Do you know how embarrassing it is to be caught crying during a kids movie? Let me tell you about it.
Besides being one of the top movies of 2014, the LEGO Movie is—if you’re paying attention—kind of a deep philosophical examination of truth.
(Warning: Spoilers ahead if you haven’t seen the movie)
Emmet is our unwitting hero – a character who is so bland and conformist that hardly anyone can remember he exists, let alone his name. Nevertheless, through a series of comical and seemingly random events, Emmet stumbles upon and takes possession the “piece of resistance,” a relic foretold of by the prophet/wizard Vitruvius that will identify “The Special,” or the one destined to free Legoland of the evil Lord Business.
As the movie progresses, Emmet proves to be not quite what everyone was hoping for in terms of “The Special.” He can’t build massive and complex Lego structures with his mind like other master builders, he’s not a great leader and he lacks in courage and gumption. But, the Piece of Resistance is glued to his back, and Emmet’s band of cohorts seem to be fixated on the prophecy so much that they still follow him, even as Emmet displays signs of being just another ordinary citizen of Legoland.
At a moment of great peril for our heroes when it seems like Lord Business is destined to unleash his evil plan on the world, Vitruvius is killed and makes a startling deathbed confession to Emmet: confession:
Vitruvius: My sweet Emmet, come closer. You must know something about the prophecy.
Emmet: I know. I’m doing my best but… I don’t-I don’t.
Vitruvius: The prophecy… I made it up.
Emmet: What?
Vitruvius: I made it up. It’s not true.
Emmet: But that means I’m just… I’m not the special?
Vitruvius: You must listen. What I’m about to tell you will change the course of history…
And then, suddenly, Vitruvius croaks.
Emmet is, of course, devastated. Since coming in contact with The Piece of Resistance and being told of the prophecy, he has felt his calling, in spite of his weaknesses and his shortcomings, was to save Legoland. Now it turns out it was all made up.
Here’s where it gets interesting. Rather than folding and walking away, our hero does something surprising. He doesn’t react with anger. He doesn’t react with shame. He doesn’t react with disgust. He actually embraces the difficult and seemingly fraudulent nature of Vitruvius’ confession. Talking to Lord Business at the climax of the movie and urging him to abandon his plan of destruction, Emmet says wisely:
You don’t have to be the bad guy. You are the most talented, most interesting, and most extraordinary person in the universe. And you are capable of amazing things. Because you are the Special. And so am I. And so is everyone. The prophecy is made up, but it’s also true. It’s about all of us. Right now, it’s about you. And you… still… can change everything.
The prophecy is made up. But it’s also true.
I remember hearing that line in the movie theater and just losing it. Openly weeping at the complex beauty of that statement and how it applied to my then-nascent faith crisis. This was in February, just two months after my shelf completely collapsed under the weight of the Race and the Priesthood essay and my acceptance of real, tangible, demonstrable prophetic infallibility.
I was drowning.
Searching for something, anything to make sense of the abyss I had fallen into. The fact that it came from a movie about kids play toys come to life was so jarring that it turned on the waterworks. And there I sat, a grown man crying through a movie that had as much product placement as it did one-liners.
It’s now the end of 2014, and as I have spent the last year combing through all the things I was never taught in church, examining the tidal wave of historical evidence about Mormonism and Joseph Smith, my mind buckles under the weight of evidence that points to it being just as made up as the prophecy of Vitruvius. I’ve come to realize that coming to that realization isn’t the hard part. It’s where you go from there. Is there really no other choice than to call it all a fraud and cast Joseph Smith aside into the gutter, along with his theology? If we’re hanging our spiritual hats on historicity, you’d be hard pressed to find a whole lot more of it in the Bible than in the Book of Mormon.
It’s time for me to get comfortable with the idea that a lot of scripture is likely mostly “made up.”
Made up by well-intentioned people doing their best at grasping toward this thing we call “God” and attempting to put it in relatable, human language. People who have the audacity to reach up toward the moon and the stars to try to touch the hand of God. Trying to bring a piece of the divine down closer to within our grasp. And writing most times in a completely different social, political and religious context than our post-modern minds can relate to.
Embracing the notion that Mormonism is made up actually helps me makes more sense of history, not less. It helps me feel more comfortable with Mormonism. It gives me more hope and less anxiety. Can you believe that?
This is a concept hermeneutics calls “breaking the myth.” The loss of literal/historical belief in something (such as scripture) or doesn’t have to necessarily mean we must or even should abandon all value in that thing. I can still find great value in the Book of Abraham, even though I may come to the conclusion that Joseph Smith created it out of whole cloth. Just as I find great value in the story of the Good Samaritan, even when I can accept the fact that it most likely has little to no historical value. In that way, it remains “true.” Myths, while not fully historically accurate, can still hold great value in our lives.
The funny thing is, this isn’t just true of Mormonism. Or even religion. This is a process humans continually go through. We place value in things we find to be literally true. Then we find out they are not literally true. We can either abandon them and give up on the value they can have in our lives, or we can re-work them and retain the values that ring true to us.
While some — especially Mormons who fall on the more literal end of the spectrum — might see this approach as an affront or threat to faith, it has actually strengthened my testimony. Because, in light of new knowledge about the truth claims of the church, it helps me make spiritual sense of things in a new way, or at least helps me re-order things in a way that allows me to still embrace Mormonism.
It helps me accept Joseph Smith’s incredibly flawed nature and of all the skeletons in Mormonism’s past, as well as the blights that are a part of Mormonism’s present, and of the uncertainty of Mormonism’s future. I can finally make sense of the Book of Mormon when I read it not as a historical text, but as inspired (and inspiring) fiction. I can make room for fundamentally flawed leadership of “modern prophets” when I understand that they’re grasping at straws just as much as I am. As much as we all are.
So, Mormonism may all just be made up. But it’s still true.
I don’t mean that flippantly. And I certainly don’t mean it to diminish the pain caused by Mormonism turning out to be not quite what someone thought it was. Believe me, I recognize the pain there.
But I also can’t escape the fact that, for me, the essence of what Mormonism is, when you strip away the dogma and the rote practices and the cultural baggage, still rings true. Truth used to be a fixed recitation of testimony tent poles. But now, with a new view of the universe and of life, truth is much more complex, much less tangible, and much more beautiful. I find truth in certain symbols, because they speak to me. Even if those symbols turn out to be constructed by man, not God, I can’t deny the power they have in pointing me toward divinity. I can’t shake off the pull they have over my spirit. I continue to find value and goodness and meaning in many of the symbols and practices of Mormonism. Not because they are based on historical facts, but because they point me toward truth and goodness if I allow them to. In that way, they are true. To me.
