The Book of Mormon

No, not the musical! This last Sunday we covered a rather controversial denomination- Mormonism. It's important to note that, like many other denominations, there are multiple factions within it- some more fundamentalist than others. And it's usually the fundamentalist portions that get the most press- so don't base your understandings just on those news stories (in this case, that would be Warren Jeffs and his polygamous, statutory rape filled division)!

The primary portion of the Mormon faith are called the Latter Day Saints or LDS (which is certainly easier to say than the full name of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints). And while our Mormon Bingo was a fun way to discuss a large variety of different topics, breaking up a complex discussion into bite-sized nuggets was not the easiest way to digest the history and belief system of this church. So rather than going through each of our topics and rewriting them, I'm going to direct you to a couple of websites:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Church_of_Jesus_Christ_of_Latter-day_Saints

http://www.mormon.org/

Any time you're looking into a topic, but especially when looking at a belief system, it's important to research from at least two different viewpoints: inside knowledge and an outside perspective. Insiders tend to know the traditions, the nuances, and the culture of a faith; outsiders often have a better grasp of some of the more questionable aspects of it.

If you need some prompting to help you get through the reading, see if you can find the answers to the following categories (our Bingo categories). You may need to click through some of the links on the wiki site to find them all.

Matter * Marriage * Caffeine * Godhead * Missions * Adam-God Theory * Kolob * Book of Mormon * True Religion * Priesthood * Exaltation * Baptism of the Dead * Family Genealogy * Importance of Human Agency * Path to Salvation * Polygamy * Books of Scripture * Presidents * Protestant or Catholic? * Tribes of Israel * Nauvoo * Excommunication * Prepping * Beards * Customs of Prayer * Moroni * CTR * 3 Levels of Heaven * Ordinances * Seminary * Modesty * Undergarments * Temple Openness * Divine Revelation * Tithing * Creeds * Service

The remaining question, after reading through those websites, will likely be where you fall within a debate that continues to rage: Are Mormons Christians? LDS believers consider them firmly within the Christian church, and are offended when someone suggests otherwise- and some Christians agree. But other Christians feel that, even though Jesus is a part of their belief system, there are too many differences for them to be "Christian." So... what do you think?

5 Minutes of God Time: How Great Thou Art by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir

A bit about Catholicism

This Sunday we discussed the Christian belief system most familiar to us (that's still not our own). Everyone knows someone who's Catholic- but pretty much no one felt like they really understood where the splits in our beliefs fall. Now, keep in mind, this is a pretty basic summary of a very deep and intricate issue- but we had one hour, not 10 years, and so this is as deep as we can go for now.

And obviously, we started at the beginning. The Protestant Reformation, spearheaded by none other than Martin Luther and his 95 Theses. It's important to note that Luther was WITHIN the Catholic church as he made these calls for change; he didn't criticize from a sense of outside superiority, but from a sense of personal responsibility. And his call to change can broken down into 3 categories:

1. Issues with corruption: Not a reason in itself to formally split, these were things that Luther felt were wrong and needed to be called out. At that point, the Catholic church had issues with "buying" positions within the church (Have enough money? Yes you, too, can be a Bishop!), papal children (if someone's promised to not have sex, they probably shouldn't have children younger than their vows of celibacy, right?), buying indulgences (see next point), and general moral negligence.
2. Salvation is through faith in Jesus alone, and it cannot be bought through good works (and certainly not with money): you can't buy a "get out of jail free" card (indulgences) and all the good works and penance in the world don't count more than Jesus' free gift of grace.
3. Scripture should be the only authority when it comes to faith, not "tradition" and not the Pope: Luther had some questions about the idea of papal infallibility, as well as the idea that just because something had "always" been done that it had "always" been done as Jesus intended.

 To keep things interesting, we staged our own "reformation," moving from the center of the room to one side or the other, based on whether we disagreed or agreed with certain statements. I have to say, I loved having you guys moving around as I further explained each statement, deciding for yourselves whether you thought something was a big enough deal to make a formal "split," or whether you felt essentially the same!

