UNDER THE RUG

In the ever-growing wake of religious scandals (abuse and rape of children, fraud, theft, dark political money) the Mormon church has always found a way to minimize its own questionable practices as they come to public light. For instance, when critics found millions of dollars of money coming from the church to influence the 2008 vote in California on Proposition 8 (which would change the California constitution to make gay marriage illegal), believers said the figure was grossly exaggerated, and that most of the funds came in the form of Mormon volunteers going door to door to rally supporters for "traditional marriage."

In November 2015 the church announced that homosexuals are considered apostates to the church and that children of homosexuals in a gay marriage could not join the church until they reached the age of eighteen (rather than eight) and only after they formally denounce the gay marriage of their parents. The church tried to soften the PR blow back by interviewing D. Todd Christofferson (a high ranking Mormon Apostle with a conveniently gay brother) by an active believing lackey fielding pre-approved softball questions emphasizing that the church super duper loves gay people and the purpose of this change is to not cause division among gay households, just like they do with polygamous households (never mind that gay marriage is legal and polygamy is not).

When the church received criticism about conducting "worthiness" interviews of adolescents as young as twelve years old, wherein the church leader would ask explicit detailed questions about the youth's sexuality and masturbation practices, the church reluctantly--and only recently--conceded that parents could be present during such interviews (apparently this isn't a new thing, and there is a protest march at Temple Square scheduled for this Friday. Fun.). It should be noted that even with this "change" church leaders will still ask pre-teen boys and girls whether or not they masturbate with the intent to help them repent of their transgression. 

When concerned Mormon parents encouraged a grassroots movement to record these sexually explicit interviews of minors to show the world how inappropriate such questions are for a grown man to be asking children, the Utah state legislature tried to pass a law which would make such recordings illegal (how's that for separation of church and state?).

When the church came under scrutiny for not encouraging church leaders to report child abuse to the police, the church's attourneys responded with the "Gold Standard" defense, claiming that if they reported abuse to the police, fewer people would feel comfortable confiding in the bishop. 

In 1978--well past the tail end of the civil rights movement--the Mormon church, which had always maintained that god will never grant priesthood authority to black men because of the curse of Cain and their lackluster performance during the pre-mortal war in heaven, backtracked on the issue and allowed black people full membership rights, including admission into their temples and allowing black men to hold priesthood office. Mormons still have a hard time understanding why black people aren't jumping at the chance to join the church nearly forty years after this announcement.

In 1890 the Mormon church announced that the eternal principal of plural marriage (i.e. polygamy) would no longer be practiced or endorsed by the church. In 1904 the Mormon church announced again that the eternal principal of plural marriage would no longer be practiced or endorsed by the church. Why the second announcement? Because many believing faithful Mormons didn't buy the ruse. They knew that the only reason the Mormon president made the announcement in the first place was because the US government was threatening to seize the church's assets, including their million dollar mini-mansions (i.e. temples). It was largely seen as a political move, and even the president of the church who made the announcement, Wilford Woodruff, married yet-another-wife afterwards. Those who did not see it as a political move denounced Woodruff as a false prophet. Now the church hems and haws and tries to downplay the importance that polygamy played in the church, but their scriptures and several decades of church leadership clearly and unequivocally state that polygamy is necessary to reach the highest degree of glory in heaven. To this day several Mormon sects and even individual Mormon leaders still practice polygamy (including current president of the church Russell Nelson!). 

Most recently a woman has accused Joseph Bishop (a high profile Mormon who has held very significant positions within the church, such as Mission President in Argentina, Mission President to the Missionary Training Center, and President of Weber State University) of sexual abuse and attempted rape while she was a missionary under him in the MTC (mid 1980s). I won't go into the details of the abuse here since others have done so quite thoroughly (Infants of Thrones, Mormon Stories). Instead I want to focus on the church's response to these allegations (their official statement). 

The long and short of it is that the church claims it went through proper legal channels and reported the abuse to police and did not have enough evidence on their own to issue any discipline to Bishop at the time (to put this into context, a couple years ago John Dehlin was excommunicated for using the Mormon Stories podcast to discuss problems with Mormon church history and abuses by the church against homosexuals, and Kate Kelly was excommunicated for creating the Ordain Women movement and suggesting that the church should allow women to hold the same leadership positions as men within the church). This is strange to me since we now know of a second woman who has made similar accusations against Bishop, and the first woman recorded a conversation between herself and Bishop wherein he admits he "confessed all his sins" to his ecclesiastical leader, including the abuse of both of these women. He also strongly implies that he abused other women for many years. 

