The Mormon church's publication of a series of essays on problematic areas of history and doctrine provides a disturbing picture if you look beyond the surface. Links to these essays along with critical analyses can be found on the MormonThink website. The essays are part of a trend toward greater transparency and have been welcomed by many Mormon critics. However an obvious question is, why was a church that claims devotion to truth not being transparent all along? That the information in these essays has been widely available elsewhere online forced the church to address the issues from their perspective. This has forever robbed them of the opportunity to demonstrate that they would have been transparent of their own volition. All indications from past history indicate that they would have continued to obfuscate and mislead if they had not been caught doing it. This is hardly what one would expect from a church claiming to be the one true church.
While it would be difficult to prove that the church has outright lied, examples of purposefully hiding embarrassing information or at least making it very difficult to find are quite easy to demonstrate. For example, the first manual in the "Teachings of the Presidents of the Church" series covering Brigham Young, first published in 1997, made no mention at all of any of his wives but the first. Another example involves the Book of Abraham papyrus. I first heard from an Evangelical Christian coworker around the year 2001 that the papyrus from which the Book of Abraham had been "translated" was found in the New York Metropolitan Museum and sold to the church in 1967. After examination by Egyptologists, it was found to be a common Egyptian funerary text that had nothing to do with Abraham. As a senior in high school in 1981, I was taught in seminary that this papyrus had been destroyed in the Great Chicago Fire. I was certain that my coworker was wrong about the 1967 discovery until I confirmed this information on pro-Mormon apologetic websites. The information itself did not bother me nearly as much as the cover up. At some level someone who knew better chose to keep this information out of the seminary curriculum. I do not think my seminary teacher was the one being dishonest in this case.
I learned about another instance of a cover up at a high level while listening to John Dehlin interview Sandra Tanner on Episode 473 of the Mormon Stories Podcast. Sandra and her husband Jerald met with the Apostle LeGrande Richards to explore his grandfather's journal entries that supposedly contemporaneously verified certain aspects of Joseph Smith's First Vision story. All Richards produced was a page of typed quotes that he could have just typed himself. They asked to see the original documents and he reluctantly showed them the microfiche in the library so quickly that they could not see the context. Later they went back to the library on their own and found that the card catalog entry for this microfiche had been removed. Fortunately, a helpful librarian remembered how to find it. When they found the relevant entries they discovered that they were from 1875, some 55 years after the First Vision is purported to have happened and 31 years after the death of Joseph Smith. Richards' obvious impatience and irritation with them indicates that he likely knew full well the context of these entries, but chose deliberately to hide this information.
Perhaps the publication of these essays is a step in the right direction, but they fall far short of undoing the damage that has already been done. Regardless of how open the church becomes now, it cannot make up for the excommunications and broken families that resulted from members holding views and revealing information that the church now admits was true all along. The church offers no apologies for past coverups or for excommunicating many of the scholars who first brought this information to light. The essays are anonymous compositions produced by committee, as revealed by assistant church historian, Richard Turley, in a recent RadioWest show hosted by Doug Fabrizio. Turley also admitted that the essays were deliberately made difficult to find for the casual browser of the church's website. The idea is to address these issues for those already aware of them while not creating an issue for those currently unaware. The essays seem to be as much an attempt to deflect criticism about lack of transparency as to address the specific issues. Some of the wording is misleading, such as stating that Joseph Smith was married to Helen Mar Kimball "several
months before her 15th birthday" rather than just saying she was 14.
Turley stated that he was not in favor of this particular wording, but it was inserted
during the committee editing process.
There are various opinions about whether these essays address the issues effectively. They do seem to satisfy some believers, while critics have expressed both vindication that this information is finally out there from an official source and disappointment about the particular slant and omissions. Another reaction has been disillusionment on the part of believers who were completely unaware of some of the information contained in the essays, especially Joseph Smith's marriage to a 14-year-old girl and his practice of polyandry (marrying other men's wives). For those in this category, some apologists have blamed the victims saying that it is their own fault that they were not better informed before now. However, the disillusioned members previous ignorance may only indicate that they were particularly good at following the counsel of their church leaders to avoid reading things about the church from unofficial sources. Blaming them for not knowing is rather calloused and uncharitable.
The anonymity of the essays follows the recent pattern of the highest church leaders' unwillingness to address issues directly and authoritatively. There has been no comment at all to the general membership or the media by any one in the First Presidency or Quorum of the Twelve. This is similar to other recent events, such as the excommunication of Kate Kelly where communication came only from a young representative of the PR department. The highest authorities have been unwilling to give these essays their official stamp of approval. This contrasts sharply with recent statements by Pope Francis who has acknowledged Catholic acceptance of evolution and the Big Bang Theory, and advocated for fair and compassionate treatment of gays.
