The End of the Progressive Adventist

There have been several reports and responses to General Conference President Ted N.C. Wilson’s, Sabbath sermon during the 2021 Annual Council in Spring Maryland. I spent some time reading and listening to the last 2 Annual Council Sermons. The 2021 Sermon “Trust God’s Prophetic Word in the Coming Conflict” and the 2020 Sermon “God Will Have A People” This is my analysis of the implications of both together, as usual my take is far different from what one reads on most of the Adventist Media outlets.

Both of Ted Wilson’s sermons are pretty much the same though I will point out that the 2020 sermon does an admirable job of pointing out just what Adventists think the messages of the 3 Angels of Revelation 14 are.  This is important because I have long said that the Adventist use of the 3 Angels messages is simply a shorthand way of saying Seventh-Day-Adventist distinctive doctrinal beliefs. In this sermon we hear that very clearly pointed out with no obfuscation which normally occurs when you ask an Adventist what are the 3 Angel’s messages.

Ted Wilson set forth a list of bullet points which I quote below with excerpts. If you are familiar with them you can skip to the Implications section.

1.     The Word of God Not Accepted as Authoritative

“The Spirit of Prophecy indicates we should read the Bible as it reads…” “…Seventh-day Adventists believe in the historical-biblical or historical-grammatical approach, allowing the Bible to interpret itself line upon line, precept upon precept, verse upon verse. We believe in the historicist approach to prophecy, not the preterist or futurist approaches. The historical-biblical hermeneutical method is the only method accepted by the Seventh-day Adventist Church.”

 2.     Attempts to Diminish the Spirit of Prophecy

“The Spirit of Prophecy was given by God through Ellen G White as special instructions to God’s last-day church and is verified by Revelation 12:17 and Revelation 19:10. The Spirit of Prophecy is absolutely reliable and is to be believed and accepted in its entirety. Ellen White was absolutely a prophet of God and her ministry including strong messages from the throne room of God about apocalyptic prophecy and instruction are for all time. As we read the Spirit of Prophecy we are convinced of its accuracy, truthfulness, and relevancy.”

 3.     Misconceptions of Justification and Sanctification

“Christ’s righteousness encompasses His justifying and sanctifying power and is at the very core of the three angels’ messages. It is through Christ’s justification that we can be righteous in the Father’s eyes. It is through Christ’s sanctification that we can keep the commandments of God.”

 4.     Denial of the Urgency of the Times 

“However, in the Bible, God has provided many signs indicating Jesus' return. We are very close!”

 5.     Humanism versus Heavenly Inspiration

“My fellow leaders, fight against humanism and lift up heavenly inspiration according to His word!” [He does not define humanism.[ Humanism is defined as:

1.  A system of thought that focuses on humans and their values, capacities, and worth. 2. A cultural and intellectual movement of the Renaissance that emphasized human potential to attain excellence and promoted direct study of the literature, art, and civilization of classical Greece and Rome. 3. The study of the humanities; learning in the liberal arts.]

 

6.     Disregard for the Sanctuary Service and the Gospel Message

“…Promote and teach the sanctuary doctrine with Christ, His righteousness, and the everlasting gospel at the center. Biblical prophecies are real and Daniel 8:14 is absolutely rock solid. Don't believe anybody who says, “Oh no, that was only 2,300 literal days and it ended with someone called Antiochus Epiphanes.” No, my friends, don't believe that. We use the biblical day/year principle given to interpret prophecy. Allow the Bible to interpret itself. The historicist approach shows us that history has accurately unfolded according to His Word!”

 7.     Ecumenism versus The Shaking and Sifting of God’s Church

“I strongly urge you to stay away from ecumenism. Instead, focus on the proclamation of the three angels’ messages. Believe what The Great Controversy says about the end time setting when the shaking and sifting of the church will take place…”

 8.     Congregationalism versus God’s Worldwide Seventh-day Adventist Remnant Church

“There are those who wish to focus only on local church and community settings ignoring the worldwide family of Seventh-day Adventists in about 215 countries…”

9.     Attacks against the Godhead

“There are those who advocate that the Godhead is not three distinct Persons thus diminishing God. We know from the Bible and the Spirit of Prophecy that there is absolutely a Godhead made up of three Persons united in One…”

 10. Opposition to God’s Law and His Ten Commandments

There are those who will say the law has been done away; however, God’s law is eternal. We do not keep God’s law, the ten commandments, through our own power but only as we lean on Christ and His righteousness… This will be our test.”

 11. Evolution versus Biblical Creation

The devil has attempted to obliterate all references to God’s authority as the Creator, including the erroneous idea that the earth evolved over billions of years. Both evolution and theistic evolution are opposed to the account of creation found in the Bible and the Spirit of Prophecy. The global flood, also denigrated by non-believers, is another indication of God’s power and authority to remake the world…”

12. Aberrant Lifestyle Behavior versus Biblical View of Sexuality

This subject is a delicate one, but we cannot be silent on what the Bible teaches as correct living and practice. The Seventh-day Adventist Church has carefully studied these topics and has issued voted statements by representatives of the world church that reflect the biblical view on human sexuality including statements on homosexuality and transgenderism. ..”

