Critiques of Church leadership
 

One aspect of Church intellectualism is the tendency to critique leadership, past events, but I see very little Church intellectualism which tends to just expand knowledge.

In areas of science, scholars and academics sometimes are simply curious and stumble upon something interesting, and pursue it to the end.

I have a passing interest in Church history, though it doesn't strengthen or weaken my testimony. Nonetheless, Church intellectuals or "liberals" is almost always tantamount to "critic". Why?

I suppose one might argue that an intellectual who is mostly supportive is very as an apologist. But a true apologist doesn't usually add, they just support.

Where is the field of positive intellectualism?

If we read our religion threads, a large number are based on weird things or what we "intellecutally more moral or superior to the brethren with priesthood authority" see clearly are the mistakes of the past.

What is it in human nature that automatically judges an institution run by men as inferior to our current thoughts?

Why do we refuse to look at the events in terms of the historical frame?

Again, why are we so quick to condemn our past or current leaders?

I have done so, hopefully not too often, but I wonder. I've seen in part the work that these men perform, mostly selflessly and endlessly. It seems we are quick to judge and slow to praise.

we long for the mythic, superior, past.

Atlantis.

The past was always flawed, but some people achieved marvelous things, despite limitations and flaws.

Where are our forward thinkers?

Where are our inventors?

We dwell on minutae without pausing to see what people were overcoming.

Doesn't the leadership say that it is not for the members to look beyond the mark? The basics are there. What are you talking about?

Your comment makes no sense.

Leadership encourages us the strive to be everything we can become; seek out education, acquire, learn and earn.

Yes it does.

We are told to trust in the apostles, look to them for doctrine, look to them for the trails to walk, look to them how to run your lives, look to them when doubts arrise.

We are told that the leadereship will not lead us astray, that the Lord will not allow a man in apostacy lead the church astray. We essentially are told to trust in the flesh, to trust the carnal man, to put off the spiritual oneness we can create with God. What happens is that church cultures creates a bunch of spiritual addicts, where they depend completely on the church approved drugs handed out far too infrequently.

Some people find the inklings of this oneness in the more open, frank, and frequent discussions of past prophets, apostles, etc, and get frustrated that the current church differs so greatly from a more 'pure' form of the gospel.

Some intellectuals find that in our church they have no positive, church sponsored or endorsed outlets. They are told that if they search for the meat that milk is all they need. They are told that if they discuss the 'weirder' things of the gospel that their plight is unimportant and to not worry about it. They are told to simply move past their perceived 'inconsistenecies,' and thusly creates a schism between them and the leadership of the church.

For many reasons
 

Dynamic thought does not happen in a vacuum. However, most institutions that seek to inspire dynamic thought are not particularly enamored with or interested in the principles and concepts to which the LDS Church is adamant. The result is that not a great deal of mormons are exposed to dynamic thought, either because they choose to avoid these types of institutions or locations where that type of thought and training is prevalent or if they are there the training rarely focusses upon supporting what they hold spiritually dear, and taught how to channelize that ability and interest. BYU will never be known for great philosophy.

Additionally, I think our world today spends more time being critical of leaders or those considered to be great. I think the trend of questioning leaders instead of dynamic thought and or self-improvement is just not a trend organic to mormons. Society is little more than a bucket of crabs. Why should mormons be any different?

I'm critical of church leaders for not letting me go to strip clubs to convert the strippers.

You can always tell who the converted strippers are. They're the ones who pay their tithing with one-dollar bills.

For someone as smart as you are, using such large words, I have never seen such crazy grammar. I have no idea what you are saying. The heading in the thread makes me think it has something to do with following church leaders. I agree we should follow them.

Hey, it's called flow of consciousness. We lawyers believe in runons. Don't you?

Take the Church's history of practicing aparthied. You say, "Why can't we put this is in historical context?" By that I assume you mean that mores were different in the past, peope were more ignorant. But for the love of God, these church leaders were supposed to be morally elite. The leaders of the only true church, correct? Aren't we justified in expecting more of them than of George Wallace or Strom Thurmond or Archie Bunker? It's hard for people to swallow that Bruce R. McConkie was just a shallow, pretentious faux intellectual generations behind the times in egalitariansm and tolerance. Bruce R. McConkie was an "apostle," but it turns out he was a very ordinary man, stupendously flawed in character and judgment. In the mid-nineenth century there were abolitionists with the wisdom and moral strength to condemn slavery and racism of any type. One hundred and thirty years later McConkie and other church leaders weren't even where they were then.