For me, these essays are too little, too late. My former bishop helped to break up my family, and also made it clear that I was not welcome as a fully participating member given my unorthodox views, even though I kept these views to myself. These essays do nothing to heal the wounds the church has already inflicted on so many. Furthermore, they do not go far enough. While they do acknowledge that some of the criticism of the detractors has been valid, they seldom admit that the church or its leaders have ever been at fault. The essays are not dated, I think deliberately so. Once all the attention over their release from the fringe Mormon community dies down, I am guessing that they will conveniently forget their release dates and claim that the church has always been transparent. As Gordon B. Hinckley would say, "That's all behind us now."
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
Thursday, June 12, 2014
What Would Jesus's Church Do?
Two days ago news broke that two prominent Mormon church activists were facing excommunication: Kate Kelly for her roll in founding the Ordain Women movement that has drawn attention to gender inequality with their peaceful protests during General Conference, and John Dehlin, founder of Mormon Stories, for speaking out on issues facing the LGBT community. This news has quickly gone viral in several online communities. Dehlin posted the following quote on Facebook from Mormon founder, Joseph Smith.
"I did not like the old man being called up for erring in doctrine. It looks too much like the Methodist, and not like the Latter-day Saints. Methodists have creeds which a man must believe or be asked out of their church. I want the liberty of thinking and believing as I please. It feels so good not to be trammeled. It does not prove that a man is not a good man because he errs in doctrine."
-- Joseph Smith, History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, ed. B. H. Roberts, 2nd ed. rev. (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1957), 5:340.
In taking these actions, not only is the Mormon church at odds with its founder, but it is also at odds with Jesus himself who was far more inclusive in who he invited to be part of his movement than the modern Mormon church. In standing up for equal treatment of women and inclusion of the LGTB community Kelly and Dehlin are being called to task for behaving in a more Christlike way than the church itself.
Thirty-six years after the church belatedly revoked their racist priesthood policy by extending the priesthood to men of African descent they once again find themselves on the wrong side of history. Recently the church published this essay as one in a series to explain controversial or difficult issues. The essay admits that denying the priesthood to those of African descent was not doctrine, but due to the racist climate that prevailed when the policy went into effect. Once again the church has a chance to be proactive in extending equal rights more broadly, but once again they are failing and will have to be reactive when their current policies are no longer tolerable in the society at large.
Old Testaments prophets frequently spoke hard truths to those in power. As the moral voice of the people they put themselves at great risk to speak up for what they believed to be right regardless of the consequences. In taking a stand, Kelly and Dehlin are behaving more like prophets than are the leaders of the church, who claim to be prophets. The behavior of church leaders has been both immoral and cowardly. Immoral because they are seeking to punish people for advocating for the disenfranchised, and cowardly for not addressing the issues openly and directly themselves.
"I did not like the old man being called up for erring in doctrine. It looks too much like the Methodist, and not like the Latter-day Saints. Methodists have creeds which a man must believe or be asked out of their church. I want the liberty of thinking and believing as I please. It feels so good not to be trammeled. It does not prove that a man is not a good man because he errs in doctrine."
-- Joseph Smith, History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latterday Saints, ed. B. H. Roberts, 2nd ed. rev. (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1957), 5:340.
In taking these actions, not only is the Mormon church at odds with its founder, but it is also at odds with Jesus himself who was far more inclusive in who he invited to be part of his movement than the modern Mormon church. In standing up for equal treatment of women and inclusion of the LGTB community Kelly and Dehlin are being called to task for behaving in a more Christlike way than the church itself.
Thirty-six years after the church belatedly revoked their racist priesthood policy by extending the priesthood to men of African descent they once again find themselves on the wrong side of history. Recently the church published this essay as one in a series to explain controversial or difficult issues. The essay admits that denying the priesthood to those of African descent was not doctrine, but due to the racist climate that prevailed when the policy went into effect. Once again the church has a chance to be proactive in extending equal rights more broadly, but once again they are failing and will have to be reactive when their current policies are no longer tolerable in the society at large.
Old Testaments prophets frequently spoke hard truths to those in power. As the moral voice of the people they put themselves at great risk to speak up for what they believed to be right regardless of the consequences. In taking a stand, Kelly and Dehlin are behaving more like prophets than are the leaders of the church, who claim to be prophets. The behavior of church leaders has been both immoral and cowardly. Immoral because they are seeking to punish people for advocating for the disenfranchised, and cowardly for not addressing the issues openly and directly themselves.