Maybe he's lying. Maybe the recording was faked. Maybe it's all true, but the church didn't know the details or extent of the abuse. Maybe the church is lying. Who knows? But let's suppose that the church's version of the story is completely true. Does this make things better? Not in the view of a believing Mormon. 

You see, Mormons believe that their church leaders have what they call "the power of discernment." Basically this means that they have a direct line to god and if someone is lying during a worthiness interview (like when they ask a twelve year old girl if she masturbates) god will let the church leader know. Nothing gets past god. Except, apparently, Joseph Bishop. 

A couple years ago I posted something on my Facebook page about Utah having an unusually high suicide and homelessness rate for gay teens as a direct result of the November 2015 policy change discussed above. In response, a Mormon acquaintance sent me a blog article (unfortunately the link appears to be broken), which sought to make the case that Utah had the same rate of suicide for gay teens as any other state. If I had granted that this blogger's assessment was accurate, I would still be left asking why Utah wasn't better than all the other states. If the Mormon church is true, then surely they should be better suited to help those most in need of support. The claim that the predominately Mormon state of Utah is just as bad as anywhere else is a tacit admission that the church doesn't really make things better in important social matters. 

Furthermore, that fact that the church has such a long history of being several years behind every social movement of the past hundred years (with the exception of women having the right to vote, which Mormon apologists love to point out, but which can easily be explained as an opportunistic way for Mormons who still practiced polygamy to cast more votes per household. So there's that.) begs the question, in what sense is the Mormon church true? In what sense does the church make people behave better? In what sense does god lead the church and its leaders? 

Why would god not tell Joseph Bishop's priesthood leader that he's lying about his worthiness? Why would god allow Bishop to be promoted through the ranks of the church amid prolonged sexual abuse? For Mormons who want to fall back on the adage that god does not intervene due to agency, first of all, that is a terribly convenient excuse, don't you think? Second, that doesn't explain why god allowed Bishop to be promoted. In addition to leaders having the power of discernment, Mormons believe that if a leader becomes sinful or abuses their power, god will remove them from that position. Why didn't he do it to Bishop? 

What the hell, here's a scripture for reference: D&C 121:37 "That they may be conferred upon us, it is true; but when we undertake to cover our sins, or to gratify our pride, our vain ambition, or to exercise control or dominion or compulsion upon the souls of the children of men, in any degree of unrighteousness, behold, the heavens withdraw themselves; the Spirit of the Lord is grieved; and when it is withdrawn, Amen to the priesthood or the authority of that man."

It's almost as if god doesn't exist... 

BONUS MATERIAL:

Tracie Harris on god allowing children to be raped.

CANON FODDER

"The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species. It may be a long farewell, but it has begun and, like all farewells, should not be protracted."

--Christopher Hitchens, god is Not Great

Few things seem to offer as much comedic fodder as religion. Brian Dawson, a Mormon Sunday School teacher (until recently, that is...), in an attempt to answer a difficult question asked by one of his students, found himself in ecclesiastical hot water after he taught a group of Mormon teens facts about the church discriminating against black members--an area of history the church has long minimized.

This sort of thing has happened before. Several instructors from the church's education system (if you can call it that) have been reprimanded, and in a few cases left the church entirely, due to issues brought on by teaching people less flattering facts about the church. High profile cases, such as the famed "September Six" of the 90s (six historians were kicked out of the church for exposing historical documents confirming Mormonism's polygamist past), and the more recent excommunication of the founder of the podcast "Mormon Stories," John Dehlin, have received national attention.

What makes this particular instance ironic and even funny is that the teacher used sources provided by the church itself. That's right. He was reprimanded by church leaders for using church sources to talk about church history. You can't make up this crap.

The Mormon Church has been spinning the truth about their history since it first had a history. Before Mormonism became a recognized religion, Joseph Smith laced his life with controversy.