I'm not asking why you as a nonbeliever will judge and condemn; I'm asking why most intellectual efforts today are focused upon condemnation.

Where is the development of our age? Inventing new internet porn?

We are a generation of weak minds, shallow hearts and pagan virtues. Our generations will long be forgotten in the annals of history of a period nonactivity, bickering and backbiting.

You make it sound like McConkie was pro-slavery. Yes he had his flaws (just like us or any other apostle in this generation or before) but he wasnt a member of the ku klux klan for cripes sake.

Look all through history prophets have had flaws and made mistakes. Jonah wouldn't go to nineveh. Moses didn't circumsise his son. Peter denied knowing Christ. Paul had a fight with his missionary companion and Peter.
Who is to say that McConkie didn't have his punishment from the lord (like moses et all..)

But I wasn't speaking as a non-believer. I gave McConkie his due as an "apostle" of "the only true church." Clearly I reject that he was any such thing, or that any such thing exists anywhere. I spoke from a thoughtful Mormon's perspective--many of these leaders of "the only true church" are just disapointing. They don't measure up to the claim.

You can't build a house on someone else's property. The right to build is held by the church leaders, and no one else. You are welcome to come up with whatever personal ideas and beliefs you want, to patch up parts of your testimony, but the moment you start spreading your personal beliefs as 'truth' you are on thin ice.

THAT is why people don't do what you are talking about. The culture of the church is FOLLOW THE LEADER.

McConkie isn't my favorite past apostle, but you miss my point entirely.

Where are the positive energies of our intellectuals directed? Nowhere.

The problem is there are no real Mormon intellectuals... where is there room to be intellectual? There are intellectuals who are also Mormon, but there are no intellectuals who are considered 'intellectual' because of their contribution to Mormon studies, unless you are speaking of intellectualism in Mormon art and letters.

There just isn't any place to get any traction. The leadership claims the sole right to advancing doctrinal understanding... so what are you left with? Archeology? You can look for Mormon ideas in the ruins of the Americas, but approaching historical sites with preconceved ideas isn't exactly intellectually honest.

What are you hoping for?

Sweeping generalizations like this don't do much for your credibility, buddy. Not one of your finer moments.

Hey now, I'm a bit out of the loop. Name a Mormon intellectual, and I'll check it out. I have known plenty of intellectual Mormons, but I don't think I have ever met a Mormon intellectual. Help me out here. I'm willing to learn.

Archaea, MikeWaters, Homeboy, My Dad, Mitt Romney, Jon Huntsman, and thousands and thousands of others I've not met.

Interesting picks. I guess I need a def. of 'intellectual,' and then a def. of 'Mormon intellectual.'

And realize, I'm talking about 'Mormon intellectuals,' ie. people's who are recognized for their intellectual work in the field of 'Mormonism.' I am not talking about 'intellectual Mormons,' who are people who are recognized for their intellectual work in any particular field, and they also happen to be Mormon.

Maxwell, Eyring, Holland, Ballard, Hafen, Stephen Robinson, Bob Millet, Wayne Brickey.

Intellectuals who will be remembered for their intellectual work in the field of Mormonism.

Nibley, Sorenson, Welch, both McKonkies.

You know, I am going to grant you this. From the beginning, I recognized that there are 'Mormon Intellectuals' in the Arts and Letters department. Now I am going to acknowledge proselytizing as a unique form of arts and letters. These people you list are poets who write the stuff that inspires faith. In the spirit of Johnathan Edwards, these people too are 'intellectuals.'

I guess my hangup had to do with Archaea's original question. It seemed like he was talking about a different kind of intellectual project other than 'inspiring faith.'

If you are talking about 'intellectualism' of a different sort (something other than poetry) then please define it.

Yeah, everyone could add a few more. I really don't get the point here. Seems a little silly to me.

What do you want to list?

Mormon intellectuals expanding the ideas of the Mormon religion...take my list and All-Americans and everyone would have a few more to add.

Do you want Mormon intellectuals exploring Mormon/BofM/Bible history with the purpose of defending the faith? Throw in all the FARMS and other scholars.

Do you want Mormon intellectuals exploring Mormon/BofM/Bible history with the purpose of tearing down the faith or rocking the boat? Throw in your Sunstone publishers and controversial BYU prof's.

Do you want anti-Mormon pseudo intellectuals trying to attack Mormons? Seattle Ute, Robin, and thousand others.

Do you want Mormons who are intellectuals in their field? We've got hundreds--go to the academia journals of each field.

