to Buddhism.

Where in Mormon doctrine do you find explicit prohibitions of exploitation of people, animals, plants and minerals? When was the last time you heard a prophet or apostle tell you to oppose anything causing "the suffering of other species"? The best we have is an awkward statement in the Doctrine & Covenants about how the U.S. Constitution "should be maintained for the rights and protection of all flesh" and how slavery (in the U.S.) is bad. Even if we want to believe the Second Mindfulness Training and the verses in D&C say the same thing, the truth is Thich Nhat Hanh says it way better.

So I'd like to bear my testimony that Thich Nhat Hanh is a partial prophet who should change his ways and be baptized by true authority and be saved, and that Buddhism can sort of be right sometimes but never as right as the Church I was born into. Nham oh Jheses Christh, ahmen!

First Conference meme

Jeff wins! This is the first Conference meme I ran into this weekend.

It's a blend of an Old Testament story and a nice hymn. We get Cain's damnable denial of having any responsibility over his brother Abel (I thought the message was that WE ARE OUR BROTHERS' KEEPERS) and the dutiful words of a hymn about sharing (which is powerful because it teachers that WE ARE OUR BROTHERS' KEEPERS).

Jeff, are we not our brother's keeper? As an apostle, if you are not your brother's keeper, what the hell are you?

The forgiving god

God forgives generously. Think of all our horrible, awful sins. Swearing, selfishness, lies, stealing, fighting, lust, backbiting, sleeping in church, not blessing your snacks, not doing genealogy, loud laughter, and the list goes on. How can a Perfect Being possibly put up with such shenanigans? Then again I'm not sure how much God even cares.

But let's pretend God does care. I have some serious doubts about him being forgiving. If he's so forgiving, why did Jesus have to pay for our sins? I mean, if Jesus paid for our sins then there's no need to forgive them. FORGIVING A PRICE THAT'S ALREADY BEEN PAID MAKES NO SENSE. It's like hearing your waiter tell you your meal's on the house right after the bill's been paid.

Did Jesus pay the price or not? If he paid the price, God doesn't have to forgive shit (and neither does Jesus, apparently), and teaching that he forgives is nonsensical. If Jesus' brief suffering didn't quite do the job, then I guess God might still have a chance to prove how forgiving he is.

Well, as long as we repent first.

Heavenly fatherliness #33 - Not an ATM

According to popular wisdom, a good father does not allow his children to treat him like an ATM.

Heavenly Father scores again! He is definitely not letting us cash in on his infinite resources. God only blesses us with financial prosperity when he sees fit. Most frequently that monetary blessing comes in the form of a coin on the sidewalk.

*These attributes represent the popular thoughts of Ask Men’s Jullian Marcus, examiner.com’s Tanya Tringali, and Open Talk Magazine’s Glenn Silvestre as per their respective articles on what makes a good father.

Heavenly fatherliness #21 - Spending

According to popular wisdom, a good father makes a budget and limits his spending on "toys".

Many religions ask for tithes and offerings to keep functions going and priests alive, but I think most believers would agree that God has no need for money (except, it seems, for blood), so there's not really any divine budget to speak of. Let's face it, Heavenly Father has everything that exists already - HE HAS ALL THE TOYS and then some - what else can he possibly want?

On the other hand, Heavenly Father does fit the criterion of limiting his spending when it comes to his children. He's extremely stingy with us, most of whom live in horrible poverty. And he's no better when it comes to the afterlife; he's budgeted the salvation to a very select few - his "chosen." In other words, he plays favorites big time. God the Father is pretty awful. Easily one of the worse dads I've heard described.

Goats, be gone!

*These attributes represent the popular thoughts of Ask Men’s Jullian Marcus, examiner.com’s Tanya Tringali, and Open Talk Magazine’s Glenn Silvestre as per their respective articles on what makes a good father.

Heavenly fatherliness - Is Heavenly Father a good father?

All of my life I was told that God, in addition to being Ruler of the Universe, was also my dad. I was not a mere creation God takes casual interest in, nor could I be compared to an abandoned puppy or a stranger taken under the wing a loving being - I was one of God’s spiritual sons who agreed to be born to earthly parents, live a life of absolute dedication to my Heavenly Father, and then hopefully return to live with him in complete Celestial Glory. I was taught that I could completely trust in God even more than I could trust my earthly father (who fortunately for me turned out to be a very caring and responsible guy) because, while my earthly father would be imperfect, have a limited knowledge and understanding of the Universe, and be only as powerful as your slightly above average human, my Heavenly Father is perfect, omniscient, and omnipotent. So in a nutshell, however much my biological dad wishes for my success and happiness, Heavenly Father wishes for it infinitely more and actually has the power to make me truly and totally happy. True and total happiness, this is the first thing Mormons will explain to you when you ask them what the meaning of life is, but millions of others have grown up viewing life under this same premise and billions more have heard similar conjectures. God is our father and he loves us. He is on our side and chooses to help us. God cares for us just as a father cares for his children. 

Viewing God as a father suggests that we can understand to some extent the thoughts and feelings that motivate his interactions with human beings. And when life gets hard and we start to feel picked on a little too much, viewing God as a knowing and loving father helps us reach the conclusion that everything will be alright and we just have keep trusting in him.

I used to cherish my “divine parentage” with only occasionally acknowledging the problems underlying the Heavenly Father narrative. Even after outgrowing the Mormon faith tradition I would at times revisit the idea that God is somehow the father of humanity and what that would mean for our expectations of God’s behavior toward us. As believers we impose expectations on God. Jesus, for example, taught that human fathers know how to give better gifts than stones, snakes, and scorpions and Heavenly Father knows how to give even better gifts (Matt. 7:9-11; Luke 11:11-13), and consequently we actually expect God to answer, open, and give when we seek, knock, and ask (Matt. 7:7-8; Luke 11:9-10).

This series will touch on a number of characteristics and behaviors of a good father. These attributes represent the popularized (and popularizing) thoughts of Ask Men’s Jullian Marcus, examiner.com’s Tanya Tringali, and Open Talk Magazine’s Glenn Silvestre as per their respective articles on what makes a good father all distilled into the most concise bullet points possible. What makes these authors or their publishers reliable authorities on fatherhood has simply been decided by Google Search. 

Please share your thoughts, unless, of course, you're an asshole.

Nephite ward lists

To all of you out there who are struggling with the recent excommunication news, let me just say, PEACE! BE STILL! This is all part of God's plan for his church. We read in The Book of Mormon that excommunication is a divinely inspired practice that brings order. It can be very hard for the faithful, it's true, but we've got to be strong. No slipping up! Heaven forbid you lapse into apostasy too!

Now if only we could find some of these Nephite lists of believers. Wouldn't it be great to see if Nephites blotted out the names of the unrepentant completely or if they just earmarked them in their database as excommunicated so they could more easily reinstate those lost sheep once they returned like we do today? I mean the Church totally has it figured out now! Don't delete anybody! Keep them all signed up! Just hide the names of excommunicated members until they return to the fold! It might not be honest, but you have to agree it's generous and loving.