It’s amazing that the NFL even managed to get all its games completed this year, much less deliver a Super Bowl LV matching The Old Guy (Tom Brady, 43, drinks almond milk smoothies full of nuts, married a movie star and a supermodel) against the The Kid (Patrick Mahomes, 25, likes ketchup, engaged to a fitness trainer). The game itself didn’t deliver up to expectations (Bucs won, 31-9) but there were some unusual features to this Super Bowl played in the shadow of Covid. I’ll wind up talking about the Jeep commercial and whether or not there is still “A Middle” in LDS theopolitics, but first the other stuff. Lots of other stuff.
The Flyby. Things started with a notable flyby. It’s a little odd the extent to which flags and military units and air force flybys have become part of NFL football tradition. I’m not an air show guy, but I’ve seen the Blue Angels (a Navy outfit) a few times. One plane did a tight turn over West Seattle when I was watching from a ridge. So low I could see the pilot. Later, I watched them zoom around tall buildings in San Francisco from about the 35th floor. Anyway, Sunday’s flyby featured a venerable B-52, a big B-2 (the one that looks like a bat), and a B-1B with the wings forward. Impressive. Don’t mess with Uncle Sam. It’ll be a long time before you see that formation flying over a football stadium again.
The Lady Ref. Sarah Thomas was the first female referee to work the sidelines in a Super Bowl. The media made a big deal out of this. Maybe this is a big deal. One more step along the path to gender equality, which is something to be proud of. Maybe someday there will be a General Conference with the first lady apostle. And the media will make a big deal out of it. This was a good look for the NFL, whose players don’t always play fair with others, especially female others. Say, did you notice Antonio Brown’s touchdown catch?
Cardboard Fans. There were apparently 25,000 real people in attendance, including about 7500 health care workers invited as guests of the league (which means, I think, that they have received Covid vaccine shots and they got free tickets). The rest of the seats were filled with 30,000 cardboard fans. These were images of actual people who paid a hundred bucks to have their photos plastered on the cardboard cutouts. Including more than a few celebrities. This cardboard or video fan gimmick is clever, but one of the more bizarre developments of this Covid year in sports. Could the Church do this for General Conference in the Conference Center? Would members pay a hundred bucks to have their image attend Conference? Let’s see, $100 times 21,000 capacity equals $2,100,000. A nice addition to the hundred billion dollar fund. That might be the winning argument. Make it so.
Halftme. I confess that I had never heard of the performing artist known as The Weeknd until last week. I still can’t quite figure out the bandages. And the spelling. And the robot masks that looked a little like C3PO. If the streaker who appeared in the fourth quarter had run on the field during the halftime show, we all would have thought it was just part of the show.
Man of the Year. If there’s one NFL award that merits serious acknowledgment, it’s the Walter Payton Man of the Year award. Each team nominates one player who exemplifies excellence on and off the field, with particular emphasis on charitable activities supporting the community or a wider global cause. It is truly impressive the extent to which players get involved in supporting good causes. This year’s winner was Russell Wilson of the Seattle Seahawks, shown during the game in a skybox along with his wife Ciara, sitting next to Commissioner Roger Goodell. Since before his rookie year even started, Wilson has made low-key weekly visits to kids at the Seattle Children’s Hospital, comforting those who stand in need of comfort. I’m hoping at next year’s Super Bowl Wilson is out on the field rather than up in a skybox.
The Jeep Commercial. Super Bowl commercials have become something of a Big Thing. Some years, they can be more entertaining than the game. Not so much this year, I think. Except for the Jeep piece. Wow. It was more of a two-minute PR piece for America than an ad. It was a plea for unity and a return to common ground, or “The Middle.” It wasn’t until after the game that I realized the man in the ad was Bruce Springsteen, who did the narration as well drive a Jeep up to that little chapel in Kansas.
It was better than any two minutes of the Trump presidency. It was better than any two minutes of the new Biden presidency, although Biden has at least been sounding the unity theme. Welcome to America, where an aging rock star and an SUV company can team up to give us two minutes of video that outshines two presidents and the marquee sports event of the year. Go watch it again if you haven’t already.
The Political Middle. The focus of the Jeep video was a plea to return to the political middle in America. There was a time when politicians could regularly reach across the aisle to support important legislation. Not all the time and not every time, but at least some of the time. There was a time when there were some liberal Republicans and some conservative Democrats. I’m not sure we can get there again — it’s a very partisan political scene at the moment, in case you hadn’t noticed — but a Biden presidency and a nice Jeep video are a start. There is hope on the road ahead.
