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Category: religion (page 9 of 36)

Utilitarianism

15 September 2011 / / 2 Comments

I’m a bit of an ethical utilitarian; that is, I generally think an action is good if it has good effects. I can see some problems with it. Since we can’t always predict the effects of our actions, utilitarianism works best in retrospect. And defining ‘good’ has its own problems, but I know it when I see it.

But I like to hear the other side. So, for the second time in two days, I went to hear a Christian have a bash at a competing philosophy. I wasn’t expecting to hear how Christianity improves on utilitarianism. They never seem to do that. They just say God is wonderful. But I hoped to get a better idea of other views on ethics.

The speaker mentioned the above problems with utilitarianism, all of which I would have happily conceded. I could have done without the straw men, though. (Did you know that utilitarianism can lead to gulags and gambling, if you define ‘good’ stupidly enough?)

So what was his great idea for ethical behaviour? It’s quite an eye-opener: An action is good if god says it is. I asked him how he could know what god wants, when believers have come to many different conclusions about that. His answer: He reads the Bible and decides. That’s unlikely to lead to any ambiguity.

At the end of the presentation, I was unconvinced that his system of ethics held any advantages. Sure, he was against gambling and gulags, but a utilitarian could be against both of those things. The difference is that they’d be against it because it was bad for people, and he’d be against it because a god said so. I had a Socratic realisation that I knew one thing more than he did: I knew that my ethical system was made by humans. His system of ethics was made by humans, too, but he didn’t know that. He thought that his system of ethics was handed down by the supreme creator of the universe. I suspect that would make him less capable of compromise.

Despite the presentation, I was quite encouraged by the Christians I met. They asked some good (and in some cases, thorny) questions, including a brief touch on Euthyphro’s dilemma. Also, the ones I met were actually in the process of reading Dawkins and Dennett. Are atheists reading Eagleton and Plantinga? Ugh, no thank you. If we tried to reciprocate, the Christians would be getting the better end of that deal. Still, I respect their curiosity and willingness to check out the other side.

‘Other ways of knowing’

14 September 2011 / / 10 Comments

Today on campus, there was a Christian Union talk about atheism, entitled ‘Why I am not an atheist‘. I can’t stay away if atheism is being discussed, and while they’re usually well-read on Dawkins et al. and give a good critique of the Gnu Atheism, they don’t always apply the same critical eye to their own faith. I was hoping the speaker would explain how Christianity improves on atheism, and in this I was (inevitably) disappointed.

A guy named Rory was the presenter. He was a good speaker — enjoyable to listen to, funny at the right times. His main reasons for being a Christian and not an atheist were:

  • He had no compelling reason to doubt his ‘sense’ that a god exists. It seemed to me that if he’d been born elsewhere and -when, he’d have no compelling reason to doubt his sense that Odin or Vashti exists. Beliefs are true to the extent that they are supported by evidence, not hunches.
  • The Christian world-view ‘resonated’ with his experiences. But people who have different world-views also find that their experiences ‘resonate’, whatever that means. Our experiences don’t always mean what we think they mean.
  • He found it satisfying to have someone to thank (after thanking people). I understand that — I feel grateful to the people in my life, and once I’ve thanked them, I like to pour my effort into making things better for them through service.
  • Finally, he found it hard, within an atheistic worldview, to account for things that are wrong in the world. I don’t know why he decided to press that point. Why would he use this as a strike against atheism, when this is actually much harder to explain from a Christian perspective? In question time, I mentioned that it was very easy for atheists to explain evil in the world — people decide to do things that harm people. But it’s very difficult for believers in an all-powerful, good god to explain why bad things happen. There’s a whole branch of theology (called theodicy) dedicated to trying to explain this very thing, yet the Problem of Evil remains. But Rory couldn’t quite get why atheists would see a thing as ‘evil’ outside some kind of ‘god’ frame. Unfortunately, we had to move on before full understanding could be achieved. Rory — if you’re out there, let’s continue this, because I’d like to understand your view.

I did ask one other question, though. His last point in the presentation was that he found it naïve to think that science was the ‘only way of knowing’ something. Now, I’ve heard people say that there are other ways of knowing, and when I ask them what they are, they invariably respond with something that is… not a way of knowing.