It’s still true because it’s still my language.
It’s still my culture. It’s how I am most comfortable reaching through the vastness of eternity and space and time to try to communicate with the divine.
The truth is that, at the end of the day, for me Mormonism isn’t about Joseph Smith. It’s not about gold plates. Those are just vehicles to deliver truth.
Mormonism is about you. It’s about me. It’s about our relationship to each other. Our relationship to the universe. It’s about believing and acting like we are more than just our current surroundings. That we existed long before this life and we will continue to exist long after it. That this world and our existence in it is an opportunity to not just live, but to progress and become better. It’s about believing that we can all call down the powers of the divine on our behalf.
It’s about believing in a God who weeps for our sorrows and is bound by our agency.
It’s about working under the assumption that we are all God’s children, interconnected by eternal bands of brotherhood and sisterhood. It’s about believing that forgiveness and becoming better is always possible and redemption is a door never closed.
Mormonism can be as true as I allow it to be, even despite problems with historicity and translation and prophetic mantles.
You can call that new-age, touchy feely or even “pastoral apologetics.” It may even not make Mormonism as “unique” as it used to seem.
You can say “well that’s not the way the church sees it.” You see my truth as a double-decker couch. A silly idea that lacks in both functionality and utility.
You might look around with your view and see a mess.
For you, that mess may be too much to make sense of. It may not be worth trying. It may even be too painful to try and pick up the pieces.
But for me, for now, I look at that double-decker couch and I see the one thing that could just save me. I look around me at Mormonism and see the same thing Emmet saw:
What I see are people inspired by each other, and by you. People taking what you made and making something new out of it.
I see so much hope in Mormonism. I see great possibilities. And I want to be around when those possibilities turn into realities.
Mormonism may be made up, but that doesn’t mean we can’t take the bricks of truth that lie all around us and make something new and wonderful out of it.
James Patterson
James Patterson lives with his wife and two children in North Carolina. He makes no apologies for being an avid fan of both Duke basketball and Taylor Swift.
All posts by James Patterson
Thanks James for the insights. I hope you are able to make it work.
To continue with the metaphor, in present-day mormonism, the Lord Businesses and Good Cop/Bad Cops of the church are still in the early part of the movie, spraying kragle over everyone, trying to create a perfect, one-size-fits-all mormonism, viewing any master builders as threats to be destroyed and purged. It’s possible to create your own individual Princess Unikitty land, but at any moment Good Cop/Bad Cop could swoop in and destroy it.
When you watch the movie through a Mormon lens, it kind of gets creepy, doesn’t it?
Completely beautiful James. Thank you for this. This post is going into my "Bookmarks" to be revisited and shared. Much love to you my friend!
Thanks, Jeralee!
I enjoyed this. And I wonder if this is the paradigm that will allow Mormonism to continue forward. I have a hunch that your new non literal belief system of nuanced “truth” makes the religion sustainable, otherwise, where do the former literal believers (like us) go but through the exit door (along with our tithing monies). We see the church already backing away from a literal translation claim of the book of Abraham by using words like “catalyst” which is a foreshadowing of how things will be spun with regard to the BoM and other things taught as literal today. My hunch is that the correlation committee is already working toward this end. Uchtdorf forever propped open the door of an ongoing restoration last GC warning us not to “sleep through the restoration” and ultimately reminding us that the brethren can always adjust the narrative to fit their/our activity needs. Who knows, maybe 30 years from now, the majority of church membership views truth as less tangible and more beautiful as you so succinctly wrote…I sure hope so.
I love your comment, Russ. Thanks.
I just recorded a podcast last night for A Thoughtful Faith with Carl Youngblood where we talked about these very issues. Stay tuned it should be coming out some time next week!
“Completely verifiable facts can always be combined into narratives that produce false ideas. We call this propaganda. Conversely, acknowledged fictions can be assembled into narratives that convey profound – and true – insights to those who read them. We call this, among other things, great literature…Just because something happened does not make it morally instructive, just because it never happened does not mean it is not true.”
Dr Michael Austin, “Re-reading Job,” pg 19,20
Very well done.
Everything about this post is awesome! (somebody had to say it 😉 )
These are great insights. There are times when I want or need it to be more true than this, but when I’m frustrated I fall back to this solid floor: even if it’s made up, it’s still true. That gives me something to stand on while I figure out what to do about the rest of the house.
Thank you. Today was becoming a painful wrestle in my head and heart. Reading your words stopped the war.
One of my struggles for a long time has been that I don’t want to let go because I believe it can be made true. Even if all the underpinnings, plates, rituals, etc. are man made they do lay a strong opportunity for us to move into a more Christlike loving way. 3rd Nephi 18 has powerful words about inclusion that can be used to redirect the stream, put aside old failures and step forward.
I don’t know if church leadership sees it the way you and I do, but today you kept me from impaling myself on my breaking heart. Thanks.
Fabulous post James. I loved it.
In all honesty, I think that finding great value and inspiration in thoroughly racist texts such as the Book of Mormon and the Book of Abraham to be incredibly problematic.
James, you wrote, "Mormonism is about you. It’s about me. It’s about our relationship to each other. Our relationship to the universe."
Nope. Mormonism is about money. It's about continuing a massive fraud perpetrated by a 19th century professional con artist in an effort to continue paying massive salaries to the hundreds of General Authorities. Are you aware of the fact that most of the Apostles have multiple homes? Thomas Monson has FOUR homes.
The Mormon Church is no more "true" than Brian Mitchell is Elizabeth Smart's REAL husband.
Many Apostles have multiple homes because of the jobs they had before becoming apostles. For example, Elder Nelson was a cardiac surgeon so, yes, he has more than one home. The “massive salary” of an Apostle is almost always a massive pay cut compared to their former employ, but being a General Authority in such a position becomes your new life; no time for a job.
It’s hilarious that you’re suggesting that tithing money goes to pay for a General Authority’s extravagant lifestyle. If you’re gonna hate, take a cue from the authors on this site and at least do a little bit of research.
