So let me ask you guys something. How does it feel — emotionally — how does it feel to be wrong?
Dreadful. Thumbs down. Embarrassing.
Okay, wonderful, great. Dreadful, thumbs down, embarrassing — thank you, these are great answers, but they’re answers to a different question. You guys are answering the question: How does it feel to realize you’re wrong? Realizing you’re wrong can feel like all of that and a lot of other things, right? I mean it can be devastating, it can be revelatory, it can actually be quite funny. But just being wrong doesn’t feel like anything.
So I should actually correct something I said a moment ago. It does feel like something to be wrong; it feels like being right.
This is a paraphrased beginning to a Ted talk given by Kathryn Schultz in 2011 entitled, “On Being Wrong“.
It got me thinking about a number of things, and I certainly suggest you have a look.
There’s a lot that we are “right” about in the church. Statements like, “I KNOW xyz”, “This is the Lords TRUE CHURCH” and “The prophet will NEVER lead you astray” are all fair examples. These statements affirm a level of knowledge, certainty and stability that I don’t hear too many other people saying. Particularly as it relates to our religion as opposed to enduring principles like love, charity and service.
Don’t get me wrong, being certain is good. You have to be certain that pushing the brake pedal on your car will stop you from hurtling into that crowd of people.
However, blanket statements like I know the church is true may not be overly helpful. What are we actually saying? Everything Joseph Smith did was inspired? Polygamy functioned exactly the way God wanted? Polygamy WAS what God wanted? White shirts are exactly what God wants us to wear on Sunday’s? Beards are no good? Even one piece swimwear for females are no good? Where does it end…???? My opinion is that such statements regarding the “Church” and it’s related policies are a little bit dangerous to make. Saying “I know that blacks won’t hold the Priesthood and they were not valiant in the pre-existence’ in 1977 might have sounded OK but it hasn’t stood the test of time. Similarly, “I know garments are meant to be to the ankle and wrist and won’t change” in 1920 wouldn’t have stood the test of time either.
I know we are taught to obtain a “testimony” of various principles in the Church. However, when these principles are subject to change, I question its real value. The Lord counselled us to keep HIM at the centre of our worship.
I taught GD last Sunday. Being one of the few token liberals in a very conservative Ward, I threw it out there…
We were looking at the scripture in Matthew where Jesus invites us to come to Him and take his yoke upon us – for his yoke is easy to bear. So far so good. Then I read this out to them.
If it is an easy church you are looking for, if that is important to you, this is not it. (Boyd K Packer -1974)
For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light. (Jesus Christ – a while ago)
Then asked the question…”How do you reconcile these two statements?”
After a few false starts, blank looks and puzzled expressions, we were no closer to a resolution to the apparent quandary. I suggested that we belong to a church with a fair size set of rules – that most other Churches don’t have. That, as Elder Packer suggested, is probably hard. Christs’ simple invitation to “Come follow me” and the qualification that His “Yoke is easy”, to me, makes reference to the fact that the Atonement is done, His suffering complete, His invitation offered. All we have to do is accept him and follow him. In and of itself, that is not complex. In that sense, that is easy.
Whilst the content of the above exercise is (at least to me) interesting, it was not the most interesting thing. The most interesting thing was that in a group of 45 or so (mostly) seasoned church members they could not reconcile two seemingly both right yet contradictory statements.
I think we are right about a lot of things in the LDS Church, however I am just as confident that we are wrong about a lot of things too. In the lesson mentioned above I asked the class members to consider what we might be doing, individually, as a local congregation and as a church that might be wrong. Unfortunately, I received the same blank looks and puzzled expressions.
I was excited to read Jeff Spector’s recent treatment of all things Anti-Mormon – and I think there is some cross over here. Our perception of others – when they disagree with us (or we disagree with them) – is critical to our ongoing relationship to the rest of the religious world. But it is also critical to how we view ourselves.
Kathryn Schultz goes on to list three things we tend to do when someone disagrees with us.
- Assume they are ignorant – we are more than happy to educate the person or group as to the ‘correct’ information. If they still disagree than we,
- Assume they are idiots – they have the information and yet are still ‘wrong’. When the person has all the information, and fails to connect the dots, the only thing left is to,
- Assume they are deliberately distorting it for their own malevolent purposes
My question to you is:
- What examples of Kathryn’s list above have you witnessed personally, by others or at the general level of the Church relating to disagreements or being wrong?
Wheat & Tares 
A very compelling blog post! Being wrong is a human problem, not just a religious one. Just look at how politicians who change their mind are treated in the press. They are labeled as spineless flip floppers, when instead they should be lauded for being willing to admit they were wrong and change their opinion in the light of new evidence.
