I served my mission in Chile, a very Catholic country. We did a lot of door knocking, and actually got in to give one or two lessons several times a week. We would teach the family about the First Vision. We would continue through the lessons, and it went well until we got to baptism. They would say they were already baptized, and didn’t need another one. We would try to tell them that theirs was not valid because it was not done with the proper authority. That seldom went over well. We would try several times, but in the end they would not want to get baptized, even though they said they agreed with what we tought them up to that point.
This was happening all over the mission , so the Mission Pres came up with a time saving idea. During the first lesson, we would ask them, that if after teaching them they came to the knowlage that what we were teaching them was true, would they get baptized. A few people would say yes, of course. But way more often than not, they would say no, that even if they know it was true they would not leave the Catholic Church. That was all they knew, it was their family, their culture, and their life.
As an immature 19 year old, I thought this was the craziest thing I had ever heard. They would refuse to get baptized even if they knew it was true!
Now 40 years later, I realize that this was not crazy, but is just human nature. If I went up to a very TBM, and asked them if I could prove the LDS church was not true, would they leave? The answer would be similar to what my Catholic friends in Chile said all those years ago: It is all they know, it is their family, their culture, and their life. They could never leave the LDS faith.
When I was bishop over a decade ago, a member of my ward gave me a copy of Bushman’s Rough Stone Rolling. A few weeks after I finished reading it, I asked my Stake President during my monthly PPI if he had read the book. He said his wife gave him a copy and he started reading it, but stopped because he didn’t want to know those things about Joseph Smith. So literally and figuratively he “put it on the self”.
Sometimes the truth is unsettling. Not all truth is useful. Can you handle the truth?
Wheat & Tares 
As a human creature of nature, I will say YES, I can handle the truth. I also agree that not all truth is useful. Finally, a person’s motives in sharing truth may shape or package the information so that it is no longer truth.
Accepting “new truth” is, for most of us, not as easy as it may appear. Cognitive dissonance and all of that. If new truth is built on prior knowledge that is one thing – but what happens when it upsets the apple cart including community relationships?
I value the truth and I do not like when the truth is withheld because someone else decided it was “not useful.” Withholding the truth breeds mistrust which is, in my opinion, more damaging than an ugly truth. I will take the ugly, painful truth over a pretty lie every time.
Ji, can you give an example of a truth that becomes untrue do to motives or packaging? While the truth may become unpleasant or inconvenient , the fact that it is “true” by the very definition of truth, cannot change or become “untrue”
I never wholly bought the JS story. What I did buy were the doctrines of the kingdom as being more correct, and foundational to a different kind of life, one in which I might have the opportunity to become more Christ-like, and create an eternal family. Where I thought I might be able to change the world and build up the waste places, where I might begin to build Zion. But I’m a convert, so ideas like a universal resurrection were new and revolutionary to me, expanding my view of humanity and God into something cosmic.
It’s so much more difficult for following generations to own something that they never chose and is not new and revolutionary to them, but a question of conformity.
Joseph was a man to me, brilliant but human, inspired but venal.Smashing printing presses was never a good idea, and probably suicidal. I realised when I taught church history and actually read D+C132 that polygamy was not vicious gossip dreamt up by enemies of the church. That was 35 years ago, and that was a long, lonely furrow.
I think we have to deal with the truth, as I did then. I’m not sure how. Now my kids have lost their faith, such as it was, I really do wonder how much longer I can make it through, but I do have the privelege of living in a liberal ward where nobody much cares for the church’s illiberalism regarding non-binary gender. That helps. But it’s not Zion, and my kids don’t like the zealotry.
So, I try not to be a zealot, putting me on a crash course seemingly with the institutional church, and hold onto my dreams like Abraham or Mormon in a cave somewhere and speak to God probably more than is better for my mental health, but I’m working on that.
We’ve done better than we might otherwise have done, and maybe that’s as good as it gets. I plan on listening to more truth. But I understand that others may chose to do otherwise, and remain happy.
I probably no longer think the church is true, but I think it has been at times, an admirable project, with very useful institutions. It remains to be seen if it can continue to be so, but it continues to be the well-spring of sound doctrine for me, in spite of its mis-steps. It is the best I’ve got.
I look forward to change.
Bill,
You can come up with examples on your own — anyone can.
Truth or lies exist in context, not in silos. To insist that we must all ingest the truth despite our differences ignores the fact that we individually construct our understanding.
