Ken wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 2:49 pm
When we aren't having LGBT drama the boy cousins love to play hooky from family events to search out their favorite gun shops in the area to look for some special discovery and then stand around in the parking lot with their trunks open, speaking in hushed tones and admiring their latest haul. By contrast, I like to bring my bike along to explore the local back roads that that makes me the weird one.
When I was a teenager, I would ride a 10-speed bike all over the countryside. When an Amish man invited me to go haying with his kids at his farm, I rode my bicycle, and they were all wide-eyed and interested in the bike. Then other boys in the same community knew who I was, and they also became interested in my bike.
Ken wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 2:49 pm
When we aren't having LGBT drama the boy cousins love to play hooky from family events to search out their favorite gun shops in the area to look for some special discovery and then stand around in the parking lot with their trunks open, speaking in hushed tones and admiring their latest haul. By contrast, I like to bring my bike along to explore the local back roads that that makes me the weird one.
When I was a teenager, I would ride a 10-speed bike all over the countryside. When an Amish man invited me to go haying with his kids at his farm, I rode my bicycle, and they were all wide-eyed and interested in the bike. Then other boys in the same community knew who I was, and they also became interested in my bike.
Which ... the parents clearly did not like.
Heh yes. I saw lots of Amish scooter bikes last time I was in Belleville. But not regular ones.
In my case my cousins know what bikes are. They just prefer to drive $50,000 4x4 Suburbans and Yukons and Expeditions or whatever is the current popular big SUV from an American manufacturer. In basic black of course.
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
Those Amish men didn't want their kids to lust after worldly things like my bike. Weren't they doing the right thing according to their understanding? Shouldn't they tell their kids not to be like me?
Ken wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 12:27 pmI don't know about the whole conservative church world. But in my own particular extended family it has been the conservative wing that has been absolutely obsessed with LGBT issues and keeps making them front and center to the exclusion of all else. Perhaps my opinions are colored by that.
Yes, I think it is where your relatives happen to be in the conservative world. They don't represent the majority of conservative Anabaptists. We still get complaints from Plain subscribers to our news if we even report on "sexual addictions" and "homosexuals".
Many conservative Evangelicals and those they influence (moderate Mennonites) talk a lot about LGBT, because that is the newest thing to wrestle with. Before LGBT they talked about women pastors. Before that it was divorce and remarriage. Before that it was alchohol. Before that it was head-covering for women. etc.
Churches that have not budged on any of these issues are still dealing with the same kinds of issues they always have. "wordliness", "lack of submission to the body", "proper Lord's day observance", "size of head-coverings", "wholesome recreation", etc.
Bootstrap wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 3:41 pm
So back to the topic of this thread.
Those Amish men didn't want their kids to lust after worldly things like my bike. Weren't they doing the right thing according to their understanding? Shouldn't they tell their kids not to be like me?
If they want their kids to grow up to be good Amish then yes.
If they want their kids to grow up to be good Christians then I expect opinions vary. Perhaps you can make an argument that bikes are the root of all evil. But that isn't the direction I would go
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
Ken wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 3:58 pm
If they want their kids to grow up to be good Amish then yes.
If they want their kids to grow up to be good Christians then I expect opinions vary. Perhaps you can make an argument that bikes are the root of all evil. But that isn't the direction I would go
Well, here's the direction I would argue for.
This is a Mennonite forum, with plenty of conservative Anabaptists. This is a thread where we can learn from them. I would like to be able to keep asking them questions and interact with them, not tearing them down, but learning from them. I don't know how to do that unless you move your pet peeves into another thread.
Could we have a thread where we can discuss things from their perspective and ask them questions to learn without judging them? Please?
Ken wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 3:58 pm
If they want their kids to grow up to be good Amish then yes.
If they want their kids to grow up to be good Christians then I expect opinions vary. Perhaps you can make an argument that bikes are the root of all evil. But that isn't the direction I would go
Well, here's the direction I would argue for.
This is a Mennonite forum, with plenty of conservative Anabaptists. This is a thread where we can learn from them. I would like to be able to keep asking them questions and interact with them, not tearing them down, but learning from them. I don't know how to do that unless you move your pet peeves into another thread.
Could we have a thread where we can discuss things from their perspective and ask them questions to learn without judging them? Please?
Imo the policing of a thread should be left up to the thread's originator but feel free to express your preferences as I am doing here with my opinion.
Ken wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 3:58 pm
If they want their kids to grow up to be good Amish then yes.
If they want their kids to grow up to be good Christians then I expect opinions vary. Perhaps you can make an argument that bikes are the root of all evil. But that isn't the direction I would go
Well, here's the direction I would argue for.
This is a Mennonite forum, with plenty of conservative Anabaptists. This is a thread where we can learn from them. I would like to be able to keep asking them questions and interact with them, not tearing them down, but learning from them. I don't know how to do that unless you move your pet peeves into another thread.
Could we have a thread where we can discuss things from their perspective and ask them questions to learn without judging them? Please?
I apologize for the snark. But I think my answer is accurate.
If you want your kids to become Amish then yes, you have to enforce those things that are Amish. Otherwise you are not Amish.
If you simply want them to become good Christians then I expect opinions vary. However the vast majority of Christians and even CAs are not going to see bikes as an obstacle to leading a Christian life.
I don't think it is any more complicated than that. Unless you want to get into an endless discussion of which specific branch of Anabaptism is most Christian. Personally I think there are many paths to the promised land. And the type of person you are is more important than what the sign on your church says.
Perhaps what I am saying is that I expect there are some types of church discipline that are important for being a Christian. And there are other types of church discipline that are more important for being part of a specific group or culture. And it might not always be obvious which is which.
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
Ken wrote: ↑Tue Jan 10, 2023 4:54 pm
Perhaps what I am saying is that I expect there are some types of church discipline that are important for being a Christian. And there are other types of church discipline that are more important for being part of a specific group or culture. And it might not always be obvious which is which.
Sure. So we should focus on the things that we each think are most important, as we understand in our own setting.
As I understand it, this thread is about how we do that. I think that's important. Even if there are differences in what one group or another considers important to cultivate.
What is a “good Christian” is something that Christians don’t have a consensus on.
Amongst (conservative) Anabaptists, the consensus is that a good Christian is a nonresistant Christian. Everything else ends up being in service to that. So, for example, eschewing technology that makes us worldly is often done in order to try to avoid the slide into getting involved in local politics, enlisting in the armed forces, and so forth.