Is there an LDS Middle? So here’s your Mormon question for the post. As politics has seeped more and more into LDS discourse and doctrine, LDS culture has become more partisan as well. A lot of mainstream LDS have become zealous Republican conservatives and Trumpists, and more than a few have become political extremists. Any remaining LDS Democrats and progressives have felt more than a bit alienated by all of this. The LDS leadership has done very little to combat these developments. Is there an LDS Middle anymore? Is there common ground that all Latter-day Saints, regardless of political views or affiliation, share? Is there anything that can be done to get crazy conservative politics out of LDS thinking and culture?
I’m not going to try to spell out any specifics, partly because I’m fairly pessimistic on the whole issue. I think a good chunk of LDS leadership, both general and local, are now Trumpists, some openly and some by default, having done nothing to oppose it. I think the political disclaimers that LDS leadership issue from time to time are largely window dressing, and that deep down most of them think that Zion would be a country full of Mormon Republicans. But perhaps some readers have a more optimistic view of the future of the Church. If so, share it. Tell us how the Church can re-establish a Mormon middle. Could we get Bruce Springsteen to do a two-minute spot to air at the next General Conference? Maybe drive a Jeep up to the This Is The Place park above Salt Lake City? I’d like to think that, for the Church as well as for America, there is hope on the road ahead.
Wheat & Tares 
I share your pessimism. I’ve seen the sign on the road to the Mormon political future and it said, ”Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.”
Years ago I recall my father saying something about how he thinks Mormonism is a fairly moderate religion. I remain surprised, given that “we’re the only true church” and different underwear and a history of polygamy doesn’t scream ‘moderate’ to me. Catholics seem moderate, though I know there are Catholics with very rigid perspectives.
It may just be my warped perspective, but I cannot imagine a middle-way Mormonism that doesn’t drop the “only true church” perspective. That just seems inherently more extremist to me. Might there be a reason to drop it? From what I can glean based on lazy and passive research, this idea just isn’t on the minds of most people. I think it was Patrick Mason who recalled giving an address and asking the audience how many had spent time considering the ‘one true church’ idea. Only one person raised their hand and they were LDS. Might society have changed enough that the appeal of God’s only true church as a concept has lost its luster?
Is there an LDS middle? It depends on where you look. Among the Brethren and leadership, I think that the middle is pretty absent. Among the members, it’s as alive as ever.
There are two reasons why the LDs middle among members is stronger than ever. First, the Internet. Everyone can now see the history info that undermines Church truth claims. Exposure to this info has pushed many to the “middle” from TBM (I should know). Second, Covid. The restrictions on attendance due to Covid has exposed many TBMs to a different kind of Sunday…one in which your Sunday isn’t tied up in meetings. For some, there’s no going back.
How the Brethren react to the new middle will be interesting to watch. They can deploy Patrick Mason and the Givens and Bushman and hope that appeals to the middle without alienating the TBMs. But I suspect that the middle mentality won’t really be displayed among the leadership (shout out to the former First Presidency member Uchdorf). The Bretheren don’t want to alienate the tith-paying calling-holding TBMs. So just like society in general, we’ll have a more divided church in the future.: a hardening of the TBMs a but a growing middle.
Moderate Mormonism has been evaporating for years, but the pandemic is hastening this process. Even before COVID I’ve been hearing an increase in black-and-white rhetoric, such as “us versus them”-ism, prepare for the end times, encouragement to be more diligent in belief and practice (going to the temple more often, scripture reading, etc.). Just last week during the 5th Sunday lesson in my ward one woman commented that we need to be having family prayers at least 3 times a day or “your kids will be in Satan’s grasp for sure”. With COVID restrictions in place, only the most hardcore members are attending church in person (and they are the only ones giving talks and receiving callings), while the moderate cautious members are staying home. The parable of the wheat and tares comes up frequently, implying that this is the time that the less-righteous and less-dedicated members are being sifted out. On several occasions I have heard members of my ward opine that the civil unrest across America over the last year is part of God’s plan to destabilize and topple our current government, prompting Christ to return sooner than later, so they pray for the destruction to continue. It feels like we are on a path to fundamentalism, and that doesn’t sit well with me. The leaders of the Church seem to be OK with this shift because it means the core active membership will become even more zealous and obedient.