13. Rejection of Temperance versus God’s Comprehensive Health Ministry and Health Reform

“…The devil will use anything to distract people from God’s laws of health and health reform, but God has given us enormous counsel in the Bible and Spirit of Prophecy for living a healthy lifestyle. Read and follow it as part of the third angel’s message to stay away from anything that will defile you. My fellow church leaders and members, stay faithful to God’s pure health principles. According to His Word!”

14. Disastrous Influences of Eastern Mysticism

The devil is using eastern mysticism to bring in all sorts of syncretistic beliefs into the Seventh-day Adventist Church, including pantheism and other forms of aberrant theological twisting of the Word of God...” 

Implications

This article is not an attempt to counter any of Ted Wilson’s points. I have read several articles in the past few weeks from the Progressive Adventist viewpoints that dealt with some of these 14 points.  I want to point out that these 14 points are pretty much in line with the views of Traditional Adventists. There might be a couple that some Traditional Adventist would quibble with, however I can say that there is relatively few on this list that Progressive Adventists would say are important and we must accept and teach these denominational concepts. Most notably I would point to the authority of Ellen White as a prophet and assertion that we must believe in a recent 6 day creation and literal worldwide flood.

As equally to be rejected by the Progressive Adventist is the Historicist view of history and the dismissal of anything but a “historical-biblical or historical-grammatical approach, allowing the Bible to interpret itself line upon line, precept upon precept, verse upon verse”. The statement, “line upon line…” is interesting since it reflects an Ellen White viewpoint that is based on a misused Bible verse.  The context of the verse in Isa 28:10 indicates that those erring teachers (vs. 7 “they err in vision, they stumble in judgment”) who use repetition without imagery or illustration and without an appeal to understanding or respect for reason.

Several of the statements on this list would seem to many Progressive Adventists to encourage what is often termed Last Generation Theology. Some of the articles from Progressives also took the political progressive view of LGBT+ non-affirmation as their most important take away from the 2021 sermon.

This leads to the question the members of the SDA denomination should be asking themselves. Which of these points is important and which ones can be discarded. If I as a Traditional Adventist am in agreement with Ted Wilson, I would say none of them must be discarded and all must be proclaimed as essential to our denomination? If I as a Progressive Adventist say I disagree with most all of Ted Wilson’s points, I would think that most of those points should be discarded. What would be my essentials that the denomination must proclaim?

It would be interesting to ask the Progressive Adventists that question and if their websites were not so restricted maybe someone could. I do guess that the Progressive Adventist would say their essentials would be fairly nonspecific. Preach the Gospel and likely essential to reject eternal torment in hell and possibly a respect for the park in time of a Sabbath. That seems to be about it, certainly there are other essentials but those would be common among most Christian denominations.

This is the point where the implications of all this really hits me. Why should the Progressive Adventist even try to change the SDA denomination? The Traditionalist would say save the denomination by proclaiming the things on Wilson’s list and the Progressive SDA would say leave those things behind. If this ever becomes a real struggle for the denomination as in if an actual schism occurs there is nothing that the Progressives would give up to the Traditional Adventists. But the Traditional Adventists would have to give up most of their beliefs.

Does it make sense to take away all these things from the Traditional Adventists? Progressive Adventists believe that many of these things the Traditional Adventist believes are harmful to the cause of Christ. Let us for sake of argument say that the Progressive Adventists are correct and many of these teachings hurt the cause of Christ. Would not the best thing be to leave the Adventist system altogether; spend their time on spreading what they believe is the gospel to the world rather than spending their efforts trying to dissuade the Traditional Adventists to change their beliefs. Having the SDA denomination infrastructure would certainly be helpful to the Progressive Adventists but it is not likely to happen is it?

I would assume that Progressive Adventists likely have most of the faculty of SDA colleges and have had them for the last 20 years at least. But because they still cling to Ellen White as something of an authority even if not accepting all her statements they don’t really have a consistent message that could dissuade Traditional Adventists. When you read the two sermons by Ted Wilson you will see that on much of his sermons he backs himself up by using Ellen White. The Traditional Adventist can always point to anyone not accepting Ellen White as a fulfillment of prophecy (making her of none effect). So in simple terms I see no way that Progressive Adventists can get what they want. They can’t even chip away at the Adventist church as they have been doing, as I have been doing for most of my life, because the church is built on Ellen White. To think that the SDA denomination will give up their distinctive message, that 3 angels messages that they think firmly places Ellen White and the Adventist denomination inside the Bible is something that simply will never happen.

At the Adventist Today zoom Sabbath School Class I asked this question:

“Should there be pluralism in the Adventist church? Should there be pluralism in the Adventist Today publication (and website)?  I am using the last half of the Cambridge dictionary definition of Pluralism: "...different beliefs and opinions, within the same society" (I am not using the different people groups/culture/races meaning…”

No one there really offered an answer to the question but Loren Seibold did reply at one point: “Ron, we don’t expect the denomination to be pluralistic. Not sure where you got that idea. We have seen little evidence that they want to be.”

