As I dissect LDS theology, I realize there is nothing transcendent within it. It is, in simple terms, a theology of "stuff"--things. God is a thing, we are things, Jesus did stuff, your wife and kids are all stuff you get, all spirit is invisible stuff, heaven involves getting more things for yourself in the form of the biggest "things" we can imagine--worlds and universes. If we could imagine bigger things, then we would get promised those too. If they could turn love and honor into material objects and barter and sell those they would absolutely do so.

Pretty unimaginative, and totally uninspiring unless you can only think in terms of getting and having more.

Where, in this lowbrow metaphysics, is there anything close to the beauty and mystery of the Tao, the Buddhist idea of dependent co-arising, the Christian Logos, or even the beauty of the "flow" concept of constructal law or the elegance of thermodynamics? There is no process, no dissipative structure philosophy, no explanation of flux or the way in which it is channeled. Science is infinitely richer, as is almost every philosophical and metaphysical system I have ever tried to learn about.

This obsession of the LDS with stuff, stuff, and more stuff, is rather crippling to the sense of awe and wonder than enhancing of it, and I get so tired of liberal LDS trying to tell us how rich and meaningful it is. It isn't. Any richness that people like the Givens see in it is made up by them.

In the LDS world, Things are God and God is Things.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/26/2015 10:37AM by generationofvipers.

hammer on head of nail.

incredibly shallow & superficial.

then, when a loved one 'passes' (no one dies these days), TSCC doesn't allow for grieving, b/c 'Everything Will Be OK' in the hereafter! A 'funeral' is now a 'celebration of life', a missionary opportunity to re-tell the Plan of Salvation to ppl who've prolly heard it (more or less) every week of their lives.


I guess Joe wove this into the quilt also to 'appeal' to gullible people (which TSCC occasionally admits)

I like your take on this. The Mormon Church is a "Material Girl," no doubt about it.

They don't promise celestial understanding, but rather celestial mansions, they don't promise understanding without end, or perpetual knowledge of perfect love, they promise wives by the dozens, your own world to govern where you too can crucify, drown, and burn your own children, and everybody has to worship you and pay you.


Perhaps the Mormons aren't able to turn love and honor into material objects, as you say, but---they do teach their members to barter and sell them with their "my way or the highway" approach.

Love in the family is often used as a weapon with the threat to withdraw it. Mormon style love often rips families apart rather than uniting them.

And honor? The very definition of Mormon honor is obedience at any price.

So love and honor are a currency to Mormons.

Yes I see that you are right. Good point. It's even worse than I thought.

As I read it, the only way that LDS thinkers get around it is to claim that this "stuff"-obsession is "symbolic."

The temple, our highest liturgy if you will, is very pedestrian (unless you think secret club signs are cool). So how do apologists try to give it some dignity? "It's all symbolic" and "The symbolism of the temple is rich and textured."

Sure it is. The symbolism of the temple, except what it stole from Masonry without giving credit, is exactly as rich and textured as you can force it to be through vigorous mental exertions. Otherwise it is as banal as a Hallmark card. Maybe I'm exaggerating, but not by much.

Haha. "Symbolic" is a very useful word for getting out of tricky situations, isn't it?

To borrow Lincoln's words which describe Mormon theology perfectly:

"as thin as the homeopathic soup that was made by boiling the shadow of a pigeon that had starved to death"

There is a actually some (Hack) MORmON scholar that is currently making claims that Joe SMith and the Book of MORmON are instruments responsible for motivating Lincoln to win the civil war, because Lincoln had read the Book of MORmON about that time. The idiot has a written a book stating his claims.

LD$ Inc is all about money and "stuff"

Those with lots of money are being blessed for being super obedient. God is showering them with "stuff".

Those with little money are not being blessed because they are sinning, or not reading/praying/serving enough.

This thinking in itself is an example of how shallow LD$ theology is. Stuff is good, no stuff is a sign or being bad.

