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| This is the portrait of dissent in Holy Mother Synod |
Apostates always portray their opponents as the village idiot, the pathetic person--all alone--blabbering to himself, pitied and patronized.
Those who oppose the New NIV will get that treatment. "But you do not know Greek! I took years of Greek in school and I know this is the best translation." Only a village idiot would stand up alone at a meeting and oppose a work blessed by WELS leaders and Dr. Moo.
Those who question the Emergent Church down the block have already heard it. The leaders' response may be feel, felt, found (an old sales method), but the real message is, "You are an idiot, all alone, the goofball who opposes God's will." Here is how feel, felt, found is worded:
"I understand how you feel.
Many have felt the same way.
But truly open-minded Christians have found that this new approach will offer the Gospel to people who never would have come otherwise. It's just an experiment."
Treating someone as the village idiot is designed to shun and punish at the same time. They would like the dissenter to blow up, so they can say to each other, "See, we knew that would happen." No one wants to be the idiot, so this method encourages the shy people to hold their tongues.
When Pastor Lange was leading his congregation out of the ALC, the synodical leaders asked about Lange's health. That is a common gambit. "I hope he is feeling better." I read the letter they sent to one member, which was kept in the St. Paul, German Village archives.
Any topic can be presented that way. Abortion is a women's health issue, a religious right, a matter of privacy. As one little girl said, "What if someone raped me?" She was already being brain-washed by her feminist mom. I read yesterday about "all the good Planned Parenthood has done."
However, there is one advantage to the Village Idiot gambit. When it is being used, the object of the attack can be certain that the opponents are wounded and afraid.
Another sign is the loudness of their howling.
Another one is deathly silence. I posted about the dreadful seminary costs in the ALPB forum. Benke, the LCMS DP who writes all day on the forum, responded, "Are these figures real?" Of course they were. No one wanted to address the absurd cost of attending a Missouri Synod seminary and the doom that means for all seminary students...and the synod. They just moved around the topic.
Did I think, "They ignored my response and the hours of research that someone did?" No, I concluded, "They are scared to death and worried sick about it."
The World War II generation fought for ideas and did not worry so much about conformity. The Boomers are eager to fit in, to have an easy life, to let others pay the price for their narcissism.
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| You can smile, because God does not care about orthodontics. |