In response, Rory mentioned Dawkins’ letter to his daughter, in which he wrote that tradition, authority, and revelation are bad reasons for believing something. But Rory thought that these were okay reasons to believe something, part of this complete scientific breakfast. He also mentioned intuition as something that was important in finding truth.

I explained that intuition was important — say, in coming up with a hypothesis — but intuition is not a way of knowing. If someone has an intuition about something, they do not know that that thing is true. It appeared that he was confusing ‘how you get an idea’ with ‘knowing that the idea is true’, which is a rather serious mistake.

So I want to say this very clearly: The way to know something is by empirical observation. That is the only way. (And even when we’ve observed something, it still might be wrong! Which is why replicable observation is so important.) There are no other ways of knowing. Not tradition — many traditions have turned out to be wrong. Not authority — authorities can be wrong. Not revelation — you don’t know the source of a supposedly supernatural revelation. It could be all in your head. Science — systematic, reproducible, empirical observation — is the only way of knowing.

If you think you have another way of knowing, leave it in comments, and we’ll have a look.

Militant atheists

11 September 2011 / / 3 Comments

Is there anything more tedious or lazy than journalists complaining that atheists are ‘just as bad’ as religionists? Especially when they write as badly as Emma Jane.

FANATICAL Christians and fundamentalist atheists are like a couple of kids bickering in the back seat during a long car drive.

As US presidential candidates make shrill demands for the teaching of creationism in schools, British pit bull atheist Richard Dawkins accuses non-evolutionists of being stupid, insane or wicked.

As US evangelical Rebecca Hagelin says there is no greater evil than gay marriage, a schoolteacher is sued for ridiculing a student’s belief in Jesus.

It raises the question of whether intransigent evangelicals and militant atheists should both be sent to the naughty corner. Not to think about what they’ve done (even though both religious and atheist regimes have clocked up appalling body counts) but to consider how much they have in common.

Ostensibly opposites, hardline proselytisers and zealous pagans are like the political Left and Right in that the further they extend into extremism, the more they begin to resemble each other.

It’s the old false equivalency that journalists are so great at. Don’t like either side? Say they’re just the same.

I’m happy to allow that ‘militant religionists’ are more the exception than the rule, but if you’re comparing worst to worst, there’s nothing on the atheist side that compares to the worst of the religious side. Committed religionists kill people, oppress women, rape children. What do ‘militant atheists’ do? Write mean things on the Internet. It’s not an apt comparison.

Or:

But what if atheists were as bad as the religious? What would that look like?

It would look like this guy:

Except that the atheist guy was kind of funny. And you can bet that after this exchange, the atheist guy just took his bullhorn back to work and stopped bothering people, and the Christian guys went bothering people somewhere else.

Prayer

10 September 2011 / / Comments Off on Prayer

Sandra points me to this episode of Dinosaur Comics.

Click on the image to go to the whole cartoon.

It reminds me of something George Carlin said about prayer:

If you insist on praying, what you need is a Magical Wishing Ferret. You can ask him for anything you want. He works by the power of confirmation bias, so if you don’t get what you want, you’ll never notice.

Monson fondly remembers 9/11

9 September 2011 / / 2 Comments

Religions are in the business of providing emotional comfort (among other things), and after 11/9/1, Americans’ sense of stability was rocked. I think this played out in a predictable way for Mormons.

I visited my US home ward in late 2001, and it was the strangest thing: I’d never heard so many references to Satan before. Naturally, when people feel like events are out of their hands (what’s known as an ‘external locus of control’), they develop superstitions, and here it was unseen malevolent agents. I saw something else on that visit that I’d never seen before: In Priesthood Meeting, they’d developed the habit of reciting their ‘group values’ in unison, chanting a sort of ‘we believe’ mantra. Even as a believer, it struck me that here was a group of people too frightened to think.

From a look at this WaPo column, Mormon president Thomas Monson sure misses that time.

There was, as many have noted, a remarkable surge of faith following the tragedy. People across the United States rediscovered the need for God and turned to Him for solace and understanding. Comfortable times were shattered. We felt the great unsteadiness of life and reached for the great steadiness of our Father in Heaven. And, as ever, we found it. Americans of all faiths came together in a remarkable way.