Friday, June 6, 2014
Social Contribution to Disaffection
I am effectively an ex-Mormon, although I am not bitter or angry, nor have I officially resigned from the church. I have always been a skeptic at my core, but I enjoyed church. I enjoyed the community, and church was a very important part of my family life. Then around the year 2000 I went from having many questions to becoming convinced that the foundational claims of Mormonism, particularly that the Book of Mormon represents genuine history, could not possibly be true. I began interacting with online communities that shared these views, but I did not share my views with anyone in real life.
For a long time, I would drop hints to test the waters of my (now ex-) wife's receptivity to some of the ideas I had been contemplating for a while. In every case I found that she was not ready and would have had a very difficult time accepting our differences of beliefs. I elected to downplay or even hide my real views in order to keep the peace. I think I could have done this indefinitely. However, by around 2005 my views came boldly out into the open in the midst of a heated argument. I still would have been happy to continue church activity, but my ex-wife insisted that I talk to the bishop, mostly to determine whether I could participate in the upcoming baptism and ordination of our children.
The bishop allowed me to baptize my daughter, which left my ex-wife thinking that I had not told him enough. To satisfy her I wrote him a detailed letter outlining my views on the Book of Mormon and other aspects of Mormon belief. Once this was more clear to him, he released me from my calling teaching the 15-year-old Sunday school class, did not allow me to ordain my son, and suggested that I resign from the church so that my children were not confused into thinking my views represented the church's views. I refused his suggestion and assured him that my children are clear on that issue. He said he would pass my information up to the stake president because he did not have the power to convene a church court. The stake president never took any action. About a year after my ex-wife found out about my disbelief in Mormonism, she divorced me. I have since been remarried to another former Mormon and we are very happy in our new life, which started 7 years ago.
This is all by way of background. I don't intend to get into my specific issues in detail in this post, but I want to explore the social contribution to my disaffection. This is partly to make sense of how intelligent people confronted with the same information can come to such drastically different conclusions. Prior to living in this Colorado ward, we lived in New Mexico where I was on the leadership track in a small ward. I had already been called to be Elder's Quorum president, and the first bishop we had in the area predicted that I would likely serve as a Bishop some day. Had we stayed there, I probably would have never had the time to look deeper into some of Mormonism's foundational claims. I would have felt relevant and probably less inclined to question. It is quite likely that I would still be in the church.
What set the ball rolling was moving back to Colorado in 1996. In New Mexico I was a high school choir director and was fairly happy and successful in that position. In Colorado I took a job as a middle-school choir director and general music teacher and it was a terrible fit for me. Eventually I transitioned out of teaching and into a career as a software developer. The transition required me to go back to school and work at jobs that a recent high-school graduate could have filled just as well. This new situation did a couple of things for me. First, it allowed me time at a very undemanding job monitoring automated equipment to research Mormonism. Secondly, it decreased my social standing in the wards we attended that were filled with technical professionals, doctors, upper-level managers, and CEO's who occupied the highest levels of local church leadership.
So now I had time on my hands, was not burdened with a time-consuming calling, and was somewhat socially marginalized at church. It was a recipe for being motivated to find problems with the church. It is not that what I found were not real issues, but I may have never gone looking if had not felt socially marginalized at church. If they were not real issues I would have found satisfactory answers, which I did not even from apologetic websites. My case can be contrasted with that of one of our Colorado bishops. It was apparent from some of his talks that he went through a period of intense doubt and questioning. However, he stayed with the church and continued to serve in leadership positions. He was much more socially connected. His mother was on the general relief society board. When he was out of work, he stayed unemployed until he found a job commensurate with his education and experience rather than taking menial jobs similar to the ones I took while in transition. Somehow this allowed him to retain his social standing and the respect of the ward members.
Up to now I have only been talking about the social contribution to the beginning of my research and questioning. Greater social marginalization came once my ex-wife and bishop knew what I thought. They both assumed that I had committed a serious sin because in their world view that is the only thing that could lead to questioning. The bishop wanted to exclude me from full Mormon fellowship when he asked me to resign. The bishop and my ex-wife spent a year consulting and planning, without my knowledge, for her to divorce me. The bishop never called us both in to counsel with both of us together. If they had been more willing to accept me where I was at the time, there is a good chance that I may have found my way back to some sort of belief, albeit somewhat more liberal. There are many faithful church members in this category. At the very least I would have continued attending with my family.
