The LCS Factor

[Hope]

Originally Posted by Matt

Hope,

Yes, it does say quite a lot. You are correct, but it's not about bucketing everyone the same. I hadn't been posting on this forum at all until what happened on this thread.

a) You reacted to dj and a few others (mostly dj).
b) I reacted to your reaction.

Thus the cycle that brings us here began. During times of difficult communication, I try to spend a few minutes each day to think back through what everyone is actually saying. I want to make sure that I am hearing while I am talking. I know it appears that I am hearing nothing in this case. That's an appearance. I didn't suddenly fall off my rocker.

I will be brief this morning. I have a lot to do today, but I do have a bit more to say in response to your post later one. You brought up the point about false premise. Here is the definition of a "false premise".

Definition of a False Premise:
A false premise is an incorrect proposition that forms the basis of a logical syllogism. A syllogism is a kind of logical argument in which one proposition (the conclusion) is inferred from two others (the premises) of a certain form.

I want to make sure I understand your usage of "false premise" here. It may be important. I cannot clearly deduce your meaning from the text of your message.

Can you elaborate on the details of the "false premise" in this case? (Note: I am not trying to point out logical argumentation error. I am trying to understand the substance behind your use of "false premise".)

Note to others: This may seem like a technical detail that is irrelevant to most, but Hope is a really smart guy and he doesn't use a phrase like this without having a specific meaning. I want to make sure I hear the meaning before I say more.

Thanks,

Matt

The phrase in bold is from me not Matt. Thanks again Matt for the complement. Boy, do you ever put me under pressure. Now all the posters will be looking at my posts is a much more critical light. Thanks for nothing friend. Does Matt ever have the advantage now!

Your definition is fine by me. Let me go over some of my thinking.

Quote from Matt
My initial reaction to this thread and my decision to post here was based on a key fact. Hope was trying to exclude his locality from the rest of the Texas bunch. I stood up in opposition to this attempt. The reason I did is not because Dallas was the best or worst, but because it was part of a whole set of churches that were under the strong sway of an idolatrous system that was engineered and whose engineering started all the way back in the mid-60's.


Quote from dj

Hope I think the fact there is an enemy seeking whom he may devour is a given for most Christians. But this cannot be the catch-all excuse for a lack of responsible parenting. It appears the issue with the LCS is not: we did everything we could to raise our kids in a healthy well adjusted manner etc but at the end of the day many just went off the deep end. But rather: our children were raised in an environment that was basically anti-family so it's a miracle that any of them survived and became healthy adults.__________________

I believe if you go back to my original post #13 I wrote very generically about the issue of children of Christian parents who get into trouble. I believed I clearly expressed that this is a genuine concern and is very important to me. Then dj in the post quoted above made his case and position much clearer. (Bold words are from me not dj.) I responded to this charge based on what I personally knew. There were many wonderful parents and families that I knew well. In Dallas, not Houston or Austin or OK City, I was intimately acquainted with parents and many of the children. I held them in high esteem and realized it is not easy raising children in the current environment.

Your conclusion of the idolatrous system going back to the mid-60's applying across the board and thus all church members got the same result is the premise that needs to be re-examined. You must consider many factors in why children developed the way they did. There are cases in the same family where the outcomes are widely different.

Finally for your argument of parental neglect, little church autocrats hurting children and bad teachings or lack of healthy teachings to be true, you do not have to subject each and every individual to the same analysis and conclussion. If some current or former lc believer reads that all are the same, they most likely will focus on what was not the same and reject the fundamental facts of your argument.

Just a little brother trying to get along the best he can.

Hope, Don Rutledge