Yes, mormonism is a mile wide and a half-inch deep. If that. The people are even shallower, especially the women.

It still cracks me up when they say people leave the church because it was too hard for them. No, it's EASY being a mormon. No thinking required. Obedience only.

One of the most thought-provoking and life altering things I've heard since becoming a UU was when our minister preached a sermon titled, "What if the Hokey Pokey IS what it's all about." Not that almost all of her sermons aren't thought provoking, because they are, but I sat through that one and thought, "I wouldn't have even appreciated this if I were still mormon." And yes, for the benediction, we lined the sanctuary in a circle and did the hokey pokey.

I'll bet the poor Handcart Pioneers were promised that when they got to "Zion" it would be a land of milk and honey, with lots and lots of "stuff"; little did they know (when that promise turned out to be a load of hooey) they were told that they just needed more faith.

'Waiting for Godot' could be about the Mormons...

Fawn Brodie pointed out years ago that Joseph's religion is very much of this world.

Yes, and not just "of this world". It is "of the lowest common denominator of this world." Getting good shit. Avoiding bad shit. That's the whole thing in a nutshell.

Buddhism says that secular authority is summed up by reward and punishment. The Law, though, is about victory or defeat. Victory or defeat is determined by character, inner potential, like strength, perservernce, dedication, struggle, compassion, etc. Reward and punishment, though, comes from outside oneself, the opinion amd power of someone else. Mormonism is all external, just an extrapolation of reward and punishment. Bigger rewards and bigger punishments, but not at all different in kind from worldliness. Mormons never learned to render to Cesear what is Cesear's and what is God's to God.

I agree with you. I also think that if you look at Lawrence Kohlberg's stages of moral development, Mormonism is firmly stuck at the Pre-Conventional or Conventional stages of development. To move to the Post-Conventional stage, the needs of the individual would have to supersede the need of the Mormon church to control behavior.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_Kohlberg%27s_stages_of_moral_development

I never thought of it this way. In my opinion this is a good and valid observation.

generationofvipers Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> As I dissect LDS theology, I realize there is
> nothing transcendent within it. It is, in simple
> terms, a theology of "stuff"--things. God is a
> thing, we are things, Jesus did stuff, your wife
> and kids are all stuff you get, all spirit is
> invisible stuff, heaven involves getting more
> things for yourself in the form of the biggest
> "things" we can imagine--worlds and universes. If
> we could imagine bigger things, then we would get
> promised those too. If they could turn love and
> honor into material objects and barter and sell
> those they would absolutely do so.
>
> Pretty unimaginative, and totally uninspiring
> unless you can only think in terms of getting and
> having more.
>
> Where, in this lowbrow metaphysics, is there
> anything close to the beauty and mystery of the
> Tao, the Buddhist idea of dependent co-arising,
> the Christian Logos, or even the beauty of the
> "flow" concept of constructal law or the elegance
> of thermodynamics? There is no process, no
> dissipative structure philosophy, no explanation
> of flux or the way in which it is channeled.
> Science is infinitely richer, as is almost every
> philosophical and metaphysical system I have ever
> tried to learn about.
>
> This obsession of the LDS with stuff, stuff, and
> more stuff, is rather crippling to the sense of
> awe and wonder than enhancing of it, and I get so
> tired of liberal LDS trying to tell us how rich
> and meaningful it is. It isn't. Any richness
> that people like the Givens see in it is made up
> by them.
>
> In the LDS world, Things are God and God is
> Things.

"Some of us love people and use things.
Others use people and love things."

- Buddha's greeting to Ho Joe at the pearly gates.

poor things...

... was to me (believe it or not) ... Adam God doctrine.

I still love that idea and wish there were some truth to it.

But if it were "true" then I'd be forced to admit that even though he is our daddy -- he is a BAD daddy and should be thrown in jail for neglect.