Interestingly, whenever someone cites the parable of the wheat and the tares in a formal Church context, they invariably cast themselves as the wheat.
I’m as pessimistic as you and CM. I’m so pessimistic that I don’t believe that even my hero, Bruce Springsteen, could bring an end to the country’s (or the church’s) polarization. Josh h makes a good point about how moderate Mormonism could (and to some extent does) thrive on and because of the internet. I see this and obviously participate in this kind of moderate Mormonism, but to jaredsbrother’s point, I don’t see the mainstream church ever dropping enough of its truth claims to facilitate a truly moderate version of Mormonism. And I can’t speak for anyone else, but as someone who still attends church (or who at least will once covid restrictions are lifted), I am experiencing an increasingly uncomfortable phenomenon, wherein every time I attend church, I hear comments and claims being made that are verifiably untrue and so I end up experiencing more alienation and moral dilemmas (when do I contradict people’s sworn testimony based on faulty history?) than I do any kind of edification. I actually think that the mainstream Mormon Church has this as a feature, not a bug; in its very origins and by its very design, it is intended to foster and reinforce a black and white, all or nothing perspective. That feature of Mormonism is in large part responsible for moderate Mormonism existing more outside of official church parameters than anywhere within its walls. And as far as Jack Hughes’s comments, I agree about the hardening of fundamentalist strains of Mormonism. This seems especially prevalent among the older people in my ward and stake. And of course, because Mormonism is designed to “weed out” moderate believers, critical thinkers, etc., anytime one raises issues or questions in an intellectually honest but potentially troubling way, one is likely to be seen as a tare and is therefore likely to have one’s ideas/comments dismissed, thus ensuring that even moderate folks remain outside of the circle.
Perhaps the tares are actually those, like the Pharisees, that follow the letter of the law, and who do not understand its spirit.
Jack Hughes says ” It feels like we are on a path to fundamentalism”
I can’t agree more. I see this so much and find it so deeply concerning.
Brother Sky speaks of the weeding out of moderate believers and critical thinkers and is not wrong. Evidence of this is abundant. I watch Zoom Sunday School and long for a meaningful discussion and leave empty every time.
Adding complexity to the picture, at least for me, is the discovery that many of the kindest, most loving & generous Saints are also raving lunatics, just off-the-charts nutz, esp politically. My ward is full of them. This beloved church is a microcosm of our catastrophic species, from the top of the hierarchy to someone like me. To those made crazy by our times, a chapter of Iris Murdoch in the evening is helpful. Say what you will about the bloody English, they have perspective. Essential.
madi, Try Dialogue’s Zoom Sunday Study
Thanks for the comments, everyone.
I didn’t really try to specify or define “the Mormon Middle.” That’s another post, I suppose. I was initially sort of thinking of regular pre-Trump conservative Mormons, as opposed to extremist Trumpist Mormons, but now I’m thinking that’s not really middle enough. It may be symbolic that the Center Chapel shown at the top of the post is a very small chapel.
jaredsbrother: “I cannot imagine a middle-way Mormonism that doesn’t drop the “only true church” perspective.” That’s a start, maybe. I heard some insightful commentary on that issue from Patrick Mason in his recent podcast interview on the Trib’s Mormonland. Well worth a listen.
josh h: “Is there an LDS middle? It depends on where you look. Among the Brethren and leadership, I think that the middle is pretty absent. Among the members, it’s as alive as ever.” Yes, there is a lot more diversity of opinion in the membership than in the leadership. Conservative leadership groupthink is a barrier to more tolerance of a Mormon Middle.
Jack Hughes: “Moderate Mormonism has been evaporating for years, but the pandemic is hastening this process.” I hadn’t thought of the pandemic effect. That makes a lot of sense.
p: “Adding complexity to the picture, at least for me, is the discovery that many of the kindest, most loving & generous Saints are also raving lunatics, just off-the-charts nutz, esp politically. My ward is full of them.” Yeah, the double whammy of Covid and Trump have outed a lot of Mormon political craziness, which is just the political part of the typical Mormon way of thinking. I have to think some in leadership are a little surprised by this — they likely thought most of the membership were fairly reasonable and informed citizens. Let’s see whether they do anything about it or just keep maneuvering to stay ahead of the crazy parade.