We are essentially individuals assembling our own mental/spiritual jigsaw puzzles. Each person puts different pieces together in a unique order and we begin seeing different pictures emerge at different times. To insist that someone must use a piece right now that helped you fit together your puzzle is often unhelpful to someone else working on the puzzle from a different angle. Should it be used? Yes, and hopefully it will be if the person finishes their puzzle. If you notice they are at that point and stuck, can you help then? Sure. Otherwise, we are simply adding to cacophony- even when holding a piece of truth.
The idea that we must feed each other truths might be scientifically idealistic, but is unrealistic when we consider our different constructs.
I consider a couple or three of the widows in the ward and now my Aunt whose husband was buried last week. And all those like them. They were raised when Heber J. Grant and George Albert Smith were the presidents of the church. They saw the growth and prosperity of Mormonism after the suffering and sacrifice of difficult Great Depression and WWII years. They had marginal if any college education and the truthfulness claims of the LDS faith were far more than academically plausible at that time.
These women devoted their lives to raising large families most of whom stayed with the faith. They held down the fort at home while husbands served in every calling in the ward and stake level and they did more than their share of corresponding callings given to women. They face the final years of their life with loneliness, failing health, financial insecurity, digital incompetence and the confusing faithlessness of some grandchildren (and peers) they are unable to comprehend.
Even if you could cram the concepts which us casualties of the faith crisis think of as truth into their heads covered with blue hair, it would be exceedingly cruel. To tell them that so much of what they lived and celebrated and suffered and died for was a fraud? A rather not-funny joke my father used to spring on older widows was to ask them how many additional voluptuous wives they thought their dearly departed husbands had managed to marry in the next life so far? How rude yet harmless was that in comparison to all the other problems?
This is not my fault and definitely not their faults. It is the fault of the deceitfulness of those from the beginning who first started the white-washing process at the highest levels; possibly to stay alive or to keep a good thing rolling and the fault of those who succeeded them who lacked the guts to face the truth. But the price of truth will eventually be paid and the interest accumulates and most of a generation will probably pay for it with their testimonies. In my opinion it would be better if those who bear this cost were young and had many decades before them, than old and looking death in the face with fractured faith.
Let the youth handle the truth and maybe handle those in control who won’t face it. Let the old die in peace.
Relatively few members have read the church essays, including my former Bishop and Stake President. Both told me they were afraid of what they’d learn and didn’t need to read them.
In my experience Truth takes a back seat to Happiness, which may actually be the more rational way to live.
The big question is whether the First Presidency and Q12 know that many of the origin stories are distorted and the BOM and BOA are frauds? Or, are they like the older widows mentioned above and simply caught up with structure and culture?
Steve,
I suspect that the entire Q15 believe the Book of Mormon including how Joseph translated it by the gift of God. They have testified of this repeatedly.
I am sure that they know of the various versions recorded of many key events of the founding of the church. Although they are not always the experts in all parts of pertinent history, they have all studied beyond the correlated resources. President Oaks has published ground breaking research into some events of church history.
As El Oso implies with the Q15, truth in a church/religious/spiritual context is a matter of belief/faith. When people bear testimony and say they know the church or BM is true, what they are really saying is that they believe in the church/BM, or that they really like the church/BM, or that the church/BM are good and help them. They may “know”, but in a spiritual way.
And how? We know how this works – through the Holy Ghost. And how does the HG confirm/reveal truth? Through thoughts and feelings. So if you think something is true, and it feels right/good, voila – it IS true! But how do we know those those thoughts and feelings are from the HG? We believe it. Circular logic.
The problem is that the Church makes general and historical truth claims that are universally applicable, independent of what any one person may think or feel – i.e. the Church’s founding story, its claim to be the only true Church, that Joseph Smith and subsequent prophets communicate directly with God, that there is only one way back to God and it’s the Plan of Salvation, that the nature of God is a certain way, etc.
These “truths” may make some of us feel good, but that doesn’t mean they accurately reflect the way things really. are/were. I don’t believe them any more and am pretty sure they are not true in a. non-spiritual truth sense. But I believe the church has value in it’s goodness and beauty (by and large) and accept it for that. I think the church teaches many good values, provides an excellent social network and has a lot of awesome hymns.
goodness
beauty
good values
excellent social network
awesome hymns
I agree with all of the above. I also believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, that He was crucified and resurrected, that that He restored His priesthood through the Prophet Joseph Smith. Posters here will say that I cannot believe or that my belief is faulty — but I choose to believe nonetheless. It is a choice. Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is a choice that He invites us to make (or to the degree it is a gift, it is a gift we can choose to accept). Not all members of the Church have made that choice, but still choose to remain in the Church for other reasons — that’s good. Perhaps someday they will choose to believe, but in the meantime, I hope they don’t encourage others to choose not to believe.
