Farewell, MCUSA

[Chris]

Perhaps I'm just wandering in mind here, but once a church purposely & knowingly defies the Bible, they really aren't a church anymore.

Just because they say "Mennonite" doesn't mean they are, or "Christian" for that matter.

Jesus said "If you love me keep my commandments". They do not by lifting up homosexuality.


See we can debate all day here "what should a head covering look like". That is fine. We are all trying. We don't have all the answers and bounce off each other a lot. Even when I condemn on other threads about the churches "Not following Matthew 28", there is absolutely NO Menno church I know of that would say "I disagree with Matthew 28".... They'd all agree with Matthew 28 and probably admit "we need to do better".

Homosexuality is clearly condemned in the scriptures. These in MCUSA are basically saying -> "tear that part out". That is not Christian at all. No gray areas. Just simply endorsing sin. They do not love Jesus, because they will not follow the Bible.

[temporal1]

Page 12

I think the Bible is a guide.

Without the blessing of the Holy Spirit, this may be the best that can be concluded with human reasoning.
Pray for the gift of the Holy Spirit to open eyes and hearts.

Page 18

I would suggest it is also largely a generational change.

a generation that has been deliberately educated against Truth, by every means possible. by tempting, often ignorant, seductors.
No one can teach what they do not know. It can be a matter of “can’t see the forest for the trees.”

unfortunately, a hurting confused generation where carnal sins, depravity of all sorts are normalized, those hurt cannot understand why there is so much pain! “why am i suffering?!” divorce, fornication, abortion, mental health, suicide, murders, they swim in sewers not knowing why. not even knowing where to turn for Life preservers.

ignorance is bliss. until it’s not. tremendous collateral damage.

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2021 / Why do you home school?
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[Ernie]

I would just look at my own large extended family which contains a lot of MCUSA and CMC families. I would venture to guess that you polled all the adults in my extended family, those under 50 would have a dramatically different view on this issue than those over 50. And those under 30 will have even different views. I expect it is the same in most churches and families.

MCUSA and CMC are transisitional churches. So it would make sense that there is a generation gap. And yes, most churches in the West are transitional, which means that they are cultural conformers. As I said earlier, churches that are counter-culture don't always have generation gap. I remember as a youth that onlookers marveled how that our conference did not have a generation gap. (There were a few slight changes but very little. If anything the conference keeps inching toward a more conservative position on many practical issues.

I'm just suggesting that the shifting opinions within MCUSA are not simply the result of more conservative congregations leaving. There is also a very strong generational shift that frankly exists in all denominations. It is exactly the same with the SBC.

If by denomination, you mean Mennonite or Baptist or Lutheran, than you are probably right. But there is not a strong generational shift in every conference, network, or fellowship of churches.

[Pelerin]

I would just look at my own large extended family which contains a lot of MCUSA and CMC families. I would venture to guess that you polled all the adults in my extended family, those under 50 would have a dramatically different view on this issue than those over 50. And those under 30 will have even different views. I expect it is the same in most churches and families.

MCUSA and CMC are transisitional churches. So it would make sense that there is a generation gap. And yes, most churches in the West are transitional, which means that they are cultural conformers. As I said earlier, churches that are counter-culture don't always have generation gap. I remember as a youth that onlookers marveled how that our conference did not have a generation gap. (There were a few slight changes but very little. If anything the conference keeps inching toward a more conservative position on many practical issues.

Explain more what you mean by “transitional” if you would.

Depending on the church and area, CMC churches often serve Amish and more conservative Mennonites who are transitioning toward mainstream evangelicalism and a lot of CMC churches seem to be transitioning that way in general.

I know MCUSA has (had) a broad range of churches, so maybe I’m over generalizing in what I’m about to say. When I imagine* an MCUSA church, I imagine of a church that has reached a stable state and isn’t transitioning to anywhere. In fact I think I would say that the average MCUSA church is more conservative than the average CMC church in every way except theologically (and even that could be said to be conservative in some sense). That is, they sing from the (purple, gender neutral) hymnbook. There might be instruments during worship, but never a rock band. The church architecture is often more traditional, the institution itself is often fairly old. I don’t know of many people that have transitioned into (or through) MCUSA churches in the same sense as the do Amish into (and through) CMC.