My question was not is either the Adventist Church or Adventist Today pluralistic but should they be. It has long been my opinion that Adventist Today has become politically progressive and that is their main emphasis. If a person thought that the Denomination should be pluralistic it would seem appropriate for a website serving other members of the church to also be pluralistic.

But if a Progressive Adventist has no expectation of the denomination being pluralistic what is the point of being a Progressive Adventist?

One thing that is quite a big difference between the Traditional and the Progressive Adventist is that the Traditional Adventists are pretty sure that what people believe in the way of doctrines is important for their salvation. I can say that for myself and many of the people who attend the AToday Sabbath school class this is not their belief.  I place myself in the Universalism camp. See my article What About Universalism which interestingly enough was first published in Adventist Today back before I was persona non grata there. While that may still be a minority view of Progressive Adventists, most certainly believe that Adventism is not now or in the future a requirement for salvation. You will notice that ecumenism was one of the things on Wilson’s list.

While I would love to persuade the Traditional Adventist of my Progressive Adventist views because I think it is closer to the truth and better for society and better for the cause of Christ. It is not to me a salvation issue for them to change. The Traditional Adventist expects that people who are not totally in on the Adventist belief system to be shaken out of the church, to be shaken out as non-believers that is a salvation issue!

So I can’t see any reason to be a Progressive Adventist. Certainly not if I was like Loren Seibold and thought that the Adventist church is never going to be open to different beliefs and opinions in the denomination. I in fact do agree with Seibold on that. How much effort should Progressive Adventist put in on changing what does not want to be changed?  Traditional Adventists certainly have the right to their chosen beliefs and it should not be too much trouble for me to accept their beliefs as I accept so many other people’s beliefs. My having been raised in the same denomination as them should at the very least make me more accepting of their beliefs. So again what is the point in being a Progressive Adventist?

There is as far as I can see only one reason for Progressive Adventists to continue. It is not however a good reason, it is a quest for power and control. That is, to attempt to take over churches and schools from the control of the Adventist denomination.

I have been what I have called a Progressive Adventist for over 20 years, (See The Problem of Progressive Adventists ) though back then I always noted it was not at all related to political progressive. 8 or 9 years ago places like Adventist Today and Spectrum merged with political progressivism and I used the term much less. Today I feel it is time to complete the dissolution of the term Progressive Adventist. I no longer see any use for the term and no benefit to continue it at all. Thus it is not only the end of a term but the end of my involvement with Seventh-Day Adventists. I appreciate the history I have with the church and people. I wish the church well and do not want to see a schism disrupt the people. So I offer this to all of Adventism, but as I am always learning if anyone can explain to me a reason for Progressive Adventism I look forward to hearing it.

 

 

 

Jane, you ignorant slut

 Back in the early days of Saturday Night Live they did a take on the 60 minutes segment called point/ counter point.  One of the catch phrases for these skits between Dan Akroyd and Jane Curtin. Was Dan Akroyd beginning his counterpoint by saying “Jane, you ignorant slut! That is kind of the way I think of the Adventist Today Dear Aunt Sevvy column. Words of questionable wisdom from an anonymous possibly female or not.

In his/her column for October 25 2021 we learn from this ignorant writer that:

“Yes, healthy people are better able to fight off infections. But it’s been proven repeatedly that viruses are equal opportunity infectors. They do not care if you’re vegan, or if you eat nothing but pork hot-dogs for every meal. If you are unvaccinated you have a 1 in 8 chance of getting sick from Covid, and a 1 in 61 chance of dying. If you are fully vaccinated, you have a 1 in 13,402 chance of getting sick, and a 1 in 86,000 chance of dying from Covid. “ 

Do you believe that? Where is the source for this startling data? None given, a 1 in 61 chance of dying, really. We went through a year of Covid and we had no vaccine.  Did 1 in 61 people die from Covid19? Of course the answer is no. To even come up with the 1 in 61 chance we would have to start at a bit above 70 years of age. I am not going to deal with the other odds given, it is highly doubtful that they are any more accurate, however.

Let's look at what the actual science says. Before we look at the chart let us see what they say about that second Aunty sentence, that viruses are equal opportunity infectors. It is important because as the chart shows there is no equal death rates by age and sex. As you will note below the virus discriminates. Starting in the 20-24 age group men are about twice as likely to die as women.

One more thing to point out. 1 in 61 odds comes to (0.0161) or 1.6129% On the chart we do not see that level of deaths until the 70-74 age range (mean between sexes).  From the American Council on Science and Health explanation connected to the chart

“There are several observations worth noting. First, as we have long known, people of college age and younger are very unlikely to die. The 5-9 and 10-14 age groups are the least likely to die. (Note that an IFR of 0.001% means that one person in that age group will die for every 100,000 infected.) The 0-4 and 15-19 age groups are three times likelier to die than the 5-9 and 10-14 age groups, but the risk is still exceedingly small at 0.003% (or 3 deaths for every 100,000 infected).

