I am with Indy, many of us don't like the Church whitewashing history so we jump on our innoculation bandwagon because that is the endstate we desire.

There has to be more to this story than what is being reported. There is no way a guy in his 40's who is cognizant was unaware of what he claims he was unaware of.

McConkie, apostate. Yeah, that's about the same thing, isn't it.

Are you serious? I read most of it and thought it sucked. IIRC, it really wasn't even about the LDS Church. It was a book on crazy religious fundamentalists and the strange they do, just with the mormon vein so to speak. I never understood what polygamy had to do with the Lafferty's wigging out. It seemed very disjointed to me.

I agree that it wasn't a very good book. It did have historical tidbits in it that aren't going to be in your institute manual.

This guy is a total donkey's arse.

How stupid can you be to grow up in the Mormon Church and be an EQ president 4 times, and not know that JS had wives up the yin yang? And I wouldn't expect the Church to advertise it either.

This is the biggest problem for people who are so certain about their "testimonies." In my opinion, the first step in gaining a genuine testimony is to admit that we know basically nothing about supernatural things, and that other people also know basically nothing (including prophets).

The other thing this guy doesn't get is that if he wants it to be true, then that's all that matters. Alma nailed that one. I just take the things that I want to be true, and I keep wanting them to be true (e.g. polygamy in heaven). And the other things that I don't want to be true, I continue not wanting them to be true (e.g. getting sent to the telestial kingdom for masturbation).

Has nothing to do with apostacy and everything to do with ensuring those who speak for the Church are authorized, or at least accurate. Certainly one definition of apostacy is false teachings, and those are in the aforementioned book.;)

Ha! I know that guy. Well, I worked with him and he would try to discuss things with me when he found out I studied Greek. The following is a true story: He carried around a Greek Concordance (it was something like strong's concordance) with each Greek word numbered. He would take a number, such as Utah's area code, 801, and look up the corresponding Greek word. In this case, word #801 was the Greek for "foolish". He told me that this meant that people in Utah were being foolish and on the wrong track. I thought he was joking at first but soon realized he was dead serious. I just avoided these types of conversations after that. But I wouldn't see the need to treat him differently than other people. I would just nod my head, and say "hmm, interesting" and change the subject. The guy speaks for himself, no need to be ostracizing him socially as far as I'm concerned. Seemed like a good but misguided guy.

I'd bet it was polyandry that shook this guy up. Anyone who says that most LDS know about polyandry are dead wrong. But that being said there's still something wrong with this guy's story. Compton wrote an entire book documenting the polygamous and polyandrous relationships of Smith and Young, basically introducing many of us to the truth of what happened. Compton was never ex'ed. I really doubt this guy was ex'ed for his beliefs re: polygamy, there's something more to it than that.

I admire people so much more when they just say they didn't want to be Mormon anymore, or when they come out of the closet and say that Mormonism isn't compatible with a homosexual lifestyle.

I get really tired of reading about people's journeys of discovery...e.g. when they found out that JS did the nasty with a teenager in a barn, etc, and how they realized they couldn't belong to a Church that was founded by a hypersexual bipolar prophet.

I don't believe people are Mormon because the JS story (with visions, angels, plates, etc.) is easy to believe. I think people are Mormon because they like being Mormon.

And I don't believe people leave Mormonism because the JS story is hard to believe. People quit being Mormon because they don't like being Mormon.

That's the way I see things, anyway.

How can you say that it is a silly thing to lose ones faith over? If one is objective and one reads the unsanitized version of Church History, it is not at all difficult for one to come to the conclusion that Joseph Smith was little more than a whore-monger who invented polygamy to cover-up his philandering. Why would you expect an objective person to come to any other conclusion?