Reflections on why young adults leave the church

(with credit and thanks to Rachel Held Evans) Her comments are in normal face, mine in italic face


1. Young adult women leave the church because they're better at planning scripture studies than baby showers...

• It makes no sense to refuse to use a talent (a gift of God after all) simply because it doesn't fit a preconceived idea of the way that person should be. The example here is based on gender -- there are other issues too.
• The church is always looking for effective teachers, planners and ministers
• Why discard half (or a third or one tenth) of our strength?
• Which verse commands that women should plan social activities but never critical thinking activities?

2. They leave the church because when we talked about sin, we mostly talked about sex, euphemistically

• We spend way too much time on the evils of sex and way too little on the realities of sex
• We spend way too little time on sin which deadens the testimonies of the young, materialism, injustice, disenfranchisement, greed, worship of worldly talents.
• We have a pattern of teaching that when one is sexually active outside civil marriage (why civil and not sacramental marriage?) that one has lost it all; that one, admittedly unwise, choice nullifies all other choices until it is rectified. It is easier in terms of church status to repent of drug abuse, theft, fraud and cruelty than promiscuity. Why?
• We largely avoid talking about real sexual activity but spent a lot of energy creating elaborate analogies such as 'too close' dancing, immodest dress (mostly in females), steady dating, and flavors of kissing.
• We spend very little formal or informal time teaching how to create a wholesome relationship except to immerse the couples' time in church programs and scripture study.  What skills do young adults have that came from the church instruction in conflict resolution, planning, personal development? 
• What do we teach the young to do when one or both of them is less interested in spiritual matters than other interests temporarily?

3. They leave the church because their questions were seen as liabilities to be minimized, ignored or suppressed.

• When a difficult question is seen as a risk, liability, or problem it reveals one thing: that we, the questioned, are insecure in our faith.
• Real, true principles will stand up to intense questioning. Truth remains truth no matter how it is examined

4.They leave the church because sometimes it felt like a cult, or a country club, and they're not sure which was worse.

• When a church becomes more about a mortal person than a divine one, it has lost its way. The purpose of church is not worship of a person or a class of persons, it is about worship of God - three beings that have overcome the limits of mortality. Every person who lives today is fallible and imperfect. If we use them a exemplars, we risk copying their weaknesses as well as their strengths.
• Humans are social but when we use church membership, seniority or other material factors to control who benefits from church we leave God's stated principle of universality behind and with it the core meaning of discipleship.

5. They have left the church because they believe the Earth is 4.5 billion years old and that humans share a common ancestor with apes, which they are told was incompatible with their faith despite physical evidence.and statements from the church to the contrary

• This returns to the meaning of truth. Is something true only if endorsed by hierarchies? Do we really believe in Paul's admonition?
• Can we accept, as at least working truths, those things which appear to be true based on evidence?

6. They leave the church because sometimes they doubt, and church can be the worst place to doubt.

• We need two rooms for church meetings, one for the convinced and completely perfect people, and one for the uncertain, searching and doubting people
• If we avoid contact with doubters, who then are we preaching and teaching for? See Rameumpton.

7. They left the church because they didn’t want to be anyone’s “project.”

• When church destroys dignity to create propriety it has lost its way. We need to learn to humbly tolerate imperfection and deviation rather than enforce conformity. 
• See D&C 121:32-end. It's a basic principle: we don't compel, we persuade gently and with love.

8. They leave the church because it is often assumed that everyone in the congregation voted for Republicans.

• Never seen this happen in my church.
• Seriously, authoritarian, socially conservative, intolerant, plutocratic and inequitable policies are not taught in scripture
• There is no scripture addressing capitalism as the divine way

9. They left the church because when they like they are the only ones troubled by stories of violence, misogyny and genocide found in the Bible, and grow tired of people telling them not to worry about it because “God’s ways are higher than our ways.”