I think that the basic argument of the orginal post goes something like this:

1. LDS metaphysics is materialistic.
2. Materialism is low-brow, uninspiring, lacking in beauty, awe, or spirituality.
3. Therefore, Mormonism is mundane, uninspiring, lacking in beauty, awe or spirituality.

If you believe premise 2, then I can see that, for you, 3 follows. But I think that Mormons would deny 2. And, while Mormonism isn't what it claims to be, I've often thought that the denial of 2, or something like it, is Mormonism's particular genius. Everything is spiritual, beautiful, and awe-inspiring to Mormonism. It seems to me that Mormonism can be thought of as the marriage of materialistic atheism (Mormonism's Gods are just people) with an insistence that there is still meaning to life because even the mundane, materialistic things are inspiring, beautiful, and spiritual.

This last assertion seems like just the sort of thing a modern atheist would say. It seems to me that if there is something to learn from Mormonism, it might be that even the mundane can be made an object of worship.

I don't think society needs any help in learning to appreciate the mundane or materialistic aspects of life unless it's to reconsider our relationship to them, and I think Mormonism is no help in that. Our culture uses material objects and pastimes as a way to distract itself from deep or painful issues - bread and circuses. I agree with others on this thread that Buddhism and other eastern traditions have a lot more to offer when wrestling with the complexities of existence or even dealing with small, quotidian aspects of life.

If materialistic atheism is correct, and human beings are to embrace that truth, then human beings will need to find spirituality in "stuff" because that would be all there is and all that human beings would embrace as "real." It seems that the other option would be for human beings to be consigned to spiritually dead lives.

I disagree. Science has flux and thermodynamics and quantum theory and is infinitely more nuanced in its relationships of matter and energy than the mormon metaphysic. Almost every other religion has a concept akin to logos or flow or tao or dependent arising.

Your "summary" of my post, which has very little to do with my post, is either intentionally oversimplified or betrays a misunderstanding. I did not say that materialism as an ethic or a metaphysic is low-brow, uninspiring, etc., merely that its mormon iteration IS all of those things. I gave examples to this point of constructal law and thermodynamics. They are both arguably "materialism" and yet don't have nearly the same banality of bigger, more, forever that mormonism trades in.

Mormonism has guys doing stuff to get more stuff. I contend that it is a banal theology, less rich and less transcendent than so many other systems.

I disagree totally with you that LDS has a monopoly, or even a very successful version of, finding inspiration in the everyday and mundane. If you study almost ANY protestantism they say exactly the same thing about their nine-to-fove grind, raising a family, making a living, etc., as mormons. The Zen tradition of being present with whomever and whatever you are interacting with or doing is, IMHO, far more conducive to imparting sacredness to the everyday.

I think that as a metaphysically materialistic theology, Mormons have the right to co-opt science. Since I think that among all religions (at least among the major mono-theistic religions) Mormonism is likely unique in its metaphysical materialism, I think that Mormonism is likely unique in its right to co-opt science. Thus, I don't see the distinction you see between the Mormon iteration of materialism and the scientific iteration, and I do think Mormonism has a kind of monopoly.

In addition, since protestantism would claim a transcendent God, it seems that protestantism cannot serve as an empirical example of how modern metaphysical materialism can be compatible with a spirit of worship and a sense of the sacred.

Right. It would seem so, that Mormon materialism, and worshipping the material as spiritual should be a marriage of atheism with spirituality, the mundane as an object of worship. But this marriage only would work through the concept of transcendence, that there is an internal meaning to the existence of things. That would require that the mundane have an intrinsic value.

And that is exactly a thing that's missing from Mormonism, because Mormonism gains value only from externals. A thing is valuable because it is conferred by a superior authority, and the authority is where goodness resides. So, God gives tests, but Satan gives obstacles--even though the actual material phenomenon, cancer, say, is exactly the same. The external authority punishes as well. There can't be worship of the mundane because the mundane has got no value outside of the external authority who delt it. A person's standing vis a vis the authority--whether you're favored, and how much that favored status gets you, are all that matters.