Second, the IFR slowly increases with age through the 60-64 age group. But after that, beginning with the 65-69 age group, the IFR rises sharply. This group has an overall IFR just over 1% (or 1 death for every 100 infected). That's a fairly major risk of death. (The red line in the chart marks where the "1% threshold" is crossed.) The IFR then grows substantially and becomes quite scary for people in their 70s and older. People in the 75-79 age group have more than a 3% chance of dying if infected with coronavirus, while people aged 80 and over have more than an 8% chance of dying. That's roughly the same chance as rolling a four with two dice.

Third, the virus discriminates. Beginning with the 20-24 age group, men are about twice as likely to die as women from COVID. This pattern remains in each age group through 80+.

With this data, let's hope that public health officials and policymakers can craft smart guidelines in regard to what parts of society should be locked down and how vaccines should be allocated.

Source: O’Driscoll, M. et al. "Age-specific mortality and immunity patterns of SARS-CoV-2." Nature. DOI: 10.1038/s41586-020-2918-0 (2020).”

 

Don’t think that it is only science that Aunty knows nothing about he/she knows nothing about law either. The Adventist Today column includes this: 

There always seems to be a cry of persecution when a government makes a decision that everyone needs to participate in something for public safety. In 1969 when the government decided that everyone needed to wear a seatbelt there were people who said, “If I want to die in a car accident, I should be allowed to make that choice!”

 No the Federal Seatbelt assembly law was not that everyone needed to wear seatbelts as it was about adding the assembly to cars and it was 1968.

49 CFR § 571.209 - Standard No. 209; Seat belt assemblies.

§ 571.209 Standard No. 209; Seat belt assemblies.

S1. Purpose and scope. This standard specifies requirements for seat belt assemblies.

S2. Application. This standard applies to seat belt assemblies for use in passenger cars, multipurpose passenger vehicles, trucks, and buses. 

Since the law was about seatbelt assemblies it is highly doubtful that there was even one person whose response was “If I want to die in a car accident, I should be allowed to make that choice!”

 After about 25 years of ads to wear seatbelts the first actual wearing of seatbelts law was in 1984 in New York state

 

 

 

 

Adventist Today editor libels Abigail Shrier but likely has never read her

 By Ron Corson

Once again Adventist Today has published an article with an abundance of opinions and little facts. Loren Seibold the editor at Adventist Today wrote an article entitled: On Complete LGBTQ+ Acceptance in the Church. I am not going to respond to the full article I think it would be good for the Adventist denomination to examine these new issues in culture and religion. What I have a problem with is when ignorance pretends to be knowledge. Here is what Loren Seibold wrote:

“Recently the youth director of the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists recommended on social media the book Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters. The author, Abigail Shrier, revives the old arguments that were once leveled at lesbian and gay people: that there is an “agenda,” a “movement,” in this case to induce young women into becoming male. This excreta is being pushed from the very top of our denomination. (Abigail will make a great deal of money on this book from the many people who love simple answers that blame others for problems they don’t understand.)”

 When a person reads that paragraph it somewhat sounds like the author of the article has some knowledge of the work of Abigail Shrier, unless, of course, anyone has read the book or listened to an interview with Abigail Shrier. Perhaps just as bad as someone who clearly has not read the book or even listened to an interview with Abigail Shrier, Loren Seibold seems to imply that the youth director of the General Conference has done something horrible by directing people to an important book on social media.

But how can it be an important book if the book is about reviving an old argument that transgenderism of young girls is an agenda or a movement.  Well, it is at this point that we know Loren Seibold knows nothing about the book. It is here that I have to come up to the plate and say Loren Seibold either does not know what he is writing about or is purposely lying to his readers. Whichever answer, it is not good for Adventist Today.  Unless of course the purpose of Loren Siebold is not honest journalism but leftist propaganda, in which case lying for the political cause is part of progressivism.

One thing all readers must learn is to identify fictional material that is attributed to someone else. This is most easily done by checking the sources. Is there a quote given, what is the source and can we read the quote. Is there any context to the quote? Here Loren Siebold gives single word quotes “agenda,” a “movement”. By just using the single out of context quotes the reader is forced to accept Loren Seibold’s explanation.  I am pretty sure he is just passing on what some other unscrupulous writer had written. That is a huge problem if someone cannot even take the time to get some first-hand information what good is their information. It is no better than gossip and in this case it is malicious gossip.

So what is the book about? The reason for the book is set forth in the beginning of Chapter 2 under the title the Puzzle:

“In 2016, Lisa Littman, ob-gyn turned public health researcher and mother of two, was scrolling through social media when she noticed a statistical peculiarity: several adolescents, most of them girls, from her small town in Rhode Island had come out as transgender—all from within the same friend group. “With the first two announcements, I thought, ‘Wow, that’s great,’ ” Dr. Littman said, a light New Jersey accent tweaking her vowels. Then came announcements three, four, five, and six.

