My answers to my daughter’s Q in mission

On Mon, May 19, 2014 at 10:29 PM, Chen 陳亭安Amanda <chen.a@myldsmail.net> wrote:

there were two questions that I didn´t know how to reply when I was talking to people on the street.  The first one was, “I don´t believe in God, if God was here, why would he let the children be hungry and suffer. If he was here, why wouldn´t he show some miracles.·” The second questions, “I believe in God but I don´t believe in a church” My mouth was shut and I didn´t know how to answer them. But I will keep thinking about these questions and find out the answers throught out my personal study time.

First Q:

I had a personal revelation when I was 16 that I chose my mom, meaning I chose to be suffered by her.

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When we were in preexistence, our souls were fully matured, and there were no more things for us to learn “in concepts.” The only thing left for us to learn could only be learned through our physical bodies on this earth — not merely the “concepts of good and bad, sad and happy, etc. in our heads, but actually suffering through the pains of all things a body and mind can endure. Being mature in spirit, we knew our own strengths and weaknesses, so designed a personal plan of exaltation. These personal plans of exaltation, once thought out, must need be approved by Heavenly Father. In other words, these mature spirits, before they left pre-existence, for the most part, planned on their own the trials and sufferings they would face on earth, then submitted the plans to Heavenly Father for approval. This is exactly what Jesus did. This planning things ahead in pre-existence is called “foreordination” — e.g., Jesus was foreordained to be our savior before he was born. No one forced this plan upon Jesus; He volunteered his own sufferings on earth for his eternal glory and exaltation. Us seeing Jesus, our older brother, planning his own suffering, also followed his example in pre-existence – laid out our own “blue print” of our lives on earth, mostly on our own volition in the pre-existence because Heavenly Father respects free agency. Those of the greatest strengths in soul in the pre-existence often chose more trials for themselves on their own on this earth. Heavenly Father would never force unwanted trials on us on earth until the “last judgement day.”

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For example, I believe I have chosen to be born in a humble home with psychotic mother to learn the things that I could have not learned otherwise. I have become who I am today for the trials and sufferings that I was willing to plan out for myself in pre-existence. I believe I was a wise and brave soul who was willing to take up the burdens of all things necessary for my personal exaltation.

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People are usually shocked when I say that they have chosen their own sufferings in pre-existence because they have to stop blaming God. I usually say that I have deep respect for their courage and wisdom for their willingness to suffer such painful trials on earth. I usually tell them that the intensity of their suffering manifests their wisdom and greatness in their souls. Also, somewhere in the scripture is a promise that those who have endured more will receive greater glory, like Jesus and other prophets. Once you believe you are the author of your own fate, you can carry out the burdens more lightly in hope. While our bodies might be in hell on this earth, no one can stop our spirits from flying free in heaven when we die.

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Second Q:

Organized Institutions are necessary for our growth – institution of marriage and family, institution of government, institution of school, etc. Even a social “book club” can be called an institution. People form institutions because two heads are better than one; it reaps bigger accomplishments and multiplies the benefits if people of same minds gather together and work towards a common goal. This is why we need the church, an organized institution, so we can better understand God and his ways.

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Any and all humanly organized institutions are imperfect, including our own church because no institution can completely control the minds of each of its member unless it is a dictatorship. Thus, while any and all humanly organized institutions are imperfect, they “are” future perfections in process. So, it is still worthy of our participation and effort.

God’s Existence: In Response to Your Search For Truth

This is an email correspondence with one of my former writing students, which I believed worthy of sharing.  The real name of the student has been replaced with a fictitious name A. 

Dear, A, what a treat to have received this letter from you! I am so honored to have been a positive influence in your life. Your mother and I never really spoke much, but we knew each other. I feel the same way about you because you used to write like I would write and ask the same questions that I once asked at your age. I ditched almost half of my high school Junior and Senior classes because I was sitting on top of the largest rock at Venice Beech, California staring at the ocean and sky, contemplating on the same questions you hunger for. I know you have burning desire for finding the truth in all things.

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Let me attempt to alleviate some of your doubts by quoting French philosopher, Descartes, who said, “I think, therefore I am.” A you think, therefore it proves that there is God. Let me explain. Descartes believed that we human beings are or at least have the potential to be Gods because we have the ability to “think.” Our mental faculty is the first step in getting rid of existential doubts because it demonstrates human’s attainability of certain knowledge. For example, even if an all-powerful demon was to try to deceive A into thinking that God does not exist, A must first exist in order to be deceived. You are a thinking being. Therefore, whenever you think, it proves your existence, and by extension, someone who has the ability to think must have created you as well.