I am comfortable with the imperfect journey toward perfection that we are all making. One dictionary defines perfection as a “process of improving something until it is faultless or as faultless as possible.” In regards to our church history, the more we learn about it and share what we find, the more “faultless” or accurate it becomes. That’s why I titled my book “The Development of Temple Doctrine” … it only covers what took place during Wilford Woodruff’s lifetime, but reading his perspective of the imperfect process that began in the 1830s certainly helped me understand the current practices and the changes that have occurred during my lifetime. He embraced the necessary “process of improvement” and contributed to that process. I hope to do the same.
Thank you for sharing James.
I am comfortable with the imperfect journey toward perfection that we are all making. One dictionary defines perfection as a “process of improving something until it is faultless or as faultless as possible.” In regards to our church history, the more we learn about it and share what we find, the more “faultless” or accurate it becomes. That’s why I titled my book “The Development of Temple Doctrine” … it only covers what took place during Wilford Woodruff’s lifetime, but reading his perspective of the imperfect process that began in the 1830s certainly helped me understand the current practices and the changes that have occurred during my lifetime. He embraced the necessary “process of improvement” and contributed to that process. I hope to do the same.
Very thoughtful. Thank you!
Sir: you said "The prophecy is made up. But it’s also true."
In the pretzel logic required to make Mormonism true … I'm trying to figure out which part of language you are using: Adjective, adverb or verb?
Let's examine this prophecy: "During the third and final appearance, the angel came with a drawn sword, threatening Joseph with destruction unless he went forward and obeyed the commandment fully." (See Brian C. Hales, “Encouraging Joseph Smith to Practice Plural Marriage: The Accounts of the Angel with a Drawn Sword,” Mormon Historical Studies 11, no. 2 (Fall 2010): 69–70 – see https://www.lds.org/topics/plural-marriage-in-kirtland-and-nauvoo)
Checking the antonyms it seems much more likely that it's true that Mormonism is untrue, false or fallacious. So in this regard… Mormonism is true!
Somehow it feels like a Jedi mind trap?
true
Pronunciation: tro͞o
ADJECTIVE
adjective: true; comparative adjective: truer; superlative adjective: truest
1. in accordance with fact or reality.
"a true story"
synonyms: correct, accurate, right, verifiable, in accordance with the facts, what actually/really happened, well documented, the case, so; More
antonyms: untrue, false, fallacious
rightly or strictly so called; genuine.
"people are still willing to pay for true craftsmanship"
synonyms: genuine, authentic, real, actual, bona fide, proper; More
antonyms: bogus, phony, de facto, insincere, feigned
real or actual.
"he has guessed my true intentions"
said when conceding a point in argument or discussion.
"true, it faced north, but you got used to that"
2. accurate or exact.
"it was a true depiction"
synonyms: accurate, true to life, faithful, telling it like it is, fact-based, realistic, close, lifelike
"a true reflection of life in the 50s"
antonyms: inaccurate
(of a note) exactly in tune.
(of a compass bearing) measured relative to true north.
"steer 085 degrees true"
correctly positioned, balanced, or aligned; upright or level.
3. loyal or faithful.
"he was a true friend"
synonyms: loyal, faithful, constant, devoted, staunch, steadfast, true-blue, unswerving, unwavering; More
antonyms: disloyal, faithless
accurately conforming to (a standard or expectation); faithful to.
"this entirely new production remains true to the essence of Lorca's play"
4. archaic
honest.
"we appeal to all good men and true to rally to us"
ADVERB
adverb: true
1.literary
truly.
"Hobson spoke truer than he knew"
2. accurately or without variation.
VERB
verb: true; 3rd person present: trues; past tense: trued; past participle: trued; gerund or present participle: truing; gerund or present participle: trueing
1. bring (an object, wheel, or other construction) into the exact shape, alignment, or position required.
Mike,
So Mike, do you believe that the church will ever adopt this way of thinking? More specifically, do you see a time when the prophet will state that the BoM may not be historically true but it’s precepts are true and eternal, or something to that effect?
Mike,
So Mike, can the LDS church adopt this way of thinking? Do you believe you will ever hear the prophet acknowledge that the BoM may not be historically true but yet still scripture with eternally true precepts?
Not in our life time, Russ
Because the Church leaders are just TOO EVIL to tell the truth. Probably busy drinking the blood of babies or something.
This is an odd piece of writing and logic. I don't even think the Mormon hierarchy would agree with any of your summations. They all say 'The Church is either true or it ain't." And the bottom line, it just ain't.
I LOVE this! Thank you so much for writing it.
I like very much what you’ve written, but I’m sure everyone has noticed that if ‘the prophecy is made up, but it’s still true’, we’ve taken quite a step down from prior claims of divine and perfect truth, and of an inspiration surpassing even that of the Bible.
Moreover, couldn’t we say, ‘It may be made up… but it’s still true’ of any book or myth that inspires us? and if we can’t assert an absolute claim for the BofM in this paradigm, then do we have any reason not to think we may just outgrow it, or gravitate toward another ‘true story’? …especially once we’ve admitted that Joseph Smith (a man whose life does not seem to have been as exemplary as we previously thought) “created it out of whole cloth”.
Why should i not prefer Dostoevsky to Smith? or St Isaac the Syrian to Smith? or Shakespeare to Smith? or even science to Smith? What it comes down to (and it’s always this, isn’t it?— but now, no longer more than this)— is that the community in which I grew up and still live takes Smith’s book as its guide, and therefore this book is the focus of shared meaning for an important part of my world. But now it is suddenly no more than this. And if we look at the book this way, doesn’t it seem that even our community has lost its center? Or at least that we’ve lost much of the rationale for our attachment to that center?
Actually I find this essay very stimulating because it’s an argument I sometimes use, myself, in discussing the truth of the Bible, which is something i like to do. And there are so many issues compact here. Historicity is only one of them, but let’s use it an example: If the point of the book is that things actually happened thus and so, and if in fact they didn’t “actually happen thus and so”, then to insist in the face of proof to the contrary that they did, is delusional. And when “faith” is shown to be delusional, intelligent people cast it away. Or at least abandon the claim to historicity and find value in the text on other grounds— the very move proposed here. But what are the implications?