*I say imagine, meaning that I’m not picturing a particular church, but what I picture is based on various MCUSA and CMC churches I’ve interacted with to different degrees. And not all the churches I’ve interacted with are exactly like this, so, again, I’m generalizing.

[temporal1]

One part of an interesting discussion in a former 2016 thread, gcdonner, Neto, Josh:
(Neto refers to his mission days with the Banawa in Brazil)

How can believers claim to be sinless? Sin is just making mistakes.

That was the doctrine of the Holiness Movement of the 19th & early 20th century, but sin is not just "making mistakes".
Sin is literally translated as "missing the mark", which is violating the law of God, not attaining the righteousness of God,
which is far different from making mistakes.

It is interesting that you should say that, because in the modern day Holiness Movement, to maintain their doctrine that is what they say. "We don't commit sin anymore, though we do make mistakes". I heard that, first person, in a Sunday School lesson wile visiting an old time Primitive Methodist church, a number of years ago.

I know that “missing the mark” is not only a good definition for sin, but also the etymological meaning of the Greek word,
as I suppose most people here know.

What I wanted to mention, however, is that it also turned out to be the way to translate ‘sin’ in the language in which we worked.
I didn’t suggest it, either.

They use (used) bow & arrow & blow guns to hunt a variety of fish, animals, and birds, so missing the mark is a common concept in their conversations. I was struggling to find a word for sin, but no one was admitting to any, so they didn’t use a word for it.

But then one man threw his knife at another tribe member’s dog, killing it.
It is a terrible thing to kill a dog in their traditional belief system, because they said that dogs have souls.
It was the talk of the village, and some men said to me that ‘He really missed the mark, killing the dog.’

Well, I knew that he hadn’t missed the DOG, so I asked the speaker to repeat what he had said.
I wrote it down, and didn’t say anything more about it right then, but later I asked several men what it meant.
They all said that it was something you said when you shot at something, and didn’t get it,
and kind of denied (at first) that it had any other meaning.

But just like it is hard for a hunter to admit that he shot & missed, it is also hard to admit that we have missed morally.
(I didn’t look up the etymological origin of the work ‘mistake’, but I don’t think that current usage at least describes sin.)

I remember a pastor telling about being at an interdenominational pastors’ conference, and one of the other pastors said that he hadn’t sinned in a certain number of years.

The others exchanged glances, and a plan was formed.

They expected him to pass under a certain balcony, where they waited with a bucket of water. And he broke his record that day.

[temporal1]

Ernie:
MCUSA and CMC are [transitional] churches. So it would make sense that there is a generation gap.
And yes, most churches in the West are transitional, which means that they are cultural conformers.

As I said earlier, churches that are counter-culture don't always have generation gap.
I remember as a youth that onlookers marveled how that our conference did not have a generation gap. (There were a few slight changes but very little. If anything the conference keeps inching toward a more conservative position on many practical issues.

In the U.S., often extreme youthful rebellion, rejection of families+faith, is so common, it’s thought to be God-given.
Much to my surprise, 1970, when taking a university course in Anthropology, i read about formal studies on this, lo+behold, this type of “maturing phase” is unknown in different cultures, it’s NOT universal.

Years later, married, with 2 children, we experienced one rebellious teen, one navigated the same waters, managing to get similar education results, without drama. In those years, witnessing 2 such different personalities pretty much end up with similar results, i often thought of the saying, “there’s more than 1 way to skin a cat.” One personality was, “never a dull moment,” the other, “steady as she goes.” Two very different approaches, similar results.

Influence of the over riding culture and government.
U.S. culture is ever-increasingly centered on the rebellious child/student model. Now so extreme, formal policies are in place to support+promote lying to parents. Christianity may be tolerated, but in many areas, not even that, UNLESS the said church embraces the outside culture. This requirement for churches to “get with the program” has been openly articulated by obama and hrc,
current Catholic politicians are big problems in the RCC.

So, when the word, “generational” is used to imply “a natural human evolution,” i choke. No.
Only if “natural” means by every human means possible, at taxpayer expense, without regard to budgets. Non-stop.

