Nottheworld
11-09-2009, 09:47 AM
Deifying self is hardly exclusive to Eastern religions. Where the leaven of mysticism is found, it inevitably spreads to some form of union with God, meaning becoming God. Consider Mormonism, Islam, and Roman Catholicism, for example. All three are quite legalistic while at the same time very experiential.
Mormon males are taught that they can become gods through closely following LDS teachings: "As man is, God once was; as God is, man may become." Most Mormons claim that the veracity of the doctrine of godhood (and for women, a goddesshood of eternal pregnancies) is affirmed through prayer, followed by a "burning in the bosom" sensation from "God." In contrast to its Sharia legal system, Islam's mysticism is found in Sufism, where devotees whirl themselves into altered states of consciousness in order to reach union with Allah.
One need not go to their writings to find the Church of Rome's position regarding godhood. It's spelled out quite clearly in paragraph 460 of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church:
For the Son of God became man so that we might become God. The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in his divinity, assumed our nature, so that he, made man, might make men gods.
Godhood as a doctrine plays a large part in the methodology of the Word/Faith, Positive Confession teachings. Kenneth Copeland's version of "the lie" was similar to what most of his fellow Prosperity teachers were promoting:
And you impart humanity into a child that's born of you....Because you are a human, you have imparted the nature of humanity into that child.
God is God. He is a Spirit....And He imparted in you when you were born again. Peter said it just as plain, he said, "We are partakers of the Divine Nature." That Nature is alive-eternal in absolute perfection, and that was imparted into you by God just the same as you imparted into your child the nature of humanity.
That child wasn't born a whale. It was born a human....Well, now, you don't have a human, do you? No, you are one. You don't have a God in you. You are one.
Another leader of the Word/Faith Movement declares the practical necessity of godhood: "Until we comprehend that we are little gods and we begin to act like little gods, we cannot manifest the Kingdom of God."
The lie from the beginning is the lie at the end. The lie at the beginning of Mormonism is that you always existed like God. The lie at the end is you will become a God.
What is God's response? He will send strong delusion upon those who have not a love for the truth, that they should believe the lie (2 Thessalonians 2:10-11 (http://biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&version=KJV&passage=2+Thessalonians+2%3A10-11)).
Mormon males are taught that they can become gods through closely following LDS teachings: "As man is, God once was; as God is, man may become." Most Mormons claim that the veracity of the doctrine of godhood (and for women, a goddesshood of eternal pregnancies) is affirmed through prayer, followed by a "burning in the bosom" sensation from "God." In contrast to its Sharia legal system, Islam's mysticism is found in Sufism, where devotees whirl themselves into altered states of consciousness in order to reach union with Allah.
One need not go to their writings to find the Church of Rome's position regarding godhood. It's spelled out quite clearly in paragraph 460 of the
Catechism of the Catholic Church:
For the Son of God became man so that we might become God. The only-begotten Son of God, wanting to make us sharers in his divinity, assumed our nature, so that he, made man, might make men gods.
Godhood as a doctrine plays a large part in the methodology of the Word/Faith, Positive Confession teachings. Kenneth Copeland's version of "the lie" was similar to what most of his fellow Prosperity teachers were promoting:
And you impart humanity into a child that's born of you....Because you are a human, you have imparted the nature of humanity into that child.
God is God. He is a Spirit....And He imparted in you when you were born again. Peter said it just as plain, he said, "We are partakers of the Divine Nature." That Nature is alive-eternal in absolute perfection, and that was imparted into you by God just the same as you imparted into your child the nature of humanity.
That child wasn't born a whale. It was born a human....Well, now, you don't have a human, do you? No, you are one. You don't have a God in you. You are one.
Another leader of the Word/Faith Movement declares the practical necessity of godhood: "Until we comprehend that we are little gods and we begin to act like little gods, we cannot manifest the Kingdom of God."
The lie from the beginning is the lie at the end. The lie at the beginning of Mormonism is that you always existed like God. The lie at the end is you will become a God.
What is God's response? He will send strong delusion upon those who have not a love for the truth, that they should believe the lie (2 Thessalonians 2:10-11 (http://biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&version=KJV&passage=2+Thessalonians+2%3A10-11)).