For a religious organization that is interested in growth through proselyting, certainty is going to be a highly prized and sought-after characteristic. But there is also theological support for cultivating humility, which can serve as a counter-balance to certainty.
Very nice post. (BCC part over with)
We’ve dealt with contradiction since the very beginning as we strive to learn the good from the evil. And as a result, we also seem to have a problem with the distinction of knowledge versus hope and faith.
So, yes, we have been known to be wrong about a lot of things and hopefully, we we discover it, we fix it rather than dig our heals in.
I wrote a piece a while ago entitled “Your Opinion is Wrong!” in which I wrote about a phenomena where people are told that what they believe is wrong. I see some of that in this topic. We can form an opinion on a wrong set of facts or ideas, but how can an opinion be wrong?
I think the same applies to a belief. Much of the time, the topic isn’t fully explored before we form an opinion, such as your example with Sunday School. People don’t know how to deal withe the appearance of contradiction.
The hardest choice we can make is to take the yolk off of our necks and accept the Savior’s yoke which is easy. our withholding of our will is our number one challenge in this life because what he wants is our submission to his will.
that is the difference between an easy religion and a hard religion.
blind sacrifices are not what the Lord wants. he wants us to openly acknowledge that we are giving up our will, interests, talking points, agendas, anything withholding us from full embrace, and sacrifice like him for the will of the father in such a way that it is completely Open and on the table what we are giving up.
It’s funny. We can’t oppose your post without being an example of Kathryn Schultz list. It’s pretty much the basis for any responses to any post that’s not “I so love this!”.
Wish we had the same class, so I could have challenged you on your false comparison based on a misunderstanding of how a yoke works, but that’s another post.
Joel – a human problem, yes. I just had to fix a problem at work that arose because of a mistake I made. It’s not nice, not easy – but owning up and being honest in my mistake has gone a long way in rectifying it
Jeff – contradiction (even if it appears to be one) is VERY uncomfortable in our Ward, and I presume elsewhere. It dits not fit nicely in our culture of being right and knowing stuff.
Ron – thank you for your testimony.
Frank – had a good laugh at your post, I wondered how long it might be fur someone to say that – as it turned out, not too long..!!! I also wish you were in the class. The noise of the crickets in the bsckground was deafening. I would have appreciated any comment, challenge or anything.
I also taught this class last Sunday, though I went more in the direction of what the original audience might have understood (Christ was actually asking the people to take His burden and become His servants) as opposed to how LDS people typically understand it (Christ is next to us in a double yoke and shoulders OUR burdens). I got the idea from one of Ben Spackman’s posts.
As far as the paradox of a burden being light, it is very similar to other paradoxes that Christ teaches (he that loses his life for Christ shall find it, etc.). I’m surprised that the class couldn’t come up with a good response for that – the idea of sacrificing our will on the altar for Christ is paradoxically understood to be the best use of agency. Although his burdens may seem onerous in this life (keeping commandments, overcoming the natural man), it is the only true way to peace and freedom. This is basic LDS doctrine (basic Christian doctrine, too).
You are correct that we generally do not like contradictions in our church. As much as we say that situations will often require us to “follow the promptings of the spirit,” we also encourage having pat answers prepared ahead of time.
I think Schultz’s categories can be helpful at times, though I’m not sure they are totally accurate. When it comes to the emotionally charged issues that have been at the forefront lately (gay marriage, women’s ordination, church history blemishes), I think a lot of people tend to jump to conclusion #3 (malevolent intent). This makes it a bit difficult for people in category #1 who don’t realize that they don’t know all the facts, but are being treated like an enemy anyway. I’m not sure that people in category #2 give a hoot one way or the other.
In our church we relish an “us versus them” attitude. It may be a carryover from the days of being persecuted, but we instinctively circle the wagons when there’s any type of dissent. Maybe it’s the whole NT “If you aren’t with me, you’re against me” type of thinking. It does make conversation difficult among members who disagree on hotbutton issues.
I read Kathy Schultz’s book, “Being Wrong,” which is all-around excellent. One of the things she emphasizes is how being wrong can be a good thing, depending on our attitude about it.
In Mormonism, the stakes for being wrong are really high. There is a series of assumption that we make, a sort of framework of belief: that there is such a thing as eternal, absolute Truth, that Truth can be revealed to humans, that the LDS prophets are the avenues by which Truth is revealed to humans, and that revelation can confirm to the rest of us that the prophets’ messages are that Truth. So much of the messaging of the church is dedicated to teaching, defending, and believing in this framework.
The problem arises, of course, when something that a prophet says turns out to be wrong, or a member perceives it to be wrong. It represents some kind of breakdown in the revelatory framework. The apologetic defense is typically to pin this breakdown on prophetic fallibility or the membership’s misinterpretation of revelation or the prophetic message. If the breakdown is serious enough, the doubting member will likely conclude that the breakdown is that the LDS prophets do not have access to revealed Truth, or that Truth doesn’t exist or is inaccessible.