My ex-wife notified me that she wanted a divorce by leaving me a note and taking the kids away for the weekend while I was out on my morning jog. She wanted me to be out of the house when she returned. During that time I made an appointment and went to talk with the bishop. That is when I found out that he was both aware and supportive of her plans, and had known about them for some time. I went to see him for help in talking some sense into her. I brought up the scripture in 1 Corinthians 7:12-14 that encourages a believing spouse to stay with her unbelieving spouse. He said that he did not believe this applied in my case, but only when the unbeliever was an unbeliever from the beginning of the marriage. He did not say this directly, but I was worse than an unbeliever. I was an apostate. He also pointed out that I had broken my temple covenants. This was completely untrue because they are all behavioral in nature and have nothing to do with personal belief. Furthermore, I did not qualify as an apostate for church disciplinary reasons because I was not spreading my views. I had only shared them with my ex-wife, and, at her insistence, with the bishop.
Even after having lost most of the social motivation to continue attending church, I still attended for a few months after the divorce. My new ward accepted me because they knew nothing about my history or my true beliefs. This was a community I had know my whole life and I was mostly comfortable with them. However, I was still somewhat marginalized in the community as a new divorcee. I attended back in my home town where many people had known me as a child. I only stopped attending when I met the woman I later married and began to develop new social connections. Even though I may have never gone back to full belief, I think I would have stayed connected and kept attending church had not circumstances led to my social marginalization.
I did not really leave the church so much as they made it clear to me that I was not welcome as a fully participating member. Stories similar to mine have been repeated thousands of times. Several groups of fringe Mormons have tried to make church work despite their changing beliefs. They go under various names, one of which is New Order Mormon after the message board, form.newordermormon.org. The staylds.org website was originally started to help people in a similar situation to mine to stay connected. However, experience has shown that these groups tend to be transitional for most people. Only a few are able to stay connected over the long term. This trend is so pervasive that those at the top are starting to notice, but so far they are not really making much of an attempt to reach out to the disaffected or to make them feel welcome. They have been losing some of their most intelligent, thoughtful, and dedicated members.
Why do I care? I am out now and probably never going back, but I still have family in the church. I want the church to be a better place for them if they ever find themselves in a similar position that I once found myself in. I also want them to understand how it was for me, which is partly why I wrote this post. I don't want to force it on them, but it is here for when they are ready.
For a long time, I would drop hints to test the waters of my (now ex-) wife's receptivity to some of the ideas I had been contemplating for a while. In every case I found that she was not ready and would have had a very difficult time accepting our differences of beliefs. I elected to downplay or even hide my real views in order to keep the peace. I think I could have done this indefinitely. However, by around 2005 my views came boldly out into the open in the midst of a heated argument. I still would have been happy to continue church activity, but my ex-wife insisted that I talk to the bishop, mostly to determine whether I could participate in the upcoming baptism and ordination of our children.
The bishop allowed me to baptize my daughter, which left my ex-wife thinking that I had not told him enough. To satisfy her I wrote him a detailed letter outlining my views on the Book of Mormon and other aspects of Mormon belief. Once this was more clear to him, he released me from my calling teaching the 15-year-old Sunday school class, did not allow me to ordain my son, and suggested that I resign from the church so that my children were not confused into thinking my views represented the church's views. I refused his suggestion and assured him that my children are clear on that issue. He said he would pass my information up to the stake president because he did not have the power to convene a church court. The stake president never took any action. About a year after my ex-wife found out about my disbelief in Mormonism, she divorced me. I have since been remarried to another former Mormon and we are very happy in our new life, which started 7 years ago.
This is all by way of background. I don't intend to get into my specific issues in detail in this post, but I want to explore the social contribution to my disaffection. This is partly to make sense of how intelligent people confronted with the same information can come to such drastically different conclusions. Prior to living in this Colorado ward, we lived in New Mexico where I was on the leadership track in a small ward. I had already been called to be Elder's Quorum president, and the first bishop we had in the area predicted that I would likely serve as a Bishop some day. Had we stayed there, I probably would have never had the time to look deeper into some of Mormonism's foundational claims. I would have felt relevant and probably less inclined to question. It is quite likely that I would still be in the church.
What set the ball rolling was moving back to Colorado in 1996. In New Mexico I was a high school choir director and was fairly happy and successful in that position. In Colorado I took a job as a middle-school choir director and general music teacher and it was a terrible fit for me. Eventually I transitioned out of teaching and into a career as a software developer. The transition required me to go back to school and work at jobs that a recent high-school graduate could have filled just as well. This new situation did a couple of things for me. First, it allowed me time at a very undemanding job monitoring automated equipment to research Mormonism. Secondly, it decreased my social standing in the wards we attended that were filled with technical professionals, doctors, upper-level managers, and CEO's who occupied the highest levels of local church leadership.