 Dr. Littman knew almost nothing about gender dysphoria—her research interests had been confined to reproductive health: abortion stigma and contraception. But she knew enough to recognize that the numbers were much higher than extant prevalence data would have predicted. “I studied epidemiology… and when you see numbers that greatly exceed your expectations, it’s worth it to look at what might be causing it. Maybe it’s a difference of how you’re counting. It could be a lot of things. But you know, those were high numbers.”

 In fact, they turned out to be unprecedented. In America and across the Western world, adolescents were reporting a sudden spike in gender dysphoria—the medical condition associated with the social designation “transgender.” Between 2016 and 2017 the number of gender surgeries for natal females in the U.S. quadrupled, with biological women suddenly accounting for—as we have seen—70 percent of all gender surgeries.¹

 In 2018, the UK reported a 4,400 percent rise over the previous decade in teenage girls seeking gender treatments.²

 In Canada, Sweden, Finland, and the UK, clinicians and gender therapists began reporting a sudden and dramatic shift in the demographics of those presenting with gender dysphoria—from predominately preschool-aged boys to predominately adolescent girls.³”

Jumping a head a couple of paragraphs:

“If this sudden spike in transgender identification among adolescent girls is a peer contagion, as Dr. Littman hypothesized, then the girls rushing toward “transition” are not getting the treatment they most need. Instead of immediately accommodating every adolescent’s demands for hormones and surgeries, doctors ought to be working to understand what else might be wrong. At best, doctors’ treatments are ineffective; at worst, doctors are administering needless hormonal treatments and irreversible surgeries on patients likely to regret them. Dr. Littman’s theory was more than enough to touch a nerve.

 Activists stormed the Twitter page of PLoS One, the peer-reviewed scientific journal of the Public Library of Science that had published Dr. Littman’s paper, accusing her of anti-trans bigotry. They claimed that Dr. Littman had deliberately solicited parent reports from conservative, anti-trans parent groups. (In fact, over 85 percent of the parents self-identified as supporting LGBT rights.)” (page 21-22)

 

From there the book is a deep dive into researcher and psychologist data and observations.

Now I don’t expect people to take the time to read her book but this is an important topic. Take the time to listen or watch her Interview with Jorden Peterson. Peterson as a clinical Psychologist is very clearly a deep thinker even if he is not the best at interviews. Please take the time to listen or watch and then see just how much truth there is to Loren Siebold’s statement: “Abigail will make a great deal of money on this book from the many people who love simple answers that blame others for problems they don’t understand.”

Update. Here is the Joe Rogan podcast with Abigail Shrier. It is a more conversational program with a bit more on cultural and activists content. Pretty sure that after listening/watching this most people would say that Loren Seibold's paragraph in question above is really activist in nature. https://open.spotify.com/episode/4SIh4Pt39AtGQYzMJMNkv1

You can read articles by Abigail Shrier at: https://muckrack.com/abigailshrier/articles

Update 12-9-21

Read her speech at Princeton: What I told the Students at Princeton

When truth is the last thing you want to report

 It seems every time I read an article from Adventist Today I read false information. It seems as if they have no filter at all by which they can test the truth of their articles. It seems to me it is really now all about pushing a political leftist view upon the readers of AToday.

 

Take this recent article. Abortion Is Terrible, but Abortion Laws Are Worse by Lindsey Abston Painter  14 September 2021 

“Only if you have been living under a rock would you not have heard that at the beginning of September the state legislators in Texas passed a draconian law criminalizing abortions past six weeks of pregnancy. Not only the woman who has an abortion will be treated as a criminal, but anyone involved in any way, including any doctor or medical personnel involved—and even a person who drove her to the clinic or offered her shelter. Women who leave the state to have an abortion are to be immediately prosecuted when they return.” 

Is that paragraph true? Does the Texas law criminalize abortions past 6 weeks? Are the women treated as a criminal, is everyone peripherally involved treated as criminals? Are women who leave the state for an abortion immediately prosecuted when they return?

The answer is no to all of those assertions. No one has to look too hard to see that those statements are all untrue. Pretty much a few paragraphs from an NPR article can show just how wrong the Lindsey Abston Painter’s article is.

“The law allows private citizens to sue abortion providers and anyone else who helps a woman obtain an abortion — including those who give a woman a ride to a clinic or provide financial assistance to obtain an abortion. Private citizens who bring these suits don't need to show any connection to those they are suing.”

 “Groups who oppose abortion rights have pushed for this Texas law, hoping that it will be harder for federal courts to knock it down. Instead of requiring public officials to enforce the law, this law allows individuals to bring civil lawsuits against abortion providers or anyone else found to "aid or abet" illegal abortions.”

“Anyone who successfully sues an abortion provider under this law could be awarded at least $10,000. And to prepare for that, Texas Right to Life has set up what it calls a "whistleblower" website where people can submit anonymous tips about anyone they believe to be violating the law.”

“"These lawsuits are not against the women," says John Seago with Texas Right to Life. "The lawsuits would be against the individuals making money off of the abortion, the abortion industry itself. So this is not spy on your neighbor and see if they're having an abortion."

