Internet Monk

Xenophile Joined : 09 May 2008 Posts : 119

[update=links are dead, see my post at the bottom of the page]

I regularly read over at internetmonk.com; it's a blog by Michael Spencer. Well he's recently revealed some very important personal information and I'd like to know what everyone reading here thinks about the whole situation.

Read the details first
Then read the comments on his blog

Then come back here and let's talk about this. It has been dominating my thoughts today and I think this is an excellent first topic to get this forum rolling. (note that it will take you a while to read it all)

Nate
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Immoderator Age : 27 Joined : 09 May 2008 Posts : 10

God knows that I'm not the biggest fan of Roman Catholicism, but his wife is still Christian, still believes in the same God as he does, and they should have no problem with fellowship in the home. So what if they go to two different churches on Sunday? If it's that big of a problem and she isn't going to change, then he always can.

More disturbing than his situation was the commentator who shared the testimony about his wife having an IUD implanted and getting pregnant anyway, only to have the doctor and their Pentecostal pastor tell them to abort the baby!!!

N.B. I did not read all of the post (the repetative whining got on my nerves), nor all of the comments (too much repetition there as well).

Xenophile Joined : 09 May 2008 Posts : 119

Yeah the post and subsequent comments have dominated my thoughts today. I'll wait to see what some others think as I'm still digesting it all.
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Subject: Re: Internet Monk Mon May 12, 2008 11:01 am

alright well I have not yet read the comments. the morning has been a little crazy for me for a variety of reasons.

but before I read the comments I wanted to share what my wife and I discussed about this story last night.

my wife:
First her reaction was similar to nick's she thought this dude is totally overreacting.
then after thinking about it a bit she came to the conclusion this woman is obviously sinning. her reasons being how it has affected their marriage and her unwillingness to submit at all to her husband.

my thoughts...

I have processed this quite a bit. My first thought was just sheer shock at the wife having this sort of epiphany... but then thinking how on earth would I be able to process it if my wife went through somethings similar. First i dont think a minor denominational affiliation change would bother me much (we come from different backgrounds and disagree on some topics that just aren't essential enough to bother either of us). but if my wife started praying to mary i think that would freak me out good.

next I'm horrified at this catholic church that they allowed her to stop worshipping alongside her husband that they saw no problem with that. ANY christian denomination should be more concerned with the wellbeing/unity of a family than they are with a convert to their specific dogmas. Any pastor should have sat down with her and said "if this is really from the Lord pray about it until your husband can be aligned with you, but stay by his side until that happens and be willing to worship in a house of prayer where you may not agree with everything as long as you are submitting to your husband's spiritual authority."

I'm not inherently opposed to the Roman Catholic Church. There are people who are RCC who really are in love with the Lord. There always have been. That said, i do think its harder to sort through the truth in a place with so many confused ideas (papal authority etc).

next i'm thinking, how much this feels like a power play on her part. She has basically castrated her husband, taken away his hope and is walking around the house in sheer joy at her conversion. This seems like she needed something to lord over her husband and found this. The beauty of the religious thing is she can say she heard directly from God about this (and maybe she genuinely thinks she did), but in my opinion it has come from the enemy, not because she went RCC but because she divided her family.

Following the Lord is above all. But if you destroy your relationship in the process and make your husband lose all hope and confidence in what he believes and in the God he loves then that outta be a BIG check that maybe you need to rethink this or pray about it longer.

okay these are just my initial thoughts... i'll be reading the comments and getting back to this thread to add more. the husband is playing out in humility (granted we're hearing his side of the story), but I can tell you all of at least one time where I "thought" i was hearing from the Lord and it destroyed a relationship and another time where i "thought" i was hearing from the Lord and I almost didn't marry the woman i'm now married to (and convinced beyond a doubt that she is the right one for me).

there are checks for when we hear from the Lord. doing this to your husband, is one of them. I fear there is more sin behind it on her behalf and it will come back to bite the husband even harder. I am shocked at the RCC pastor who is allowing her to do this.

Immoderator Age : 27 Joined : 09 May 2008 Posts : 10

Out of curiosity, why is the wife sinning and not the husband? He didn't say that God told him to stay with the SBC (or even to stop attending church regularly). Yet the wife does claim to have heard from God. If the husband is so concerned with maintaining fellowship then he can go to the RCC. If anything, I'd think that if we had to attribute sin to one of them, it should be attributed to the husband for his selfishness.

Xenophile Joined : 09 May 2008 Posts : 119

I am pretty much in total agreement with Roger. I was shocked that the RCC leader would permit the split in her home, and that the wife would split her own family. Here's my wife's take:

When the woman felt that God was speaking this to her, and her husband was not in agreement, she should have prayed about it. If God really was in this change, he will speak to the husband about it. Finally, she should remain faithful and in submission to her husband, even if he doesn't come to her position until the day she dies.