Our statements (and explanations) are below:

• Your denomination’s pedigree is important Because they aren't Protestants/Reformers, Catholics trace their church back to Peter, The Rock, and so view their beliefs as consistent with Jesus. This is part of why they have such an emphasis on TRADITION. Protestants might find church history to be incredibly interesting and worth studying, but are typically much more focused on the "where are we right now?" part of the equation.
  
• There can be areas of humanity that are beyond sin and corruption Catholics believe in papal infallibility in teachings on faith and morals, though they separate the Pope's behavior from his teachings. They also believe that papal infallibility stems from the Pope's extensive research and learning before issuing a statement, rather than from divine grace or inspiration. Additionally, they point to Matthew 18:18 ( “Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be^[a] bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be^[b] loosed in heaven."), as evidence that what the Pope says here on earth has a true link to what happens heaven.

• Faith in Jesus isn’t enough to erase all sins at death, though you’ll still arrive at heaven First, we have to start with Catholic teaching on the nature of sins: mortal vs. venial. In the most basic terms, mortal sin is something done wrong with the knowledge that it's wrong and with intention to harm. Venial sin is sin done without those two conditions. For example, gossip/slander would be a mortal sin if you intended to spread a lie about someone to damage their reputation. It would be a venial sin if you idly passed along a story that you didn't verify and it caused a rift between people. Obviously, there's a lot of grey area between those two examples, but that's the general idea. Catholics believe that Jesus' death erases all sins that you've confessed and paid penance for, but since venial sins may be done without you recognizing it enough to label it "sin," Catholics believe that purgatory exists to burn off the impurities that exist from those unconfessed sins (since nothing imperfect can exist in heaven, those sins still have to be "atoned"). Thus, Catholics will pray for those souls in purgatory, as well as offer masses in their honor and request that the saints pray for them as well, that they may be made pure and make it to heaven sooner rather than later. Protestants believe that Jesus' death covers ALL sin, and that faith in him, rather than works or prayers of repentance, is enough. It's worthwhile to note that Protestants still encourage righting your wrongs- but we believe Jesus' gift of grace doesn't allow for other obstacles before entrance into Heaven.
• Matters of faith require an intermediary to guide and instruct you Catholics place a strong focus on "professional" rather than lay understanding, believing that those who have studied for years have a better grasp of the issues and theology than the average believer or newbie. Thus, a priest guides confession and the proper penance, saints pray/intercede, there is little focus on individual interpretation of phenomena or messages, and the church doesn't have a big emphasis on individual or unofficial bible study, as scripture is/was considered too important to risk an "uneducated" understanding overriding what those who studied a passage for years had found. Protestants focus greatly on bible studies and individual interpretation, believing that combining the insights of many believers gives us a greater understanding of who God is and what He asks of His people. While Protestants also value role models and great thinkers and theologians (and seminary and pastors, etc.), we tend to see them as aids to our faith rather than 100% necessary bridges to knowing God.
• Intercession is an important part of the body of believers Yay! All of us believe this! FYI, intercession basically means praying on behalf of someone else. Catholics make a special separation on the importance of having the saints in heaven (and particularly Mary, whom they refer to as the Holy Mother) pray on behalf of those both living and dead. Their belief in this importance lies primarily in a) the belief that those given special honor or those who have been nearest to God for the longest have a greater weight/insight in their prayers and b) that those who are in heaven are less distracted in their prayers, and thus may pray unceasingly. Protestants give importance to past Christians on the basis of their ability to model a Christian life, but we don't celebrate many individual saints and don't focus on their abilities in Heaven. We do put a lot of importance on praying for others, even if we don't call it intercession, and you can see it in worship (prayers of the people), in prayer chains, and in announcements (to name a few).
•   Ritual gives meaning, weight, and honor to your actions Catholics have ritual down to an art! During Mass alone, they will use a basin of holy water to remind themselves of their baptism, they cross themselves, they kneel and stand at specific times in order to give honor to God (believing that if you would rise or kneel to a physically present king, you should do the same to the physically present God- even if you can't see Him), they have specialized phrasing and programming so that Catholics all over the world can worship in the same way- and I could go on and on! Protestants also have our rituals, our special services to include believers all over the world in the same type of worship, and our rote prayers, but we definitely don't practice ritual on the same scale as the Catholic church.