If Christians had like influence, the majority young population would consist of (quick example: nuns+monks!)

Ernie:
If by denomination, you mean Mennonite or Baptist or Lutheran, [then] you are probably right.
But there is not a strong generational shift in every conference, network, or fellowship of churches.

As above, my guess is, the more exposure to, dependence on, gov schools, Pre-K through college, the more the ”mysterious” shift.

“You are what you eat!”

[temporal1]

[Ernie]

Explain more what you mean by “transitional” if you would.

Over the decades, they begin thinking things or doing things that they didn't used to think or do.

[Ken]

I would just look at my own large extended family which contains a lot of MCUSA and CMC families. I would venture to guess that you polled all the adults in my extended family, those under 50 would have a dramatically different view on this issue than those over 50. And those under 30 will have even different views. I expect it is the same in most churches and families.

MCUSA and CMC are transisitional churches. So it would make sense that there is a generation gap. And yes, most churches in the West are transitional, which means that they are cultural conformers. As I said earlier, churches that are counter-culture don't always have generation gap. I remember as a youth that onlookers marveled how that our conference did not have a generation gap. (There were a few slight changes but very little. If anything the conference keeps inching toward a more conservative position on many practical issues.

Explain more what you mean by “transitional” if you would.

Depending on the church and area, CMC churches often serve Amish and more conservative Mennonites who are transitioning toward mainstream evangelicalism and a lot of CMC churches seem to be transitioning that way in general.

I know MCUSA has (had) a broad range of churches, so maybe I’m over generalizing in what I’m about to say. When I imagine* an MCUSA church, I imagine of a church that has reached a stable state and isn’t transitioning to anywhere. In fact I think I would say that the average MCUSA church is more conservative than the average CMC church in every way except theologically (and even that could be said to be conservative in some sense). That is, they sing from the (purple, gender neutral) hymnbook. There might be instruments during worship, but never a rock band. The church architecture is often more traditional, the institution itself is often fairly old. I don’t know of many people that have transitioned into (or through) MCUSA churches in the same sense as the do Amish into (and through) CMC.

*I say imagine, meaning that I’m not picturing a particular church, but what I picture is based on various MCUSA and CMC churches I’ve interacted with to different degrees. And not all the churches I’ve interacted with are exactly like this, so, again, I’m generalizing.

In my (limited) experience, CMC churches tend to be more rural. Looking at the map of churches on the CMC web site I see none in any cities larger than Lancaster and mostly in small towns. CMC also seems to me to be more conformist (or worldly) in that they have gone further in adopting the religious trends and norms of the surrounding communities in which they exist. The congregants are politically conservative no doubt but that is more of a reflection of their communities than anything theological. It can be hard to tell you are in a Mennonite church and not just an average community Bible church of some sort. Most people from the community who are Lutheran or Baptist or whatever and who walk into a CMC church are probably going to feel right at home and familiar.

MCUSA churches are spread across a much wider geographic and demographic range. You have rural, suburban, and urban churches. The ones I have been associated with tend to have a core group of old Menno families with roots going back to the original waves of Mennonite immigrants to the US in the 18th or 19th Centuries, along with smaller numbers of newer congregants from non-Menno roots who have sought out Mennonites specifically for theological reasons like peacemaking, social justice, third world development work (MCC) etc. And not people transitioning from more conservative flavors of Anabaptism. Unlike CMC which seems to be more generically evangelical, people seeking out MCUSA churches, especially those in more urban areas, tend to be seeking out something more uniquely Mennonite. Just a more liberal version of Mennonite with different points of emphasis than many here are comfortable with. MCUSA churches are less evangelical than CMC, and as a consequence, seem to have less of a tendency to adopt the worship patterns and mores of their surrounding communities. They are more or less just doing their own thing and not really trying to be like other more evangelical denominations. You have to find them, they are unlikely to find you.

[Josh]

Look at how much abuse and sexual dysfunction exists in the Amish and plain Menno community if recent news and documentaries and statistics are to be believed. And these are mostly straight people who have legitimate outlets for their desires.

No, they are not “mostly straight”. The three most notorious to come to light in the past few years - Mast, McGrath, and Herr - all were oriented towards young adolescent boys.