This is the dumbest thread yet.

I guess it comes down to what it means to do 'intellectual work.' Like I said, I grant you the poets, the painters, the musicians, and the preachers. Art is a form of intellectual work. And I will grant you the critics. Criticism is a form of intellectual work. But Archaea seemed to be asking about something different. You aren't going to find a Thomas Aquinas or a Martin Luther in the LDS tradition. That kind of invention is reserved for the highest echelons of the church leadership. It seemed like that was the kind of 'intellectual work' that Archaea was hinting at. I would also add history to the mix of positive intellectual efforts outside of arts. Maybe Bushman meets Archaea's criteria for positive Mormon intellectual work.

As for your FARMS people, I guess it would depend on the meaning of 'intellectual work,' but they don't hold much credibility outside of a very very small circle.

How much credibility could they possibly hold so long as they maintain that a 14 year old saw Jesus?

What exactly is the definition of an "intellectual" that you're looking for? You cited Martin Luther as an intellectual-- does a man have to leave the church in order to qualify as an "intellectual"?

If they are NOT operating under the premise that the church is true, but nevertheless produce studies favorable to the church, they are merely apologists. If they ARE operating under the premise that the church is true, then they are either artists or they have no credibility. If, however, their studies hint that the church may not be true, THEN they are intellectuals?

I suspect we are all letting fuzzy definitions be filled in by our bias, Mormons not excluded. Let's try to pin down exactly what is being referred to instead of trying to decide who's on what side of an undrawn line.

I hear you. I was mostly responding to Archea's question. If all of the people we have mentioned so far are 'obviously' intellectuals, then what the heck was Archaea talking about? He raised the question. I think he should say what he means, and then we could answer the question on his terms.

I call bull crap on your slam on FARMS. Religious based academia ought to be evaluated against its other religious-based-academia peers. Of course your atheist scientists and researchers will turn their nose at them AND any other religion apologizing scholars.

FARMS and other LDS academics are doing more in their arena than their peers in other religions. I recently read a Christian scholar critiquing a FARMS publication on Central America anthropology and said he didn't agree but said that LDS scholars are kicking Christian scholars butts when it comes to research. Wish I could remember where I found it to give the link.

LDS scholars are also some of the guys leading the whole Dead Sea scrolls research.

Probably this one:

http://home.uchicago.edu/~spackman/losing.doc

In fact, as I read this paper, there's a lot that's pertinent to the discussion at hand.

Interesting comments on Nibley, whom SU dismisses without familiarity with his skills.

I think the Wikipedia article linked below has a set of good working definitions of "intellectual."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual

The opening, summary paragraph, reads in part as follows:

"There are, broadly, three modern definitions at work in discussions about intellectuals. Firstly, 'intellectuals' as those deeply involved in ideas, books, the life of the mind. Secondly, and here largely arising from Marxism, 'intellectuals' as that recognisable occupational class consisting of lecturers, teachers, lawyers, journalists, and suchlike. Thirdly, cultural 'intellectuals', being those of notable expertise in culture and the arts, expertise which allows them some cultural authority, and who then use that authority to speak in public on other matters."

Many in this thread cite Mormon intellectuals while apparently applying the second definition above; under this definition, yes, MikeWates and others cited are intellectuals. I submit there are are few genuine devout Mormon intellectuals who fit under the first or third category. But there are some that come to mind immediately, from the past and present: Michael Young, Rex Lee, Richard Bushman, B.H. Robers, maybe Dallen Oaks, probably Orson Scott Card, probably a number of professors at BYU who have been careful about what they say publicly or in print. MikeWaters also could qualify under the first definition.

I wouldn't include anyone from FARMS or Nibley in the first or third category because those individuals have devoted their life's work to building a case to support Mormonism. I don't disqualify anyone because they have religious faith or adhere to a religious creed; Augustine, Aquinus, and Dante, among many others, were towering intellectuals who were devout Christians. The problem I have with Nibley and FARMS folks is a level of intellectual dishonesty, carrying on a pretense of using the scientific method to prove something based on purported objective evidence when really all they are doing is consciously engaging in sophistry. It's more accurate to call these people fraudsters.

Fraudsters, because you say so?

Even the evangelical link seems to support the concept that Nibley is respected for his intellect.

You are being disengenuous. At the very worst, Nibley and FARMS could be considered religious advocates, which is all a religious apologist is.

You yourself admitted that you do NOT pay attention to minutae, but you claim they are "fraudsters". Are you being objective in your evaluation of Nibley and FARMS? Not being in the same sphere of their expertise are you even qualified to judge them?