There was a time when I could not comprehend the possibility that any new truth could challenge my belief. Perhaps for that reason, I don’t think I would have admitted that I would stay in the church if I found out it wasn’t true.
I actually don’t mind the phrase itself that “not all truth is useful”. It is worthwhile to examine what truths are worth the time to study. But I deplore the fact that it seems it was used as a reason to hide or obscure things that as far as we know are true. It seems that what Packer really meant was that some truths should be buried.
Ji,
With regard to this comment:
“Posters here will say that I cannot believe or that my belief is faulty”
Since I believe you don’t mean to say that the W&T community is opposed to goodness, beauty, good values, excellent social network, or awesome hymns, you must be referring to your belief in “Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, that He was crucified and resurrected, that that He restored His priesthood through the Prophet Joseph Smith”. This comes close to telling the posters of the W&T community that they have no testimony.
Personally, I take no offense at this, as I do not claim to have a testimony. But the majority of this community does claim to believe in these things, and may object to your comment. Ironically, it seems that you are telling others what they do or don’t believe.
For my part, I value the diversity of opinions here, including yours, even when I disagree. I specifically come here for that diversity of opinions. I try not to presume to say what you may or may not believe, and I hope you will grant the rest of us the same courtesy. In most cases, I think this community respects belief, although it does tend to a progressive or liberal direction.
Great prompt, Bishop Bill. Often in these sort of discussions Truth is held out as something easily reachable or ascertainable, as if the only reason for not living in the radiant light of Truth is merely human weakness. Ah, if only people weren’t lazy or sinful, everyone would be Mormon (or whatever belief system connects to the easily grasped radiant light of Truth).
In reality, truth is often elusive, perhaps simply not ascertainable, at least in the present. For many questions or quests in life, truth is not even that relevant. Goodness and beauty and happiness seem to have an independent and autonomous claim on our approach to life. Who you marry, what profession to pursue, where to live, where to go on vacation, what kind of car to buy, what team to root for, what books to read, whether you exercise once a day or once a month — it’s hard to come up with “a true answer” to these and many other life choices. There are many reasonable choices, and truth doesn’t really help us decide them.
Short answer: the Mormon habit of framing these discussions in terms of truth (and with the assumption that Mormonism and the LDS Church have some sort of monopoly on relevant truth) doesn’t have much traction with most people anymore. That’s only partly because the Mormon claim to some special connection with Truth is less tenable these days, even to mainstream Mormons. It’s also because people understand there is a lot more to life than truth, and the Mormon narrative doesn’t make much effort to connect with those other aspects of living. Sometimes the Mormon approach quite casually subverts them. I’m sure many people, after a serious discussion with an LDS missionary or a zealous member, go away shaking their heads and saying, “Wow, these Mormons just don’t get it.”
I had a home teaching companion that was notified that I was having serious problems with Joseph Smith. He decided to take it upon himself to study up on the various church history issues. At this point, he knew very little about difficult church history issues (similar to most of us that were raised in the church). He purchased Rough Stone Rolling. According to him, when he opened the front cover of the book a “dark feeling” immediately came over him. In response to this dark feeling, he quickly closed the book. Upon closing the book cover, the dark feeling went away. Apparently, God told him not to read Rough Stone Rolling.
MTB – I’ve heard several very similar stories from ladies in my relief society. Negative emotional responses are linked to Satan rather than any understanding of cognitive dissonance and are then used as justification not to even try to understand truth outside of LDS manuals.
That is what happens when “feelings” are your guide. Feelings are, if they occur, to follow the study of scripture and not the other way around. Otherwise, they can lead you anywhere. I knew a missionary that told me about when he prayed whether the LDS Church was true or not, he then was overwhelmed by the feeling that it was false. He went and told his father and he was instructed to go back and pray about it again – which he did. He was then confirmed by his feelings that it was true. Hmmm – makes one wonder which prayer the Lord answered. If it was Him.
The phrase “… the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth … “ reminds us that the truth can be presented in such a way that it become or supports a lie, and becomes toxic.