So now I had time on my hands, was not burdened with a time-consuming calling, and was somewhat socially marginalized at church. It was a recipe for being motivated to find problems with the church. It is not that what I found were not real issues, but I may have never gone looking if had not felt socially marginalized at church. If they were not real issues I would have found satisfactory answers, which I did not even from apologetic websites. My case can be contrasted with that of one of our Colorado bishops. It was apparent from some of his talks that he went through a period of intense doubt and questioning. However, he stayed with the church and continued to serve in leadership positions. He was much more socially connected. His mother was on the general relief society board. When he was out of work, he stayed unemployed until he found a job commensurate with his education and experience rather than taking menial jobs similar to the ones I took while in transition. Somehow this allowed him to retain his social standing and the respect of the ward members.
Up to now I have only been talking about the social contribution to the beginning of my research and questioning. Greater social marginalization came once my ex-wife and bishop knew what I thought. They both assumed that I had committed a serious sin because in their world view that is the only thing that could lead to questioning. The bishop wanted to exclude me from full Mormon fellowship when he asked me to resign. The bishop and my ex-wife spent a year consulting and planning, without my knowledge, for her to divorce me. The bishop never called us both in to counsel with both of us together. If they had been more willing to accept me where I was at the time, there is a good chance that I may have found my way back to some sort of belief, albeit somewhat more liberal. There are many faithful church members in this category. At the very least I would have continued attending with my family.
My ex-wife notified me that she wanted a divorce by leaving me a note and taking the kids away for the weekend while I was out on my morning jog. She wanted me to be out of the house when she returned. During that time I made an appointment and went to talk with the bishop. That is when I found out that he was both aware and supportive of her plans, and had known about them for some time. I went to see him for help in talking some sense into her. I brought up the scripture in 1 Corinthians 7:12-14 that encourages a believing spouse to stay with her unbelieving spouse. He said that he did not believe this applied in my case, but only when the unbeliever was an unbeliever from the beginning of the marriage. He did not say this directly, but I was worse than an unbeliever. I was an apostate. He also pointed out that I had broken my temple covenants. This was completely untrue because they are all behavioral in nature and have nothing to do with personal belief. Furthermore, I did not qualify as an apostate for church disciplinary reasons because I was not spreading my views. I had only shared them with my ex-wife, and, at her insistence, with the bishop.
Even after having lost most of the social motivation to continue attending church, I still attended for a few months after the divorce. My new ward accepted me because they knew nothing about my history or my true beliefs. This was a community I had know my whole life and I was mostly comfortable with them. However, I was still somewhat marginalized in the community as a new divorcee. I attended back in my home town where many people had known me as a child. I only stopped attending when I met the woman I later married and began to develop new social connections. Even though I may have never gone back to full belief, I think I would have stayed connected and kept attending church had not circumstances led to my social marginalization.
I did not really leave the church so much as they made it clear to me that I was not welcome as a fully participating member. Stories similar to mine have been repeated thousands of times. Several groups of fringe Mormons have tried to make church work despite their changing beliefs. They go under various names, one of which is New Order Mormon after the message board, form.newordermormon.org. The staylds.org website was originally started to help people in a similar situation to mine to stay connected. However, experience has shown that these groups tend to be transitional for most people. Only a few are able to stay connected over the long term. This trend is so pervasive that those at the top are starting to notice, but so far they are not really making much of an attempt to reach out to the disaffected or to make them feel welcome. They have been losing some of their most intelligent, thoughtful, and dedicated members.
Why do I care? I am out now and probably never going back, but I still have family in the church. I want the church to be a better place for them if they ever find themselves in a similar position that I once found myself in. I also want them to understand how it was for me, which is partly why I wrote this post. I don't want to force it on them, but it is here for when they are ready.
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Willful Blindness
I am currently reading the book "Willful Blindness" by Margaret
Heffernan. One subject Heffernan discusses is how we tend to cling to
our beliefs no matter how much evidence is stacked against them. This
can apply to political views, religious beliefs, or our beliefs about
ourselves. Since this is a blog about religion I want to focus on the
religious aspect of this phenomenon.
As I write this, there is a case pending before a British court wherein Thomas S. Monson is being charged with fraud under a new statute (as of 2006) for using false claims to benefit financially. The false claims include certain Mormon beliefs that can be demonstrated scientifically to be false. The financial benefit comes from tithing, which in the Mormon church constitutes 10 percent of gross income and is mandatory for baptism and temple attendance. Monson has been named because he is the sole of a corporation sole that is responsible for collecting and managing the tithing funds of the church. Thomas Phillips, who has filed this criminal case as a private British citizen, has documented cases where members had to go into debt to pay back tithing in order to qualify to attend their children's wedding in a Mormon temple. The contrast between this method of extorting money out of its members, and freewill offerings collected in other churches is one of the main reasons that this case has been allowed to get this far.