• When communion is served, it literally transforms into the body and blood of Christ Transubstantiation is a big word for the wafer and wine becoming literally the body and blood of Christ. Catholics recognize that in terms of appearance, molecular composition, taste, etc. there is no change in the wafer and wine. And official Catholic teachings on this can be really hard for an outsider to understand! The best explanation I came across is that when people get married, they are visually and molecularly the same before and after their vows- but that something essential in their self has changed when they went from being single to married, something important and intangible has changed, much the wafer has changed in important and unobservable ways. Most Protestants (other than some Lutheran synods, for example) believe that communion is done in remembrance of Jesus' body and blood sacrifice and is meant to be a holy, symbolic exchange rather than a physically-altered phenomenon.
• The Greek language “Old Testament” teachings used by the early church are important, even if the Jews didn’t use them While Protestants base authority on Sola Scriptura, rather than including tradition and the pope, it's also important to note that we have a different bible than the Catholic church! The Catholic bible includes a set of books in the Old Testament known as the Apocrypha or the Deuterocanonical books. (Side note: say Deuterocanonical out loud. It's fun. Now that I know it, I wish we could use it more often!) They are books used by the early church, and are written in Greek (as much of the early Christian church growth occurred with Gentiles). Protestants, true to form, reject tradition as a reason to keep using something, and use a bible that does not include books the ancient Jews wouldn't have used.
• Christians need to pray formal prayers, written by officials, because words are important No one doubts that words are important, right? But Catholics place more importance on formal, written prayers and rote prayer than Protestants do; Hail Mary, Our Father, and formal prayers to individual saints are all in heavy rotation for a Catholic believer. Catholics also focus on using set prayers and prayer beads (i.e. the rosary) as a way to focus thoughts and unify believers. Protestants, of course, also say the Lord's Prayer, have written prayers said in unison (like our weekly prayer of confession), and use prayer books- but Catholics are much more likely to use a formal prayer for individual prayers than a Protestant would be. Protestants tend to focus on the belief that God understands our meaning, even if we can't find the words- whereas Catholics believe that finding the words (even if they aren't spontaneously your own) is important for a believer. Note: both Catholics and Protestants believe rote (recited) prayers and free-form prayers are important- but each tradition focuses MORE on one or the other.
• Not attending weekly church is a sin For a practicing Catholic, Sunday Mass is a day of holy obligation (there are a bunch of other days throughout the year, too- you can look them up if you're curious). Protestants don't have days of obligation, and while we strongly recommend having a congregation and coming to church regularly, we don't view corporal (coming together as a group) worship as a requirement. We (perhaps too often) give a lot of leeway for personal circumstances and desires.
•  Only unmarried men can dedicate themselves properly to preaching the word of God This belief comes in two parts: One, Jesus remained unmarried, and therefore those who follow in His footsteps as preachers ought to also remain unmarried. And two, each person is given only so much energy and passion (and time), and a person who is married or has a family will necessarily dedicate energy, passion, and time to them- time that they would have otherwise had free to dedicate to their congregations. And why men? Because Jesus voluntarily chose only men when picking his 12 disciples. Protestants, on the other hand, believe that having a family can add to a pastor's ability to understand his or her congregation (since there are usually families in that congregation!), and we prefer to give our pastor's more license in choosing how to spend their energies and time (you are a pastor AND....). We also tend to believe that Jesus chose men as his 12 disciples based on culture, rather than as a binding statement to his future church, but really, there's a fair amount of difference even within the Protestant churches on the whole female pastor thing.
•  Abortion is a sin that requires lots of emphasis to eradicate Most of the Christian church feels that abortion is a sin (though not everyone), most commonly using Psalm 139:19 (For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb) as evidence that God is involved from conception. And if God "knows" you from conception, that argues that a zygote/fetus/baby has a soul and is a person from conception onwards. The Catholic church, more than any other denomination, has made this an area of special emphasis (see below for more information on the "why?").
•  Birth control is attempting to limit God’s sovereignty in your life, and is therefore also a sin This is one that culturally sets Catholics apart from most Protestants- officially, Catholics can only practice Natural Family Planning as a form of birth control. They believe that children are the natural consequence of sex, and any form of artificial birth control (the pill, condoms, IUDs, etc.) is a step away from giving your life over to God (and giving your whole life to God is one of the underlying beliefs of making Jesus your Lord, no?). So birth control in general is trying to keep God's plan for your life limited to certain areas, indicating a general lack of trust in God's goodness, and abortion in particular adds murder to the list of "Things That Are Not Good." Most Protestants believe that God gave us free will and knowledge as a gift, part of which currently includes the ability to plan our family size and spacing. Additionally, Protestants emphasize that family size and spacing can be planned WITH the input of God, using prayer and discernment to determine God's plan- in much the same way as we would use prayer and discernment to find the career or location God has called us to. It's important to note, though, that Protestants don't all agree on the use of birth control- and some feel that even natural family planning is attempting to limit God's blessing of children.

