I was asked to write today on the admirable open letter at nomorestrangers.org requesting the removal of The Miracle of Forgiveness from Church-owned store shelves in addition to asking the members themselves to no longer turn to it for counsel or use it to counsel others.
I concur with them that Spencer W. Kimball was a good man, and a Prophet of God. He just had some bad ideas, and this book was one of them. I agree with everything contained within the letter such as how badly damaging Miracle of Forgiveness is, how it tacitly endorses suicide if one does not fit a particular model, how it has erroneous conclusions regarding homosexuality and sexual assault which are no longer even in line with current Church teachings. I agree with them about everything—except for the most important thing. I do not think that Miracle of Forgiveness should be stricken from Church consciousness.
I am not one to argue that some things are not worth preserving even for the sake of history such as the confederate flag, etc… I don’t ask that Miracle of Forgiveness be preserved because I think it is something that we still need to be teaching, I think it needs to be preserved because when I testify of the damage it has done and people tell me that it does not say what I say it does I have my copy handy. No one will ever tell me what it does and does not say, and deny the pain and anguish that it has caused so many people because I have the proof in black and white. Who among us is dumb enough to argue against the truth?
Deleting the past allows it to fester in the memories of those who have been harmed by it. We must preserve something even so horrible so that we can show further generations that this is not how you treat people. This is not how Christ would have us be loved by one another.
I can definitely stand behind adding an additional foreword to the work that explains that it is not in line with current Church teachings, and that it is preserved for the sake of history, not as a teaching tool or to be used for ecclesiastic counsel. Simply doing away with it only pretends that it never happened though. All the soul-scarring words will be gone forever—swept under the rug like so much dirt.
EOR
EOR is a convert and a divorcee. She is the 2013 Wheaties award winning author in the category: "Funniest Thread", and has a B.S. in Business Management and Economics. In addition to being a permablogger at Rational Faiths, she also is a permablogger at Expert Textperts. She lives in NY, has 2 cats, and enjoys brevity, deli sandwiches, and laughing.
All posts by EOR
I completely agree. I don’t like the book. I don’t like the damaging things that have been said or done, and there’s a part of me that would like to get rid of all of the crap that that book is.
I also know that pretending that the abuse never happened, makes it very difficult to heal from the abuse.
Jen, so true. The light of day is the best way to foster healing from such pain.
Very well put. There is inherent danger in erasing history rather than learning from it, danger of repeating it.
The Church already tries to hide, spin, and cover up some of the less savory parts of our history. Let’s not add to that.
My point exactly, Esther. We leave ourselves in danger of repeating what we don’t acknowledge. Warts and all.
All I can say is “Amen.” Look how many people didn’t/still don’t know Joseph Smith practiced polygamy because the easily available resources decided to put no record of it. I grew up knowing, but it blows my mind how easily it was tiptoed around for others. We shouldn’t be afraid of the truth, even truth that shows our own darkness will eventually point us back to God if we let it.
Pieface, I love this sentiment: “even truth that shows our own darkness will eventually point us back to God if we let it.”
I agree with Dumbledore when he said the truth was generally preferable to lies. I would rather a harsh truth that I can process out in my own time and my own way than to be fed a lie or a half-truth, or a lie by omission.
Amen!
But Kimball supposedly was a prophet, seer, and revelator. Why, then, did he not foresee the results of the alleged toxic statements in his book? Why, when under the putative mantel of prophet, seer, and revelator, did he publish a book– used and promulgated widely since its publication– that eventually would cause pain for many and be considered harmful and hurtful (some might even say hateful)? If, as some will respond, the book was just his opinion and not church policy or doctrine, then one must ask why has it been required reading for repentant sinners as part of the repentance process? I was present in a bishop’s court about ten years ago when the bishop stipulated that the excommunicated member read the book as well as attend church weekly for a certain amount of time if she wanted to get her membership back. The bishop at that time stated it was standard practice to include that reading requirement. But you can’t have it both ways. This is just one example of a situation that generates potent doubt about the authenticity of the church and its leaders.
Brent, Thank you for your comment.