• A lot of the scriptures are not about God, they are about Man's failure to respond to God. 
• It is a rhetorical trap to insist on the infallibility of scripture. What has been written does not produce perfection by reading, reciting or study. More is needed.
• Those claiming to know "God's ways" usually think they are the same as their own ways. We should expect them to be as humble and teachable before God as they are with us.
• If we can't, in time, understand God's ways, we are doomed. We should worry about it if it will lead to our doom.

10. They leave the church because of their own selfishness and pride.

• We walk into church proud, selfish and self possessed. 
• Instant gratification, even when directed at godliness, is not a gospel principle.
• God has said He is willing to suffer our imperfection as we grow. Shouldn't we human beings do the same?

11. They leave the church when they become convinced they will never see a woman behind the pulpit, at least not in the congregation in which they grew up.

• If God values women, then He listens to them. He listens to their prayers. He listens to their sermons too. Who are we to deny an act of faith?

12. They leave the church because they want to help people in their community without feeling pressure to convert them to Christianity.

• Missionary work is a program of the church. Sharing love, talents and good works are gospel.
• Statistical programs emphasize behavior over belief. Which is the church?

13.They leave the church when they realized they have learned more from Oprah about addressing poverty and injustice than they had learned from 25 years of Sunday school.

• The gospel tells us to care for the poor until there are no more poor among us. 
• When we speak of injustice it usually means an act which violates gospel principles.
• When we make no personal progress in these two areas, we make no progress in our spiritual development. What are the fruits of our labor by which we are known? 
• Do we have programs that have statistical measures of the number of poor or abused we have redeemed? Why?

14. They leave the church because there are days when they're not sure they believe in God, and no one tells them that “dark nights of the soul” can be part of the faith experience.

• If what we learn in church doesn't prepare us for real life, then what is its purpose? 
• We don't live the set piece stories we are hearing all the time. 
• Not all problems have 20 minute answers.

15. They are leaving the church because one day, they see signs out in the church parking lot that said “Marriage = 1 Man + 1 Woman: Vote Yes on Prop 1,” and they know the moment they see them that they never wanted to come back.

• Reaching beyond the church to compel behavior rather than teach uplifting principle will never work. Civil law compels, always.
• When sexual behavior is used as the entire measure of a man we lose the spirt of God's word. 
• If the primal meaning of marriage is the type of people in it, why does the church permit or recognize civil marriages as equivalent to church marriages in mortality?
• Male and female are recognized as equal before the law, there is no legal basis for gender discrimination in civil law if taken to its logical end.
• The basis of gender discrimination is theological. If there is an important difference between same and complimentary gender marriage it is in the church not the community ethics,
• If same gender marriage is a violation of gospel law that means the first action is to restrict marriage to be solely the province of the church. We cannot rely on civil law to enforce church law. Denial of authority to set civil standards for civil contracts is not a church power. If the church wishes this why are they not working to ban civil marriage?

Exposing your weakness

What would you do if you knew you could  not fail?

Who would you help if you could see them succeed?

What would you sing if your voice was magical?

Who would you love if only the two of you knew?

Up and down

Another disappointing attempt. How will I ever learn this stuff if all I focus on is where I've come from? I have big dreams. The world is such a small place with everyone grabbing.

The Sun will raise tomorrow, I'll get up up and I pray I'll keep moving.

A defense of Negativity

Nobody likes hearing negative attitudes, it's always bad news. I see that, but is forced optimism or Pollyanna positivity the cure? I think not. That's swinging from one unbearable extreme to another. Truth is, neither constant positivity nor negativity is the right approach. Nobody want a bucket full of bad news nor a handful of happy talk. The heightened positive and negative tones are best as accents to decorate our attitude rather than major themes.

What is necessary is honest, objective realism: telling thing as they are. Sometimes that's positive when things are looking up, sometimes negative when we're on a slide off the edge. Mostly is just good descriptive narration on life.

All right then, what if life really is looking bad? You're coming down with the flu, for the third time this month, your tires are flat not just on the bottom but the top too, and your dog just watered your new shoes. So what do you say? Is it time to break out your emergency positivity kit? No, dispite all the happy-talk power of positive thinking types telling you to envision a better present, you still can't get more than twenty paces from a toilet, the car is not going anywhere and your feet are wet. No amount of magical thinking cleans and dries shoes, fixes a tire or chases the nasty little bugs out of your guts. Everything will get better with time and some patient work but right now it is kind of sucky. You don't have to be negative about it, it's just bad.