 Things we didn't get to on Sunday? Criticisms of the Catholic church, as well as reasons why people are drawn to this particular church. You can find a bit more about both below:

Criticisms: 

• Any centralization of power or strong hierarchy makes corruption easy and reduces the ability of individual churches to respond to their communities' needs.
• Corruption of the heart, which can be disguised in a large, hierarchical organization, can make even more heinous and terrible actions possible (if you've read the news in the last 5 years, you probably don't need me to elaborate much on this one).
• Exclusion of women from positions of hierarchical power or teaching is lopsided and even misogynistic
• Wealth used for buildings, artwork, real estate, stock market holdings, etc. could be used to help the poor (the argument against this criticism is that holdings like the Vatican bring in more money than they cost, giving them a positive impact; the counter of that is often the question of whether Jesus would have approved of a church that acts as a business and brings in money by using worldly splendor)
• Use of ritual without some sort of guide can be very exclusionary and alienating to outsiders.
• Policy of excommunication is an implied threat that coerces compliance
• Focus on "professional" interpretation and wording, rather than individual insights and inspiration, doesn't encourage believers to make their faith their own, and catechism/required attendance/parochial schools/home rituals indoctrinate certain beliefs, rather than allowing seekers to come to them with an open heart.
• Official answers are NOT seeker-friendly (the official answers often use terminology coined by Catholic scholars, and tend to talk in a circular fashion rather than giving answers that would be easy for an outsider to understand).
• The importance placed on confession, adherence to ritual, and the doctrine of purgatory can place an emphasis on sin and guilt that makes Catholics feel that they can never please God (How many times have you heard a variation of "I'm Catholic, I KNOW "guilt." ")
  

But really, all of us, in every denomination, have things that could be criticized- and probably even have a fair amount of overlap with the list of common Catholic criticisms. So let's end on a positive note: What makes people join or stay with the Catholic church?

• Knowing you're doing something that has been done by believers throughout the ages gives depth to your faith
• Being part of a large body of Christ gives a sense of community and options for activities and charities that couldn't be done otherwise
• Some people thrive on a sense of knowing what will happen- they like knowing that you could go to any Catholic mass in any town, and they would all be following the same lectionary and have the same traditions and expectations.
• The Catholic church has a number of large charities that it runs, and many people have very positive associations with the good works that they do
•  Mass is a very sensate experience-  and the level physical exertion, visual stimulation, and use of incense is pretty unique to the Catholic church.
• More than most other traditions, Catholic teaching is assured of its "rightness"- if you do this, believe this, avoid this, you'll be right with God. This is obviously a very simplified explanation, but there is something appealing about that sense of certainty.
• It asks something of you- there are expectations that must be followed and there are consequences to violating those standards (your lack of attendance is called a sin, your use of birth control may get you excommunicated). People are more likely to be fully committed when they don't feel like their membership just an empty promise.