If it creates potent doubt within you that men of God are still ultimately men I respect that but I cannot agree with you when you attempt to insert that feeling onto others. Miracle of Forgiveness has been damaging to me personally, so this piece is not an objective one, but I made my peace long ago with Prophetic Fallibility.
Prophets aren’t fortune tellers that call up the future at their whims. They often times see things through the lens of their own experience. That is 100% what I believe Miracle of Forgiveness is. Forgiveness is a Miracle, one we should all be grateful for because we are all in need of it so I could see the book having redeeming value to those who are not now nor ever were sensitive to some of the awful ideas contained within. They take what resonates for them and apply it to their lives.
I can’t speak to what people in disciplinary counsels do, but I am sure it has been used the way you describe. That is where the open letter from nomorestrangers.org comes in, and it is precisely where I agree with them most. Calling for this book to be abandoned as standard counsel is something I can write home to Mom about.
As far as Spencer W. Kimball’s Prophetic authority or lack thereof, I will leave your beliefs on that to your own mind and trust that you have your own reasoning for feeling like you do. I expect the same in return both for myself and on behalf of the readers of this post.
While I haven’t read the book, I am interested in what others are saying who have. My only contribution is what I have noticed about a lot of things written or quoted in and out of the Church records and histories, and that is that everyone, prophets and leaders, family members, and casual observers, writers, and folks quoted by news sources on the street, are people of their times, and will always reflect the current points of view, that were held by various groups at those places and eras where they happened to be. So will we reflect our times, and our many viewpoints in fifty or a hundred years–or even a mere ten or so–from now.
Thanks for your comment Catsissie.
I agree that we are all products of our time and subject to the many human failings. I don’t think that mitigates our being held accountable for such things when the greater light presents itself though. Spencer W. Kimball was a good man, I won’t do him the disservice of acting as if he was never wrong about anything.
To tag along with what Brent said….what good is a prophet seer and revelator if they don’t do anything but parrot the standard thought of the day? There is a difference in fallibility and being completely absolutely wrong as Kimball was with this book. Why didn’t god give him some sort of direction that his ideas were wrong, harmful, and damaging. Either god doesn’t care, he is sitting on the sidelines, or he doesn’t exist and these men simply do what they think fits best.
I’ll echo again what I said to Brent–that is not how prophecy works. One must seek The Lord out. As damaging as the book is (and it definitely is) I am unmoved that God didn’t save us from it considering there are people starving all over the world. I think their claim is greater. I *personally* don’t believe in an interventionist God; the God of lost keys for rich white ladies has no claim on my love and devotion. I’ll spare testifying in the comments because I think it is pointless but it all comes down to one’s belief or lack thereof. I believe, and that is my well sought out answer.
EOR…
What is the point of having any revelation at all….if god is providing any sort of revelation at all then he is an interventionist god even though you state he isn’t. The fact is that everyone makes god out to be who they want him to be. God is a direct reflection of everything you create in him. These men, the prophets, are simply products of their time….no more inspired than you or I….struggling to make sense of things and hoping they get things right.
I, too, have a copy of Miracle of Forgiveness in my home in a closet on a shelf. And I have it for the exact same reasons EOR describes. Many times I have wanted to burn the pages of that book because I grew up believing its horrible words, but it stands as a reminder of where we used to be and gives me hope as to where we are going. I do not believe in that God. Your post is a good one.
Also, I can reference the source where President Kimball’s son said, years after the book was published and Pres Kimball had died, that his father–our prophet–regretted the harshness of his words in that book. Thank goodness we belong to a living and growing church!
So he “regretted” the harshness in the book….and yet didn’t do anything about it..that makes no sense, I know the book I put out is super harsh and damaging to many people but because of my fallability I’ll be ok to leave it out there.
“Prophetic fallibility”—ah, the oft cited warrant for ignorance and error. What the term seems to insinuate is that god cannot effectively communicate with fallible humans; that through his omnipotent power he cannot open their minds enough to transmit clear and unambiguous messages; that on important (eternal) matters he leaves his servants to their own devices; that he permits supposition instead of certainty, that he allows ambiguous interpretations to stand that are later shown to be unjustified, and what have you. If that’s the case, then about any semi-literate person can claim transmissions from god, achieve a far less than 100 percent accuracy rate, and still be considered authentic depending on the audience he or she is indulging. To me prophetic fallibility is an incoherent and unjustified concept.
