The Great Apostacy

Public forum to discuss questions about Mormon history and doctrine.
GBSmith
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Re: The Great Apostacy

Post by GBSmith »

Brian Johnston wrote:
GBSmith wrote:Yeah, most members do believe this - but does that make it "true?"
Actually, that's cwald but I agree.
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Nathan
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Re: The Great Apostacy

Post by Nathan »

I just spent the past half hour reading this thread: Fun conversation.

Early on, someone paraphrased a line from A River Runs Through It, something about Baptists being dumber than Presbyterians. As a movie buff, I need to clarify that it was the son of a Presbyterian minister narrating who said, "Methodists are Baptists who can read."

I was hoping to take the conversation up a notch, with this question: "Assuming it is a historical event, what is gained by the notion of a great apostasy?" Or how about, "How does the notion of a great apostasy differ from the perspective of one interpreting from Fowler's 3rd, 4th and 5th stages of faith (or Peck's 2nd, 3rd and 4th)?"

It's been over a decade since I've benefited from the notion of a great apostasy, much less The Great Apostasy.

Nathan
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Heber13
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Re: The Great Apostacy

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I see a benefit for the church movement to be able to differentiate it from other churches and for selling the story to new members to gain brand loyalty.

I don't see overall benefit for all of God's children.
Luke: "Why didn't you tell me? You told me Vader betrayed and murdered my father."
Obi-Wan: "Your father... was seduced by the dark side of the Force. He ceased to be Anakin Skywalker and became Darth Vader. When that happened, the good man who was your father was destroyed. So what I told you was true... from a certain point of view."
Luke: "A certain point of view?"
Obi-Wan: "Luke, you're going to find that many of the truths we cling to...depend greatly on our point of view."
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Tom Haws
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Re: The Great Apostacy

Post by Tom Haws »

Well said, Heber13. Over the pulpit at Cooper Ward, Gilbert Stapley Stake two Sundays ago, a full-time missionary said essentially what you said. As I recall, he was reading from Preach My Gospel, and he said that "the pearl of the restoration is easier to appreciate when presented against the blackness of the Great Apostasy." "Ahhh!" thought I. "That explains it, then. Merely a rhetorical persuasive device."
Tom (aka Justin Martyr/Justin Morning/Jacob Marley/Kupord Maizzed)
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Sure, any religion would do. But I'm LDS.
"There are no academic issues. Everything is emotional to somebody." Ray Degraw at www.StayLDS.com
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Tom Haws
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Re: The Great Apostacy

Post by Tom Haws »

Nathan wrote: "How does the notion of a great apostasy differ from the perspective of one interpreting from Fowler's 3rd, 4th and 5th stages of faith (or Peck's 2nd, 3rd and 4th)?"
Can you rephrase the question?
Tom (aka Justin Martyr/Justin Morning/Jacob Marley/Kupord Maizzed)
Higley and Guadalupe
Gilbert, Arizona
----
Sure, any religion would do. But I'm LDS.
"There are no academic issues. Everything is emotional to somebody." Ray Degraw at www.StayLDS.com
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mormonheretic
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Re: The Great Apostacy

Post by mormonheretic »

what is gained by the notion of a great apostasy?"
I agree with Tom and Heber. For us, it is a bit of a rhetorical device to differentiate why a restoration was necessary. It gives greater validity to the Mormon movement.
"How does the notion of a great apostasy differ from the perspective of one interpreting from Fowler's 3rd, 4th and 5th stages of faith
Hmmm, interesting question. I would say my wife is a stage 3, and I am in stage 4 or 5 (I'm not sure which--I don't know the levels that well.) From her perspective, I am approaching apostasy, and she is not at all comfortable with it. From my perspective, I'm no where near apostasy--my faith is growing. In fact, I think my faith has grown tremendously in the past few years.

Looking at it from a different perspective, say a Stage 3 Mormon vs a Stage 3 Catholic, both view the others as completely in apostasy. So, a person's perspective has a lot to do with this notion of apostasy.

Oh Nathan, thanks for the movie clarification. I knew I didn't quite have it down right, but it was close.
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Nathan
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Re: The Great Apostacy

Post by Nathan »

Heber, I concur. Brand recognition, is one benefit. Another is boundary maintenance (as you also seemed to imply). It is a lot easier, albeit disingenuous, to explain differences via the Great Apostasy. This teaching draws the line in the sand pretty clearly. I can see that mission presidents and bishops could benefit from using the Great Apostasy in such a way. I teach early morning seminary (a class of 25, here in Stuttgart Germany). This fall the subject matter will be Church History and the D&C. The Great Apostasy will be discussed and understood much differently by my class members than by their 40-year-old teacher.