I suppose if we were to follow Schultz’s model, we would try to break out of the framework and instead look at being wrong as essential to the system of revelation rather than a danger to it. Revelation itself is the idea of replacing one (wrong) idea with another (right) idea. And the concept of continuing revelation implies that we currently are wrong about a lot of things. If we could embrace this wrongness and strive to re-examine our beliefs and current understanding, we would open ourselves up to greater continuing revelation.
The current messaging on female ordination and gay marriage suggests to me that the leadership is still committed to the old framework, but there is lots of theological support for the latter model.
Okay, reading Schultz’s talk from the link in the OP helped. So operating on the assumption that I think I’m right on an issue and there’s no way I can view the opposing idea with any sort of intellectual or emotional respect, then yes, the categories are very well suited to debates on emotionally charged church issues.
Let’s take an orthodox member who is bristling at a non-mainstream view:
1. Clearly you are not aware of what X apostle has said on the subject, let me educate you…
2. Instead of suggesting you are an idiot, I would prefer to attack your religious intelligence (level of testimony or loyalty to the church)…
3. You are clearly a wolf in sheep’s clothing, an anti-Mormon, an anti-Christ, minion of the devil, etc…
On the flipside, an unorthodox Mormon (or exMormon) competing against a mainstream idea they abhor:
1. Clearly you are not aware of what X apostle has said on the subject, let me educate you…
2. Only mindless sheeple would believe such drivel…
3. Only racist/sexist bigots would teach this idea and use it to justify abuse on such an institutional scale.
“However, blanket statements like I know the church is true may not be overly helpful. What are we actually saying? Everything Joseph Smith did was inspired? Polygamy functioned exactly the way God wanted? Polygamy WAS what God wanted? White shirts are exactly what God wants us to wear on Sunday’s? “Beards are no good? Even one piece swimwear for females are no good? Where does it end…???? My opinion is that such statements regarding the “Church” and it’s related policies are a little bit dangerous to make. Saying “I know that blacks won’t hold the Priesthood and they were not valiant in the pre-existence’ in 1977 might have sounded OK but it hasn’t stood the test of time. Similarly, “I know garments are meant to be to the ankle and wrist and won’t change” in 1920 wouldn’t have stood the test of time either.”
… blanket statements like I know the church is true may not be overly helpful.
I prefer being specific – the leaders are called of God – They have the priesthood – the keys, etc.
“Everything Joseph Smith did was inspired?”
First of all – forget the word “everything”. Then be specific. Give some context.
“Polygamy functioned exactly the way God wanted. Polygamy WAS what God wanted. White shirts are exactly what God wants us to wear on Sunday’s. Beards are no good. Even one piece swimwear for females are no good. Where does it end…???? My opinion is that such statements regarding the “Church” and it’s related policies are a little bit dangerous to make.”
If you really do have a testimony of these things, then give them as a testimony which will, probably, contain experiences which lead you to those testimonies
“I know that blacks won’t hold the Priesthood and they were not valiant in the pre-existence.”
Be careful with this all together. Saying that blacks won’t hold the priesthood is absolute nonsense in this dispensation and the degree of their valiance in the preexistence is not known.
“I know we are taught to obtain a “testimony” of various principles in the Church. However, when these principles are subject to change, I question its real value. The Lord counselled us to keep HIM at the centre of our worship.”
Make sure you know what the principle is. If it is, indeed, a principle, than, it WILL never change. God may tell you to kill someone today and not to kill someone tomorrow. The principle underlying the sixth commandment – Thou shalt not kill. – or, in other words – thou shalt not commit murder – is we are forbidden to do and act that would cause a spirit and a body of a person to separate without our having proper authority to do so. That will never change and will always have great value to us. Make sure you know the principle.
THE CONTRADICTORY STATEMENTS
You show two statements which can seem to be contradictory. I know that can be be kind of fun to do to a class but maybe there’s a better way to it. Try to find one.
Having been guilty of all three items on Kathryn’s list, my answer to LDS Aussie is: See above.
LDS_Aussie:
On the two contradictory statements, I think you handled that well. I got side tracked on the part where you mentioned the ‘fair size set of rules.’ In my mind those rules predate the Later-day Saints by millennia. They’ve always been there even though they have manifested themselves in different ways. I’d rather have to keep my thoughts clean in this period of time, for my whole life, than to have to travel across the plains with the Martin Handcart Company and then finish my life there. Both sides have their challenges but I consider mine less.
In other words, a further discussion of the rules might be in order.