[zeek]

Originally Posted by aron

Authoritarian groups solve this dilemma of uncertainty. Whatever Maximum Brother (or Big Momma if headed by a female) says is the certainty, the True Jesus. The MB is the only one who has the truth. So we must obey MB without question.

This gospel is the power of God unto salvation (1:16). In the book of Romans salvation means a great deal. Salvation not only means to save us from God's condemnation and from hell; it means to save us from our naturalness, our self-likeness, our individualism, and our divisiveness. This salvation saves us to the uttermost, enabling us to be sanctified, conformed, glorified, transformed, built up with others as the one Body, and not divisive in the church life. The gospel of God is the power of God unto such a full, complete, and ultimate salvation. It is the power of God for all who believe. Praise the Lord! We believe. (Life-Study of Romans, Chapter 2, Section 4)

You are spot on with your identification of a problem with authoritarianism. Christianity has a long history of authoritarianism, and the European Enlightenment the eventually spawned the USA with it's Declaration of Independence and Constitution was an outcome of Enlightenment thinking.

First off, don't forget the cultural influence, here. We went into this at some detail in the "Asian mind and the Western mind" thread.

Yes. We were misguided to abandon our cultural heritage of individualism for Witness Lee's concept of "the Body of Christ."

Second, I say let the individual decide where to draw boundaries between self and the collective. The Hive Mind of Lee shamed away all our boundaries. We were "trained" to stand up before the MB and be exposed, stripped bare. This was for the good of the Hive, so we thought. The individual is nothing, the Hive is everything; the Hive Mind trained us to give up self, family, job, thought, for the Hive.

In my expereince, what I gained through that process was less rich and real then what I lost by giving up family ties.

But in truth the individual has to make a choice, and usually chooses the group at some level, anyway. No one likes to be alone, right? People will typically choose a collective association on some level. So don't let the collective impose terms on the individual. Let the individual choose how they want to associate with the group, and where they draw the boundary. A numb bunch of automatons, waiting passively for MB to direct, does not enrich the collective expression. There's no Spirit; only the flat intonation, "Our brother said", and "Our brother wanted".

I don't think it is an either/or kind of thing. By dropping out of church participation, I may on the individualistic extreme. But, look where I am...on LCD in a dialogue with you. If the "Body of Christ" is a reality, perhaps it isn't something we have to make happen by our own efforts to sacrifice our individuality but rather a spiritual reality that we experience spontaneously.