So what do you think? Are there additional criticisms or benefits of the Catholic church that I didn't list? I'm sure there are! Feel free to let me know if you think of any!

5 Minutes of God Time:  Salve Regina Gregorian Chant

Mature Faith

Two of our enlightened elders came and spoke with us today about their path of faith, answering the same questions as our other speakers:

• What does "Jesus Loves Me" mean to you?
• How does your faith impact your life?
• What's the hardest thing about being a Christian?
• If you could only tell someone ONE thing about your faith, what would it be?

Their insights into how faith and its impacts were so, so important (and can I take this moment to remind you that THIS is one of the big reasons why it's important to be part of a church? Spending time with those who are your own age is great, but they rarely have the same depth of experience and insight as someone who's had more than double your lifetime to glean knowledge.) Some of their highlights:

• Your vocation can change throughout your life. It's OK to mourn the loss of one stage, but don't let looking back keep you from seeing new, and equally satisfying, opportunities to share God's love.
• You NEVER have all the answers- and it can still be exciting to look for new insights when you're 80.
• Pouring yourself into others is emotional, and it SHOULD be emotional. Life isn't meant to be lived as though nothing touches you.
• Mold your life around who God has made you to be, using every bit of those talents to further His kingdom. You don't have to be a pastor to teach others about what love really means!

Lots of talking today about what we heard, but also about how it doesn't necessarily get easier with age (though you do have more experiences to pull from when making decisions and reflections). An excerpt about how things might be harder follows: (but first note, that this is written as a Senior Demon's advice to a younger tempter, discussing how to best lure the "patient" into the clutches of Hell)

 They, of course, tend to regard death as the prime evil and survival as the greatest good. But that is because we have taught them to do so. Do not let us be infected by our own propaganda. I know it seems strange that your chief aim at the moment should be the very same thing for which the patient's lover and his mother are praying- namely his bodily safety. But so it is; you should be guarding him like the apple of your eye. If he dies now, you lose him. If he survives the war, there is always hope. The Enemy [God] has guarded him from you through the first great wave of temptations. But, if only he can be kept alive, you have time itself for your ally. The long, dull monotonous years of middle-aged prosperity or middle-aged adversity are excellent campaigning weather. You see, it is so hard for these creatures to persevere. The routine of adversity, the gradual decay of youthful loves and youthful hopes, the quiet despair (hardly felt as pain) of ever overcoming the chronic temptations with which we have again and again defeated them, the drabness which we create in their lives and the inarticulate resentment with which we teach them to respond to it-- all this provides admirable opportunities of wearing out a soul by attrition. If, on the other hand, the middle years prove prosperous, our position is even stronger. Prosperity knits a man to the World. He feels that he is "finding his place in it,' while really it is finding its place in him. His increasing reputation, his widening circle of acquaintances, his sense of importance, the growing pressure of absorbing and agreeable work, build up in him a sense of being really at home in earth, which is just what we want. You will notice that the young are generally less unwilling to die than the middle-aged and old.

 - The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis, ch. 28

(seriously, you MUST read this book!)

Other than that, we wrote numerous cards to our older children in India, and then... we partied! Thanks to all of you who helped with the cards and who stayed for a good time!

5 Minutes of God Time: O Come, O Come Emmanuel by The Piano Guys

The Next Stage: Adulthood

We began today with the best possible exposition on adult faith that I could have requested from our lovely Dr. Anna. She didn’t know what we were going to be talking about and I didn’t know what she was going to say, but somehow she managed to cover each of the 10 points we discussed today!