Most people nowadays are aware of Joseph's polygamist relationships, for instance. But many people do not know about the truly messed up tactics he used to manipulate people into those relationships. Horrible things such as telling 14 year old girls that if they don't marry Joseph or if they tell anyone about it, their whole family will be damned. Or Joseph sending men on missions to the other side of the world, and then marrying their wives while they are gone. Or Joseph telling his first wife, Emma, that if she objects to his philandering behavior then god will destroy her (this one is actually in canonized Mormon scripture: D&C 132).

Even fewer people are aware of Joseph's treasure hunting enterprises with his father. They were so bad at finding treasure via magic rocks that on more than one occasion Joseph was sued and convicted of fraud. By the way, these magic rocks used by Joseph to swindle poor farmers out of their money are the same rocks he used to "translate" the gold plates in to the Book of Mormon. This is no different than divining rods or psychic mediums--nothing more than parlor tricks and gullible sorcery.

The only "treasure" Joseph ever found was the gold plates, which no one without a vested interest in the Book of Mormon's success ever saw without a cloth over it. No one with anything close to a real academic credential ever saw--much less examined--the purportedly ancient gold plates to determine their authenticity. No one thought it suspicious that these mysterious and elusive gold plates were found by a convicted fraudulent treasure hunter with magic rocks?

Over the last few years (starting around the time of Mitt Romney's 2012 presidential campaign, curiously enough) the Mormon Church has quietly released a series of essays clarifying controversial historical issues. The Church finally admitted in these essays, which are available for all to read on the Church's official website (lds.com), that Joseph was a polygamist and that he married over 30 women, some of which were well under the age of eighteen (he was twice their age), and some were married to other men.

They also admitted that Joseph used his treasure-hunting magic rocks (in a hat!) to "translate" the Book of Mormon, contrary to the traditionally more-palatable (i.e. "whitewashed") version of Joseph using in tandum the gold plates and the biblically-referenced Urim and Thummim (according to some accounts, Joseph didn't even have the plates in the same room during the "translation" process).

They admitted--finally--that the policies started by the Church's second president, Brigham Young, which until 1978 were used to exclude black people from being able to receive the priesthood, were inspired by Brigham's own racism, rather than revelation from god.

The admissions made in these essays were ground-breaking in one way or another. The remarkable thing to me is that the Church is finally admitting to things over which they have excommunicated historians in the past. These essays, although clearly not enough to undo the Church's wrongs, is something of an apology.

There are still many things to which the Church has yet to come clean, and they still whitewash much of their history in an effort to make it more faith-promoting. But perhaps we have seen the last of the Church's efforts to buy up historical documents with embarrassing information in order to control their public image, such as the "Salamander Letter," even if those documents turn out to be fraudulent.

All of this public relations management dished out by Mormon HQ has me thinking: Why the sudden admission of issues long covered up?

The hypothesis circulating around some Mormon circles, that the Church is attempting to help Mitt Romney's next campaign, is intriguing. There may even be some truth to it. But I see a much deeper motive than seating the most powerful man in the world (which, surprisingly, is not the Mormon prophet who claims to talk directly to, and for, god). In a covert and never-to-be-admitted way, the Mormon Church seems to have stumbled upon one of modern society's great truths: The internet is where religions go to die.

For centuries religions have relied on a monopoly of information to control their public image and divert doubters and naysayers. Mormonism, being no different from any other fundamentalist religion, teaches its members to only read from Church-approved sources--especially on matters of the Church's history. Anything which challenges the Church's official story is deemed "anti-Mormon" and should be avoided at all costs.

This monopoly of information, however, has become increasingly difficult for the Church to maintain, due in large part to the Information Age. The internet provides questioning Mormons a means to discreetly research controversial issues of the church. Open forums give doubters a voice among other doubters. Historical documents cannot be purchased and hidden as easily as in days passed.

The members are finding this information and because the facts seem to contradict the Church's storybook version of their own history, the Mormon Church is being forced to face their historical problems in a public way in order to "get ahead" of the flood of people stumbling on this information and leaving the Church. And they are leaving. The Church is seeing its greatest era of apostasy ever and no amount of contraception bashing and over-breeding will stop this flood from surging now that the dam holding back their true history has been cracked.