Middle of the road, for a liberal, is often completely left-wing. That’s why Dan Rather called The NY Times, whose last endorsement of a republican presidential candidate, was Eisenhower, “middle of the road”. That’s why Liberal concepts in the Community of Christ church are called “mainstream” by their leaders. .Even the author uses the words zealous, extremists, crazy, and Trumpists to describe conservatives. No derogatory descriptions of liberals; not very middle of the road. Can we call followers of the new president “Bidenites”?
I think of the desktop plaque that reads “Let’s compromise, and do it my way”.
Well said, vajra2. More than worth contemplating!
Until we begin to get more comfortable using the indefinite article (“a” true and living church) rather than the definite (“the” true and living church), I just don’t see much improving when it comes to finding the middle ground. The “us” versus “them” mentality seems to permeate so much of our Latter-day Saint culture now as it tends to overlap with the tribalism of our politics.
Isn’t it ironic, however, that following President Nelson’s example with wearing a mask to church and trying to be positive about the coming vaccines, is almost considered too liberal of an approach by many.
These are peculiar times we are living.
I’d guess that the tares are the ones who think in “Us vs. Them” terms. Sort of misses the whole point of the Gospel.
Dave B, your inspiration was Bruce Springsteen, and a Jeep add.
My inspiration was this by Twiggy Forrest https://www.aumanufacturing.com.au/i-choose-green-hydrogen-and-steel-by-andrew-forrest-his-boyer-lecture-in-full
In Australia we have more mining billionaires than tech. Twiggy has vision beyond making money. He is an iron ore miner, who is going to start manufacturing green steel, with renewable energy he generates himself, and will be exporting green power to Singapore, among other things.
My wife was talking to a friend, who we share grandchildren with, she is on the political spectrum similar to a pre trump republican, she was expressing concern about what she could say at church, because she knew some members were trumpers, and didn’t know about others. Some overseas members believe Utah politics is part of the church, so the more righteous members, are trumpers. Very extreme in Aus, where our conservative political party supprts abortion, and universal healthcare.
We are back to 2 hour church with social distanancing, precautions around the sacrament, and loging in at the door. Our temple is open.
I will be expecting talks in conference, by senior leadership, on truth, relable information, conspiracy theories, In language that can not be taken to support trumpers. If not credibility all gone.
I think “middle” needs to be defined before we can have an intelligent conversation, because I get the feeling reading the comments that each person is talking about a middle between different things. Are we talking a political middle? Say between the Trumpists and Bidenites, or is it between the old standard conservative “what we always used to be” and real political neutrality, or is it between the real crazies who won’t wear masks or get vaccinated and supported trump and think the election was stolen and those who voted for Bernie Sanders? A doctrinal middle, and if a doctrinal middle is the middle between progressive Mormons and fundamental Mormons, or between mainstream Christianity and the peculiar people Mormons used to claim to be? Middle between what and what?
To me, you just can’t have a middle between “batshit crazy” and “in touch with reality.” That is like finding middle ground between those who have fallen off the cliff and those standing looking down waiting for their friends and family to splat at the bottom. There is no “ground” between the edge of the cliff and the bottom splat. We have to somehow bring the crazies back to reality before we can have a conversation about where the middle ground is between For example, my friend who is a rabid socialist can find middle ground with Mitt Romney. But another friend who is 100% sure the election was stolen from Trump and that he won by a landslide, and 100% positive that Covid was invented to make Trump look bad, and that there are micro chips in the vaccine, is not even able to find middle ground with Romney. He can discuss details about voter fraud and exactly how the election was stolen, but unless you agree with him that all news outlets are lying and the only truth comes from Q, you are not even going to have a conversation. He is in a whole different reality than I am and Mitt is. There is no middle ground between those who believe an alternate truth and those who are still in reality. I don’t care what your politics or religion is, if you are off in a world where crazy conspiracy theories are “truth” then there is no middle between that and reality.
So, what do we when some who used to be nice conservative people have gone off the edge of the cliff? We no longer share any ground with them, we don’t even live in the same reality, so how do we define middle ground?
Anna, that is a great point.
I found the Jeep ad’s embrace of Christian Nationalism concerning. It was only calling a certain kind of people together (Christians) and left out wide swaths of Americans.