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You might now say, well my existence still doesn’t exactly prove God’s existence. In fact, my existence could have been a “random” thing, like the “the big bang” theory that scientists believe. This theory asserts that the universe originated approximately 20 billion years ago from the violent explosion by going through the process of agglomeration – a process in which small universal particles grow into huge masses then hitting each other. But if you study the the exact scientific preconditions required for this “big bang” to occur and if you realize that its probability is mathematically less than zero, one can certainly argue that unlike “the Big Bang theory” which is almost solely based on scientific randomness, “intelligent design theory” (belief that God created humans and this earth for a purpose) is rather a logical belief through a process of deduction using our mental faculty. The fact that A could not have existed without a father and mother, and also that so much about who you are today is a direct result of and a combination of the DNAs of your creators (your mom & dad) is a proof that the “preconditions of intelligent life” is another intelligent life that bore it, another intelligent being that existed before A. There is no way, that someone like you or me was a product of random chance. Each of us are too special, too unique, and beautiful to be called random products.

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If you don’t believe human beings are amazing, ask any doctor about the biological make-up of our body. Consider our exquisite eye construction, the hard skeleton that supports our weight, our ability to hear the faintest sound, our brain’s amazing circuitry. Think of our body as a large symphony of Mozart or Beethoven. It begins by being inspired to create a music which is not tangible, then putting it into notes that are tangible, then each individual playing his precise note and part at the precise time designated. This is how creation is made: must follow the intelligent, purposeful steps. This is also much like how our body operates with its 11 systems working in concert with its director, our brain, the intelligent faculty. Sadly, many so called the scientist who should base their arguments on facts preach things that are based on “random chance,” that human body is the result of “millions of years” of Darwinian evolution. Only a believer who has labored with questions like you and have reached a conclusion like me will give some credit to the One who must have created these amazing systems designed to work as one. A, I testify that the human body is a testament to our Creator’s wonderful intellect!

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You don’t need to search far to know that God exist. Just look at yourself. All answers can be found from within. You are the answer to your question. I don’t know whether this helps, but I do appreciate the opportunity to share my insights with you. Remember, that someone who had to be more intelligent than you must have allowed your temporary and transient existence on this earth; I say temporary because we all die at some point.  Our time on earth is timed and counted – another testament to intelligent design.

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Thank you for sharing your life in in the U.S. I can feel every word you say. At the same time, I also know that you will overcome all obstacles by what you call “showing” rather than “saying.” Action indeed speaks louder than words. I am so happy that you made it to the varsity track team. Being second among the African Americans meant you were the best, if you think of their physical advantages. In my mind, you are the best, and you know you are also the hero to my son, B, which was a pure surprise to me when I found out later. I guess my son and I, sharing the same genes, are attracted to and appreciate the same type of people – you.

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My small Taipei Debate Academy that I have basically started by teaching free a few kids have now become an enterprise, the Asian Debate League with growing employees (champion coaches from the U.S.), clients (12 international and local schools in Taiwan), and partners (Stanford and Harvard University Debate societies to name a few). And my small testimony to this evolution of my business is that I was “inspired by my prayer with God,” and all I did was to execute my inspiration into action using my mental faculty, which I have inherited from my intelligent Maker.

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Once again, A, thank you for your updates, and take good care of yourself and your mother and your sister. Please say hello to your mom, my good friend and someone I deeply appreciate and love. I will always have time for you and your family, so don’t hesitate to ask any questions that you may have that I can help with.

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Best,

Jessie S. Chen, CEO Of

Asian Debate League:ADL Brochure

Taipei Debate Academy

JC’s Mental Portal

JC’s Word Origin

LDS Share

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From: A
Sent: Friday, December 28, 2012 7:44 AM
Subject:

Dear Ms Chen,

It has been too long since our last conversation! I hope you had spent your Christmas wonderfully. I often recall all the memories and lessons I was able to experience and learn from the small class we had together. I really miss it. It has already been 6 months since I arrived in America, but my longing for returning to Taiwan hasn’t changed a bit; I don’t think it ever will. I have been slowly adjusting to the new culture. I should be used to moving by now since my family has had moved around countless amount of times, but it’s different and difficult every time. It’s crazy to think about how all the things you have told us about your life in America were just lessons half a year ago, and now they are my reality. I can always sense racism here, whether it is silent or loud. Especially in sports, my friends have always reminded me of how Asians stand no chance against naturally talent athletes here in America, but I managed to make varsity in Track and place 2nd in 200m among more than 70 sprinters around New York and New Jersey. At the finals, there were 7 African-Americans and one Asian, which was myself. I sometimes feel the limit of words, and how there is only so much I can prove with what I say, therefore I show. I think showing is one of the best solutions to anything, and it encourages me to do work harder.

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One of the things that consume the majority of my time is fortunately school work. I have always valued self-education and thinking, but was never too into the works from school. However, I matured fast enough to realize the importance of school. Also, I joined philosophy club, but I feel like high school students’ philosophical mind-state can only reach to a certain point; it’s quite disappointing. I want to become the president of club in my senior year and expand it’s field of topics. One thing I like about moving is that I am free to build myself anyway I like because the people here do not know my past. I feel no insecurity or hesitation in representing myself anyway I want.