As a fact checking website states:

“​​On May 19, Abbott signed a law stating that ‘a physician may not knowingly perform or induce an abortion on a pregnant woman unless the physician has determined … whether the woman's unborn child has a detectable fetal heartbeat.’ The law creates an exception if the physician determines a medical emergency makes an abortion necessary. Critics have noted that fetal heartbeats can be detected as early as six weeks into a pregnancy, limiting the window in which a woman can legally seek an abortion in Texas.”

“The law allows citizens, rather than the state, to sue anyone who performs or assists in procuring an abortion. Those found to have done so will, thus, be civilly instead of criminally liable, and will be made to pay “statutory damages in an amount of not less than $10,000 for each abortion.” Notably, SB8 does not allow for suits to be brought against women who recieve abortions after a heartbeat is detected.”

Reading the Facebook comments there are loads of people who praise this AToday article even though it begins with clearly false information. My point is not for or against the Texas law but simply pointing out the lack of factual information in the Adventist Today article. Most of the article is typical of political progressive arguments for abortions. So the article is trying to be a persuasive argument for the leftwing views on the subject. This points out again that the major focus of Adventist Today is the spreading of political progressive, democrat philosophies.

 

 

 

 

Politics seems to color everything Adventist Today publishes

 

By Ron Corson

Once again we see Adventist Today wallowing in their political leftists views.  They really should change the name of the site to Leftist Thoughts for Adventists. The latest article from Jack Hoehn entitled ComeAndReason.com Seems Unreasonable on COVID  The article’s third paragraph reads:

Anti-vaccination Views

That is why his political views now infusing health issues are so distressing. In the past he has come out in support of the twice-impeached past American president’s policies both on his Christian website and in an article published on the Spectrum website February 3, 2020.

That is interesting how the political left has forgotten that it was the Trump Administration that fast tracked the vaccine creation and production.  But now Trump is just that twice-impeached President, even though he was never convicted of any offense by the Senate which is needed to really complete an impeachment of a president. But now to the left Trump is synonymous with Anti-vaccination views. Interestingly Donald Trump had the COVID-19 virus and who was also vaccinated. Facts that in the world of insinuation have no place it appears.

The next paragraph is equally as silly:

Now Jennings focuses on masks, vaccines, and what he considers the threat of “mandates.” He calls the most-studied vaccines in the long history of vaccination “experimental injections,” as if this were some sort of isolated lab study instead of a crisis response to a death-dealing pandemic.

Let’s begin with the clearly false statement that the COVID-19 vaccines are the most studied vaccines in history.  It has not even been out for 2 years, we have no studies on the long-term effect or even the 5-year effect of the vaccines. It is impossible to believe anyone thinks it is the most studied vaccine in history but you see that is what Dr. Hoehn who was actually at one time a doctor thinks!

Why Hoehn is not equally concerned with mandates is peculiar since even President Biden and his Spokesperson have said that they would never do mandates. Kind of something that anyone with any regard for our Republic should be concerned with.  Of course, there is a fear side to a lot of leftists who feel that individual rights have no place when the world is in a pandemic condition even though the case fatality rates is pretty much less than 1% for those below 60 and does not rise to above 4% until the age of 70. So yes it is a death-dealing disease just like every other disease in the world. See the chart at https://ourworldindata.org/mortality-risk-covid#interpreting-the-case-fatality-rate

I will not bother to argue support or data against Dr. Hoehn’s position or Dr. Jennings position as that much more complex a subject and really there is nothing to Dr. Hoehn’s position he simply implies that Dr. Jennings is wrong by appealing to organizations. That, by the way, is not really how science works and that appears to be one of the key points to Dr. Jennings argument, pretending that science is a consensus business instead of a questioning endeavor.

Toward the end Hoehn states:

Only the last three on the list are not dangerous with possible serious side effects, and all have proven to be largely ineffective in preventing death or long-term disability from COVID-19. All have had their proponents, Petri dish or theoretical suggestions, and all have been tested in real life. There are now very few politically unmotivated supporters of any of those drugs. Dr. Jennings denies political motivation, but when you are agreeing mostly with QAnon conspiracists and irrational pillow salesmen, one gets a bit anxious.

Here we see again that Hoehn feels this is all political and indeed it is to him. I am sure that Jennings article mentions nothing about QAnon or Michael J. Lindell is the inventor and CEO of My Pillow, Inc. famously a supporter of Donald Trump. He is also a well-known Christian whose testimony from drug addict to successful businessman seems to make him one of the enemies of the political left. We can look at Dr. Jennings article here, something that Hoehn did not link to in his article or really even quote Dr. Jennings. Funny how that works isn’t it, a electronic publication that can’t even link to the article it is criticizing. That is a good indication that you are not dealing with an honest journalistic endeavor.