Take politics (there go half of you). Right now I'm living with an official who's afflicted with the half ways: he takes a good idea and finds a way to compromise with a bad idea because it makes people with bad ideas feel powerful and important.  He's not bad, just avoidant. Running against Mr Half good are a crowd of misfits. One is so much into his money games he can't relate to a normal person, another is so self-possessed he doesn't have the capacity to be emphatetic, a third is a narrow-minded zealot willing to cause pain to prove a point and finally there's a grumpy old man who sees clearly what the problems are and then proceeds to come up with solutions which absolutely make it worse.

Should I be negative because I'm stuck with Mr half-good because I can't see how there is a choice in Mr hollow suit, Mr Narcissus, Mr Church Lady or Dr Curmudgeon? You bet I should! Realistically things aren't working when your goal is to avoid making bad things worse. When all the offered choices are poor to bad, it's time for a bit of negative focus. No amount of positive thinking is going to make this bunch do good. Say it, this is no good. Then leave the party. Negative is realistic.

Freedom of religion

Freedom of religion, or more accurately freedom of belief and conscience, is fundamental but it does not stand alone. It needs freedom from persecution based on gender, culture, phenotype, or belief. If one is forced to live in a culture of injustice, making moral decisions becomes fatally distorted.

It needs freedom of access to information sufficient to determine truth or folly. Otherwise, one becomes a mere pawn of propaganda or the most persuasive fable. Religious truth withstands testing as well as truth in any other field.

It needs freedom from fear, want or illness. Practice of a religious life becomes impossible if in order to do so means dealing with threats to life, liberty or health.

Without these foundational rights, freedom of religion is reduced to the license of the sick and dying to hold their own delusions.

The West has a terrible record of abridgement of religious freedom: slave trade in the eighteenth century, imperial colonialism in the nineteenth century, genocides of Jews and Armenians in the twentieth century and materialist consumerism in the twenty first century.

We, as a culture have not learned that with religious freedom comes with a responsibility to be moderate and tolerant in its exercise. Religious freedom is not license to do as we believe without considering its consequences on others: there is no right to take from others that which we value for our selves. It includes providing for the freedom of conscience for others with whom we do not agree with in our religious principles. It includes provision for cultural space in which we may seek spiritual wisdom and fulfillment balanced with spaces for those who seek their wisdom and fulfillment is other ways. It includes a space for the use of peyote. It includes a space for those who would formalize same-gender marriages. It includes a space for polyandrous or polygynous marriage. It includes a space for open marriage. Unless we can tolerate these other beliefs in our culture, the cry for religious freedom will be understood only as another of our demands for dominance without just and equal rights for others and therefore just another attempt at unjust dominion.

When we condemn others for acts we consider immoral in our belief system, we cannot enforce penalties on those who are without our belief system unless we wish to return to a struggle based on who is most powerful to determine who may exercise their rights and who may not. Rights without justice is just a continuation of intolerance which denies rights to the majority in order to grant rights to a powerful minority.

Freedom of religious belief and practice is a foundational American right but one requiring knowledge and temperance to practice. It is not freedom to one (or a few) religions at the expense of others. Indeed, it requires recognition that mass ritual, mass worship, large buildings or hierarchies are not required to be considered as a religion. It separates the state from control of spiritual devotion but it also separates the organization from the individual: it is only in the individual that the right exists. Two individuals exercizing their rights does not outweigh one exercising her right. It is the ultimate form of anarchy for in its expression the person is as powerful as the state or church.

Consider this when you lobby for religious freedom. People have rights. Churches have privileges. Rights trump privileges. Your right to determine your religious belief and practice is only between yourself and the divine in civil law.

Solutions to untrained drivers on our roads

Why don't we train our drivers? There is no excuse. The cost is moderate and the benefits accrue every day.