Rephrasing the question for Tom: "How does the notion of a great apostasy differ from the perspective of one interpreting from Fowler's 3rd, 4th and 5th stages of faith (or Peck's 2nd, 3rd and 4th)?"

From Fowler's 3rd Stage of Faith, a Latter-day Saint needs the teaching of the Great Apostasy. It helps order a quid-pro-quo, cause-and-effect-driven interpretation of human experience and history. It explains difference; it provides meaning. Are those people currently working from a stage 3 experience wrong, or bad? Not according to Fowler (or Peck's stage 2). In a developmental sense, most all of us need to pass through stage 3 in the maturation process. Some of us will never leave it. And there are necessary tasks in our society that are best facilitated from a stage 3 place of interpretation: elements of teaching, law enforcement, national defense. I think it likely that the notion of the Great Apostasy may also be beneficial in the 4th and 5th stages too, although in significantly different ways.

Tom, from the short time I've been a part of this forum I've observed yours is a thoughtful faith. Thank you.
Last edited by Nathan on 10 Jul 2010, 00:59, edited 1 time in total.
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Nathan
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Re: The Great Apostacy

Post by Nathan »

Brother Heretic,

Sharing from such a personal perspective, even more than the ideas exchanged, is what makes this forum so valuable to me. Thank you.

If I may, I would share with you that from the vantage point of my professional experience, where couples are divided by Fowler's stages, it is most often as you described: men venture from stage three before their wives. For those in stages 4 or 5 who can continue/resume to authentically live the gospel, they will find the tension in marriage to be manageable. It's those who wear an air of superiority and liberation that alienate their spouses. As you shared in your post, your faith is growing. I'm guessing your wive senses this too, even if she is "uncomfortable" with it. I'm guessing too, that you're on your way to a stronger and healthier marriage as well.
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Re: The Great Apostacy

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It's those who wear an air of superiority and liberation that alienate their spouses.


Amen, Nathan. Amen.
I see through my glass, darkly - as I play my saxophone in harmony with the other instruments in God's orchestra. (h/t Elder Joseph Wirthlin)

Even if people view many things differently, the core Gospel principles (LOVE; belief in the unseen but hoped; self-reflective change; symbolic cleansing; striving to recognize the will of the divine; never giving up) are universal.

"For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong." H. L. Mencken
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Brian Johnston
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Re: The Great Apostacy

Post by Brian Johnston »

In a Stage 3 framework, people have to start building their "story of stories," as Fowler calls it. They are fully immersed in the flow of their own group "story" of faith content -- like a fish in water, still not conscious of what water is because it is everywhere. BUT in this framework, they begin to see that other people have "stories" that are different (other religions, other denominations). They recognize that others are sincerely believing other ideas, often at odds with their own.

So, they have to construct an overarching story that explains why all the various stories exist -- their "story of stories." In Mormonism, the group provides this nicely pre-packaged story to the members in the form of The Great Apostasy and The Restoration. It explains why the other 99.9% of the people on the planet aren't Mormon (yet). This is vital to functional faith in this state of seeing the world. It is also a handy method, in general, for dividing the world into convenient groups of "good guys" and "bad guys."

I'm not sure how Stage 4 and Stage 5 styles of thinking would interpret the concept of a Great Apostasy. I'll take a stab at it. I would think that a (mostly) Stage 4 person that used an LDS concept of Great Apostasy would go one of two directions: If they were stage 4 within orthodox LDS faith content, they would see it as an explanation for their personal truths, as a "proof" they are right and others are wrong. It can't be both ways. Not all of these people on the planet have the right answer. *I* do, and the others are victims of a Great Apostasy in varying degrees (all the ideas that don't match mine). I'm not sure how someone in Stage 4 who abandoned their LDS faith content would functionally use a specifically LDS version of the Great Apostasy. I suppose someone shifting to some other form of restoration or primitive/fundamentalist faith might use the concept in a more broad sense, justifying their newly acquired "truths."

Stage 5? This is gonna be pretty hard to define. But I would guess that Stage 5 style thinkers on this subject are going to have to play pretty fast and loose with it consciously as a metaphor for some part of their life journey in faith. They would probably tend to interpret the LDS version of the Great Apostasy story in some sort of universalistic, mythological sense of people being separated from the divine and returning. They might also decide, I suppose, to allow themselves to consciously dive into this story and experience it literally, using it as an explanation for the diversity in belief in the world. This would not be quite the same as the Stage 3 perspective because they could jump in and out of it, and on some level know that it is just a valuable story for them to experience, and not an objective reality they are attached to. Stage 5-ers are probably not going to lead the charge to burn the "others" at the stake for heresy based on this explanation of other faiths :-)
"It's strange to be here. The mystery never leaves you alone." -John O'Donohue, Anam Cara, speaking of experiencing life.
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