A Poor Wayfaring Man

As noted in a previous post, Church leaders often struggle to control how the lifeblood of the Church (i.e., personal reassurance that one is on the path to salvation in the Celestial Kingdom–a concept I’ve termed “Hope”) is distributed to, and apportioned among, the members of the Church. Below is an example of one such battle.

In the early 1980’s, a BYU professor named George Pace had previously given speeches and written a book promoting the idea that people should “center their lives on Christ and…develop their own personal relationship with Him.” Even though Pace was simply echoing ideas recently taught in General Conference by then-apostle (and future First Presidency Counselor) James E. Faust, his “taking out the middle man” approach to interacting with the Savior prompted a humiliating public rebuke from Apostle Bruce R. McConkie, which included the following counsel: Continue reading

In a previous post, I outlined the concept of the LDS Church as a living system. I’ve been thinking recently about what keeps a living system like the Church together. I think the general answer has something to do with the system as a whole being able to obtain and create things that the system components need (or want), but are unable to get independently. Continue reading

Here is another example of LDS Church leaders retiring unwanted doctrine by playing with the concepts of “policy” and “doctrine” in order to avoid violating LDS stare decisis.

Despite early acceptance of black men into the LDS priesthood, the Church, beginning with Brigham Young in at least 1852 (and possibly earlier, with Joseph Smith), taught for more than 100 years that black people bore the Mark of Cain, which labeled them as a cursed and disfavored people in the eyes of God, and unable, therefore, to be part of the LDS priesthood. Continue reading

A reader posted a comment recently, asking two questions. Good ones. I answered the first one in my previous post, and the second one here.

Mormon Woman Wondering asked:

Please help me understand how you…speak with your children, with integrity to your beliefs and with sensitivity to their need for something to hold onto in this world.

This is a tough question, particularly for somebody like me, with a spouse who is active in the Church, and who wants our kids to be active too. Obviously, my solution is a compromise, and could possibly have been different if she felt differently.  But I think this solution does take into account the potential need for kids to have something to hold onto as they develop their own worldview. Continue reading

There are a lot of Mormons and former Mormons who are annoyed and upset by the way the leaders of the LDS Church treat Church members, and the way Church members treat each other. It’s easy to see a leader disrespecting, belittling, or otherwise bullying somebody (or a group of people) and condemn him as an evil, arrogant, selfish bastard. Likewise, it’s easy to see a member snubbing, gossiping, or imposing social burdens on somebody and judge him or her to be self-centered, unscrupulous, or stupid. I know I’ve done that.

I have been wondering recently, however, if jumping to that conclusion about people in the Church is really warranted. Could I be exhibiting an error in judgment? Some bias buried in my all-too-human psyche? I think it’s possible.

Okay, probable.

Continue reading

My previous two posts (Confession and Polygyny?) deal with topics that are quite different on the surface, but share certain underlying concepts, namely

1. there are circumstances in which it is necessary for an LDS Church member to approach his or her local Church leader, seeking something that only the leader can provide;¹ and
2. the Church rules governing such circumstances are usually unclear or unknown to the Church member.²

Situations like this are the norm in the LDS Church. Continue reading

1. When I met with a counselor in the branch presidency, I was seeking a way to be forgiven of my sins; when my mom met with her bishop, she was seeking cancellation of her temple marriage [↩]
2. Neither my mom nor I had a clear idea of what kind of process to expect, or what would be required of us by our Church leaders in connection with our respective request. [↩]

My mom and dad married in the Salt Lake Temple at the ages of 18 and 19, respectively. They were civilly divorced when I was still a little kid.

By “civilly divorced”, I don’t mean to say that the divorce process was completed in a civil manner, without petty bickering (though I believe that is true). I mean they were legally divorced. Free, in the eyes of the state, to remarry and move on with their lives.

This is an important point, because their divorce was not fully recognized by the LDS Church. Continue reading

Like every other Mormon missionary, my mission started with a stay in the Missionary Training Center (the “MTC”). I will probably have more to say about this topic in the future, but for my purposes today, I will just say that the MTC fills the same role as boot camp does for the military–it is meant to break down the new recruits and re-mold them into homogeneous parts of a mighty army. In the MTC, part of that process involves convincing the new recruits that they are sinners, and in need of repentance and reconciliation with God in order to avoid being a complete failures as missionaries.

As a new missionary, I was in the (common?) position of having never really leveled with my local bishop back home about grave sins like masturbation and/or looking at pornography. Continue reading

In 1844, in the wake of the Prophet Joseph Smith’s murder at the hands of a mob in a Carthage, Illinois jail, he was eulogized by a very close friend, John Taylor, with the following statement:

“Joseph Smith, the Prophet and Seer of the Lord, has done more, save Jesus only, for the salvation of men in this world, than any other man that ever lived in it.”

Now, that’s pretty high praise coming from a Christian. Maybe a little too high? Continue reading