Brent, I realize you are a perfect person, but I am unsure why you seem to insist that others join you on such an exalted plane. For all I care, you are free to claim yourself as a prophet. You won’t hear a peep from me about it.
Here’s the thing, you can’t prove he wasn’t a prophet, and I can’t prove he was. I don’t believe in “agree to disagree” because I don’t think it is something that is necessary–we just disagree and there is no need to agree about it. We can stand here all day whipping out our penises until one of us just gives up but that seems like a super waste of time; especially considering mine is bigger.
Finally you’re ending with an “I” statement of sorts–I believe I will win you over yet.
Wow, thought we were having a respectful,intelligent (adult) discussion(disagreement). Appears as if I’ve been interacting with a middle schooler. LOL
Brent, what’s a few penis jokes among friends? 🙂
I’m tired of hearing people state that the prophets have to ask in order to get revelation on something. There is plenty of talks and manuals that state differently. One example is Claudio Costa from a recent conference. He said the following….”we are told that ‘surely the lord god will do nothing, bit he revealeth his secret unto his servants the Prophets (amos 3:7).’ We learn from the scripture that the lord will reveal to his prophets absolutely anything that he feels is necessary to communicate to us. He will reveal his will to us and he will instruct us through his prophets.”. This was not the prophet saying this but it was not changed by the leaders of the church which indicates they are in agreement with the statement. There is nothing that states the prophet has to ask first before the lord tells him what he is to reveal. It is not my job to try and prove they are prophets….I can give all sorts of evidence such as this terrible miracle of forgiveness book and so much more that these men do not work based on revelation and simply try to do what they personally feel should be done. If they are claiming to be prophets seers and revelators then it is on them to show that they are truly just as they claim.
Garrett you are correct that you don’t have to prove anything to anyone, but you are incorrect in assuming anyone has to prove anything to you. The Doctrine and Covenants and the Book of Mormon are positively littered with examples of the model I have described. You don’t believe because you don’t want to. You are only happy with instances that fit your preconceived narrative. So, all of a sudden a conference talk slipping through the fingers of correlation amounts to enough evidence to prove your hypothesis when mounds of scripture speak to the contrary. All prophets *all of them* are products of their time because they are human beings and that is human nature. You’re free to be sick of people saying anything you choose (I am a champion of free agency and you will never get me to let that go by trying to force anyone to believe what I do) but you are absolutely not free to armchair quarterback other people’s hard work. I have done the work of my faith and my testimony, it is well beyond your place to dismiss it.
As far as your comment up-thread about God in my image it is of course possible that you could be right, but if just talking to myself alone in the dark spurs me on to be a better person (which it does) then I’ll take it. When I die, if I find out I was wrong all along then I’ll simply lie there and be worm-food with no regrets. Maybe *you* see no good in religion, or deity, or cosmic forces beyond what you can hold in your hands but I do.
EOR…you are the one that said prophecy only works when the prophet seeks The Lord out. Yes there are plenty of examples in the scriptures of prophets seeking The Lord out…and there are also plenty of examples of The Lord coming to them and telling them what they should do without them seeking him out. The scripture in Amos is very clear that The Lord won’t do anything without revealing his secrets unto the prophets. There isn’t a caveat on there that he will only reveal it if the prophet says please and thank you first. For my entire life growing up I was taught in the church that we are led by continuous revelation….now it’s very convenient to say that The Lord only talks when the prophet asks, or he doesn’t intervene at all, the prophets are a product of their time, etc. all excuses to cover for the fact that these men are no more inspired than your average joe.
Goodbye.
Well-written post! The sooner we can get disavow MoF, the better. Also, I’m always entertained when aggressive non-believers attempt to argue with liberal/heterodox believers as though they’re ultraconservative literalists. Those who insist on viewing the world in black and white are always bumping their heads against what they don’t see.