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In the AZ case, the perpetrator was excommunicated. The attorney for the children tried to get the the ward clerk (who was privvy to the details of the excommunication) to tell what he knew, and argued that after the man was no longer a member, local church leaders could have reported it. They did not. Lower courts said the clerk wasn’t subject to clergy privilege so should comply. Church attorneys appealed successfully, claiming the ward clerk was a bishopric member and under the same law. It’s been a mess. This sexual abuse was sickening and went on for years, and included an infant. It took a person in New Zealand to make the report. Two bishops over the course of several years. I feel for them, as they did what they were told to do, which was encourage the man to turn himself in. One bishop also got the guy to confess to his wife and encouraged her to report. She did not. Meanwhile, at least one young girl and one infant were severely abused. I believe there were ways those bishops could have stopped it. One was actually a mandated reporter in his occupation.
There is obviously more to the story, but that’s the gist. And we don’t know the extent of the confessions to the bishop, but law enforcement knows how heinous the abuse was because he made videos. He was eventually excommunicated. And he killed himself before he could be prosecuted.
When does it become moral to break a law?
This is very distressing, but a good article by the same guy who helped uncover the Catholic mess. I wish the church would instead support Bishops who report such atrocities to law enforcement, but I suppose it’s less expensive to pay off victims than fight lawsuits.
I understand clergy privilege but I wish that just like with mental health professionals, there were some confessions that prompt reporting. I wish bishops were mandated reporters.
Bishops, good grief. Report child abuse! You can do it. You’d have public support and likely eventually church support. Maybe some laws need to be broken for the public good.
I realize that’s easier said than done.
It seems like there are usually reasons behind the stated reasons when there is any new policy change. In my stake, we’ve noticed new wards created when it seems like there are not the members to fill those wards. All the wards are smaller now, there are fewer meaningful ward activities, and fewer people to fill the callings. What’s more, the boundaries are sometimes meaningfully geographic, but also completely goofy and look like some political gerrymandering. I’ve been told, in essence, that’s exactly the case in order to collect the requisite number of righteous priesthood holders sufficient to create a ward.
My suspicion in the case of my stake, is that an ambitious stake president wants to give the appearance of growth to hopefully gain church recognition and/or a temple in our area. I also suspect he’s not the only church ambitious stake president or area authority out there. So, maybe this general
standardization of policy regarding the creation of wards and stakes is meant to slow down the tendency of such folks to push growth when there really is none, but couched in the idea that we’re just going to make stakes abroad look more like stakes in the states. Who knows.
To be fair.. I stopped paying tithing before the SEC Order. But I certainly paid a lot over my life, including times I couldn’t afford it. Paying tithing caused me to take out more in student loans, which is stupid, I know. I thought it was the right thing to do at the time.
If you want to read the actual SEC order, you can use this link then click on “sec order” near the bottom of that page. https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2023-35 This issue bothered me greatly.
I think it’s a good idea to read the order itself. As I understand things, this cease and desist order was drafted by lawyers on both sides, agreeing to the details within the order. That is to say, top church leaders knew exactly what was going on, had annual meetings to discuss what was going on, and “signed off” on decisions that circumvented the law. EVEN IF top church leaders weren’t aware of the complicated SEC laws, they were certainly aware that these actions were designed to hide the investments, which seems antithetical to being honest in your dealings with your fellow man.
Additionally, the order agreement details WHO these top church leaders are– first presidency and presiding bishopric.
The level of deceit is too great for me to dismiss or swallow that “the matter is closed”. They (Ensign Peak Advisors and top church leaders) asked people to lie for them. To sign off on investments they had absolutely no control over, putting themselves at risk of prosecution. These people were chosen because they had common names that wouldn’t be easily linked to the church. THIS INFORMATION IS RIGHT THERE IN THE ORDER. THIS IS OUTRIGHT DECEPTION, is it not?
Also.. no tithing funds were used to pay the fine? They used investments returns. Ok. I believe that, but where did the church get the investment returns? From excess tithing that was invested. If it wasn’t for tithing, there would be no money to invest. This is money left over after all the bills have been paid, including all the expensive temples. The church does not borrow money, even against itself. It does not spend more than it takes in, which is great policy. It puts some aside for a rainy day, which is also good policy. It then invests this rainy day fund, which is also a good idea. There is SO MUCH excess nowadays, however, that the invested excess, even at modest returns, has become gargantuan. It’s a good problem to have, but it is very hard to have that much excess and still preach to members that they should give. Yes, they’ll say the church doesn’t need the money, but you need to give, because it’s a commandment and it’s the Lord’s money anyway.
Well, I believe it’s past time for the stewards of the lord’s money to do a better job with the excess.