See my previous posting on how our Drivers Ed course are a failure and something of a fraud.
The failure of drivers ed

These are off the shelf commercial programs that do what Drivers Ed should have done. They train you in the proper responses to driving challenges. No endorsements but they're good.

Honda Teen Defensive Driving Program

Providing driving techniques not found in a typical drivers' education classroom, the Honda Teen Defensive Driving Program puts students behind the wheel to learn skills that will be used for a lifetime. Students practice collision recovery techniques, loss of control recovery skills, bad weather maneuvers through emergency lane change, wet braking, slalom and skid car drills. Parents are highly encouraged to stay and watch the program while their teen participates. Course begins at 8:30 am with registration. Class begins at 9:00 am and ends at approximately 3:20 pm. The program takes place at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, 7721 Lexington-Steam Corners Rd, Lexington, OH.

Curriculum

• Discussion of driving basics, defensive driving behavior and vehicle safety
• Classroom session covering the physics and dynamics of good driving
• Wet braking drill
• Emergency lane change / collision avoidance exercise
• Skid car drill simulating weather conditions such as ice, snow and rain
• Vehicle maintenance talk

Amount of Seat Time

Paddock Drills - 3 hours

This Course is Ideally Suited For:

• Newly permitted or licensed teenage driver
• A parent that would like to take the course with their new driver
  The practice sessions
  =================================================================
  

  Skip Barber School

  1 Day Safety and Survival School Program

  
  
  The NEW DRIVER PROGRAM is for drivers who have at least a permit and 20 hours of experience. It conveys the same vehicle dynamics message made clear in the Driving School but emphasizes greater "street awareness" and a thorough review of road etiquette. Important fundamental skills, including how to operate a manual transmission, parallel parking and reversing exercises are included in the curriculum. Driving the Mazda MX-5, the Mazda RX-8 and MAZDA3 sedan, students benefit from core Driving School exercises such as braking, emergency lane change and slide recovery on the skidpad.
  
  Real maneuverability
  
  Real skills development     Do you think you can do it?
  
  Secrets

The failure of drivers ed: Ohio Driving Training Curriculum

Driver Training School Curriculum (from http://www.drivertraining.ohio.gov/resources/Drivercurriculum12-04.pdf)
[with my comments]

LABORATORY INSTRUCTION
Printed Resources
1. Digest of Ohio Motor Vehicle Laws; Ohio Department of Public Safety (ODPS)
2. Ohio Administrative Rules for Commercial Driving School, Ohio Department of Public Safety

The beginning driver must receive a minimum of eight hours of ... behind-the-wheel
instruction from a certified/licensed instructor. These lessons should be scheduled to allow supervised
practice with a licensed driver between each lesson. There are ten planned lessons for the beginning
driver in a variety of driving environments. With a practice to instruction ratio of two or three to one, the
beginning driver should be able to satisfactorily accomplish all of the planned lesson objectives.

Lesson #1 Objectives
A. Pre-ignition procedures
B. Ignition procedures (how to start the car)
C. Vehicle familiarization
D. Ready to drive position
E. Preparing to move
F. Moving forward
G. Moving backward
H. Stopping, securing, shutting down
I. Lane change [with no traffic conflict]
J. Maneuverability test  [arguably the most pointless exercise of skill ever conceived]
K. Left turn
L. Right turn
M. U-turn
N. Three-point turnabout
O. Two-point turnabout
Length of Time - 60 minutes of instruction per student or until satisfactory performance is achieved.[never seen this go longer than 60 min]

Lesson #2 Objectives
A. Entering and leaving flow of traffic 

B. Negotiating intersections
C. Identifying traffic controls (primarily signs and markings)
D. Using selective searching techniques
E. Negotiating turnabouts
F. Interacting with other users  [huh?]
Length of Time - 45 minutes of instruction per student or until satisfactory performance of the
planned objectives is achieved.