And the bottom line couldn’t have been better.

Side note: what’s with the capital H on ‘Him’? I haven’t seen that in Church publications since the 1920s.

Sadly, it seems that much of that renewal of faith has waned in the years that have followed. Healing has come with time, but so has indifference.

Isn’t it too bad that we don’t have more horrible tragedies to turn our hearts to god? Darned if Monson doesn’t feel some nostalgia for that time of national agony. What a ghoul.

Whether it is the best of times or the worst, He is with us. He has promised us that this will never change.

But we are less faithful than He is. By nature we are vain, frail, and foolish. We sometimes neglect God.

Then we’re even, because God was more than a little neglectful on that day. He failed to save the lives of 3,000 people, but left instead a steel cross. You know, just to let us know he’s there, thinking about us.

If you object to this, saying that ‘super-hero’ isn’t part of god’s job description, consider: What would you have done if you’d had the knowledge of what was about to happen that day, and the ability to do anything? Well, god had all that, and still failed to do what you — a normal human, with all your goods and bads — would have done. Why do people say that god is good?

Mormons talk interminably about what they call the ‘pride cycle’: People get prosperous and prideful, they forget god, then god (that sicko) burns them up in fires, buries their cities in earthquakes, or sinks them into the sea (and that was gentle Jesus, BTW). Then the people remember to grovel sufficiently before him, and he prospers them. Because it’s all about him.

One could rewrite the narrative thus: Tragedies happen, and the feeling of vulnerability drives people into authoritarian religions. But life goes on, and people stop feeling frightened, at which point they abandon superstition, becoming secular or at least joining liberal churches. Until the next tragedy. Rinse, repeat.

Small wonder, then, that Monson is banging the drum for a more godly society. The vacuum cleaner salesman wants everyone to buy vacuum cleaners, and the god salesman… you get the picture. It’s just business.

Reasonably Good Performances

8 September 2011 / / 1 Comment

The Mormons had Gordon Jump and Mike Farrell doing their films in the 70s and 80s (remember Gordon as the Apostle Peter? probably not), but the Seventh-Day Adventists had a young Russell Crowe plugging their ministry programme at Avondale College in New South Wales.

I have to say, young Russell brings a certain believability to the role, with his grudging yet growing acceptance of ‘the call’.

Does it matter what a candidate believes?

3 September 2011 / / 2 Comments

People are talking about this article by Bill Keller in the NYT about religion in politics.

Asking Candidates Tougher Questions About Faith

If a candidate for president said he believed that space aliens dwell among us, would that affect your willingness to vote for him? Personally, I might not disqualify him out of hand; one out of three Americans believe we have had Visitors and, hey, who knows? But I would certainly want to ask a few questions. Like, where does he get his information? Does he talk to the aliens? Do they have an economic plan?

Hal Boyd of the Deseret News gives a roundup of writers who are shocked — shocked! — at the impertinence of asking candidates about their religious beliefs. After all, isn’t that personal? Well, it could be, if the candidate makes it private. Colbert I. King thinks faith is no big deal, but he makes an exception for candidates who make a big deal out of it. Sounds fair, but it doesn’t go far enough for me.

I’d say that a candidate’s faith is fair game for a much more pragmatic reason. Let me start with evolution. If someone doesn’t accept evolution as true (as all but a few Republican candidates don’t), I won’t vote for them. That’s because this person is going to be making decisions on my behalf, and by rejecting evolution, they’re showing me that they don’t know how to tell if something’s true. They’re not good at making decisions based on evidence. And there’s a high probability that their thinking is compromised by undue influence from the religious sector. Those are all very worrying tendencies in a leader.

And that’s just evolution. I’d say the same goes for Mitt Romney’s underwear, Michele Bachmann’s superstition about a god controlling the weather, Rick Perry’s belief in ritual starving to attract the attention of his god, or anyone else’s beliefs in magical nonsense. Delusion is delusion.

Of course, even if someone is an atheist, they can still be a disappointing leader; check Australian PM Julia Gillard, an atheist who shows a bewildering opposition to gay marriage, and an unaccountable fondness for distributing federal dollars to Christian chaplains in high schools. Nor are religious beliefs the only ones to watch out for. There are also irrational and dangerous secular beliefs involving climate change denialism or free-market fundamentalism. For me, the key is: does this person know how to use science and evidence to find out what’s true? If not, keep them away from the levers of power. Ignorant people should be represented in government, but not by ignorant people.