BONUS MATERIAL:

YouTuber, Thunderf00t on religion and the internet:

A PEACE OF MY MIND

"To know a person's religion we need not listen to his profession of faith but must find his brand of intolerance."
—ERIC HOFFER

"Give a man a fish, and you'll feed him for a day; give him a religion, and he'll starve to death while praying for a fish."
—ANONYMOUS

A couple of months ago I received an email from a ward clerk (record keeper) for a local branch of the
Mormon church. Basically, they want to know if they have my correct address, phone number etc, so that they can appropriately fellowship me (in other words, harass me until I begrudgingly come back to church). I promptly deleted the email in part because I don't want that kind of harassment, and also I don't want to make this too easy for them.

Honestly, I don't oppose the idea of having some missionaries or a home teacher or even a bishop track me down for a lengthy, in-depth religious conversation. I just want them to work for it...

A couple of weeks later I received another email from Mormon church headquarters asking me to take a survey to help them determine "general trends" within the church. Suspecting this to be a mildly clever ploy to pick up where the last email had failed, I declined the invitation. Two weeks later, a reminder email was sent inviting me, the randomly selected church member who's regular church attendance is not necessary for participation, to take this survey. 

While I haven't actually followed the link as of writing this sentence, I have been debating whether or not I should click it. After all, faults aside, the church is often as clever as it is non-random. Not to mention my curiosity often gets the better of me.

But first, I recently came across a new (to me) podcast called "Thank God I'm Atheist" which, being based in Mormon-friendly Salt Lake City, Utah, often discusses Mormon topics and issues. And it turns out that the Church sent out a survey to 1000 random members to see how the general membership feels about the recent excommunication of one Kate Kelly. 

For those who don't know, Ms Kelly is the founder of the "Ordain Women" movement, which consists of hundreds (perhaps thousands) of Mormon women who go to the General Conference Priesthood Session (a male-only, world-wide church meeting) and, being denied admittance to the meeting, walk away peacefully. Now, the reason for Ms Kelly's expulsion from the church's membership is evidently for merely not doing as The Brethren (old, rich, white men) told her to do, namely stopping the quietest protests ever. 

Coincidentally, John Dehlin (about whom I have written before) is also facing possible excommunication from the church for his podcast "Mormon Stories", which addresses difficult issues within Mormonism. Again, his crime is simply not doing as The Brethren have asked, which in his case is to cease bringing up such touchy, disconcerting topics in such a public and accessible way. 

No theocracy would be complete without ample censorship...

Well, let's see if the link to the survey still works (the email specifically asks that I do not share the link, but, meh. Click it if you feel especially dickish). 

Ok, the link works and I have finished the survey (which rather disappointingly had nothing to do with Ms Kelly) and I will post screen shots of the survey along with my responses below: 

Welcome screen:

Starting easy...

Vague preliminary stuff.

 Basic, but getting meatier.

Hmmm, they sure do like to assume I believe in god, even though the very first question was whether or not I consider myself Mormon (nope)...

Eh, more of the same.

More loaded questions assuming a belief in god.

Believe it or not, I still occasionally read scripture passages, although, not for the usual reasons...

Bleh.

More bleh.

Straightforward.

Funny how the first option for reasons not to go to church is being offended by people at church. I could have selected more, but I want my primary reasons to be concise and clear.

Just a repeat of the last screen ("is that your final answer?")

It seems that they really want me to admit I don't go to church because of people. Weird.

Ah, a pertinent question.

Ok, ok.

Finally a chance to clear the air a bit. And I had to squeeze in a little Hitchens at the end. 

Trying to fish out other possible reasons for my leaving church. But they don't allow me to explain that the two "life changes" were a direct result of my desire to stop going to church, not the other way around. 

See what I did there?

Come on, really? Given my earlier responses, why would you even ask?

Surprise! There isn't much money in atheist blogging.

More loaded questions. Man, I really want to elaborate on a few of these.

Check.

Brown chicken, brown cow.

Pretty sure...

Kind of disappointed that they didn't ask me if I'm living in sin here.

Not sure why this is relevant.

From "god's university" no less.

Suck it.

I actually clicked "yes" at first, which took me to a screen to provide them with a bunch of personal information (sly dogs). So naturally I went back and selected "no", again not to make things too easy.

Not sure if "uncomfortable" is the right word... maybe "sickly", or "bloated".

Yay, another chance to clarify things a bit.