Phillips has included 7 teachings of Mormonism that can most easily be demonstrated to be false. Some of the items are the same things that caused me to lose faith in Mormonism. One belief is that a group of Jews came to America in 600 BC as told in the Book of Mormon. This can be proven false through archeological, DNA, linguistic, and cultural evidence. Another belief is that the Book of Abraham is a literal translation of an ancient papyrus by Joseph Smith that contains the writings of Abraham. This can be demonstrated to be false because this papyrus still exists and has been translated by Egyptologists, who found it to common funeral text. Other beliefs include mankind descending from a single couple who lived about 6,000 years ago and a world-wide flood about 4,500 years ago that killed all but eight people. These beliefs are incompatible with the natural history of the world as revealed through geology, biological evolution, and genetics.
My main purpose is not to debate these beliefs or to provide evidence for them. The evidence is readily available and is overwhelming. The question that interests me is the subject of Heffernan's book: how intelligent people can maintain beliefs despite overwhelming evidence against them. According to Heffernan, belief takes much less energy and cognitive resources than skepticism and doubt. This is not to say that doubters are smarter than believers, but only that they had the time, motivation, and available cognitive resources free from distractions to do the difficult mental work required by skepticism and doubt. Maintaining belief is the default, easy, comfortable behavior while changing requires great effort. This contrasts sharply with the idea of many believers that doubters have taken the easy way out. Not only is doubt more difficult and less comfortable than belief, but doubters have also often paid high social costs as well.
When my ex wife learned of my doubts she accused me of arrogance and reminded me that lots of smart people at BYU knew about these issues and still believed. Given Heffernan's insights this should not be surprising. The easier, more comfortable path is maintaining belief. This is what our minds want to do. It is much more significant to change. That so few are willing to change their beliefs speaks to our natural tendency and desire to maintain the status quo, not to the weakness of the evidence that created the doubt.
The reasons some maintain belief and some do not is a frequently discussed topic on support message boards. An often discussed theory is that somehow skepticism correlates with intelligence. However, this is an overly simplistic view. Everyone knows some very smart people who believe all sorts of things that are not backed up by evidence. It is not raw general intelligence that makes the difference, but applying that intelligence to grappling with the difficult questions and not being afraid of what we might find when we look into the forbidden box.
As I write this, there is a case pending before a British court wherein Thomas S. Monson is being charged with fraud under a new statute (as of 2006) for using false claims to benefit financially. The false claims include certain Mormon beliefs that can be demonstrated scientifically to be false. The financial benefit comes from tithing, which in the Mormon church constitutes 10 percent of gross income and is mandatory for baptism and temple attendance. Monson has been named because he is the sole of a corporation sole that is responsible for collecting and managing the tithing funds of the church. Thomas Phillips, who has filed this criminal case as a private British citizen, has documented cases where members had to go into debt to pay back tithing in order to qualify to attend their children's wedding in a Mormon temple. The contrast between this method of extorting money out of its members, and freewill offerings collected in other churches is one of the main reasons that this case has been allowed to get this far.
Phillips has included 7 teachings of Mormonism that can most easily be demonstrated to be false. Some of the items are the same things that caused me to lose faith in Mormonism. One belief is that a group of Jews came to America in 600 BC as told in the Book of Mormon. This can be proven false through archeological, DNA, linguistic, and cultural evidence. Another belief is that the Book of Abraham is a literal translation of an ancient papyrus by Joseph Smith that contains the writings of Abraham. This can be demonstrated to be false because this papyrus still exists and has been translated by Egyptologists, who found it to common funeral text. Other beliefs include mankind descending from a single couple who lived about 6,000 years ago and a world-wide flood about 4,500 years ago that killed all but eight people. These beliefs are incompatible with the natural history of the world as revealed through geology, biological evolution, and genetics.
My main purpose is not to debate these beliefs or to provide evidence for them. The evidence is readily available and is overwhelming. The question that interests me is the subject of Heffernan's book: how intelligent people can maintain beliefs despite overwhelming evidence against them. According to Heffernan, belief takes much less energy and cognitive resources than skepticism and doubt. This is not to say that doubters are smarter than believers, but only that they had the time, motivation, and available cognitive resources free from distractions to do the difficult mental work required by skepticism and doubt. Maintaining belief is the default, easy, comfortable behavior while changing requires great effort. This contrasts sharply with the idea of many believers that doubters have taken the easy way out. Not only is doubt more difficult and less comfortable than belief, but doubters have also often paid high social costs as well.