Finally, Bidenites don’t exist. I don’t know anyone who has a Biden flag on their house or truck, or goes to Biden rallies. There are people who voted for him and support his policies, but these are not the blue equivalent of Trumpers or Trumpists or MAGA World. There’s no cult of personality around Biden.
Moss, yes, I was joking about Bidenites, because someone else mentioned it. There are no Bidenites the way there are Trumpers. No one I know puts Biden above the well being of the nation or the party like many Trumpers put Trump. The Republican Party didn’t have a platform, except support Trump. You can tell the few current Republicans who put their party or country as more important than Trump , because they do not blindly support him no matter what he does or says and he hates them for not being loyal to him. Support for Biden is nothing like that. Most of us just “settled” for him as the most electable and most able to defeat Trump. We didn’t so much like him, as we wanted to get Trump out.
Yes, Anna. I respect that. But I haven’t noticed any respect for those who didn’t despised Trump and some of his policies, but voted for him only because they wanted to keep Hilary or Kamala out on the basis either policy or perceived past behavior. Not all Trump voters are Trumpers. Note: I couldn’t stomach voting for him regardless of perceived issues regarding his opponents in the races, but I know a number who did. Some of those fit your description of Trumpers. More of those I know do not.
From my perspective, a Church move toward a middle position would have been much easier pre-Trump. But now it will be difficult. Progressives before 2016, would have found a middle position fairly easy, since for them it would be preferable to the Church’s marriage to the Republican Party. But it would have been more painful for conservative Mormons. Post-Trump, progressives wonder about the majority of members who supported Trump (the alleged conservatives). Wonder about whether there are really shared values between conservative and progressive Mormons. Progressives wonder about anti-immigration, white nationalism, withdrawal from international relations, cozying up to dictators, encouraging attempted insurrections, lose of moral compass, intertwining of church and state, etc. By delaying a move to the middle, the leadership of the Church has created a whole new list of problems. Perhaps unsolvable problems given the current exodus of members.
Roger may well be right. But I know conservatives who not only wonder about, but oppose “anti-immigration, white nationalism, withdrawal from international relations, cozying up to dictators, encouraging attempted insurrections, loss of moral compass” etc. Positions opposing those things may not be Trumper positions, but they are also not uniquely progressive positions, just as not all Trump voters are Trumpers..
I’m sorry, but everyone who voted for Trump is an enabler, regardless of how reluctantly they may have cast their ballot. He is not an ordinary politican. He is something far more dangerous, and it was never any secret who is was, what he stood for, or what he would do if he gained power. Those who supported him for the sake of tax cuts, or reduced regulations, or conservative judges, or whatever, made a deal with the devil, and the bill has come due. It’s hard for me to imagine any thoughtful, conservative Trump supporter watching the impeachment hearings and not being deeply upset and ashamed. I know plenty of Conservatives who chose differently, out of principle, and voted for Republicans down the ticket, while voting for neither Trump nor Hillary (or Biden). They put country over party. But that is not most of my ward, and I cannot go back to seeing them the way I did before 2016. I had thought that they were Romney Republicans, which is fine, but they turned out to be Trump Republicans, which is not. The deeper values that I thought we shared, despite different opinions about policies, turned out to be an illusion.
p said:
“Adding complexity to the picture, at least for me, is the discovery that many of the kindest, most loving & generous Saints are also raving lunatics, just off-the-charts nutz, esp politically. My ward is full of them.”
I’ve also struggled with this realization this past year and a scripture came to my mind:
43 ¶ Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy.
44 But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
45 That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.
46 For if ye love them which love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same?
47 And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the publicans so?
Many of these kind, loving, and generous Saints are only thus to their own kind…if not limited to fellow members of their ward, often to people who look like them, act like them, talk like them, or think like them. How much of our vaunted charity and love for mankind extend to people of a different race, economic status, living situation, family makeup, belief system, orientation, political outlook, etc etc? For those unlike us whom we do actually help, when is the expectation ever that it’s not part of spreading the gospel and “taming the savage”?
CTR. Nope. At least not those in states where it was never in question that Biden-Harris would have all the state’s electoral college votes and who participated in no rallies of any kind. Your trying to cast all Trump voters as enablers is both ignorant of the election system, the reality of at least some of those voters, and as divisive as the rhetoric of the horrible Trumpists. Its the horribles and the “deplorables” who get in the news. It’s foolish to conclude that what gets in the news represents all Trump voters. That’s the same order of thinking that led some in some years past to think that all gays were promiscuous. You can do better than that.
