Education – 316.5

I seem to be finding a lot of tangents as I go over my political leanings, but that is not too surprising for me. When I was thinking about the issues of charter schools and home schooling, I started thinking about intelligent design and things like that, and it sort of dovetailed with a recent controversy in Sherwood School District about whether or not Grendel should be allowed in the curriculum, so I am going to write about that.

Starting with Grendel, the curriculum for that particular class includes Beowulf, so having the same story told from two different angles makes a certain amount of sense, though I tend to hate those kinds of books. It has been done with several classic novels, and the re-imaginings tend to ruin the characters and end up more vulgar or more nihilistic or more ugly, if for no other reason than the new one is trying to provide some edge. (Parental permission was required, with alternative choices for students whose parents objected, but some people wanted it completely removed.)

In this case, there is graphic violence in the novel, but the controversy comes more from a passage where the monster confronts the queen, rejects female anatomy as ugly (with violent fantasizing) but ultimately lets her go because killing her would be as meaningless as not killing her, but not killing her would confuse the other humans.

So, will reading this corrupt teenagers? Possibly. There are ugly thoughts in it, but they come from someone alienated, and I doubt anything a monster says in a book will make teenage boys reject female anatomy, and the way it is written would probably not give girls a complex in this case. I didn’t see any thing from former students who had read it and what they thought, but that might be good to find out.

Honestly, I think what makes it more of a bad idea for teenagers is the general angst. “I understand them, but they don’t understand me. All the world is against me and no one else is like me.” (The author was very influenced by Sartre.) I can see a lot of teenagers relating to that, and it would not necessarily be the healthiest thing to validate. I read something recently about different age limits for books where if you don’t read by a certain time, it won’t have much of an impact on you. I don’t remember the ages, but the books were The Catcher in the Rye, A Confederacy of Dunces, and either something specific by Ayn Rand or her work in general. It is definitely true that there are some viewpoints that will sound less valid as you gain in experience and maturity. That being said, is elimination of these viewpoints the answer?

Honestly, I don’t know about the book. I have researched it some, but I haven’t read it. If my child was going to be in that class, I would try and make a point of reading it, but so far it sounds like it would be really annoying, and since I don’t need to read it, I’m not going to. I feel more comfortable saying that intelligent design should not be taught in science class.

I believe in the Creation. I don’t particularly believe in evolution, and there were times when that was kind of uncomfortable in science class. However, there are things that you know by faith, and they are the opposite of science, and therefore science class is not where they belong.

Studying the regular, largely accepted science can teach you a lot about how different features work well, and symbiotic relationships, and just how various processes work. On the other hand, will teaching a skeptic about intelligent design really lead to faith? Especially because they often get pretty stupid.

It’s amazing to me how strictly some people adhere to the six days of creation as six twenty-four hour periods. First of all, we get our twenty-four hour period from the period between one sunrise and another, and the lights in the firmament are not mentioned until the fourth day. Also, there are other verses that say a thousand years is as a day to God, indicating that our measurement and understanding of time is different than His. Finally, like the Bible is never figurative?

And really, how much do we know about the Creation? Could we do it right now? No, and that is fine. We will understand that later, but it is completely beside the point right now, when clearly we have still not adequately learned how to love each other.

That’s not to say that no one can have an explicit revelation of how it happened, but if they did, it would probably be something to keep personal. I sometimes get ideas of how specific things could work, and that is fine, but they could easily sound silly to someone else, and since they are not essential, I’m not going to worry about it too much.

My real concern is that often it seems the fundamentalists are having knee-jerk reactions against things that are bad. I am still pro-thought, so I am against the knee-jerk in general, but my experience has also been that my thoughts strengthen my faith. Yes, I start out believing, and coming from that viewpoint, but as I ponder things I find logic and beauty in them, and that reaffirms my faith in God. He is good. His plan is good. I can trust Him.
If we are afraid that questioning things is evil, are we saying that God can’t stand up to the questions?

One thing that has been interesting to me is that at several meetings where we have had area authorities they have opened the floor to questions. This strikes me as very brave and generous, but unfortunately people ask really stupid questions. The questions I have heard have usually seemed to be more about trying to make the asker look smart or justify their selves or settle a disagreement, instead of actually being a sincere question. However, there was one that was a sincere question that got asked of Elder Brinkerhoff, about organ donation. She had heard that the Church was against it, and I think she said that her father told her that if you donated your organs you would not get them back in the Resurrection.
It’s just mind-boggling to me that even if you did believe that selflessly making one last contribution to others at the end of your life was wrong, that you could actually thwart the Resurrection. It seems to show a lack of faith. I think it shows even less faith to believe that God cannot stand up to being questioned. No, scientific inquiry is not how people learn about Him, and grow in faith, but there is still inquiry even if the answers are coming to the heart.

My point is, this is why I sometimes think that fundamentalists or evangelicals or whatever you want to call them (and certainly including some Mormons) don’t seem to have a very high opinion of God. They shout down differing viewpoints, but shouting makes it impossible to hear the still small voice that would actually resolve the question.

I don’t completely despair though, because I see that people are often instinctively smarter than doctrines. Post-Nicaea, Catholic doctrine described a God without parts and passions, and technically the tenets of the Protestant sects still subscribe to that belief. However, some time ago there was an article that even though most churches will say this, most people will say that the first thing they want to do when they get to Heaven is to give God a hug. Their hearts know that He has a form, and can be hugged, and it is something they long for. I believe this is the light of Christ working within them.

False doctrine does get in the way, and maybe this is why so many people seem to believe their God is a bit of a jerk. I mean, if you really believe that unbaptized infants go straight to Hell, or residents of lands where they have never heard the Gospel and never had the chance to accept it, or if, like my old friend Lise you know Mormons who are good people and are tormented knowing that they will go straight to Hell, well, the God who ordained that would be hard to confide in. But He is so much better than that.

There was a guy in my ward in college that I couldn’t stand, who said that on his mission he would knock on people’s doors, and tell them that if they didn’t listen to him they were going to Hell. I’d like to think it was a joke, but I doubt it. He wasn’t funny. He thought he was clever for saying that, but he wasn’t doing the listeners or the Church any favors. First of all, the tone is combative, so that is leading into contention right there, making it hard for anyone to feel the Spirit. In addition, what he meant by going to Hell would not be the same thing that the other person would understand. Also, that their eternal salvation would rest upon letting this obnoxious, arrogant person into their house is patently untrue—therefore, there is no opportunity for the Spirit to confirm anything to them. It’s just not the way.

I know that everyone can know the truth of the Gospel, and I know that everyone will get a chance. That is wonderful, and amazing, and beautiful. It is also logical if you have any kind of a God worthy of the title, and we do. It is incredibly worthwhile to spread this knowledge. It will not be well spread by fighting, or Bible bashing, or visits to Creation Museums where the displays show human children playing with a Triceratops.

It can grow with sincere expressions of faith, where the person listening feels something in the heart, and then wants to hear more. Thinking about it can be good, and some people will get it wrong, because they will think only as a means of explaining it away, or maybe they will let negative thoughts drown it out, but they won’t listen any better to shouts and condescension. That’s just logical.