As always, every topic we touch on has so, SO much more to cover than we have time to discuss in our 1 hour allotments, but even so, we managed to talk about the top ten faith struggles people have as adults (particularly as they head off into adulthood or go to college):

1. Faith: Many teens (and adults) have questions that they don’t seek answers to. This leaves them with a shaky faith foundation, particularly as they head off on their own; unsurprisingly, this doesn’t bode well for their faith in the future. What you believe is NOT irrelevant to the rest of your life! Ask questions! Explore! And then keep asking! Your faith (or lack thereof) is the grid through which you see the rest of the world- there is no integrity or honor in pretending those questions don’t really impact anything. In Luke 11:19 Jesus tells us “Ask and you’ll get; Seek and you’ll find; Knock and the door will open.” 
2.  Freedom: You’ve been waiting your whole life to make your own rules! Cereal for dinner? Check! Want to move to Costa Rica? Go ahead and book those tickets! Netflix marathon for an entire weekend? Thirsty Thursday? Roommate out of town the same night you have a hot date? With great power comes great responsibility- or, as Paul put it, “Just because something is technically legal doesn’t mean that it’s spiritually appropriate. If I went around doing whatever I thought I could get by with, I’d be a slave to my whims.” (1 Corinthians 6:12, MSG). Don’t get confused by the heady buzz of freedom and forget that not every choice is going to be a good one. Though cereal for dinner is almost always a good one.
3.   Input: What you put in front of your eyes and into your ears is what you think about. Duh, right? Your brain HAS to think about it, constantly, because it has to process that information, and often in ways that you’re not even conscious of (Anything on fire? No. Good. What about the TV- is it still working? Yes. Good.). This is true for the things you choose to explore and those you don’t- but all of it, passing through your brain, is being dealt with in ways that can change how you see the world. Reading a history of US Interventions or a biochemistry textbook is giving your brain new ways think about things- and while new knowledge is always good (even if it's rejected, it helps us clarify things), the manner in which it’s presented can be challenging to faith. Particularly when the format/teacher is openly hostile to your faith. Keep learning (PLEASE keep learning), but make sure to balance the scales of “anti-faith” with “faith-forming” material, too. And remember that all of us are human, given to prejudices, grudges, and incomplete world-views. That includes your brilliant professor or boss, too!
4.  Output: Many people experience God through service (though there are about a million ways to change the world through your personal choices, I’m talking about face-to-face, intentional service here). Make sure you don’t get so distracted by yourself and your changing life that you forget about others. Intentional service can be organizational or individual, ongoing or once, big or small. But it’s crucial to avoid that shriveled, stunted faith that refuses to fruit.
5.  Love: Ahh, amore. The onrushing emotions that make us believe all differences are small change because we FEEL like he/she’s the one! THE ONE! Many differences truly can be worked out, but it’s important to remember, too, that you can respect and love someone and still realize that you would both be happier with someone else. But for Pete’s sake, PLEASE examine what’s important to you and your partner now, what might be important in the future, and what you couldn’t care less about and then TALK about it. A relationship that can’t stand those kinds of talks is pretty much destined to a rocky patch (even diving off a cliff) in the future. Don’t deal with it by pretending your faith and church expectations are not that important. That’s the road that leads to heartache. 
6. Time: So… you’ve got a job, and potentially classes and homework, and hey, there’s a really neat club that would help you network, and you should probably spend time with your family, and that new movie just came out, and… and… and… There’s never any end to the things you could be doing with your time. And it barely warrants mentioning that you should avoid the not-so-shinebright ways you could occupy yourself. The biggest issue here is that you can get so caught up in doing things that are “good” that you miss out on the BEST. Getting to know God is what you were made for- and He wants more from you than just the occasional nod of acknowledgement. Make sure you schedule in time to pray, to learn, to act.. and to let Him act, speak, and teach, too!
7. Community: So, you’ve moved. Or your friends have moved. Or things are just different and you find yourself feeling like no one understands. Chances are good that someone does- you just need to reach out and find your community. If you’re in a new place, start searching for a church to help support you and answer those tough questions; it’s often the difference between staying connected to your faith and forgetting it all together. And if you’ve stayed in the same place, keep involved in the community you already have, even if you find you’d like to add to it. You might just find that the people you knew all along suddenly have different roles in your life- filling voids you never thought you’d have (or have them fill). No matter your situation, it’s important to remember that no man is an island-- even hermits usually need some contact with others to survive.
8. Social: Particularly at college, but also in certain job situations, you might find yourself unable to get away from your peers. That means peer pressure is there all the time, and you can find yourself cracking under that pressure- doing things you wouldn’t do otherwise. Watch your fault lines and know when to take a break, or how to find different peers (even if it’s only temporary).
9. Diversity: It can be a challenge learning how to separate “respect and tolerate” from “assimilate.” Remember when you had a paint palate as a kid, and some nice adult put glops of red, blue, and yellow paint on it? Those sure were pretty colors. And then you got to mix some of those colors to make green and purple and orange. Also lovely. But then you got a little crazy trying to put all the colors together- and what did you end up with? A murky brown that might have faintly resembled something you’d find in your younger brother’s diaper. Not so pretty. Don’t fall into that trap with people. Love the blue for being blue and the red for its redness. Know when you can take small parts of another culture into yourself and enhance the beauty that’s already there. But don’t think you can or should be just like everyone else, in every way. That’s the way that leads to the color that gets quickly washed away ('cause ain’t nobody gonna paint with that!)
10. Commitment: If you don’t decide beforehand that your faith is important to you, you’ll find that, in fact, it’s not. Making the decision to actively put your faith first, figuring out who you want to be and how you want to get there, and then COMMITTING to those ideals is so, so important. There’s so much out there warring for your attention and time, it’s easy to forget that we’re the ones in charge of our choices. Choose well.

