A Virus Added To The Doctrine of Christ

As the virus of woke ideology continues to spread and become more pervasive, I have seen some troubling trends become more and more common among members of the church who have become infected by and infatuated with this new Religion of Academia. One of these trends that appears incredibly seductive is the misinterpretation of the Doctrine of Christ. This misinterpretation can arise due to personal biases, innocent misunderstandings, or malicious and purposeful deception.

Two main methods govern this trend. First, their focus is almost solely on the Christlike attributes of love, compassion, acceptance, nurturing, etc, while ignoring Christ’s other traits of truth, justice, and obedience to God’s laws. This focus on elevating the traditionally more feminine qualities is part of a larger shift in our society that’s trying to stigmatize masculinity and destroy the harmonious balance that’s only possible when gender characteristics are evenly yoked. It is what we might call “Teddy Bear Jesus.”

I go into more detail on this in my conversation with Del Tackett from my podcast series about the 7 Threats in Our Times, titled “Malevolent Compassion”. In it Del makes a keen insight that whenever the traditional traits of the genders have become untethered from each other, problems occur; unchecked justice and obedience turn to tyranny, while unbridled compassion and acceptance result in debilitating coddling.

One poisonous result of this virus that needs to be mentioned is the corruption of Jesus as Savior over the "oppressors" in place of Jesus as the Savior of our souls and the conquerer of sin and death. This is Liberation Theology. And it's coming. I have more on this coming soon.

Secondly, they will often take the words of The Brethren out of context in an attempt to show that not only do the prophets and apostles personally agree with the ideologies of social justice and anti-racism, but that this is the direction that they are moving the Church as directed by God.

One of the most egregious examples is the claim that when President Oaks spoke out against racism and said, “Of course, black lives matter,” in a BYU devotional, he was endorsing the BLM movement on behalf of the Church. While he did advocate for rooting out racism and speaking out against hate (all of which we should all agree with), in listening to his talk, he makes it obvious that he was actually doing the exact opposite.

Only two sentences after that quote, he said, “Unfortunately, that persuasive banner was sometimes used or understood to stand for other things that do not command universal support.” Earlier in this same talk, he also spoke out against the movement towards demonizing people from the past (i.e., tearing down statues, changing historical names of buildings, etc.) when he said, “Let us not open a quarrel between the past and present lest we jeopardize out attempts to improve our future.”

This directly contradicts a core principle of social justice and critical theory, namely penalizing or punishing people in the present for injustices from the past.

The following statement, I believe, most clearly articulates his opposition to the pernicious ideologies of the Religion of Academia. “Cries for help should be heard, and in this setting, there are three obvious helps: inspiration, education, and clear thinking. That combination will surely be preferred over symbolic actions that accomplish nothing but a bow to the cause of political correctness.”

President Oaks’ talk is just one of many examples of people trying to twist the words of The Brethren to fit their political agendas. It is crucial now more than ever that we remember President Nelson’s hierarchy of identity:

We are first children of God, second children of the covenant, and third we are disciples of Jesus Christ. We need to ensure that NOTHING supersedes these three pillars of identity, which goes for people of all political affiliations, ethnicities, gender identity, and sexual orientation. Thanks for reading.

Best,

Greg Matsen