Nick,
I completely disagree. The wife's selfishness and going out on her own is the sin. He cannot in good conscience attend a RCC church any more than I could. As Roger has pointed out, the whole "God told me X, Y, Z" has been abused for who knows how long. As I mentioned earlier, if God really spoke to her, she needs to be patient and wait for him to speak to her husband as well. Her selfish decision to make the choices she has is completely wrong, as evidenced by the status of their relationship.
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Immoderator Joined : 09 May 2008 Posts : 40 Location : CA

Subject: Re: Internet Monk Mon May 12, 2008 4:31 pm

due to ridiculous life.
i still have not gotten to the comments yet as I intend...
however

in response to nick.
I dont see anything inherently sinful in anything the wife did (going to the rcc, feeling the need for a change, or even "hearing from the Lord") but i do see sin in the willful disruption of her family instead of willful submission to her husbands authority and a lack of willingness to postpone the change until he too should have a change of heart (if indeed it was from the lord)

Subject: Re: Internet Monk Mon May 12, 2008 5:52 pm

okay I just got around to reading the comments and actually my view has changed slightly.

the more comments you read the more mild the whole situation was, or rather the more it seems the wife was willing to compromise. She didn't leave her husband's church to go be a RCC, she continued to attend with him at the southern baptist deal until he decided to stop attending church.

that said, first I am still shocked that the RCC didn't press for her to make the change slower than she did and ask for the Lord to align their hearts.

secondly i still think its pretty unusual for the Lord to tell people outright things like "go be RCC not SBC." it may happen, but I remain skeptical. His wife being extremely devout doesn't put that fear to rest at all, in my experience it is often the most devout people who think they hear the Lord the most clearly and the most specifically. often it is they (us) who over-religious-ize things like that.

finally, I'm back to thinking more along the lines that the dude is maybe making a bigger deal of this than he needs to. His wife still seems supportive of him and in my opinion he needs to go back to church and start taking her with him. he is the one who chose for them to no longer be worshipping together, not her.

he needs to continue on his knees if he thinks what she's doing is wrong for the lord to align her heart in the same way she needs to.

my wife comes from a dispensational background. i do not. her church brings almost every sermon back to dispensationalism rather than to the gospel. This drives me absolutely nutty. BUT. the church is so in love with the Lord, and the people care for us in a way I've NEVER seen a church do that I can disagree with some of what they believe, some of what they teach, and even how they teach it but still be blessed by them.

there is a piece of RCC out there who truly loves the Lord, maybe this dudes wife is one of them. I think the praying to mary thing is weird if not downright idolotry.

BUT the longer i'm around the less dogmatic i am about such things. the issue seems less complicated than I thought, and as usual it looks like it took two to tango and neither party is doing fully what they should, or or fully responsible for the trouble.

that dude needs to pack up his bible, go back to the SBC sunday service and say "hey i dont agree with all that my wife is doing but I support my wife 100% to be following the Lord the way she feels led. I'm helping her understand why and what I disagree with, but the rest is between her and the Lord. Here is where i'm comfortable and here is my lovely wife standing beside me willing to love me and continue attending my church."

he also needs to set a good example for the students he is ministering to by continuing to church-go. a student ministry is a funny sense of a church, there are no old or children.

anyhoo... just my updated thoughts... that was long. sorry.

Immoderator Age : 27 Joined : 09 May 2008 Posts : 10

Is it better to obey God or man? That is the question. If God told this lady to go back to Mother Rome, then she better do it! She's not breaking up her marriage, her husband's handling of the matter is. He should rejoice that she's still a believer and didn't go atheist or Muslim on him.

Also, why would you guys expect the priest of whatever parish it is she is joining to tell her to hold off until her husband is on board? RCs believe that there isn't true union with Christ except through the Church. Why would they discourage her from true union with Christ?

I'm also curious as to why you think that if it is really God's will, then he would have dealt with the husband as well, or even, why do you assume that God hasn't dealt with the husband? Who says that the husband's heart was genuinely open to hearing what God had to say? There's all kinds of variables here.

Xenophile Joined : 09 May 2008 Posts : 119

My take is still my gut reaction, which I posted earlier:

Subject: Re: Internet Monk Tue May 13, 2008 1:43 pm

well nick... i have to say i really agree with what your saying... and even the questions your asking... i dont think its as black and white as i originally did.

but i also agree with nathan, and my gut tells me something funny is going on...

but these are people, not situations. situations have nice easy clean cut answers. people are messy and dont.

Subject: Re: Internet Monk Tue May 13, 2008 2:47 pm

I was trying to catch up on this story, and found that both the links are now dead, in ways which probably mean that the story has been deliberately taken down. Anyone know why?

I am disturbed by your suggestion, Roger, that a husband's authority over his wife extends to dictating to her which church she should attend even when this goes against her conscience. In fact I would consider this spiritual abuse. Yes, it is best if the whole family can attend one church, but it is better that they agree to go to different places than for anyone's conscience to be violated.

Xenophile Joined : 09 May 2008 Posts : 119

This is the original post which is now gone.

Subject: Re: Internet Monk Tue May 13, 2008 6:20 pm

Thanks, Nathan, for reposting this. Now I understand a bit more of what this is all about.

It seems to me that the problem is that this man and his wife long ago abandoned any meaningful spiritual partnership. He trusted in "the God who takes cares of ministry marriages because they are special", but didn't put in his own work to keep his marriage special. In fact, if he was shocked and angry at her initial decision to explore the RCC, he wasn't even keeping proper channels of communication open with her.

But I am glad that now he has found a God who is real to him rather than the idolatrous caricature which he used to serve. Also he should understand that the gulf between him and his wife need not be anything like as wide as he imagines.