Quid pro quo, if you dare. Buahahaha!

Of course they did.

THE HARDER THEY FALL

"The truth has nothing to fear from discussion."

--someone smart

"Popular ideas do not need to be protected by free speech laws."

--someone else smart 

One of my closest friends is just about the most avid supporter of Ron Paul as you would care to find. Personally, I don't care much for Ron Paul, so we have had a number of debates about his policies and the effects that they might have on our current system of government. Every time we argue (i.e. "discuss"), we end up on the point that Ron Paul, a doctor, doesn't believe in evolution, and whether or not this will affect his policies on education. I firmly believe that beliefs inform our actions, and this unsupported belief, which runs contrary to modern biology, will undoubtedly influence Ron Paul's actions. My friend disagrees.

To my friend's credit, however, he acknowledges that this is an area where he doesn't agree with Ron Paul. This is important. I find it hard to take seriously someone who believes someone else implicitly, or who agrees with someone else on every point. To do so would be to claim infallibility of the other person. This is how demigods and tyrants (and prophets) come about.

The mentality of infallibility by virtue of the divine is inherent in religion. One might say it is where religion begins. Unquestioning obedience is flaunted as a virtue. My Mormon youth leaders made this very clear. It is OK to ask questions, but to persist after receiving a mediocre answer is pushing it. This devotion to leadership is reiterated in "temple-recommend" interviews, prior to admission into Mormon temples. In fact, they take it one step further and inquire about affiliations outside of the church, which may run contrary to the church's teachings (i.e. activist groups, gay support groups, etc.).

To speak out about injustices towards a community facing discrimination within the church, such as homosexuals, is to bring chastisement upon yourself. Even trying to bridge gaps between seemingly hostile communities, like disgruntled "ex-Mormons," can call your loyalty and testimony into question, or even call for disciplinary action.

Fraternizing with ex-Mormons can expose you to anti-Mormon literature (i.e. "anything that contradicts the church"), and this can challenge your testimony or lead you to sin. Religion is no stranger to censorship. After all, religion takes the saying "beliefs inform our actions" one step further by saying that "thoughts inform our actions." Merely thinking something can send one down a perilous road to iniquity and damnation.

Indeed, thoughts can be as dangerous as actions according to some religions. This is why the Bible and the Koran condemn disbelief and apostasy with eternal torture and death, respectively (I'll let you decide which is the greater punishment). In fact, Jesus himself employs censorship, by stating that uttering certain things is unforgivable. In Mark 3 Jesus is accused by the Pharisees of being possessed by an evil spirit, and Jesus responds by laying out the law of blasphemy. According to Jesus it is forgivable to speak ill of a person, but speaking ill of the Holy Spirit is not:

"28 Verily I say unto you, All sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme:

29 But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation:

30 Because they said, He hath an unclean spirit."

Nothing wins arguments like "eternal damnation."

In past posts I have referred to videos and sites from John Dehlin, although I don't think I properly credited his name. He started a group called "Mormon Stories" which tries to network active Mormons with ex-Mormons. Dehlin believes that in order to truly help ex-Mormons come back to the church or deal with a loss of faith, etc., active Mormons should try to genuinely understand their concerns and why they left the church. Sounds reasonable in principle, but as I mentioned above, many people feel that associating with ex-Mormons will put them in a bad position spiritually, and thus are hesitant to come anywhere near an ex-Mormon forum.

Now, I'm not convinced that such a bridge is necessary, but I do admire Dehlin's efforts to open the dialog. However, not everyone is on board with this; some church higher-ups have attacked Dehlin and condemned his efforts. This is shown in an article addressing the position Mormonism has taken in the mainstream. The article points out that one such person had intended to release a "100-page take-down of Dehlin," but someone even higher-up than he stepped in, and, fearing that a smear campaign would look bad for the church, stopped the report. You may be tempted to say "crisis averted," but it doesn't end here. Dehlin's son has recently turned eight years old and, per Mormon custom, is going to be baptized into the church. Normally, the father would conduct this rite of passage. But, in the case of Dehlin, his bishop has denied him this privilege simply because of his podcast. By opening a discussion, Dehlin has become the face of censorship in the Mormon Church today.

BONUS MATERIAL:

And now, the KKK speaks out against the Westboro Baptist Church: