I guess the first thing to say is that pastors are imperfect human beings too in just as great a need of a savior as the rest of us. That isn’t an excuse, merely a reason why pastors fall into sin. There is almost a “celebrity” associated with being a pastor as well as being a member of his or her immediate family (on a much smaller scale, of course). They are therefore held to higher standards than most of the rest of the congregation and are always in their congregation’s eye. They can’t do much of anything with anonymity. When they fail to meet those standards, they often do so publicly, just like a celebrity. Some people don’t tolerate that kind of pressure well. I’ve heard my share of horror stories about pastors or pastors’ families going off the deep end or bringing their highly persuasive demons into the parish with them. I’m afraid theology school and ordination do not purify those charged to lead others to Christ.
The flip-side of that coin, I guess, is that what is often referred to as the “progressive church” is increasingly tolerant of behaviors the Bible speaks against. Since they often seem to view the scriptures as a “living document” that is open to interpretation and modification, the progressive church can often turn a blind eye to such things.
In the end, I guess what I would suggest to you and anyone who is struggling with seeing immorality in the church or it’s leadership, is to remind yourself that we are all in need of Christ’s grace and forgiveness, for we all fall short: even pastors, bishops, elders, and popes. You need to go where you feel you are hearing the truth (not to be confused with “my truth” or the like). It’s easy to feel a desire to pull away from God when the church seems to be going awry. It’s an issue that is tearing many churches apart, makes the church at large look bad, and tragically drives many people away. Just please try not to let poor representation of God turn you away from Him. I hope this helps.
I guess the first thing to say is that pastors are imperfect human beings too in just as great a need of a savior as the rest of us. That isn’t an excuse, merely a reason why pastors fall into sin. There is almost a “celebrity” associated with being a pastor as well as being a member of his or her immediate family (on a much smaller scale, of course). They are therefore held to higher standards than most of the rest of the congregation and are always in their congregation’s eye. They can’t do much of anything with anonymity. When they fail to meet those standards, they often do so publicly, just like a celebrity. Some people don’t tolerate that kind of pressure well. I’ve heard my share of horror stories about pastors or pastors’ families going off the deep end or bringing their highly persuasive demons into the parish with them. I’m afraid theology school and ordination do not purify those charged to lead others to Christ.
The flip-side of that coin, I guess, is that what is often referred to as the “progressive church” is increasingly tolerant of behaviors the Bible speaks against. Since they often seem to view the scriptures as a “living document” that is open to interpretation and modification, the progressive church can often turn a blind eye to such things.
In the end, I guess what I would suggest to you and anyone who is struggling with seeing immorality in the church or it’s leadership, is to remind yourself that we are all in need of Christ’s grace and forgiveness, for we all fall short: even pastors, bishops, elders, and popes. You need to go where you feel you are hearing the truth (not to be confused with “my truth” or the like). It’s easy to feel a desire to pull away from God when the church seems to be going awry. It’s an issue that is tearing many churches apart, makes the church at large look bad, and tragically drives many people away. Just please try not to let poor representation of God turn you away from Him. I hope this helps.
I’m with Contented on this. It is generally best to avoid work relationships. They can even get awkward when things are going well in the relationship. He may very well want to approach you, but he may have a role model or father who has also told him to avoid work relationships. If he’ll stare at you across a room but won’t look you in the eye when talking to
The previous posts all give correct reasons, but I think they can all be boiled down a simpler answer that covers most everyone, including women that ghost men: it’s the easy way out. We all must routinely make choices between what is right and what is easy and we don’t always choose what is right. Ghosting is much easier than crafting a carefully worded ‘goodbye’ and then dealing with whatever awkwardness or hurt feelings may result. Furthermore, the computer is an impersonal device that allows the "ghoster" to effectively cut themselves off emotionally from the fact that there is a human being at the other end of the conversation anxiously wondering why they haven’t received a reply.
I used the word "feel" a total of three times in that post. How many times would you prefer?
All banter aside, regardless of whether we are analytically minded or not, often feelings do guide people's actions. It's not always wise, but it does happen, especially in faith when objective answers are not always apparent.
Feelings are also involved in relationships. If you view your faith in God as a relationship, then feelings will inevitably play a significant role in your journey and the choices you make along the way.
I see a lot of assumptions about the intentions of others on here, and all of it seems to consist of miserable accusations. Although I'll be the first to confirm that human beings are not inherently good, I have a hard time believing that this forum is the last or only vestige of people with pure intentions in the world. I'm sure that's not the attitude here, or at least I hope it isn't.
In the world there are always leaders and there are followers, and of the two, the followers vastly outnumber the leaders. Leaders by virtue of their nature will often prefer to always return to the source material (i.e. the Bible). Followers may read the scriptures, but they also like to find leaders--shepherds, if you will, that they feel they can trust. In this way they will seek out authors and teachers to lead them and that may make them more likely to reference other authors before the Bible. This tends to make them vulnerable to being misled, unfortunately.
Even leaders will often look for other sources, written by other authors in order to compare their understanding of the Scriptures to that of others in order to hone their understanding or to try to know how others see the Bible. Many leaders see wisdom in checking themselves against others, knowing that their own limited perspective may be inadequate to understand the complete picture.
Leaders also often feel a need to share what they learn with others through evangelism. Evangelism can be done in many different ways: through teaching and verbal communication, writing, music, and other artistic expression.
The recognition and accolades from peers is often a pleasant side effect of such sharing, but is not always the motivation. Some who write a book may feel led to do so as surely as someone who might have a nagging need to write a check to a mission project they've never heard of before. Leaders who do write books often understand that those who are seeking or who have little direct experience with the Bible might be intimidated by the Bible. They may find it easier to hear what someone knowledgeable has to say about God and the Bible, or what a singer might say through their lyrics when first getting their feet wet.
Thanks for weighing in, I appreciate the discussion and you bring forward some important points that should be discussed and I'd like to add to that discussion and maybe introduce a couple of new ideas into evidence.
First, it's worth noting that this conversation has strayed a bit from the moral issues of socialism to more of the discussion of its effectiveness. I don't point this out as a criticism or to necessarily reign it back in, but to note that there seems to be little room for dispute of the moral component of the socialism debate.
The mixed economy approach is one I've heard a number of times. With the wisdom of "all things in moderation" ringing in our ears, this would seem like a sensible approach. After all, most of us appreciate the presence of social safety nets for those who fall on hard times or otherwise find their efforts insufficient to stay afloat in the world. However, when we look closer, it becomes apparent that the only way to prevent the kind of evil I described in socialism/communism before is to exercise a free market economy. The slippery slope is real, and steep.
As Christians, we should find any part of socialism repugnant. Marxists have long regarded religion as the "opiate of the people," thus expressing great disdain for religion. As such, Marxist doctrines will never be content to let the church be and always finds itself at odds with Biblical principles and values. The values put into place by the US founding fathers were taken directly from Biblical values shared by those people. As such, capitalism is the Biblical perspective.
Early colonial history nearly saw some of the American colonies wiped out because of an attempt to implement socialist principles. The problem was, as Larry Schweikart notes in his PragerU video, "When everyone's entitled to everything, no one's responsible for anything!" Half the colonists of Jamestown and Plymouth starved to death under this early socialist system. It wasn't until John Smith came and introduced private property to the colonies and told them, "He who won't work, won't eat," that the colonies were saved. When Plymouth's socialist model failed, its governor, William Bradford noted, "By adopting the communal system, we thought we were wiser than God." As I said, socialism violates the first commandment.
When talking about the economic structure, the mixture of private market and socialized market ultimately looks more like the fascist model than anything. Under fascism, there was a private market, but the government called the shots on how it operated. The government made the rules. We know what the outcome of fascism was after an attempted world domination resulting in a massive worldwide conflict and an attempted genocide. And now after 80 years have passed, we have healthcare in the US set up under the same kind of fascist system with the private market controlled completely by government regulation.
After the normal Marxist socialists did not see the "workers of the world unite" revolt overturn the system to establish a socialist utopia, they readjusted their tactics to stimulate their revolt by focusing on national pride because they noticed that socialists of England would fight and die for England, and likewise for Germans, Italians, Americans, etc. So, National Socialism (aka. Fascism) was born. Today, the tactic has shifted again, this time targeting minority groups to try to assemble a majority dream team of minority groups using tactics of identity politics to bring about the revolt and socialist utopia, calling it "Democratic Socialism," a contradiction in terms. New target, same tactics, same outcome.
So my question to democratic socialists would simply be this: how many must suffer this time to convince a generation that socialism is evil?
portland oregon is still in head need this morning 82 days if looting and burning property.
Posted : 15 Aug, 2020 10:35 PM
A very good point. My response would be the same as it is any time someone might suggest that I'm part of a group that has or is committing atrocities. I say: "Prove it." It's not my job to prove the Republican Party's innocence of those accusations. As the accusers, it's their job to prove Republicans' guilt. However, I did make a case for the Democrat Party's guilt. It would probably still be wise to take a look at the historical records of where this argument of a "big switch," comes from and why it's a complete farce.
First of all, talking about the roles of racism and oppression switching sides between the Democrats and the Republicans is kind of like saying that you're going to tell me about the day that all the cops became robbers and all the robbers became cops. An absurd notion to begin with.
The Big Switch argument is fueled from three major things that have happened in history: 1: Black voters who once voted almost unanimously for Republicans today vote mostly for Democrats. 2: Some members of the racist Dixiecrat wing of the Democrat Party became Republicans. 3: They cite that Richard Nixon had a "southern strategy" that appealed to the racists in the south. However, these things did not happen in ways that indicate that there was any such polarity switch in American politics.
