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Edited on Tue Sep-02-08 11:30 AM by igil
That confuses theoretical position with pragmatic position, a set of unranked values versus the same set with a ranking imposed, values taken in isolation versus values as part of a value system. They're usually distinct, but the distinction is usually not explicit and not obvious--sometimes even to insiders, and often to outsiders.
It becomes clear when an imperfect situation comes along, then you find out the ranking, the structure of the system.
I was on a student board. We had a difficult situation, and fought. Somebody pointed out what I just pointed out. After hours of wrangling and name calling, that is. So we scheduled a mini-retreat, and assigned homework: list the values you have for the organization, and order them in importance. We then got together and talked about values in the abstract, and pretty much everybody had the same values--or were embarrassed to have left them out. Then we compared rankings, and found the problem. Acknowledging the same values bridged most of the animosity; we could then discuss the rankings--not without a bit of acrimony, but the problem was mostly resolvable once we stopped thinking of each other as moral midgets.
Same for the church I was in. We had out-of-wedlock births, even though "no premarital sex" was a point forcefully shouted from the pulpit. But so was family cohesion, loyalty, acceptance of individual faults, restoring sinners to the congregation after they lapse, etc., etc. When there was an out-of-wedlock birth, the church's position was clear: If somebody repents and try to do what's right, they *shall* be forgiven and helped; if somebody sins and tries to justify it, or does so in a blatant and flagrant manner, they're history ... unless they later repent and tries to do what's right, then they *shall* be forgiven, and helped. Some people had a different ranking: "no fornication" was vastly more important than "forgive the sinner", and this resulted in problems.
The minister wasn't stupid. Sermons started talking about rankings. Yes, X is important; it's sin. But do you want to say that fornication is worse than not showing forgiveness?
Outsiders only heard the fire-and-brimstone, doctrine-devoid-of-context parts, and made assumptions that were wrong because they missed the structure of the doctrinal system. (For that matter, a few members missed it, too.) Often, rather than questioning the conclusions they reached based on imperfect knowledge and bad assumptions, they wound up trying to keep the faulty conclusions by adding yet other bad assumptions--the church was changing some doctrine, it was inconsistent, it was hypocritical. On occasion it was. More often than not it wasn't.
Are these particular evangelical/conservative Xians being hypocritical or inconsistent, or merely making unignorably obvious a part of their values system? Dunno. I'm not in their particular groups, and remain a bit humble in front of my own ignorance, given my personal experience.
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