That is the saddest point in all this. I don’t really care that people have different views on the vaccine or masks. I care a lot more that the Adventist Church is becoming the playground of political progressives who have no interest in even dealing with other views and actively removes those who disagree with them from their pages.  I care most about people who are ignoring government over-reach by the state and Federal government claiming an emergency. No doubt the next emergency will be climate change which will likely be far more over-reaching than this pandemic but if there is no push back against government mandates now it will be far harder in the future.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Christians must not disagree or world will reject Christians

 

I am often amazed at the things I read on Adventist Today. I don’t mean amazed in a good way but amazed at the poorly reasoned statements that are included in the articles. I am equally amazed that on Adventist Today’s Facebook comment page none of those good SDA’s even notice the absurd statements.  I suppose since they have purged most people who ever criticize or offer counter opinions to their articles they are left with not the brightest population to offer their comments but occasionally someone gets in there with a good comment.

 

In the article, Ecumenism Is Not a Bad Word Clarence Pamphile writes in his article of 27 June 2021 this statement:

“Christian unity is inevitable. It is of Christ’s and of God’s imposing, and that, for a reason: the world will not believe while Christians are criticizing, accusing, or denouncing one another.”

Really Christian perfection is inevitable, the world will not believe while Christians don’t get along with each other perfectly. The world which at one time was changed by Christians even when they denounced other Christians and their beliefs or actions can do that no longer. The Adventist church can’t get along within itself. Maybe the SDA church should avoid dealing with other denominations until we are all in agreement. It is an absurd statement.  Now Christian unity may one day be inevitable likely after the second coming and then it will be God’s imposing but this idea that we must all get along now with no disagreement before the world can recognize God is placing too much responsibility on humans. I guess it would give the world a really good excuse to reject Christians and Christianity however. So if the goal is to promote Atheism then the statement might have a bit of power. But as a method to spread Christianity, it is worthless.

 

Olive Hemmings distortion of the beloved disciple

 

Adventist Today writer Olive Hemmings  Presents a rather peculiar view of the “beloved disciple” here is what she says in the excerpt of her article and presentation

 

Tradition

The idea that John the son of Zebedee is the beloved disciple is based on tradition. The internal Biblical evidence points elsewhere to the “beloved disciple”. The entire investigation about this disciple requires a hermeneutic of suspicion.

This is what we have to show that John is the “beloved disciple”.

In John 21: 20, ff., Peter turns and sees the disciple whom Jesus loves following them. The text says that it is this disciple who reclined next to Jesus and enquired about who would betray him. Peter sees him and continues to interrogate Jesus concerning this disciple. Then the author of the Fourth Gospel says: “This is the disciple who is testifying to these things and has written them, and we know that his testimony is true.” The assumption is that John wrote the Fourth Gospel, therefore John is the beloved disciple.

But in fact we do not know who wrote the Fourth Gospel. Even the commentary saying: “This is the disciple who is testifying to these things…” appears as a comment by the actual author about the ‘beloved disciple”. This suggests that the beloved disciple, an eye witness, was the source of the author’s work.

Dr.Olive Hemmings presentation at the zoom Sabbath School took the position That the beloved disciple was Mary Magdalene. Due to the use of some extra-Biblical works namely Gospel of Thomas, and the Gospel of Mary Magdalene. In order to use those books for her theory (the same theory that you can read about in Dan Brown’s the Da Vinci Code) Ms. Hemmings assumes that we can discount the tradition of the author of the book of John as actually being John. Which in fact may be the case and yet it would not negate the meaning that John was the beloved disciple in any way. So there is very little reason to entertain the idea of Mary Magdalene being the meaning of the beloved disciple in the book of John

 Contrary to Dr. Hemmings statement above, in fact, this is not the only thing we know to give us an idea of who the beloved disciple was. There are 6 references in the book of John:

1.     John 13:23: “One of them, the disciple whom Jesus loved, was reclining next to him.”

2.     John 19:26: “When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, ‘Woman, here is your son.’”

3.     John 20:2: “So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, ‘They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!’”

4.     John 21:7: “Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, ‘It is the Lord!’”

5.     John 20:20: “Peter turned and saw that the disciple whom Jesus loved was following them.”

In addition to this, John 21:24 describes the Beloved Disciple as the “disciple who testifies to these things and who wrote them down.” 

https://zondervanacademic.com/blog/who-wrote-the-gospel-of-john

By the internal evidence of the book of John we can rule out the beloved disciple as being Mary Magdalene Using John 20: 1-4:

20 Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. 2 So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!” 3 So Peter and the other disciple started for the tomb. 4 Both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first.

Thus Mary Magdalene could not be the person referred to in the book of John as the beloved because she in fact speaks to that person. Then after Mary Magdalene having run from the tomb, if she was the beloved she would have had to run back to the tomb beating Peter.

Let’s look at Dr. Olive Hemmings Biography

“Olive Hemmings has been teaching in Seventh-day Adventist higher education since 1982. She began teaching at her Alma Mater West Indies College (now Northern Caribbean University) in 1982, one year before graduating, and continued teaching there until 1998, when she moved to California to further her studies. She earned the M.A. in New Testament and Biblical languages from the SDA Theological Seminary at Andrews University in 1989, and the Ph. D. in Theology, Ethics, and Culture from Claremont Graduate University in 2004. She taught at Northern Caribbean University for 15 years, and has been teaching at Washington Adventist University for the past eleven years in the areas of New Testament Bible and Greek, World Religions, Social, Biblical, and Theological Ethics, and Dogmatic Theology both in graduate and undergraduate programs.”

