Delf, you know I'm actually trying to change my habit of assuming Mormons believe all things "Mormon." I'm seeing that younger generational Mormons tend to be a bit of all things...
...part secular...part HS & college-campus secular...part multi-media bathed secular...
...certainly culturally Mormon...but not necessarily doctrinally through and through Mormon...
...some have picked up more from the Bible than other Mormons...
...some have picked up more emphasis from Evangelical Christianity...
...some Lds, especially younger New Age, may have even some New Age thought tinged into their beliefs -- or beliefs from other non-Mormon, non-Christian sources...
My point? While we still need to have a lexicon for how our culture currently describes things, overbroad knee-jerk labels & stereotypes are becoming less helpful all the time -- at least the broad overarching labels. Our labels need to be more specific to head off automatic assumptions.
I mean, what is the current Mormon ad campaign if anything than to show the diversity of Mormons? And it is. You perhaps have 20% who are "temple" Mormons. You have "jack" Mormons. You have cafeteria Mormons...and you can probably come up with a list much longer than mine. And then even with these sub-groups, are individual unique Mormons.
The key thing is that we have to get know each person individually. We're all unique; though different groups share many characteristics and beliefs.
Therefore, I declare that the "anti" label is one of these. A person can be pro-Mormon the person and still be anti-belief system re: MormonISM. A person like Szonian can dearly love his Mormon wife and still oppose the system.
We are ALL opposed to some ideology...hence, in that sense, we are ALL "anti"...something. (Some beliefs are just easier to not object to or assimilate into your own worldviews than others).
What we object to comes down to provocation, passion, opportunity, and calling.
A parent practicing "tough love" on a teen going off the deep end into a brainwashing cult is actually engaged in more pro behavior than anti behavior...because they have the best interest of that teen at heart. And if our "best interest" is informed by the Bible and led by the Holy Spirit, then we have a Source beyond us guiding us.
We'll never lose the labels. (And I'm not advocating that we do away with them). We simply need to be slower & more cautious before we toss them out. We need to get to know people better.
Otherwise, what I find is that people use labels as an excuse to automatically write off what people are saying.
There's one FR poster who I use to view as a thread disruptor. I then reviewed his decade long posting history to see what he had gone through spiritually and found out we had a lot more in common than I thought. My respect for him increased. My understanding did, too.
We still clashed, but I was able to see him more as a multi-dimensional person, vs. me simply writing him off.
(That's all I'm suggesting we do).
I don’t really care what Mormons choose to label me with. It actually says more about them than it does about me.
This man who became Christian after leaving Mormonism says it better than I could myself.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_Y_hZJr2nU&feature=related