If you voted for Trump the first time around, I can give you a pass. But not the second time around, after you found out what a lying, inept, corrosive individual he is, I can’t give you a pass. Particularly after you got your conservative Supreme Court justices. Just look at how Trump mishandled the COVID crisis. Just examine his failed moral compass.
Roger, Not that any of my non-rabid Trump voting friends need your forgiveness, but your comment reminds me of the guy who can’t forgive Democrats who voted for Hilary in the primary in 2016, because if the party had had the sense to run Biden against Trump then, we’d never have been burdened with the Trump presidency. So, I guess that guy thinks its the fault of the Democrat voters that we had Trump in the first place. It’s always nice to find somebody to blame — even if in 2020 we can’t figure out what we’re blaming Trump voters for since he didn’t win anyway. (That, of course, is an entirely different issue than blaming Trumpist and other rioters or inciters to riot.) Cheers. 🙂
Back to topic — it seems the refusal to acknowledge complexity or to respect others reasoned choices (however wrong they may be or even to acknowledge that there could be a reasoned choice that differs from yours) could be a significant cause of the perceived absence of a Mormon middle. OK, bring on the decriers of both sidesism. Cheers. 🙂
It looks as though enough republican senators will vote not to support the impeachment of trump. So they are saying it is OK to attemt to overcome an election, by whatever means including inciting an insurrection.
Do the republican party still believe in elections/ democracy. Is America still a democracy if only one party accepts the result of elections?
Do between 30 and 50% of members, however many still thing trump won, realise they are saying they no longer believe in democracy, no longer believe in the constitution? O r is there some other explanation?
I was watching a discussion of the impeachment and there was concern expressed about how this could all be settled without america decending into civil war. Suppose Biden were shot by a trumper. How would the church fare in a civil war with a proportion of members on each side? Should they be doing something to prevent it?
Thanks for the comments, everyone.
The discussion seems to have moved from consideration of a “Mormon Middle” to ramblings about how Trump has undermined what little incentive for cooperation between the parties existed in American politics. Perhaps that’s because of the Impeachment 2 trial shown on TV yesterday (Wed. Feb. 10) and continuing for a day or two. This trial, and the almost inevitable Republican vote to not convict Trump, seems like something of a watershed moment in American politics. But I’ll leave that sad analysis for another post. Some quick responses to a few recent comments:
Anna: “To me, you just can’t have a middle between “batshit crazy” and “in touch with reality.” We have to somehow bring the crazies back to reality before we can have a conversation about where the middle ground is …” Yes, that does seem to be a problem. If the political gulf is, perhaps, too wide to permit cooperation or discussion, the danger is that carries over to a now-politicized LDS culture. There will be some (many?) active LDS who view a good chunk of other active LDS as incapable or unworthy of any attempt at discussion or understanding. This will be a big problem going forward, exacerbated by ongoing political strife fueled by Trump’s likely continued participation in Republican politics.
rogerdhanson: “From my perspective, a Church move toward a middle position would have been much easier pre-Trump. But now it will be difficult.” It seems like everything is more difficult post-Trump. And we’re not even post-Trump, we’re just post-election Trump. He’s like cancer that is removed in an operation but, somehow, quickly returns to re-afflict the body politic.
CTR: “But that is not most of my ward, and I cannot go back to seeing them the way I did before 2016. I had thought that they were Romney Republicans, which is fine, but they turned out to be Trump Republicans, which is not.” This nails the problem, I think. If we define “the Mormon Middle” as common ground that all active LDS can stand on, together, to do good Mormon things jointly — well, that ground has shrunk, perhaps to zero. And if there is no common ground that all active Mormons can comfortably stand on together, that’s a big problem. LDS leaders invited political partisanship into the Church, and the result has been disastrous. Increasingly, stakes and wards have become groups of pro-Trump Mormons who want to vote any alienated progressive Mormons (as well as any non-Trumpist conservatives) off the Mormon island.
Even McMullin and other republicans are trying to form a new party away from the Trumplicans. Perhaps if there were another conservative option, LDS leaders and the rank and file would switch. It would Ned to gain traction first, we aren’t ones for sticking our necks out or abandoning power. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-party-exclusive-idUSKBN2AB07P?utm_source=34553&utm_medium=partner