Would it be a bad thing to live forever?

1 September 2011 / / 11 Comments

‎”Blindly we dream of overcoming death through immortality, when all the time immortality is the most horrific of possible fates.” -Jean Baudrillard

One of the worst things about my deconversion was realising that there probably wasn’t going to be an afterlife. I’d been counting on that all my life, and as a result, I had to do some serious rethinking on my timescale. A universe without me? I’m not an eternal being? My religion had flattered me, made me feel so important, and appealed to my sense of vanity. I hated thinking that I probably wasn’t going to live forever.

I was surprised, then, to find that some people aren’t concerned about it, and don’t particularly want to live forever.

In the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series, one character is immortal, and it’s a curse.

To begin with it was fun; he had a ball, living dangerously, taking risks, cleaning up on high-yield long-term investments, and just generally outliving the hell out of everybody.

In the end, it was the Sunday afternoons he couldn’t cope with, and that terrible listlessness that starts to set in at about 2:55, when you know you’ve taken all the baths you can usefully take that day, that however hard you stare at any given paragraph in the newspaper you will never actually read it, or use the revolutionary new pruning technique it describes, and that as you stare at the clock the hands will move relentlessly on to four o’clock, and you will enter the long dark teatime of the soul.

So things began to pall for him. The merry smiles he used to wear at other people’s funerals began to fade. He began to despise the Universe in general, and everybody in it in particular.
…

“I think I’ll take a nap,” he said, and then added, “What network areas are we going to be passing through in the next few hours?”

The computer beeped.

“Cosmovid, Thinkpix and Home Brain Box,” it said, and beeped. 

“Any movies I haven’t seen thirty thousand times already?” 

“No.” 

“Uh.” 

“There’s Angst in Space. You’ve only seen that thirty-three thousand five hundred and seventeen times.” 

“Wake me for the second reel.”

Immortality might be horrible. Really: how long can you enjoy the vitality of life? How many more times can you listen to Vivaldi’s ‘Four Seasons’? How many times can you watch your favourite movie? Eventually you’ll have found all the things that do it for you. And habituation’s a bitch. What if I became so accustomed to the sunset, or the touch of my sweetheart through repeated exposure that I could no longer enjoy it? I’d be dead then, but still walking around.

Okay, so I can see that eternity would be a long long time, but I don’t envision a check-out date. There’s too much to learn! There’s enough for fifty lifetimes. I’m doing linguistics now. I think in the next lifetime, I’ll do maths and get really good at that. Then what? A lifetime of typography! What kind of computers will people invent? What will English be like in 500 years? And so on. Seventy years seems so short.

Even so, it’s probably a good thing that people die. Max Planck has been paraphrased to say “Science advances one funeral at a time.” And Steve Jobs has his take on it:

 
Transcript for people who don’t like watching videos.

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

It’s true, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.

So what do I do about it? Steve continues.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

Have you made peace with mortality? Or do you rage against the dying of the light? I haven’t decided which approach I like best. I guess at this stage I’m just glad to have escaped the liars who make big, empty promises about forever.

Education in reverse

29 August 2011 / / 2 Comments

Aren’t you glad you’re not a kid going to a private Christian school in Perth, Australia? Because if you were, you’d have assignments like this:

Gay sex ‘sickest of sins’

CHILDREN have been asked whether homosexuality is “the sickest sin” in a school assignment.

The homework given to 14 and 15-year-olds at Armadale Christian College, also also points them to bible quotes describing homosexuality as an “abomination”, and describes “coming out of the closet” as “open sinning”.

Way to go, Christians. Imagine you’re 15, trying to figure out what your sexuality is, and you get handed that as homework. High school students are already cruel enough about ferreting out the gay kids in their midst, without the teachers piling on.

Another question asked what God said about homosexuality and pointed to Bible quotes for the answer, which called it an “abomination”.

The assignment also stated that homosexuality was a “compromise for the need to be loved and accepted”, resulting for many from “low self-esteem (and) gender emptiness”.