The historicity of the Bible was, after all, our own assumption— at first naive, perhaps, but later narrow and programmatic. Anyone who has read how the ancients understood and taught the Scriptures knows that what we call the “literal” approach was only one of several that might be practiced by the same writer. It seems that only with the rise of scientific history did anyone start insisting on the “literal” truth as the defining truth of the biblical texts. So if in the end the assumption of historicity has proven false, this shows only that the problem was never more than ours; it was not the Bible’s, for the Bible doesn’t particularly claim to be historical. It never existed to teach history or cosmology, but only to teach about history or cosmology. But how deeply does the claim of historicity actually go to the essence of the BofM? I think historicity is more of a problem there, because the BofM has always been put forth explicitly under the rubric of “this is what actually happened”, and we were even told, “this is how Smith came to put it forth; these are real ancient records”— and now, as it turns out, neither the events in the book, nor the claims for its origin seem to have been “how it actually happened”. As it turns out, Smith did in fact “make it up out of whole cloth”, whatever significance we may see in that.
But what we’re left with is an author, not a “translator”. Perhaps, if you like, he was a “prophet, seer, and revelator”, but he was such no longer in the sense once claimed and believed by all Mormons everywhere. He was only an author, and one with some pretty major character flaws. As it turns out.
The historicity fails, and the author is questionable. Yet despite all this, the book, and the myths surrounding it (none of which are so true as we were taught)— have served as a defining myth for a whole American subculture, to which people from all of the world have hitched their wagons, as well. And in this context you say, “It’s still true because it’s still my language… still my culture. It’s how I am most comfortable reaching through the vastness of eternity and space and time to try to communicate with the divine.” As it is for many. But— as it now turns out— this language of mine, this approach to the divine, is based only on a book, only on a “myth”, in which I “can still find great value”— but it was written only by “well-intentioned people doing their best”… and I can regard it no longer, really, as God’s own words. Which is a serious loss!
In view of all this, it seems mistaken and in fact impossible to try to insist any more, “You must accept and believe this; your life and your salvation depend on it— objectively!” We can only say, “Try it; you might like it.” We can no longer say, “This actually happened, this is real history, and therefore the world is really like this, as history shows.” For we know that not one single Native American language is even remotely related to Hebrew, nor one single strand of Native American DNA to the Hebrews themselves. Therefore, we can only say, “This is a story about ‘Israel’s lost tribes’; it’s just a story, but there are some good lessons for living here, and a group of us have been trying for 175 years now to apply them— won’t you join us!”
Such a missionary approach seems a little weak, if you ask me.
With the Bible, the assertion that “it happened exactly thus and so” was never much of the story; I’m not sure it applies to anything but the resurrection itself, and then only with careful qualification. Otherwise, things may or may not have happened as stated, but whether they did nor not was not itself the point. And even from Genesis 1 there’s already an awareness of myth; in fact we now know that Genesis was composed in dialogue with other myths in the ancient world. The very first word of Genesis, “b’reshith”— usually translated magisterially as “In The Beginning”— actually lacks a definite article and therefore could equally be rendered, ‘As a beginning’, or ‘To start with’, or even: ‘One way of starting the story is this…’. Thus the Bible begins by inviting people to a consideration precisely of myth, and of the power of myth in the community that tells it. Significantly, Genesis begins with obvious myths, not with (say) the Exodus, or King David, or any other historical(?) event as such; and in fact there are no fewer than seven different myths of “the beginning” in the Bible as a whole. (My favorite is Ps 74.13, “You split the sea by your might; you smashed the heads of the dragons upon the waters”— a allusion simultaneously to Marduk and Exodus.)
What you’ve done in this essay is to say sever the BofM from any claim of historicity. It has no value and will have no value as an archaeological field guide.
But if the BofM is just a book, a ‘myth’, then the question is open and indeed all the more pressing as to what kind of book it is, what kind of vision it puts forth, and what kind of god it proposes we worship. What kind of life does it ask us to live? The same can be asked of the Bible, the Qur’an, or the Rg Veda. What does ‘faith’ mean— or rather, what kind of faith does it call us to? Alma’s unforgiving and, frankly, brutal authoritarianism toward Korihor is certainly threatening, but not really all that impressive to anyone who has more social options than Korihor did; Alma’s subsequent discussion of what faith is, with the Zoramite outcasts in Alma 32, is not altogether impressive either. Is ‘faith’ really to be manufactured like that? Can an educated urbanite in Berkeley or Kampala in 2015 even do so, in the same way that a relatively uneducated pioneer could, in Kirtland in 1835, or Deseret in 1860? The assumption of historicity in either the Bible or the BofM depended on actual ignorance of history. How much does the call to faith in either book depend on ignorance as well?
The Bible is a vast and sprawling book penned by the greatest geniuses of an entire civilization over a period of more than 1000 years; its subtleties are measureless, and even the history of its reception down through the millennia (it seems we’re at the start of the fourth) is drowningly deep. The particular historicity of any of its myriads of text-units has to be assessed on a case-by-case basis, but in the long run, such studies only end up securing its own character not so much as a history of Israel’s experience with her God, as above all a reflection on that history. So it uses history as far as useful to tell its story, but it does not primarily report history. Once we understand that, the question of historicity remains interesting, but secondary. In this line, it’s significant that the books we westerners tend regard as “historical”— Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings— are known as the “Former Prophets” to the Hebrews. Those books were never intended as history per se, but as God’s point of view about Israel’s behavior in history. When considering the BofM, we may find in this analogy helpful, except that it is sheer fiction, based on no history at all. Still, as any novel may be insightful, the BofM may seem insightful as well.
Yet if the Bible and the BofM are only books, then they belong most decidedly to the field of “comparative literature”, and positively demand to be compared. And in the end, what is the behavior, the response, to which Jeremiah, or rather, Jesus calls Israel? What is the faith, the behavior, to which Alma calls the Zoramites? And how do these views on faith compare? These are all new questions, and potentially painful and bewildering ones, too.
Historicity is only one of the issues that come to the fore when we take seriously all the new “revelations” about Smith and his books. But if we have settled matters in the way outlined in your article, then like the Lego movie that you discuss above, or like any novel we might pick up, we must acknowledge that, while we can approach the various scriptures naively, as children, still, as fairly sophisticated grown-ups we are bound to ask what kinds of social and spiritual attitudes and behaviors they promote. How trustworthy, and how deep, were the teachers who wrote them and who appear in them?
I think the idea that “the prophecy is made up, but it’s also true” is enormously helpful as we try to work through all the facts that have come to light about Smith and his books. Exchanging historicity for myth can help us to appreciate the book within the community that uses it. But to assert that it was “made up by well-intentioned people doing their best at grasping toward this thing we call “God” and attempting to put it in relatable, human language”— is to raise a serious question, one that actually had an answer before, but now does not: Does God himself ever speak directly, in his own voice as it were, in any scripture? Is there a “word of God” written anywhere? Or is it only a case of “well-intentioned people doing their best” and, frankly, sometimes failing, so that the best I’m left with is a human book and my own private ‘witness’? Weren’t the Scriptures meant to be God’s word, not man’s word— and to be so, objectively? Haven’t we renounced precisely that by admitting that “the prophecy is made up” by “well-intentioned but fallible people”?
