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Beitrag 5 von 7 Beiträgen.

Seite erstellt am 26.4.24 um 15:04 Uhr

der Beitrag:

Verfasser: Nyu

Datum: Mittwoch, den 24. März 2004, um 10:02 Uhr

Betrifft: Ein Artikel ist in diesem Zusammenhang sehr interessant

...einfach, weil er das mindset mancher Apologeten sehr gut trifft. Der Artikel kann, wenn man sich das antun muss, unter folgendem Link eingesehen werden:
http://www.meridianmagazine.com/lineuponline/040318harquestions.html

Anbei meine Antwort auf diesen Artikel:
First of all let me note that in my opinion this Mike Ash seems to view Christianity and the conflict between Mormon Apologetics and their critics or the critics of the Mormon church as a whole lot more simple than it actually is.
No matter how Mike looks at the ongoing dispute between the parties and what the motivations of the critics may be, he never once starts to wonder whether any of the criticisms are in any way substantiated by correct claims and facts.

One of the first things that come to mind by reading his article and rather obvious misunderstandings of reality are shown in his view on the future of the LDS Church:
"Yet nearly two centuries later, the Church is over eleven million strong with temples dotting the globe. As non-LDS sociologist Rodney Stark noted in 1984, the Church shows all the signs of â€œâ€˜the rise of a new world religion,â€™â€ and he predicted that â€œâ€˜the Mormons will soon achieve a worldwide following comparable to that of Islam, Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism and the other dominant world faiths"

Now, that is one way to look at the Mormon church and its current status. A closer look, however, will demonstrate a different view:
- each year over 100.000 people actually leave the Mormon Church by sending in letters of resignation while the growth rate is totally decreasing. The webmasters of the pro-mormon website Cumorah.com come to a different conclusion: "During the decade of the 1990s, many rapidly-growing churches, including the Adventists, Southern Baptists, Assemblies of God, and numerous Pentecostal groups, reported accelerating growth trends throughout the decade, while The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints experienced persistent trends of decelerating growth. In fact, the LDS Church is one of the few Christian groups with a large missionary program to experience declining growth rates in spite of widening opportunities."
- By no means, the church will achieve numbers of 100 Million and beyond by 2080 as we keep on hearing rather often. If activity rates and growth rates continue to develop in this direction they have been going for the last 14 years, church membership will be nowhere near even 40 Million by 2080 while SDA, Baptist and other protestant denominationsÂ´ growth rates are ever increasing.
- Activity rate within the church is around 35% (with only 20 to 30% activity and next to no growth in Europe).
- Sociologist Armand Mauss states that "75 percent of foreign [LDS] converts are not attending church within a year of conversion. In the United States, 50 percent of the converts fail to attend after a year." (see: http://www.cumorah.com/report.html#trends)
- Strange doctrines, centralization and conservative politics within church leadership, ever increasing access to information by the general public and a continuing change in moral values throughout the world put the church in an obscure position which will result in continuously decreasing growth rates.
- The Seventh-Day Adventist Church has about a 2.5 - 3 times larger growth rate than the Mormon Church and a retention rate that is just about as high (about 3times that of the Mormon Church).

I think those figures paint a clearer picture.

I find it highly interesting that Mike Ash writes in his profile that he writes articles for "Dialogue - A Journal on Mormon Thought". If he would take a closer look at some of his co-authors at Dialogue, he would quickly find that by far not all of his peers come to similar conclusions as he does. So it is definately okay to still be "this side of the fence" in Mormondom and yet be a whole lot more critical of even the most fundamental views and doctrines and interpretations of history of the Mormon Church.
No one at F.A.R.M.S. and FAIR to my knowledge still believe in the Traditional Hemispheric Model (i.e. that Nephites and Lamanites solely inherited and lived on both American Continents). I just wonder how they account for the Millions of Nephites and Lamanites who killed each other off if the Lehites were just a small regional occurrance, including all the technologies and fauna and flora we still donÂ´t find in ancient and contemporary Central America. But thatÂ´s beside the point.

What intrigued me was Micheal AshÂ´s simple view on peopleÂ´s motives to fall away from the Mormon Church and become apostate. Everyone who really read peoples testimonies about why they left will quickly find that passing a quick judgment like Mike Ash does is neither fair nor justified.
He writes:
Anti-Mormons often disregard the facts, current research, and the sacred beliefs of Latter-day Saints. They frequently engage in techniques that are aimed at destroying the faith of tender-testimonied Latter-day Saints or investigators, and are not usually interested in dialogue or reaching the truth. Many critics often â€œpoison the wellâ€ by getting non-LDS or perspective converts to shut their minds, hearts, and doors to anything presented by Mormons or missionaries. Winning the argument by proving Mormonism fraudulent is more important than actually understanding Mormon issues.

Amazingly simple, isnÂ´t it. He may be right on the mind-set of many "anti-mormons" who aim at destroying feeble testimonies of tender LDS. But what about: "Anti-Mormons often disregard the facts, current research, and the sacred beliefs of Latter-day Saints".
Is that really so? Who, now, does not see the big picture and looses themselves in petty details by disregarding the overwhelming evidence against the authenticity of the Book of Mormon as an ancient text? Who continuously tries to sway any reasonable argument away from a serious critical analysis of the character of Joseph Smith and the early church? Who repeatadly denunciates any critical researcher about any of the above issues? Its people like Ash and others at FAIR and FARMS.

But look at some of his other generalizations:
There are also some members who leave the Church simply because they no longer believe. Such people generally do not have a spiritual testimony and they are not able to reconcile what they see as difficult issues. Some of these former-members simply walk away from the Church and embark on their own search for happiness. Others depart from the Church but are drawn back to it in vengeance â€“ angrily claiming that they had been duped or misled.

What is it about a "spiritual testimony" that makes it invalid and non-existant if its conclusions differ from the fundamentalist views of the main-stream mormon church? I do have a spiritual testimony of spiritual things. But this spiritual testimony of mine differs from the spiritual testimony the church would like me to have (concerning such points as the atonement, the word of wisdom or the relation between grace, love, justice and faith for instance, or the prophetic calling of Joseph Smith for that matter).
So, is my testimony any less valid because its focus differs from Mike AshÂ´s? One has to be quite a self-centered morgbot to believe that. No?

Then Ash goes on to lecture us on the nature of a false prophet and a false Christ:
"There are also some members who leave the Church simply because they no longer believe. Such people generally do not have a spiritual testimony and they are not able to reconcile what they see as difficult issues. Some of these former-members simply walk away from the Church and embark on their own search for happiness. Others depart from the Church but are drawn back to it in vengeance â€“ angrily claiming that they had been duped or misled."
....
Interesting how biblical scriptures can be misused to serve a self centered intellectual purpose. Only that he doesnÂ´t get closer to the spiritual core of the matter.

The great problem of the Mormon Apologetics is that they still put the Mormon Church on a higher Value and level before God than any other christian church. This is very easy to be detected.