Also on the assignment was: “Many people say that homosexuality is an inborn trait. Is a person born greedy, jealous, malicious, gossiper, slanderer, thief, child abuser, serial killer?”

Because being gay is just like all those other things.

I managed to procure a copy of the actual assignment (PDF), and yeah, it’s pretty much the standard anti-gay stuff that gives Christians a hate-on, plus Bible scriptures.

Homosexuality
“Do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived. Neither fornicators, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites…” (1 Corinthians 6:9)

Preliminary Thoughts

1) What is homosexuality?

2) Is homosexuality a new practice? Why do we hear so much about it now?

3) What are some reasons people give to justify homosexual practices?
a)
b)
c)

4) Why are some people tempted with homosexual feelings and others are not?

5) Are feeling and temptations wrong, or do they become wrong when we do something about them (James 1:12–15)?

6) Is there a limit to the power of any temptation (1 Corinthians 10:13)?

7) The subject of homosexuality is confusing because everyone calls it something different.
• Is homosexuality a physical or genetic disease?
• Is homosexuality “the sickest sin there is?“
• Is homosexuality “natural” for some people, being an inborn trait (Romans 1:26–27)?
• Is homosexuality a legitimate “alternative lifestyle” (Genesis 2:24; Hebrews 13:4)?

8) Most people seem to have no idea how homosexuality can be a temptation to anyone. Therefore we are not very helpful to a person who is struggling with the temptation (cf. Galatians 6:1–2; Jude 22–23). Maybe that can change if we understand a few general things about homosexuality.
• God makes every person unique (Psalm 139:13–16; 1 Corinthains 12:12–27). He may be different, but God does not make him “gay” (James 1:13).
• Homosexuality generally has little to do with sex. The sexual involvement with another person of the same sex, is a compromise for the need to be loved and accepted.
• Some inborn factors may contribute to the development of homosexual attractions, but these are not sufficient to make a person homosexual (James 1:14–15; 1 Corinthians 10:13).
• Factors which lead to each person’s struggle with homosexual attraction are different, but certain stages are common to many—low self-esteem, gender emptiness, gender attraction, sexual attraction, homosexual reinforcement, homosexual identity.

What Does The Bible Say?
1) Is homosexuality a new practice (Genesis 19:1–29; Judges 19:1–28; 1 Kings 14:24; 15–12; 22:46; 2 Kings 23:7)” Is there anything new (Ecclesiastes 1:9–10)?
2) What did God say about homosexuality under the Law of Moses (Leviticus 18:22; 20:13)?
3) Many people say homosexuality is an inborn trait. Is a person born greedy, jealous, malicious, gossiper, slanderer, thief, child abuser, serial killer (Mark 7:20–23)? Why would people say that homosexuality is inborn?
4) Is homosexuality a “natural” practice (Romans 1:26–27)?
5) Is homosexuality against God’s law or sanctioned by it (1 Timothy 1:8–10)?
6) Homosexuals advocate “coming out of the closet” and being open with their lifestyle. What does the Bible say about such open sinning (Isaiah 3:9)?
7) Men try to lessen the severity of sin by softening its description. The Bible does not describe homosexuals/lesbians as “gay” or living an “alternative lifestyle“. How does the Bible describe such people?
• 1 Kings 14:24—
• 1 Corinthians 6:9—
• Colossians 3:5—
• Jude 7—

8) What two things does 1 Corinthians 6:9–11 teach us about homosexuality?

9) Those who oppose homosexuality are often called “homophobes” or “gay bashers“. Some people really are—but how would you desribe a caring, concerned Christian who wants to help a person overcome his struggle with homosexuality (1 Corinthians 13:4–7; James 5:19–20)?

Practical Solutions

1) Can a person who is engaged in homosexual practices remain in that condition? What much he/she do (Ephesians 5:1–14)?

2) Does God care about our struggle? What are some practical ways that God gives to overcome this temptation (1 Corinthians 10:13)?
• How did Jesus overcome temptation (Matthew 4:1–11)?
• Who can we turn to for help (Philippians 4:13; 1 John 4:4)?
• How must we respond to the devil’s temptation (James 4:7)?
• What activity helps us as much as anything (Philippians 4:6–7)?
• What do we need to try and master (Philippians 4:8; 2 Corinthians 10:5)?