I'm not sure that I buy the assertion that the marriage requires the mundane to have an intrinsic value. If you are right about that, and you are right that this is missing from Mormonism, then it would seem to follow that Mormons could not worship, and could not find meaning, in the mundane. But it seems to me that it is a matter of empirical fact that they do. So, it seems that one or both of these premises must be false. I tend to think it is at least the former because it seems that the blessing of a superior power could elevate a thing having no intrinsic value to a status worthy of worship. But I'm also a little unsure whether the latter is true or not. It might be right, at least culturally.

I should clarify what I mean by materialism. It can refer to either (a) a metaphysical position that nothing but matter exists, or (b) the belief that acquisition of material wealth is of higher value than other pursuits (like justice, freedom, knowledge, etc.) I think Mormonism promotes both. I think it is inherent in its theology, but worse is the fact that it has no logos, no flux, no dependent arising, no flow, no process theology...

Regarding (b), I think you are mistaking the worst portion of the culture for the theology, or maybe a certain portion of the theology for its entirety. The glory of God is intelligence, after all, not material wealth. And my recollection is that I was warned ad nauseum on Sundays against elevating the pursuit of material wealth above all other goals, though wealth was said to be good if employed correctly.

In addition, I will confess that I really don't understand your comment about logos, flux, flow, process, and dependent arising. I don't know why you think Mormonism lacks these things. There is as much of this in Mormonism as there is in science. Mormon material theology wholly embraces science. Even God's miracles are said to arise from nothing more than His applied science. This seems to hold even if some of Mormonism's Apostles and adherents, not understanding the thorough-going metaphysical materialism of Mormon theology, have been afraid, at times, of particular scientific theories. And it seems that Mormons have plenty of logos, as evidenced by their multiple scriptures.

I see what you are saying and I don't disagree that I am resorting to synecdoche in my assertions. I do disagree that Mormonism "embraces" science. To me that is an apologetic lie. Mormonism embraces 19 century Newtonian materialism, NOT Big Bang cosmology, not evolutionary biology (although many intelligent Mormons do, the church does not), not quantum mechanics by any stretch, not the "soft" sciences of archaeology or anthropolgy or linguistics or psychology or any of them.

You imply that "getting stuff" is not a central idea within Mormonism, but I submit to you that it is the entire eschatology. Powers and priesthoods and dominions and glory and honor, Worlds without end, right Phelps?

As I said before I am not opposed to materialism as a metaphysic, but this "stuff and things" world view of Mormonism isn't very deep or moving to me personally. I read the book of Mormon or the d and c of the p of gp and am baffled over how they are even considered sacred texts. Where is the deep theology, the insight into the human condition, the awe and majesty of the unknown, the thirst for insight? It's not easy because to me it is all just guys (always guys) doing stuff--Joseph asking for money, nephi making his brothers shake, generals talking piously and Jesus thumping his chest in revelations. I believe this shallow narrative, written by an immature mind, has infected Mormonism ever since.

however, sometimes "transcendent" just means make believe hooha that makes me feel good.

"Have you ever noticed that everyone else's stuff is sh!t, but your sh!t is stuff?" -- George Carlin

Mormonism is an offshoot of Catholicism, with 19th century Americanized ordinances. Catholicism in turn is based on a Jewish reformer invented by God knows who. The Enlightenment supposedly ended the dark ages, but I look around and I see "not really". Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. Apologies to Roger Daltrey.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/26/2015 11:20PM by bradley.

PhELPs:

I hear what Generation's saying...but that was one hell of a zinger.

You should post more.

My eyes were unable to penetrate the Mormon Facade. Wealth from 100 sources (the Tao, Buddha, Rumi ....) slipped through unnoticed by external and internal Mormon border patrols,took me by the heart and gently lead me away from my provincial home.