(This list was freely adapted from this site. Their list is worth looking at, too!)

5 Minutes of God Time: Fix My Eyes by for King and Country

Faith Like A Child

We began our class with a brief “interview” of two of our favorite JAM Time-rs, reminding us of how we might also have looked at church, Jesus, and the impact of faith on our lives at that age. Besides being thoughtful and cute, they also transitioned us into a discussion of what child-like faith could mean for us (as teens and beyond).

Some trademarks of childhood that we considered include:

• Assurance: if you pray, it’ll happen!
• Trust: All things (and people) work for good
• Lack of social conditioning: for better or worse, very young children aren’t burdened by others’ expectations of right/wrong, what’s proper, the “shoulds’ and the “musts”
• Dependency: You know you can’t do it all yourself and aren’t ashamed to call on others to help out 
• Growth: Knowing you need help sometimes doesn’t mean you want someone to do it for you ALL the time
• Learning for learning’s sake: You ask 400+ questions every day because you just. need. to. know.
• Creativity: Everything is an option and “rules” are made to be broken
• Honesty: You say what you think, without guile
• Excitement: The world is full of possibilities waiting to be explored and you can’t wait to do it!
• Simplicity: Not everything is complicated

Now obviously, not every trait of childhood should be idealized and held up as worth retaining (see: Reasons My Son Is Crying for just one such example of behavior we're glad to outgrow). But the ones listed above are worth keeping, even if we often “grow” out of them.

What are some of the things that make us "grow up" in ways that we don't love so much? Glad you asked! :)

• Focusing on cultivating an “image”- whether online or in- person, it can make us ignore or hide parts of who we are so we fit in that box
• Overscheduling, particularly when we’re doing things because we “should” 
•  Consuming too much media: reinforcing someone else’s ideas of what’s normal and who we should be
• “If you want it done right, you have to do it yourself”- You’ve just narrowed all of the creative solutions to a problem down to one, and I’ve yet to hear that phrase said with excitement…
• Worrying about the future

Now, say we want to get back some of that childlike faith. What can we do?