3) After you rid yourself of this practice, what must you do to keep worse sins from returning (Luke 11:24–26)?

4) How is the church to respond to a practicing homosexual who repents (2 Corinthians 2:3–11)?

5) Do you have a closing thought?

Maybe some parents at ACC wouldn’t mind having this assignment plopped down on their child’s desk, but I suspect more than a couple would. And people in the wider community should definitely be concerned that high schoolers are being exposed to the hateful teachings of the Christian bible — subsidised by tax dollars, no less. Remember, this is happening not in the American South, but in good old secular Perth WA, today. It can happen here.

If you want to write your own answers for this assignment, give it a go in comments.

Purity, but without the balls.

30 July 2011 / / 1 Comment

I am so sick of sex-negative religious bullshit. And it’s not just because they fill children up with guilt and shame about their bodies and their desires. It’s also because they hector other grownups about how they should conduct their sexuality.

Take this video from the Mormon Church, for instance, which focuses on the meaning of ‘pure’. (h/t profxm)

Wow, feel the waves of pent-up energy.

George Lakoff, a cognitive linguist, is big on the idea that metaphors are instrumental in guiding our thinking. And it seems to me that the metaphor of ‘SEXUAL ABSTINENCE IS PURITY’ is being used as a giant Trojan Horse to smuggle in a very sex-negative view.

I’m going to put on my cognitive linguist hat, and try to unpack what’s going on with this metaphor.

1. Who would disagree with ‘purity’? If purity is an unquestionable good, then going up against it makes you automatically bad. This is an underhanded tactic commonly used when ideas aren’t strong enough to be accepted when stated clearly. Run ‘abstinence’ up the flagpole, and who salutes? Sexually repressed ninnies and religious folk (lots of overlap there, though). Call it ‘purity’ instead, and it’s a lot more palatable.

2. A thing becomes impure by having something else put into it. A pure vial of water becomes impure with the addition of some other liquid. A hypothetical Miss X, before intercourse, was just herself, presumably with no liquids added. She was, if you will, a pure vessel, unadulterated. (Ah, le mot juste. It nicely preserves the etymological link to ‘adultery’.) But after sex with Mr Y, she is impure, coated with someone else’s sticky remnants inside her.

3. Mr Y, on the other hand, doesn’t have very much put into him during (typical) sex. Which is kind of a shame, because it can be nice if done well. Sex doesn’t impurify men. They’re still 100% themselves (minus a few teaspoons).

4. So, taking this metaphor to a logical conclusion, the consequences of impurity should therefore be more serious for women than for men, since according to this metaphor the Anti-Sex Brigade is handing us, they have more to lose in the purity game.

We could therefore make a prediction that the bulk of efforts toward maintaining ‘purity’ would focus on women. And indeed, they do. Is it surprising that the young women in the video says the emotional consequences of having sex are serious, “especially for girls”? The Book of Mormon even says that the Lord delights in the chastity of women. And so the Church obsesses over female ‘purity’, while ignoring the fact that Joseph Smith got as much ass as any sex guru in the modern era (with the possible exception of Brigham Young).

As a linguist, I’m not a fan of language engineering; language is such a big thing that it’s hard for any one person or group of people to move it. But this is one instance where the use has taken hold among the religious community, and now they’re trying to export it to the rest of us. This is kind of a thing for Christians, who have taken a lot of good words for good things, and crammed them into their own sex-hating definitions.

It’s not just the word ‘purity’. It’s also the word ‘morality’. As a Mormon living within the Mormon speech community, I came to think of morality in terms of sexual morality, not in terms of what it took to be a moral person. For many Christians, Bush was a ‘moral’ leader even though he lied about Iraq, but Clinton was ‘immoral’ because he got a blow job. This is a perverted standard of morality.

‘Virtue‘ is another. It comes from Latin vir meaning ‘man’ and it once meant something like ‘excellence’ and ‘valor’. But that’s not the prevailing sense among Latter-day Saints, where it just means ‘sexual abstinence’.

This use of language debases these concepts among its users, and elevates a standard of behaviour that is easy to measure, but which does nothing to promote actual morality, virtue, or purity.

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