It might be interesting to know how Dr. Hemmings arrived at this decision to support the idea that Mary Magdalene was the beloved disciple.  Perhaps if a person watches the Adventist Today YouTube presentation when it posts they can see. Check for it in the future.

 On a related note, when people view the presentation they will see that Dr. Hemmings trys to discount the notion that the gospel of Thomas is a gnostic work. But as you can see in my opening quote of Dr. Hemmings she says: 

"The entire investigation about this disciple requires a hermeneutic of suspicion."

Here is the definition of hermeneutic of suspicion which to me sounds like gnostic reasoning. 

"The hermeneutics of suspicion is a style of literary interpretation in which texts are read with skepticism in order to expose their purported repressed or hidden meanings.^[1]

This mode of interpretation, invented by Paul Ricoeur, who was inspired by his interpretation of the works of what he called the three "masters of suspicion"^[2]—Karl Marx, Sigmund Freud, and Friedrich Nietzsche— Ricoeur's term "school of suspicion" (French: école du soupçon) refers to his association of his theory with the writings of the three, who themselves never used this term.^[3] This school is defined by a belief that the straight-forward appearances of texts are deceptive and that explicit content hide deeper meanings or implications.^[1][4] 

 In reference to the last post I made this may reflect what is going on with Dr. Hemmings. 

The Gospel of Thomas has become popular in recent decades in relation to a populist Christian movement known as Liberation Theology, which also teaches self-reflection of each person as the Christ within you. Gustavo Gutierrez coined the term in his 1971 CE book, A Theology of Liberation. He criticized the Catholic Church in Latin America for corrupting the original teachings of Jesus.  Jesus. https://brewminate.com/secret-knowledge-a-history-of-christian-gnosticism-in-the-ancient-world/

 

Alex Bryan pseudo-intellectual nonsense

 Alex Bryan Posted on Facebook:

I have come to the position that Christians must let Jesus go.

Why? The only possible solution to our insurmountable global, political problems must include two elements. First, the solution must truly include every individual human being: if any one person or group is left out there cannot be success. Second, the solution must pull every one together. Individualistic libertarianism for all won’t get it done – “live and let live” is a philosophy that eventually kills community.

The solution, therefore, must “hold ALL things TOGETHER.”

Paul’s Colossians 1:15-20 proffer to us: Jesus does this.

Religious sectarianism fails this test. Secular humanism fails this test. Globalism, nationalism, conservatism, liberalism– they all prove inadequate.

Only Jesus will do. But for “Jesus” to work Christians must let him go. We cannot claim him as ours and not yours. We cannot proclaim him as the private possession of Christendom. We cannot use him for our own tribalistic dreams.

He’s always asked for this – “I have to leave now for I have other towns” … “Remember, I have other sheepfolds” … “Mary, you can’t hold on to me” … “God in a Single Human Body must leave so the Spirit of God can blow all over the earth.”

The monotheistic message of Jesus – there is only One God, and all are God’s children, together. This message transcends all religion, all culture, all party, all tribe, all nations.

Transcendence.

And so we have to let Jesus go, and at the very same time, remain.

https://www.facebook.com/alex.bryan.393/posts/10158998077086072?

Oh, how I hate this kind of pseudo-intellectual nonsense!  First, how does he define letting Jesus go?  He does not yet that is his opening and closing line! Second, he says Christians cannot claim Jesus as ours or yours. Yet very clearly that is the Biblical and Christian tradition. "John 20:17 Jesus said, “Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet returned to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am returning to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’ ” My Father AND your Father – my God and your God." This pastor even uses the first part of that text in his message. You can't ignore the whole Bible to follow foolish pastors! 

"Deuteronomy 6:5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might."  Third You must be able to deal with reality. Saying that some religion, say, Islam does not hold Jesus as their God is not telling them Jesus is "not yours". All in all this message is totally unchristian. Not to mention it does not seem to understand transcendence at all if he thinks that it is something that comes from God that we can stop! The whole thing is based upon his false premise: " We cannot proclaim him as the private possession of Christendom. We cannot use him for our own tribalistic dreams." Well I guess that is true for the very few who do it, I can't think of any but I suppose there are some that don't understand Christianity enough to think that. If that pastor knows those types of people he needs to help them. Though after this I would question his ability to do that. By the way when he says: "if any one person or group is left out there cannot be success." That is liberation theology. It is also not Christian.

Update:
About 2 hours after I posted my response on Alex Bryan's Facebook it was deleted. This is typical of the unthinking left, They are unable to logically deal with their own postitions. So they ignore and remove anything that is critical and bask in the approval of their unthinking minions.  But he did write this in one of his comments. It gives you a good idea that he does not really even know what a conservative is: "5. Conservative "God, Guns, and Gays" fundamentalism fails Jesus. And so does utopian-dream, John Lennon "imagine" liberalism." 

It Does make a person wonder if he has any knowledge about conservatives at all.