I thought it was beautiful. While I will never go back to the church, I have kept the good parts and practice them. I can still love parts of the scriptures because experimenting has taught me that they are teaching truth. I have picked up the bricks of truth around me and made a new life that I can feel good about.
Seems like this only makes sense if you're also willing to concede that all other made-up beliefs systems are also "true". And invest in them as well. How much time you got?
Daniel, I don’t think I said anywhere in there that one must invest in all belief systems in order to find truth. I made it pretty explicit that Mormonism contains a set of symbols and sacraments that, despite my loss of literal belief, still help me feel connected to the divine.
And I am fully willing to concede that other “made-up” belief systems are true. They are true inasmuch as they provide value to their followers.
So, in other words, EVERYTHING is both true and untrue… to everyone… and no one.
I'll give $20 to the first True Believing Mormon who can answer this simple question,
"Was there ever a law that allowed a man to claim another man's wife as his own?"
If so, prove it.
If not, then why continue singing the praises of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young, who stole other men's wives and children, like Zina Jacobs, wife of Henry Jacobs, for the sole purpose of making babies with them, in clear violation of the law of the land, 2 of the 10 Commandments and all 5 of the requirements of the LAW of the Priesthood (D&C132:61) making them both adulterers and sexual predators no better than Warren Jeffs, the Fundamentalist Mormon PRofit who's rotting in jail for the rest of his life on multiple child rape convictions?
Bonus of $20 if you can explain why you claim as your God, a fully engorged, Pagan Egyptian Phalic God named Min, as depicted in Figure 7, Fax 2, BoA. Doesn't that violate another one of God's commandments against worshipping other Gods besides the God of Abraham?
So what's that 3 out of 10 of God's commandments I'd have to break to buy Joseph's Myth?
Thanks but no thanks.
I'd rather piss off the God of Joseph's Myth than the God of Abraham.
If you replace the author's use of True, with valuable, then it makes more sense. For me, this seems to be the point of the article
Mormonism may be made up, but it's still valuable.
As a social structure, there is certainly value in Mormonism. However, the TRUE claim is not valuable. Using the author's argument, the truthfulness of Mormonism is in it's value to the members. This creates the corollary that the most TRUE organization would be the one that was the most VALUABLE and this is where it fails.
If it is all made up, then the ordinances have no value other than social bonding. They are not 'saving ordinances' but merely the group criteria. They are not critical to anything other than entrance to the community.
So, the question becomes is belonging to the Mormon community more valuable than any other community? Is the price of entrance worth the value obtained?
Mormonism is considered a 'high-cost' religion. It takes a tremendous amount of money and energy to be a faithful member. If it is 'made up', with no extra reward (celestial kingdom) is it worth the cost? Is the value greater than the price?
I agree. I found myself thinking “valuable” each time the author used the word “true.” It doesn’t make much sense to describe a religion as “true.” All religions are man made. They obviously exist. In those senses, they are real and “true.” But when Mormons use the word “true” in describing their church, they presumably mean that the church is the only religion that enables people to go to the highest heaven, to put it simply.
I think the author’s use of the word “true” rather than words like valuable, useful, etc., is not helpful. It further erodes the meaning of the word. It gives NOMs like the author a way to keep using the same words “I know the church is true” while meaning something entirely different than what most active church members would understand. It creates more confusion.
In the Lego movie, the prophecy was rather simple and straightforward: “You’re the special.” When the particular prophecy turned out to be made up, this didn’t negate the fact that Emmett, along with everyone else, is naturally “special.” That is true in an objective sense: he is a unique individual not wholly identical with any other person that has ever lived. The truth claims of Mormonism, on the other hand, are not nearly so simple and straightforward. They stand for propositions of historical, scientific, and philosophical “fact” that simply do not square with reality. It is misleading to continue to describe such a system as “true,” when what you really mean is “valuable” or “useful to me.”
That word "True" … I don't think it means what you think it means … if truth is what you're saying it is, then reading DUNE or Harry Potter is just as valuable as reading the Book of Mormon … and on top of that, how can you feel like you have any personal integrity when you pledge (as you MUST as a member in good standing) that you have a testimony of Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, and all the other trappings of membership?
John, I make no such pledges as a part of my church membership.
I admire your courage in posting this, and your intelligence that has allowed you to peek behind the curtain and see the wizard for what he is. I too loved the Lego Movie, for many of the same reasons. However, the mental gymnastics in your essay are tough for me to swallow.
To me, the question isn’t, Is there anything valuable and truthy in Mormonism? Sure there is.
The question is, Is the church what it says it is? No, it is not. Can I trust it to guide me in making crucial decisions in my ever-shortening life? No, I can’t.
No matter how you slice it, the Mormon church has not been honest with you. It demands your loyalty, time, money, talents, even life if necessary. But it has not reciprocated.
What you’re describing here, unfortunately, is the Church of James Patterson. I like this church, I think it has a lot of potential, but it is not the Mormon Church. And the beautiful thing is, you could transpose the Church of James Patterson into any other belief system, and still find Truth and Value there. There are deeper truths that Mormonism allows you to tap into, but that does not mean it deserves your loyalty or trust.
You’ve figured out the first half of the most important question: is it true? The second half is much more thrilling and terrifying: what comes next?
Maybe you can make this format work for you. My guess is that soon you will recognize the intellectual and spiritual compromises this format demands from you, and you will go searching for something more authentic and honest. Many friend await to walk beside you on that journey. Best wishes.
When I was confronting my diminishing testimony I found myself often singing “Dare to Do Right” and “Do What is Right, Let the Consequence Follow.” Only, for the first time in my life I was allowing my own conscience to be my guide. I realized that for me, the only possible reason I would ever live my life based on the (what seemed to me) faulty morals of the church (over-emphasis on obedience, distrust and even hatred toward people who are different, sexual puritanism, blind conservatism, etc) was if I believed that the church was True and that I did not understand God’s purposes. Once I acknowledged that the church was not what it claimed to be it did not feel “right” to bend my obedience to men who both make mistakes regularly and live in a system where they are not accountable for those mistakes but where I am accountable for not following them into those mistakes.