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The biggest thing that has been surrounding my mind lately is religion. I have been trying to discover God somewhere inside me, but it doesn’t seem so easy. I am amazed how people can have so much faith in something so unprovable, and appreciate and have hope in everything in their life through that faith. I think all happiness comes from appreciation. Yesterday, I was talking to my mother’s closest friend, who is a first-generation Christian. She found her own ways to God. She told me that humans usually understand, then believe, but religion is where you believe, then understand. I think she is absolutely right. There is only so much I can  understand about religion and the words of God without truly and completely believing it. I hope someday I can have enough courage to completely soak myself with the same faith she has on God.

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Anyways, all the selfish talking aside, how has your life been? I am fascinated to hear about your life and wisdom. Please update me!

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Sincerely,

A

 

Hugo’s ”Superconsumerism”

My Response to Hugo’s Superconsumerism: http://web.media.mit.edu/~hugo/publications/drafts/Nada8-Liu-Superconsumer.pdf

I want to share this with you because, after reading Hugo’s paper, I realized that I have personally went through the process of cultural perspectivism, in that I was first, to borrow Hugo’s words, the “naïve [cultural] consumer, frustrated and anxious.” But because “[my] spirit[could] not tolerate anxiety and meaninglessness for long,” I have reshaped the American culture that was once my “oppressor into tool” which I now wield it integratively with my other cultures for moment-to-moment, situational purposes. I can do this because I am in tandem the consumer and the owner of multiple cultures and have a diverse range of self-expressive sociolinguistic mediums; I can never be mainstreamed into only one culture; I thus believe that I have found what Hugo calls one’s “niche culture” composed of rich cultural languages and authority.

I think this is what Hugo means by a “superconsumer” a postmodernist of auto-culture, a person of credible (authoritative) culture amidst an “in-credible culture,” a concept and a reality that emerges in stages as one travels this journey of cultural transformations from being naïve to superconsumer (which I do not totally agree; I think some will get stuck in this journey, forever xenophobic if not, in Hugo’s term, an incorrigibly “passive consumer”).

If I may reiterate Hugo to make sure that I am understanding his continuum of cultural evolvement: 1) Strauss & Derrida’s (1966) two primal models: a “bricoleur,” a cultural hero, opportunist, and critic who uses one culture to undermine another and his/her antithetical counterpart, an “engineer,” a cultural fool who is one-dimensional and submissive to authority; then 2) Jameson’s (1991) “intertextualist,” a culturally unsettled, faint vestige of globalism who is unduly influenced by and thus desensitized to milliard cultural propagandas; and 3) Bhabha’s (1994) biculturalist who, rather than being desensitized, by negotiating and contesting the bipolar cultures of one’s motherland and the host country has carved out a transcendent space of beyond in a conjoining sense; and ultimately, which brings us back to 4) Hugo’s (2006) superconsumer, an emblem of self-constructed culture which one is not born into ethnically/geographically but willfully and optimistically self-fashioned by utilizing/reconfiguring contaminated (or dumbed down) original cultures in the age of hyperglobalisation.

Now, what I don’t understand is Hugo’s paradoxical concept of simultaneously submitting one’s self to a controller and yet controlling the controller. Help me with this, please. At the same time, I find Hugo’s “poetics of three critical experiences” simply exquisite! I agree 1000% and appreciate his graphic representations of his dense, potentially confusing theory.

Kant’s “Purposiveness without a Purpose”

It’s me again. Can you help me understand Kant?I’m stuck with his notion of “purposiveness without a purpose.” What significance does it hold for Kant’s claims about the human value of aesthetic judgment? I read this many times, but the more I read it, it confuses me more.

As far as I know, that’s Kant’s definition of the aesthetic. The aesthetic, to Kant, should be non-utilitarian (spelling). A knife is utilitarian-you use it to cut something with, but a poem is not utilitarian-you don’t use it to “do” something practical.

To put it differently, a work of art is not something that has a (utilitarian) function or “purpose.” But, that does not mean that the work of art does not have a purpose within its non-utilitarian realm.It has a purpose within the purpose-less (non-utilitarian) context. Take a beautiful tie for example. Its beauty lies, first, in the fact that it does not have a utilitarian purpose (I don’t have to wear a tie). But in the sense that the tie is carefully designed and produced, it has its purpose: it is meant to be beautiful, aesthetic.

Another example. Many students, English majors or non majors, ask me: What can literature do for me? They are thinking: how can literature help me get into a more profitable career? I tell them-if that’s what you are thinking, literature is useless. Can people live without the experience of music, painting or literature? The answer is: There are some people who live their lives without that experience.

The ancient Chinese philosopher Chuang Tze (or, Zhuang Tze) once said: “The great Tao appears useless” (da dao wu yong). That’s similar to what Kant tries to say.Art-or philosophy-appears useless if we look at it in the utilitarian sense.