Lesson #3 Objectives
A. Entering and exiting an angle parking space
B. Entering and exiting a perpendicular parking space
Length of Time - Thirty minutes of instruction per student or until satisfactory performance of the planned
objectives is achieved.

Lesson #4 Objectives
A. Vehicle control at higher speeds [first time over 35]
B. Increased sighting distance
C. Orderly search pattern
D. Identifying traffic controls [more sign ID?]
E. Identifying highway conditions
F. Planning ahead   [how do they teach this??]
G. Lane selection and position within the lane
H. Negotiating multiple lane intersections
I. Selecting a safe gap for crossing or entering traffic
J. Communicating  [with whom? ]
K. Moving lane changes [ were previous lane changes not moving?]
L. Negotiating and parking in shopping centers and malls
Length of Time - 45 minutes of instruction per student or until satisfactory performance of the
planned objectives is achieved.

Lesson #5 Objectives
A. Search, Identification and Prediction
B. Maintaining adequate space margins
C. Interacting with a larger number of highway users [shouldn't interactions be avoided?]
D. Negotiating a variety of intersections
Length of Time - 45 of instruction per student or until satisfactory performance of the planned
objectives is achieved.

Lesson #6 Objectives
A. Maintaining a constant speed when conditions permit
B. Entering and exiting expressways
C. Cooperating with other drivers who are entering or exiting
D. Demonstrate satisfactory search to reduce the risk of real/potential hazards
E. Demonstrate satisfactory communication [fluff]
F. Measuring distances with time [acquiring this skill requires many weeks of practice, how long is allocated? 5 minutes!]
G. Passing
H. Using the motor vehicle’s cruise control safely and efficiently
Length of Time - 40 minutes of instruction per student or until satisfactory performance of the
planned objectives is achieved.

Lesson #7 Objectives
A. Entering and exiting a parallel parking space
B. Parking on an uphill and downhill grade
C. The driver will demonstrate and practice the maneuverability test as identified in the Digest of Ohio
Motor Vehicle Laws. [way too much time on a skill which isn't used on the road]
Length of Time - 70 minutes of instruction per student or until satisfactory performance of the
planned objectives is achieved. Of the total time, 30 minutes should be devoted to performing and
practicing the maneuverability test.
Lesson #8 Objectives
A. Identifying and responding to negative roadway conditions
B. Identifying clues for side roads, driveways and other problem areas
Length of Time - 40 minutes of instruction per student or until satisfactory performance of the
planned objectives is achieved.

Lesson #9 Objectives
A. Maintaining adequate space margins
B. Timing driving actions
C. Selecting paths of travel
D. Communicating [fluff]
E. Selective searching in relation to selected maneuvers
F. Negotiating complex intersections
G. Interacting with pedestrians [plan: don't interact, avoid them]
Length of Time - 40 minutes of instruction per student or until satisfactory performance of the
planned objectives is achieved.

Lesson #10 Objectives
A. Preparing to drive at night
B. Using selected visual skills to increase identification
C. Using selected visual skills to improve vehicle control
D. Using selected visual skills to reduce glare
E. Speed control and tracking
Length of Time - 30 minutes of instruction per student or until satisfactory performance of the
planned objectives is achieved.

Time spend on emergency braking? zero

Time spent on emergency actions in a high speed curve? zero
Time spent on correcting skids, understeer or oversteer? zero
Time spent on collision avoidance maneuvers? zero
Time spent on identifying and coping with vehicle limitations? zero
Time spend in rainy conditions? zero required
Time spent in snowy conditions? zero
Time spent in icy conditions? zero

Most frequent fatal accident location? Rural
Cause of accident?  Single vehicle, departure from road accounts for half of the fatalities (intoxication is only involved in one third)

What to make this?  The big problem is controlling the car in a high speed, open environment. The maneuverability test has no impact on this. Most of the curriculum doesn't address this. The driver never learns what to do when something goes wrong. There is no recovery plan which can be used in a moment of need because this requires training. It requires the training that the state doesn't provide. Many people think since it's not required for licensing, it's not important. Ohio has two people die every day because it is important. Many of those are under 18.