Acknowledging that there are good and comfortable things about the church, that you are not ready to give up on the church for your own reasons and even acknowledging that the church could be worth reforming is one thing. Creating a model in which the church gets to continue to be “true” (which is really comfortable for the church) without acknowledging that the church didn’t just encourage you to be great – it flat out told and tells you that many great people in the world are not and that if you don’t treat those people as not-great then you are also not great – well that just feels false.
There is so much that is wrong with this post….but I’ll focus on one statement that pretty much sums it up:
“Mormonism can be as true as I allow it to be, even despite problems with historicity and translation and prophetic mantles.”
Yes, mormonism can be as true as you want it to be…and as true as a 5 year old wants Santa to be….and as true as the abominable snowman….and as true as the Easter bunny…and as true as the the tooth fairy. This statement is absurd. The problem is that you cannot separate the historical from the spiritual…it is all one in the same with mormonism. It is intertwined. It is woven together. When I see posts like this I feel sorry…sorry that you cannot separate yourself from something that you have already determined to not actually be true….something that causes you to have to fabricate “truth” to stick around. I feel sorry that fear holds you back from actually seeking out real truth and instead clinging to lies that have been perpetuated now for close to 2 centuries.
And once he breaks free of that fear, he can stop clinging to lies and start clinging to hate and join with you, taking the Church down one interweb post at a time. Excelsior!!
“Almost all lies are acts, and speech has no part in them. I am speaking of the lie of silent assertion; we can tell it without saying a word. For example: It would not be possible for a humane and intelligent person to invent a rational excuse for slavery; yet you will remember that in the early days of emancipation agitation in the North, the agitators got but small help or countenance from anyone. Argue, plead and pray as they might, they could not break the universal stillness that reigned, from the pulpit and press all the way down to the bottom of society–the clammy stillness created and maintained by the lie of silent assertion; the silent assertion that there wasn’t anything going on in which humane and intelligent people were interested.
“The universal conspiracy of the silent-assertion-lie is hard at work always and everywhere, and always in the interest of a stupidity or sham, never in the interest of a thing fine or respectable. It is the most timid and shabbiest of all lies…the silent assertion that nothing is going on which fair and intelligent men and women are aware of and are engaged by their duty to try to stop.” Mark Twain
I believe in Christ. I believe in divine revelation and inspiration. Man does not comprehend all that God does. Each individual has a unique and personal pathway back to Him. Respect and love one another. Forgive and forget. Save the critiques and criticisms for your own life. Many religions believe things foreign to us or are just plain foolish in our eyes. If you leave the church, learn to leave the church alone. If you’re not building up, you’re tearing down. For those who’ve lost the faith, what do you replace it with that is so perfect and free of flaws?
"So, Mormonism may all just be made up. But it’s still true.
I don’t mean that flippantly. And I certainly don’t mean it to diminish the pain caused by Mormonism turning out to be not quite what someone thought it was. Believe me, I recognize the pain there."
James, have you recognized the pain of Emma Smith? How she was lied to? How painful it was to find her husband with a young girl in a barn? How painful it was to have him marrying up to 40 other women without her knowledge or consent?
Have you recognized the pain of generations of women who have lived in polygamy and those children who were raised in this system that lived without a present father? My great, great grandfather had 23 wives and I am certain that the vast majority of them felt neglected and abandoned at some level.
How about my pain, where my extended family refused my request to speak at my Mother's funeral because I chose to leave a religion that has lied to me. Can you measure my pain?
It does seem flippant to me and you may choose to stay in church that has lied to you, but please don't diminish us who chosen to walk away because we do not want to hand over our money to an organization that has lied to us.
So, Mormonism may all just be made up. But it’s still true.
The core morals, ethics, teachings that ring true can be found in hundreds of other religious organizations and even in secular philosophies. Why stay in one that was founded on lies?
It’s true because it’s still a part of your language:
The language of Mormonism held slaves, sold slaves, and kept blacks in a diminished status until 1978. It forced teenagers and married women into marriage with a flaming sword and promises of eternal damnation if not adhered to. Even today, the Mormon language gives more power to a 12 year old boy than a Grandmother of 40 grandchildren.
You might look around with your view and see a mess.
The mess you see now will only get messier. The possibilities will be fewer. And then what will you do with your new found truth?
I have read this article multiple times….and the more I read it the more angry it makes me.when you “strip away the dogma, and the rote practices, and the cultural baggage” the only thing left is not mormonism..
it is nothing more than you would find in any other religion….it is not unique. All that makes mormonism unique is being proven false time and time again. All that makes mormonism unique will eventually be folk doctrine. All that makes mormonism unique has deeply affected so many minorities. You strip away all the uniqueness to make your mormonism worth it to you. Why don’t you simplify the process and leave mormonism and go actually find something unique and true elsewhere? Go find truth in places that weren’t founded on fraud and lies. This mindset of rationalizing away the harm that has been done to so many….not just a harm in finding out that we were lied to….but harm to gays, harm to women, harm to adolescents who were raised to think they were committing sins almost as bad as murder by masturbating, harm to blacks who were treated as the scum of the earth for so long…
It is this harm that you can’t just ignore. There are plenty of good organizations out there worthy of your support that haven’t caused this much harm to so many in the name of the lord. You can’t justify any of it. Yet you do.
If you want to get closer to the universe and understanding all the beauty that lies in it….then get away from the man made religious concepts. Go seek out your divine in a place that is not subject to the scrutiny of an organization that is not what it claims to be. There is so much beauty out there….you don’t need to rationalize and justify your way through life in mormonism to make it work
Hold on to that anger. Breath it. Bathe in it. Revel in it. Live by it and it alone.
I agree with you partly Brian. It is either true or it "ain't". I believe strongly it is true. James can not make the claim that is it is sorta true in a nice make believe way and can still be good for you.
The Church is true or it is false, there is no middle ground with the LDS church.
2+2=5. This mathematical equation might be made up but it is still true. The higher truth is in the missing one….you just have to Have Faith That It Is there. I like this because it resonates with me. I know mathematical truths might state that 2+2=4 but I choose to find new meaning in math that resonates with me. I don’t mean to be flippant but I understand that my superior math can harm the mathematical belief system of some. When you strip away all the dogmatic mathematical beliefs that have preceded our time here on earth you find something beautiful in realizing that 2+2 can equal 5 if you want it to be.