First, #1: When did the black vote convert to the Democrat party? If it really was that they saw their new friends among the Democratic Party, it should have happened somewhere around the 1960s when the Civil Rights act, Voting Rights Act, and Free Housing Bill were passed, around the time that the "racist south" started converting to the Republican Party. It's worth noting that those pieces of legislation were supported by Republicans in greater percentages than Democrats and the 1964 act was filibustered for 75 hours by Democrats.
Nevertheless, the 1960s is not when the Black vote changed to the Democrats in such large numbers. So when did the Black vote switch? It switched during the years of the Great Depression because of the New Deal. Republicans believed then as they do now in not interfering with the market. They believed that it would recover on its own after the stock market crash that led to the Great Depression.
However, Democrats believed that it required help to recover, and since the Black community was still suffering from Jim Crow laws that were all passed by Democratic governors and legislators, they got hit hardest by the Great Depression, and during the coarse of Franklin Roosevelt's terms as president, they reluctantly started voting for Democrats because they believed that they were in too precarious a position to wait for the market to recover on its own. By Roosevelt's last election, he basically had all of the Black Vote. Many of them were sad to switch their vote because they knew they were leaving the party of Lincoln and emancipation for the party of the KKK and Jim Crow.
Later, Linden Johnson, infamous for frequently using racial slurs and reported by an Air Force One flight attendant for saying "I'm going to have them [very nasty slur I refuse to post] voting Democrat for the next 200 years," ensured that the Black community, and the inner city community in general would be always beholden to the government, relying on it for all their needs in life.
Many Blacks today who learn of these things immediately change their voting patterns, and often receive a lot of racist trolling as a result, from the Democrats and many times from their own friends and families who still haven't learned this history. There are several people today who are more than happy to tell their stories publicly, like Carol Swain, Candace Owens, Larry Elder, and Brandon Tatum.
#2: There were some racist Democrats who switched to the Republican Party, but how many? Only a very scant handful. In the upper echelon of the legislative branch, there are only two who went from Democrat to Republican, the most famous of which is Strom Thurmond.
So why did he switch? Would it surprise you to learn that he switched because of a sincere change of heart? When he walked away from the Democrats, he had a recent conversion to Christianity and had actually left his racism behind! In fact, he hired several Blacks to work in his office, not as token Blacks, like the one Woodrow Wilson kept around in the White House to lick stamps or do some other meaningless job so that he could say he had Black employees.
Thurmond hired Blacks to key advisor and strategy positions in his team. When the "Big Switch" is composed of barely enough people to count on your fingers and toes, I wouldn't call that a "Big Switch." I call that a few changed minds, and I know of no Republicans who switched to Democrats during that time. And no, finding a couple wouldn't constitute a big switch either.
"But wait," I hear someone say. "What about David Duke?" What of him? He's persona-non-grata among conservatives and in an interview with Dinesh D'Sousa, he demonstrated that he holds views more in line with the Democratic Party than the Republican party.
Let's also not forget that Democrat KKK members is not ancient history. Robert Bird died in 2010. Hillary Clinton called him a mentor. President Obama said that "The arc of his life bent toward justice." Bird never switched to the Republican Party. He was a Democrat when he was in the Klan. He was a Democrat when he helped filibuster the Civil Rights Act, and he was a Democrat when he died after the "arc of his life" had bent toward justice.
#3: Nixon's Southern Strategy. First, the south was becoming more industrial and less agrarian when Nixon was running, which often leads to more modernization and a stronger sense of affluence. As this happened, many who found their values turning to being upwardly mobile were already starting to turn from their racist ways when Nixon was campaigning for president. It was a process that would continue beyond Nixon through the 70s and into the Reagan years.
Why did they switch to the Republican party, then? In large part, it was because their values included strong ties to Christianity, which is more in line with conservative values. I'm always puzzled why Christian belief was not enough to convince plantation owners to renounce slavery, but the mention of servants and slavery in the Bible without the outright declaration that it was evil apparently became a justification, and try as we might, we're still human and prone to justifying something we know is wrong any way we can.
Anyway, back to Nixon: Nixon's campaigns emphasized things like law and order, which may bring images of the inner city and minority races to mind today, but in the late 60s and early 70s, the hippie movement was in full swing. Law and order referred to the unrest stirred by protests against the Vietnam War, which was not a racial issue at all.
It is generally true that Nixon had his own little prejudices that affected his personal life, but these things did not appear to affect his policy decisions as president, regardless of his apparent lack of character and paranoia about getting reelected. His administration enacted one of the first affirmative action programs, so if he was a racist, he didn't exactly do a very good job at it.
Besides, the states that were still largely racist during that time were in the deep south, and Nixon didn't win those states in that election. So, if there was a racist appeal to the south on the part of Nixon's campaign, it didn't really work.
What do you think? Does that answer things pretty well?