What are the “missions” of the church? Redeem the dead? Wow, ok I see lots of temples being built. Proclaim the gospel? Ok, the Church is already subsidizing missions, what about subsidizing the whole thing or cutting the price of missions especially for lower income members? How about creating more service missions? What about paying folks to serve instead of getting loads of free labor? Still a drop in the bucket. Perfect the Saints? Expand ward budgets. Create better youth programs. Pay for services instead of expect them for free. What’s the 4th mission? Care for the poor and needy? They’re already doing that right? But omg, with the billions in reserve, the Church could really do some amazing things above and beyond what relatively little they currently spend on humanitarian aid.
I’ve decided that I’ll not give another dime to this church that has billions in excess. I’m all for helping then keep the lights on, but I feel the interest they’ve made on my significant past donations is enough to cover it. I don’t feel guilty. In fact, the thought of paying feels wrong to me. I can steward my money better than that. I will still give, but now my contributions will help people directly.
Jennifer Thompson firmly and adamantly believed Ronald Cotton raped her in that famous case in the 80’s, and confidently picked him out of a police lineup. She KNEW he was the man, but she was later proved wrong by DNA evidence. Memory research, particularly that from Elizabeth Loftus, shows us how fallible and unreliable our memories are, as well as how easy false memories can be constructed.
I can believe the 11 witnesses believed what was written in their group testimony and still doubt or question the veracity due to what seems to me overwhelming evidence against their assertions.
For myself, it would be more believable had they each written their own personal testimony and experience with the plates and angel. However, their reports would have likely not been exactly identical, which probably would have caused people at the time to be less accepting. We can now look at the different versions of the first vision and accept that Joseph remembered things differently, related the experience differently depending on his audience, or constructed a false memory of the event over time, but a few decades back these different accounts concerned at least once church historian enough that he (reportedly Joseph Fielding Smith) took steps to hide the evidence for a while.
Bottom line is that eyewitness testimony is very fallible. We know that now. Folks didn’t know that back then.
I agree that it would have been more supportive to have all witnesses provide personal statements. Harris further discredits his testimony with wilder assertions after the testimony of the angel, but comes back with stronger and more detailed testimony later in his life. Eh. Memory is fallible and definitely prone to change over time. It’s also relatively easy to create false memories and I suspect Joseph Smith kinda figured that out under the guise of spiritual enlightenment. We’ve all noticed more and more missionaries returning early, and while it used to feel like they were stigmatized a bit, it now seems it’s a bit more normalized. I always try to welcome them and make them feel good by saying things like, “so great to see you!” and giving them a hug and not asking them why they’re back early. It breaks my heart to hear of missionaries who were and are suicidal. There are some systemic problems the church still needs to address, IMO, but I’m happy that now there are more options for kids who want to serve missions, and somewhat more mental health services available to them.
I’m not sure if others have touched on this point already, and I don’t want to presume any interpretation of Dr. Finlayson-Fife’s quotes, but I think it’s important to point out that she is a marriage and family therapist, and that I THINK this quote is more intended as a personal guidance when dealing with feelings of resentment towards a spouse or individual, rather than an organization or church. Polygamy increases the progeny of specific selected males, but does not increase the population in general. One might also argue that if population increase were the purpose, why did Joseph Smith not have children with his many additional wives, and why in the world did he marry those who already had husbands? And why do we still allow a man to be eternally married to more than one wonan?
I know this topic has been discussed ad nauseum, but it seems to take an awful lot of mind bending and scripture twisting to make polygamy fit into a plan of God, but only one simple explanation of why maybe it doesn’t really. I think Occam’s Razor wins this one.
Roy wrote:
Cnsl1 wrote:
Maybe the metaphor should be a polished rock. It’s smoother and shinier now. Not as rough. It’s been down a couple of streams, but now there’s more beauty in the stone.
Would that be a “rough stone rolling?”
For anyone that doesn’t get the reference, there is a Biography of Joseph Smith by that title.
:thumbup:
Lol!
No, I was thinking more along the lines of a smooth polished river stone.
Not a licked cupcake
Not a chewed piece of gum
Not a board with a nail hammered in then pulled back out
A cool stone that’s a little more familiar with the rapids and feels better in your hands.
But I wanted to go down those rapids together!
You still can. Rapids aren’t ever the same twice. It’s still a new experience.
You’re obviously right, DJ. The church as an institution does a poor job of teaching and preparing us to be sexual adults, but prepares us well to become guilty adults. Many church leaders have said some really deplorable stuff, and more will probably continue to do so. But we’re also clearly encouraged to learn, grow, seek out the best knowledge, and have joy. We understand now that the chewed gum metaphor is horrible. Maybe the metaphor should be a polished rock. It’s smoother and shinier now. Not as rough. It’s been down a couple of streams, but now there’s more beauty in the stone.