While I understand that this is where you're at in your journey, I think you're being disingenuous by writing this, to yourself, literal believers, and especially to the plight of those who discovered the fraud and left. Ask your stake president to read this post and then see if you still think this harmful corporation holds any value or truth for you when you're excommunicated for expressing public opinions that aren't in line with the brethren.
I can appreciate your perspective, and can empathize with your need to salvage value from something for which you and I have invested so much of our lives.
However, I have found that there is a paucity of spiritual nuggets in Mormonism. There are a few things, such as "Man is that he might have joy", and, well, can't think much of anything else. The BoM is pretty much a narrative of battles with a foundation of racist "white and delightsome" and "dark and loathsome" perspectives through out.
Why is it other literary works such as Kahlil Khalil Gibran's The Prophet has page after page of rich spiritual insights and it doesn't even claim to be divinely inspired?
I submit that any work, no matter how mediocre, can be used as a source of inspiration if we revere it enough and invest enough study searching for insights that may or may not exist.
Looking at your pathetic bitch-boy Utah face, I can see you are exactly the person who would say some bullshit like this. Dude, the church isn't true and it's not true. It's made-up and also philosophically fucked. It's based on the rape of little girls. There is no God and life is meaningless. Kill yourself.
James, are you SURE you want to stay a member? I mean, you could be hanging out with Garrett and this winner if you quit. I’ve already quit and I’m using inspired terms like bitch-boy and I’m LOVING IT!
I also found myself thinking “valuable” each time the author used the word “true.” It doesn’t make much sense to describe a religion as “true.” All religions are man made. They obviously exist. In those senses, they are real and “true.” But when Mormons use the word “true” in describing their church, they presumably mean that the church is the only religion that enables people to go to heaven, among other things. (It's already a rather loaded phrase–further ambiguity not necessary!)
I think the author’s use of the word “true” rather than words like valuable, useful, etc., is not helpful, but rather counterproductive. It further erodes the meaning of the word. It gives NOMs like the author a way to keep using the same words “I know the church is true” while meaning something entirely different than what most active church members would associate with that phrase. It creates more confusion. It is precisely this type of word dilution/elimination that "Big Brother" sought in the book "1984" as a means of thought control. The less words you have in your vocabulary, the less you are able to express yourself, and the less sophisticated are the concepts you are able to communicate. Besides, I can hardly conceive of a more perfect example of "doublethink" than describing the same thing simultaneously as both "made up" and "true."
In the Lego movie, the prophecy was rather simple and straightforward: “You’re the special.” When the particular prophecy turned out to be made up, this didn’t negate the fact that Emmett, along with everyone else, is naturally “special” in an objective sense: he is a unique individual not wholly identical with any other person that has ever lived. The truth claims of Mormonism, on the other hand, are not nearly so simple and straightforward. They stand for propositions of historical, scientific, and philosophical “fact” that simply do not square with reality. It is misleading to continue to describe such a system as “true,” when what you really mean is “valuable” or “useful [to me].”
Aaron, you’ve articulated my thoughts exactly. When my sweet mother says she “knows the church is true,” she’s not saying that “Yeah, it’s all made up, but there’s still practical truth buried within it.” When Thomas S Monson says “It’s true” (well, he actually doesn’t do much testifying, now does he?) . . . But when other general authorities say, “I know the church is true,” they are signaling the exact same thing as what my mother believes in her heart, beliefs with with she indoctrinated me, with the best of intentions, from my infancy: that the church and all of its various truth claims are True with a capital T. Literally, absolutely, salvationally true. They mean that they KNOW that every fictional event depicted in the Book of Mormon is factual, that God commanded Joseph Smith by angel with drawn sword to take 33 wives, that baptism into the Mormon church is required for every soul, living and dead, to return to God’s presence, that there will be angels standing at the veil waiting to check your signs, tokens,and secret name. They know that all of these things are the true meaning and purpose of life, that this is the straight and narrow path, the Great Plan of Salvation that was presented through Jehovah before the world was and is now being actualized by the Saints of the latter days.
This belief in the literalness of the church is why my mother pays 10% of her income to the church, is deathly afraid of the scourge of coffee, and waters her pillow every night pleading with God that her wayward son will return to the fold. My damaged relationships with family are the result of them taking literally–hook, line and sinker–the church and gospel EXACTLY how it was presented to them by authority figures. So to here someone say, “It’s made up, but it’s still true!” is, as you said, the quintessence of double speak.
I agree with James in the sense that there is value and utility in the Mormon church, and thus it persists. But let Thomas S Monson come out at next conference and say, “You know what guys? It’s not true in the absolute sense. There is no actual priesthood authority. We’re just regular guys like you, trying to figure out our relationship with the divine. We’re going to stop pretending, and going to join all of you at the table of brotherhood, and see what we can figure out together, see what’s worth keeping from our 185 years of peculiar history.”
If he says that, I’ll come running back to the church, not to join, but to welcome.
While others may believe I've "drunk the koolaid," I just wanted to let you know you're not alone with these beliefs.
James, I used to have great hopes for Mormonism, too. I was gay, and I knew I was gay from a very early age, it's just that in Mormonism and the society in general when I was growing up, 1960's and 1970's, it was really the only sane solution to hide being gay. So I did, and I lived as a straight Mormon man up until age 49, all the while hoping that the church would move ahead in respect to gays. It didn't, and so I came out and left the church, too. I think your hope is much like my life was, very altruistic. There is not much hope that the church will change significantly. It can't; it has systemic problems. I wish it could change, I wish it would change, and not just in regards to homosexuality. I wish it would change towards a less pharisaical church, but it doesn't. It has become more and more pharisaical, and there is no way of stopping its decline. Backfire effect people will "dig their heals in" and say my leaving, as so many are doing, is just evidence that the Lord is coming even sooner, that these really, really, really, are the last last days (as opposed to the last days at the time of Joseph Smith's prophecies or even the ancient apostles). How long will you wait for change? I waited as long as I could, but I couldn't suspend my life in limbo, even though I wanted to be changed from gay to hetero. Many Mormon leaders said I would be changed in the next life, so I almost tried that, too! Then, I learned, this life is more important than anything else (RE: The Railway Man, good movie, by the way). Don't wait too long.