I am not an intellectual, and really don't want to be one. But I have many friends who busy themselves with the intellectualism of life. You seem quite happy to pick and choose, to use the pretense of intellectualism, but to shed its rigors when it pleases you.

Why are they fraudsters in your mind? Because they haven't reached the same conclusions as you have? Is that approach intellectually honest?

This post is not your best work.

I don't care what the "evangelicals" say. I looked the authors up and I don't see that they're known for anything other than this article. I looked Mosser up on Google and the first thing that came up was a glowing profile on the FARMS web site. Who are these guys? Just "evangelicals?" Needless to say, "evangelicals" are not an intellectual lot.

A major premise of Nibley's and FARMS' work is that native Americans are descendants of Lehi.

Let me ask you this: If they are such world class intellectuals and their scholarship so distinguished, why have Nibley and FARMS folks been confined to this tiny tithing funded think tank? Nobody knows who the hell they are except for Mormons and a couple of evangelicals. If they really were world class, wouldn't they do more good to everyone, not least of all the Church, developing their platform at places like Harvard, Stanford or the University of Chicago (a school with leading anthropology and archeology research programs)? They can't go there because their "scholarship" isn't recognized by intellectuals as legitimate.

They haven't gone to Harvard and the like because of the narrow field of Mormonism doesn't interest those colleges or no Mormon has funded a chair there. Do you think a Mormon funded the first Harvard Hebrew studies chair.

You also no do what you accuse Nibley and FARMS of. As I understand it, FARMS looks at evidence to determine if the limited geography theory is applicable. Nibley would probably accept that concept. Have you read the stuff from the Iceland geneticts program. It's the one that shows a large portion of the now extant Icelanders don't actually exist according to the same type of program analysis that is used to say no Semitic genotypes are found amongst Native Americans? You seem to latch on to the one group of studies that confirm your suspicions and ignore all others.

It's not a question whether you care if something is true or not.

So these lists of persons don't matter according to you. Evangelicals, Mormons, people not at Harvard, Stanford. Anybody's opinion that does matter? Israelis?

So what is this narrow field of interest? There's no observable, physical relationship between the the "Book of Abrham scrolls" and the Book of Abraham. MesoAmerican and middle Eastern archeology have as much to do with the Book of Mormon as they do Alice in Wonderland. What do the Dead Sea scrolls have to do with Mormon scriptures? NADA. There's nothing to study concerning this "narrow field." This is what I find reprehensibe. High falutin pretense at scholarly pursuit when there's no there there. They're studying the limited geography theory you say. You wouldn't fill up a thimble with real linguistic, archeological, scientific, anthropological evidence bearing on this. Unlike the Hebrews, the Assyrians, etc. there's no evidence these Book of Mormon "peoples" even existed. All the limited geography theory is is a retrenchment, a dissembling. It doesn't justify a think tank, reams of articles, a web page, hundreds of thousands of dollarrs a year. It's all a big charade. Really just a big lie. Like I said, there are Mormon intellectuals. I listed some of them above. These jokers aren't among them.

Cheers

Didn't you say a while back that you hadn't followed this area of study at all? Now it appears you are a well-read expert. Interesting....

Hmmm. I think that's my point, isn't it? You can capture essentially the width and breadth of real substance that they put out in almost no time at all.

By the way, I do find it personally offensive, even creepy that FARMS tries to appropriate the Dead Sea scrolls as a means to advancing their agenda. They have added zilch to genuine Dead Sea scrolls research.

Really they've just interfered with honest pursuit of knowledge by many people. I once took one of my sisters in law to the Metropolitan Museum in New York; we went into the specimens from Mesopotamia, relics of literally the first known peoples who organized themselves in cities, had law codes, farmed, etc. Talk about feeling "the spirit"; it's there if you're attuned to it. She had a genuine curiosity about things that I admired. But at an age well over 30 she kept trying to correlate what she saw to what she'd read in the Book of Abraham (Abraham being a native of Ur, after all), FARMS commentaries, etc. I found it supremely annoying, and very sad.

Um, sure... And if you carry some bias with your excess baggage, you can cut your study time down to almost nothing and still come to a firm, confident conclusion.

Why is this "personally" offensive? And why do you automatically assume that the sole purpose of the interest in the scrolls from that group is to "advance their agenda"? Could it be that they simply find it a fascinating object of study (like thousands of other scholars)? I am not an authority on the FARMS books on this topic, but I am starting to suspect I may have studied it as much as you have.