Aloha, my friends!
The majority of my Social Media experience over the last few days has been centered on the recent policy change in the Church. I, like you, have been troubled by the new policy, but I’ve been far more troubled by the reactions of fellow social media users, in and out of the Church, and in and out of the LGBT community. Mostly out.
I’m not here to discuss the new policy. I’m here to discuss a phenomenon of today’s society: taking seriously and personally everything on the Internet.
Since the policy change, 90% of what I saw on Facebook pertained to it. Some friends had changed their profile pictures to be rainbow-filtered to show their support for their LGBT friends and family (I’m assuming), some friends announced they were leaving the Church, some friends posted Elder Christofferson’s video explanation, some friends expressed outrage at the “shameful” move, and all friends were highly opinionated.
It would have taken hours to read all the articles posted by my friends, almost all certainly biased one way or another, so I stuck with the official Church announcement and a few others. But the really amazing thing to me was just how much stuff was out there. Everyone wanted to add a voice to the conversation, and the conglomeration of voices jumbled together created a confusing situation.
A verse in the New Testament stuck out to me in Sunday School today, and I feel it relates directly to the issue at hand. It is found in 2 Timothy 3:7, and it reads, speaking of people in the last days, “Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.”
Isn’t that just a perfect description of our society today? We “learn” all about some stressful issue by reading opinion articles and Facebook posts. Is that knowledge? I don’t believe so. Truth with a capital T comes by the Spirit, who has to be invited. I think it’s time we stopped seeking knowledge in “divers places” and looked to the Source of Truth, who is represented by our Prophet and found in the Holy Scriptures.
That scripture is excellent! #samepage