When my ex wife learned of my doubts she accused me of arrogance and reminded me that lots of smart people at BYU knew about these issues and still believed. Given Heffernan's insights this should not be surprising. The easier, more comfortable path is maintaining belief. This is what our minds want to do. It is much more significant to change. That so few are willing to change their beliefs speaks to our natural tendency and desire to maintain the status quo, not to the weakness of the evidence that created the doubt.
The reasons some maintain belief and some do not is a frequently discussed topic on support message boards. An often discussed theory is that somehow skepticism correlates with intelligence. However, this is an overly simplistic view. Everyone knows some very smart people who believe all sorts of things that are not backed up by evidence. It is not raw general intelligence that makes the difference, but applying that intelligence to grappling with the difficult questions and not being afraid of what we might find when we look into the forbidden box.
Thursday, February 20, 2014
No Heaven for Me
I have had many conversations with Evangelical Christian friends.
One thing we have discussed is our differing views on heaven and hell.
As I understand it, the Evangelical view is that heaven and hell are
very literal, the one being the ultimate joy the other being the worst
imaginable pain and torture and that each lasts forever. The only
requirement to enjoy heaven rather than hell is to confess Jesus as your
personal savior. I am not exactly clear on what constitutes a valid
confession, but it seems that it would be very important to get it right
given the extreme difference of the two possible fates.
Every Evangelical I have spoken with is quite confident that they are "saved," and they speak of it in the past tense even though being saved is presumably something that happens in the future (i.e. going the heaven instead of hell). This is something I do not understand at all.
Apparently, very few will actually be saved. The vast majority of humanity is doomed to endure the fires of hell for eternity. As some have explained it, we all deserve this fate, but God in his mercy chooses to save a few of us if we are lucky enough to know we must confess Jesus and then we actually do it.
I don't see how we all deserve such a horrible fate. We did not choose to be created and we did not choose to be a part of such a seemingly arbitrary and extreme system of reward and punishment. Since God basically put most of humanity into a no-win scenario, I think that he is the responsible party. (I am only speaking about this hypothetical God as described to me, which is not the way I personally view God.)
If this system is true, then I am afraid that there can be no heaven for me. Here is the problem. I would never be able to enjoy heaven with the knowledge that so many were suffering in hell, including friends and family members. How could parents enjoy heaven if even one of their children were not with them? I would rather go be with them and stand beside them in their suffering, in solidarity and silent protest of such a cruel system.
Don't misunderstand me. The Evangelicals I have known are very good people. They are concerned with the fate of humanity, which is why they try so hard to convince others so they can save as many as possible from the fate of hell. However, beliefs such as this can make people behave irrationally and even cruelly, doing things like flying planes into buildings, because no earthly suffering can compare with hell. Therefore any means can be justified if it can only save some from this fate.
My own view is that hell is mostly self inflicted. I would rather focus on alleviating suffering, if I can, here and now in the only world that I have any firsthand knowledge about. Sometimes I wonder what it says about someone who is attracted to such a cruel and exclusive world view. It probably plays right into the natural human tendencies to want to be unique, special, and right.
Every Evangelical I have spoken with is quite confident that they are "saved," and they speak of it in the past tense even though being saved is presumably something that happens in the future (i.e. going the heaven instead of hell). This is something I do not understand at all.
Apparently, very few will actually be saved. The vast majority of humanity is doomed to endure the fires of hell for eternity. As some have explained it, we all deserve this fate, but God in his mercy chooses to save a few of us if we are lucky enough to know we must confess Jesus and then we actually do it.
I don't see how we all deserve such a horrible fate. We did not choose to be created and we did not choose to be a part of such a seemingly arbitrary and extreme system of reward and punishment. Since God basically put most of humanity into a no-win scenario, I think that he is the responsible party. (I am only speaking about this hypothetical God as described to me, which is not the way I personally view God.)
If this system is true, then I am afraid that there can be no heaven for me. Here is the problem. I would never be able to enjoy heaven with the knowledge that so many were suffering in hell, including friends and family members. How could parents enjoy heaven if even one of their children were not with them? I would rather go be with them and stand beside them in their suffering, in solidarity and silent protest of such a cruel system.
Don't misunderstand me. The Evangelicals I have known are very good people. They are concerned with the fate of humanity, which is why they try so hard to convince others so they can save as many as possible from the fate of hell. However, beliefs such as this can make people behave irrationally and even cruelly, doing things like flying planes into buildings, because no earthly suffering can compare with hell. Therefore any means can be justified if it can only save some from this fate.