• Spend time with kids! Reacquaint yourself what with being a kid means.
• Do something that brings you joy. Make sure that it doesn’t have a single other reward than making you happy (no competitions, no pay, no increased social standing).
• Spend time with your Abba- your heavenly father. You’d start to feel a little lost if you went a while without seeing your earthly family, no?
• Take a media break- sign off from social media, put away the remotes, hide your magazines. Live as you’re called, not as you’re told!

Five Minutes of God Time: Faith Like a Child by Jars of Clay

Ana-what?

Alright, ladies and gents, here's our first post of the new year! (Apologies: We're going to be a little anachronistic soon, as our next three posts will be about our December unit. Sorry for the delay!)

January is our month to explore three "other" Christian faith traditions. In the past we've looked at what some of the most populous non-Christian faiths believe- but we've got a fair share of diversity within our own house, too! Sunday #1 saw us exploring the Anabaptist faith- which is the over-arching category of the Amish, the Mennonites, and the Brethren of Christ, to name a few.

Anabaptists gets their name from their belief that baptism into the faith should be done as an intentional, personal decision; back when they split from the Protestants, practically EVERYONE was baptized as an infant, and most of those baptisms had occurred in the Roman Catholic church (which they obviously disagreed with strongly enough to make a formal split). Thus, Anabaptists re-baptized believers as adults, and didn't baptize their children until they were older ("ana" means "re-," not "anti-").

This was a pretty big deal back then. Church and state were entwined tightly, and rejecting the significance of infant baptism (and thus, the authority of the church) was basically thumbing your nose at the two most powerful forces in society. It probably didn't help that these Radical Reformers were the starting place of some even more Radical Reformers (who, after being kicked out of the Anabaptist movement for being too radical, went on to start some social reform wars). So Anabaptists, from the start, were persecuted and exiled for their beliefs. What made them so strong in these new beliefs that they were willing to lose their homes, their friends, and even their lives?

It started when Protestants first got the bible into the hands of the population in their native language- up until then, the Catholic church had only permitted the Latin version. Surprisingly (sarcasm alert), the uneducated masses couldn't read Latin and were relegated to being TOLD what was in there. They had to trust the authority of the church, because there was no way for them to verify it. When Luther translated the first bible, Anabaptists thought he was lovely- but with this new knowledge, they also realized that there was more to reform than just those 95 theses.

Anabaptists believe strongly in the words of Jesus- that he meant what he said, and that following Jesus meant putting his life and words first, particularly in the Sermon on the Mount. As such, they:

• Refuse to take oaths (let your "yes" be "yes" and your "no" be "no"- there should never be a time when you're MORE truthful than another)
• Believe strongly in the separation of church and state (Jesus did not encourage his disciples to change the world by getting involved with Rome, for starters)
• Live simply, double and triple checking the impacts of their actions, purchases, lifestyles, etc.
• Consider every believer to be a priest or minister of God
• Oppose any sort of obligatory faith (you can't legislate belief)
• Reject any argument that gives Christians the right to bear arms (they are pacifists in the extreme, believing that God's love and mercy should never come with violence)

I strongly encourage you to Wiki or Google Anabaptists to get an even deeper understanding of what that all means in practical terms. I could write a novel on this denomination (in fact, there are several outstanding books out there, including "Living More with Less" by Doris Janzen Longacre), but I'll spare you the required reading in hopes that you'll do some of that individual answer-seeking we discuss so often.

We also watched a very humorous and enlightening video from The Meeting House (the speaker is Bruxy Cavey). I also STRONGLY encourage you to check out more of The Meeting House's videos- lots to learn, and not just about Anabaptists!

We'll be back next week with the beginning of it all- the infamous split with the Catholic church, and how we protestants differ in our beliefs from the most populous of all Christian denominations.

5 Minutes of God Time:  Simple Gifts by Jewel