Absolutely. I am often annoyed at the propensity of individuals to be imprecise in the language that they use. Ironically, his use of the term "true" is what most people mean (whether or not they realize it) when they bear testimony that they "know the Church is true" or "know Joseph Smith was a prophet of God". What they are really communicating is their deep feelings for these concepts or ideas. The ideas are appealing to them, they resonate with them as something they would like to be so, regardless of whether or not they are in fact so. It is the reason they get that special feeling they have been taught to attribute to the Spirit or Holy Ghost whey the experience something thing, hear something, see something, read something, or think about something which resonates with a deep longing, desire, or sense of goodness or what they view as being "the way things ought to be". It is why one person might feel the Spirit is telling them to marry someone and that someone feels the Spirit telling them no, they should not. Both experiences are valid and accurate and "true for them" but not "true" in the objective sense of the word. When something is subjectively "true" or "true for me" or "true for you" or "true for them" but not "true for everyone", it is because we are actually talking about ideals and preferences which resonate with us and our desires, not statements of objective fact.
I liked the post, I get what you are saying. I had a wake up moment in this movie as well… when they went into Emmett's brain and couldn't find one original thought. I felt that if someone were to look in my brain, that's what they would find. I've always just done what I was told, and believed what I was told, but since my husband left the church, I am now starting to realize I need to take some ownership and responsibility. Such a hard thing so many of us are going through in the church right now. Just flat out painful!
Honest questions from this–if you have answers, please share. So the Church is made up but “true/has value”–where do we go from here? How do I give tithes an offering to an organization that does good, but doesn’t need it when so many other good programs need it? How do I explain to family the priesthood ordinances they believe to be so vital to salvation are as useful as doing something in the name of Thor when they ask why I don’t frequent the temple (or that I have allowed my recommend to lapse because I’m not comfortable with the interview anymore)? Or that I taught my son not everyone needs to join the church, so a mission isn’t something he sure feel pressure to serve? How do I teach my children the advice of the prophet is as good as grandpas despite what they learn in primary? How do I seek eternal truth in scripture I now see 19th century fingerprints all over? Most important–how do I cling to my the “truth” of my religious culture while recognizing it’s strongest and most identifying characteristics (restoration, Revelation, and obedience)are not apart of that truth?
People cling to what doesn’t work when they don’t have an alternative that does. And you can’t take interest in something you don’t already at least see on your horizon. So you can end up feeling very stuck and alienated and at a loss for a long time! Others may offer alternatives, but it’s pointless, for example, for someone to say that “Eastern Orthodox Christianity”, or some such, contains the satisfying truth you’re looking for— unless you’re already inclined to look there. You’d just go Yep, uh-huh, thanx. Eastern Orthodoxy or Buddhism or whatever, there has to be a point of entry.
But without a point of entry, the exit is hard too. It’s hard enough to leave an outgrown faith when you’re pretty much the only one who had it in the first place, but it’s especially hard when you no longer accord with an intensively community-oriented worldview in which you were totally immersed. The less you buy it the more isolated you feel. Many, many people in Utah live halfway out the door of “the Church” because they can no longer really believe but can’t bear to be separate from their families, and nothing else is more compelling, nor seems to make a greater claim on them. Jesus says, Whoever loves father and mother more than me is not worthy of me, and we might be willing to follow him ‘outside the city’ (as the letter to the Hebrews says)— but what do we do when the only Jesus we know is the one we learned of in the context we’d leave behind if we knew where else to go?
A lot of people end up just leaving behind the organized church and try to come up with truth the best they can on their own. We’ve all met them— they might be admirable, but there’s always something a little off-balance or idiosyncratic about their approach. You find yourself saying, “Well, if it works for them, fine”— but you can’t quite go there yourself. You’d like a community; you’d like to be part of something bigger than yourself; you’d like to have the certainty of something that really has worked, and really has transformed people, and really has raised up balanced and holy men and women— since the beginning of time. But where do you find it?
I think with kids you have to be honest, because they know when you’re lying to them. If that means to say you’re no longer comfortable with the temple interview process, then it means to say you’re no longer comfortable with it, and why. Those will be honest conversations, and they will push you. They will likely end up not comfortable with it either, but is that a bad thing? Maybe they will be the ones whose courage and curiosity will find the lost path.
It probably won’t last. You’re on the slippery slope to leaving the church altogether. I don’t think mormonism is a thing you can do half-assed. I certainly wasn’t able to – not that I tried. All the nice things that Mormons do are – surprise – also done by non-Mormons. The only thing truly unique about Mormons is their doctrine. Now that you think it’s made up, you’ll find little reason to stay. You can find better things to do with your time and money than go to church for hours a week and pay tithing.
Look, what I really want to say is:
Sack up, man. Stand up for what you *actually* believe in. If you think Mormonism is incorrect, don’t look for bullshit ways to make yourself feel better – like redefining the word “true.” Don’t stick around just because it’s your convenient “language.” Learn a new damn language (try science!). Don’t let habit stop you from living with integrity. It’s the only life you’ve got.
RCB,
Just realized how old this is…
RCB,
all good RCB, the conversation, and the issues, continue after all. what was your story? how long did you try/did it work? I know some people who have tried decades and can’t get it right, and others who tried a few months before (they say) they found balance. Please share your experience!
theflyingmouseman,
Not totally sure what you mean by “try,” here. Try what?
As for my leaving the church: I began doubting the veracity of the church about half way through high school, and was mentally checked out by the time I went to college. Not going to BYU or a mission sealed the deal. Admittedly, I was probably too young to make those kind of decisions (although I wasn’t a complete moron). On the other hand, lots of big decisions DO happen early in life. Had I done what family and church wanted me to do (go to BYU, go on a mission, get temple-married, etc.), I wouldn’t have been any better positioned to make unbiased decisions – just more ingrained.
If it matters, I consider myself an atheist/agnostic now.
RCB,
I see. By “try” I meant attempting to live “the truth” in Mormonism as the OP talked about after realizing the Church isn’t what it claims to be. From your comment, I assumed you were like many on here, who’ve been trying/tried to make a go of it for family/work reasons from an agnostic view point–it is after all, our culture and tribe. It sounds like you rejected that early on rather than attempt to make it work. (that’s not a judgment; in some ways I’m envious of those who can separate themselves. It’s just not something all of us have been able to do so looking for universal truths is how we manage.)
theflyingmouseman,
Mouseman –
Yeah, I left pretty early. I didn’t have a temple marriage or kids in the church or a calling or an exclusively Mormon social network. I can imagine that it’s much harder for people under those conditions.
Joseph Smith fought polygamy. Search for the Price's book by the same name and see the evidence.
Joseph Smith fought polygamy. Search for the Price's book by the same name and see the evidence.