My own view is that hell is mostly self inflicted. I would rather focus on alleviating suffering, if I can, here and now in the only world that I have any firsthand knowledge about. Sometimes I wonder what it says about someone who is attracted to such a cruel and exclusive world view. It probably plays right into the natural human tendencies to want to be unique, special, and right.
The Devil Incarnate
I am still officially a Mormon, but I do not practice nor do I
believe in many of the unique tenets of Mormonism. A while ago one of my
children informed me that his former bishop warned him that I was
miserable and that I wanted my children to be miserable like me. Where
did this come from? How could anyone say this about a parent's desires
for his children? Not only is everything about this bishop's statement
untrue, but it reveals something very disturbing about the Mormon mind
set. I do not believe that this man is the only Mormon who would make a
statement like this.
I believe that this former bishop was highly influenced by this passage from the Book of Mormon. "Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto man. And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself." (2 Nephi 2:27, emphasis mine)
The italicized portion of the above passage is based on the idea that misery loves company. That phrase appears nowhere else in the Mormon scriptures. In other words, it only applies to the devil in Mormon scriptures. The implications are quite clear. This bishop was equating me with the devil. His belief is that I am miserable because I have left the fold (an idea Mormons use to scare the faithful into obedience). He also believes that I want to drag down as many people as I can to my level, even if that means causing suffering to my own children.
Happiness is very subjective, but I certainly perceive that I am happier now than I was when the Mormon church consumed a good portion of my time, money, and freedom. Furthermore, if I actually was miserable, I would do everything I could to help my children avoid making the same mistakes I have made. I would not wish my own suffering upon them, but I would only wish their health and happiness. Normal parents are strongly influenced by their genetic makeup to sacrifice for their children's welfare, and I am no different.
I might find it alarming that someone with such a responsible position in the Mormon community actually believes this except for the fact that I thought this way too not that long ago. Even more disturbing is that this bishop actually thought he was doing good by informing my son that his dad only wants him to be miserable. Maybe Mormon leaders have not led their followers to an isolated island and given them cyanide-laced Kool-aid, but this tendency to demonize those who question or leave strikes me as rather cult like. This bishop is not just some hayseed ignoramus. He holds a PhD., he is the CEO of a large business, and he is well respected in his community.
Yes, most Mormons are nice people. I believe that many of them are very good people, but they are the victims of in-bred thinking can be so far afield from reality as to be quite scary and even, at times, emotionally abusive. Most Mormons have enough sense not to reveal everything they think to the uninitiated. They are very good at putting up a front that is palatable to the general public. This is all the more reason to beware of some of the underlying philosophies that they only share among themselves.
I believe that this former bishop was highly influenced by this passage from the Book of Mormon. "Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto man. And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself." (2 Nephi 2:27, emphasis mine)
The italicized portion of the above passage is based on the idea that misery loves company. That phrase appears nowhere else in the Mormon scriptures. In other words, it only applies to the devil in Mormon scriptures. The implications are quite clear. This bishop was equating me with the devil. His belief is that I am miserable because I have left the fold (an idea Mormons use to scare the faithful into obedience). He also believes that I want to drag down as many people as I can to my level, even if that means causing suffering to my own children.
Happiness is very subjective, but I certainly perceive that I am happier now than I was when the Mormon church consumed a good portion of my time, money, and freedom. Furthermore, if I actually was miserable, I would do everything I could to help my children avoid making the same mistakes I have made. I would not wish my own suffering upon them, but I would only wish their health and happiness. Normal parents are strongly influenced by their genetic makeup to sacrifice for their children's welfare, and I am no different.
I might find it alarming that someone with such a responsible position in the Mormon community actually believes this except for the fact that I thought this way too not that long ago. Even more disturbing is that this bishop actually thought he was doing good by informing my son that his dad only wants him to be miserable. Maybe Mormon leaders have not led their followers to an isolated island and given them cyanide-laced Kool-aid, but this tendency to demonize those who question or leave strikes me as rather cult like. This bishop is not just some hayseed ignoramus. He holds a PhD., he is the CEO of a large business, and he is well respected in his community.
Yes, most Mormons are nice people. I believe that many of them are very good people, but they are the victims of in-bred thinking can be so far afield from reality as to be quite scary and even, at times, emotionally abusive. Most Mormons have enough sense not to reveal everything they think to the uninitiated. They are very good at putting up a front that is palatable to the general public. This is all the more reason to beware of some of the underlying philosophies that they only share among themselves.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)