Very interesting to see the development of this thread. I remembered that I had a heck of a lot to say on the topic, but I suppose didn’t feel sufficiently motivated to take the time to keep my psychological hat on and add something helpful, and not just say c’mon, dude, grow a pair, which would obviously not have been helpful. OCD explains a lot, of course, but that doesn’t just come out of nowhere. In my experience, there will be other areas where the OCD would also be obvious. And maybe it is.
I’m not trying to diagnose. What I’m trying to do is get to a word that has been tossed around a bit on this thread, with some denying they felt it. Jealousy.
When we look at neighbors who may have had some fun times as teens and they are now just like us, or possibly at the same spiritual level, success level, or whatever, when we were the good little boys and girls who did what we were supposed to do, that feeling we have is Jealousy. And that feeling can also become resentment towards the organization that told us we’d be happier doing what they told us to do.
Jealousy is also the feeling of sadness, envy, or anger that our spouse did something with someone besides us. Now, I don’t think the OP necessarily felt mostly jealousy over his wife’s premarital manipulations that she didn’t detail to him, rather selfish pain for not getting what he felt he deserved. It didn’t feel like selfishness, but I will call it what it is. I’ve been there, felt that.
But hey, she lied, right? Of course she lied. People lie. Why did she lie? She didn’t want to hurt you, but also wanted to get what she wanted, which was you. After a number of years, it probably didn’t seem like a big deal anymore. It wasn’t to her. She was a kid.
I don’t mean to minimize the pain. That’s real. And it’s hard to figure out why it’s there, because it doesn’t make sense to our rational brain. That’s because we’re being irrational. It’s an irrational assumption to believe we should get what we deserve, that others should always treat us nice, that our spouses should always behave in a way that helps us, etc. We think we’re feeling super sad because we were betrayed, but we’re really feeling super sad because of the irrational assumption that our spouse should never do anything sexual with anyone else, including before they know us and even when they are stupid teenagers, OR the irrational assumption that our spouse would never lie to us to spare our feelings or to get what they want.
Once we let go of the irrational thoughts and assumptions, we can see how her premarital mild infidelity doesn’t have to lead to our sadness. We are choosing to be sad, so we can reframe and make it a positive in some way. Learn and move on.
Back to jealousy. I think it has a lot to do with self-esteem, self confidence, and trust. Once I trusted my spouse completely, there was absolutely no jealousy. Part of trusting is also having faith. We don’t know. We’ll never know. Might she leave me? She might. Do I think she will? No. Why? She’d be a fool, cuz I’m awesome and I treat her well. How would i feel if she left? Devastated and awful of course, but it’s not something I worry about. She could tell me she made out with the mailman for fun, and I would not be worried she’d leave me for the mailman.
The UPS guy, however… hah.
I’m not trying to imply I have it figured out. I don’t at all. But I’ve been down some of these same roads and I’ve learned how to make them beautiful shiny avenues that are remembered fondly, not pot-holed paths we’d rather forget.
And how does this relate to staying LDS? When I figure that out, I’ll offer an opinion.
Just for clarity, i interpreted the OP question as being more about statistics and not about what are good or valid, right or wrong, or the best reasons, which might suggest other reasons might be less valid or wrong. I didn’t read it that way. So, if interpreted correctly, I found the warning odd. Did I misinterpret?
I know of the Dehlin study, and i think there was another two or three. I’m not familiar enough with the Dehlin study to remember if his surveys were open ended or forced choice questions. What I do remember is that while many members might assume the reasons people leave the church are because they were offended or have a desire to “sin”, these reasons were very very rarely given by those who left. Rather, the reasons were more related to historical or doctrinal issues (and I understand that it’s often hard to agree on what is really “doctrinal”). If I remember correctly. Dehlin listed some pretty specific things, such as the Book of Abraham authenticity, DNA, polygamy, etc–some of the common issues of difficulty people often report.
Maybe a better question for this forum would be why do people stop believing what they believed before? It seems that lots of people stop believing this or that, or believe differently than they did before, but still do not leave the church. I’ve assumed this forum is basically about supporting those who don’t believe the same as they did before, but still want or feel they need to maintain connection with the church in some capacity.
I would suspect the reasons would be similar. I can only speak for myself but the reason I no longer believe what i used to believe is mostly because I studied the issues more thoroughly than I’d ever done before, and found evidence that overwhelmed my previous beliefs, which led to significant differences in my world view and church view. The vast majority of my study involved what most would consider Church sources or sometimes neutral sources. Were these doctrinal issues? I think many would say definitely yes. But I agree that we have a hard time agreeing on what is doctrinal and what is policy or tradition. For me, tradition and culture had nothing to do with my change of belief or disaffection. Sometimes the traditions annoy me, but they kind of always did, so that was not a factor for me.
Also, any desire for behavioral changes for me came well after the change in belief.
