NOM

I only caught part of this on the radio today so I plan on going back to listen to the whole thing tonight.

https://www.npr.org/2023/04/03/11677159 ... odern-time

It occurred to me that church lessons rarely bring up the 2nd coming and the last days anymore. When I was growing up that topic was very popular, now they almost never mention it. I wonder why.

The church is painted in a corner on this. There is no other endgame so I wonder what the church will look like in 100+ years when it's clear that Jesus isn't coming back. I mean it's been clear that Jesus isn't coming back for 2,000 years now but at some point I would think the church is just going to pretend they never believed in a literal Armageddon.

I also saw this quote online this weekend which is true and makes also has the church painted into a corner:

Just a reminder that apocalyptic religions will never have the power to bring about meaningful change to the world, as societal dissolution is baked into their ideology. They are literally banking on everything going to shit.

-Zelph on the Shelf

"

Sam Harris also interviewed Ehrman about his new book. It was a fun interview and I learned a couple new things from it (for example, that 666 simply refers to Nero, and a 616 variant in some manuscripts is just further evidence of this).

They also talked about how Evangelical support for the State of Israel is in part based on the belief that the temple must be rebuilt before Jesus can return. Which is kind of an interesting tension.

https://www.samharris.org/podcasts/maki ... apocalypse

Spicy, your avatar says it well: "Jesus gave up his weekend for your sins..."

Plus the quote: "Just a reminder that apocalyptic religions will never have power to bring about meaningful change to the world, as societal dissolution is baked into their ideology. They are banking on everything going to s---" is sadly true for so many Christians, Muslims, and suppose a few Jews as well.

Spicy McHaggis wrote: ↑Mon Apr 03, 2023 1:23 pm It occurred to me that church lessons rarely bring up the 2nd coming and the last days anymore. When I was growing up that topic was very popular, now they almost never mention it. I wonder why.

This is true, but RMN has mentioned the 2nd coming a lot in his talks. I have not listened to his talk from Sunday, so I don't know if the pattern continued. I think they want to keep members in fear of the 2nd coming, but if it were mentioned in lessons too much people might start to notice that the 2nd coming never seems to come. We are probably past the point where McConkie thought the apocalypse would happen. His apologetic for why the "rising generation" in the days of JS would live to see the 2nd coming cannot work today. Everyone who could be considered to be part of that generation is quite dead. Today the church needs to ignore those quotes.

This was a great interview, it was Ehrman at his best. And it raised a lot of good questions. The big concern for me is Christian evangelicals and fundamentalists who see an apocalypse in the future, and may be willing to do things to make it happen. At the same time ignoring climatic indicators, or believing Jesus will take care of that. The reference to James Watt brought back memories.
It also mentioned that the idea of a "rapture" didn't really take hold until the 1830's- interesting.