Alternate Voices: The Calling and its Implications

[Detroitdad]

Originally Posted by jay santos

That point was pretty sketchy, in my opinion.

Why do you think so? I thought the evidence that he presented was compelling, but I must admit I don't have more than a cursory knowledge of the internal politics of the mid-century church.

[Sleeping in EQ]

Originally Posted by creekster

SIEQ, if Indy is simply baiting you, why rise to take it? By taking the approach you have you have actually made Indy look much more reasonable than he would have if you had ignored him and he persisted in trying to bait you, and you have allowed him to succeed in his effort to divert focus from the real issues. Moreover, do you give us all such little credit that you fear we are unable to see through baiting techniques that avoid the substance? I am not sure to what end you persist in the back and forth here.

As to Indy, I have no idea if he was trying to bait you or not, as his approach didn't get far enough to tell before this devolved into a sort of lovers' quarrel.

I should add that I actually appreciated the articles referenced.

You have a point. Still, while many here see through such techniques, others do not. Regardless, I objected to Indy's question based on my experiences with him. On many occasions he has entered the fray with that sort of a question and then completely derailed the discussion. I was trying to point out that I'm not fooled by such, but then, of course, the exchange was relegated to the ephemeral world of intentions.

If he was breaking from behavior that I have previously noted then that's great. I've just now asked him a couple of straightforward questions and hope that he responds in kind.

[Indy Coug]

Originally Posted by Sleeping in EQ

You noted that you found some of Oaks' ideas to be ambiguous. Do you think that's a good thing? A bad thing?

No, I found his definition of who is an alternate voice to still be a bit vague. I agree in principle to the points both Mauss and Oaks made, even if repeated readings of Mauss has caused me to be bothered a bit about the tone taken in some of his points.

Maybe my mind is too empirical given my statistical background, but I continue to have a hard time understanding what distinguishes a voice from an alternate voice.

[creekster]

Originally Posted by Detroitdad

I'll attempt to change the subject back to the original topic..

It seems that Mauss is making the unconcventional point that a more homogeneous population had more heterogeneity of thought within the upper echelons. While the growing heterogeneity of the church lead to more homogeneous thought and policy.

If this is true, is it a good thing? And in what ways would it be possible for the church leadership, if they recognized and regretted the emergence of this trend, to prevent this from taking hold?

In many ways this seems to be an outgrowth of the earlier thread on diversity, in which there were many who thought that diversity was a good thing and others who thought that diversity (at least in terms of ethnic identity) was less important, or that recent changes are making the church more diverse. But, in reviewing this set of articles it makes me wonder if diversity of viewpoint is more what the champions of diversity are after?

Good question and I admit I have not had a chance to actually read the articles yet. But I sometimes wonder if the reason so many of the leaders fear encouraging diversity of thought and opinions is based on a couple of factors that may be hard to fully grasp if not in their shoes: 1. They believe the church is true, down to the very base, and believe that we are engaged in an eternal struggle to save souls on earth in the face of an increasingly successful adversary. If you have a true conviction and witness of the truthfulness of the gospel and that deviation from its principles will result in your alienation from eternal blessings, then you act to try to preserve as much activity among members as possible. 2. I wonder if they look at this in a utilitarian way, so to speak. There are a lot more fence sitters who would be bothered by too much openness than there are scholars who will leave the church. As a function of numbers, IOW, they are choosing the path that they believe (or are inspired to follow) which will result in the greatest good for the greatest number of members. 3. The diversity in thought crowd more often than not (notice I did not say always) contributes little to topics that are needed for eternal salvation. If the focus of the scholar crowd was improving prayer or increasing service it would be more appealing to the leaders, but more often than not (and this is my guess as to what Oaks was referring to) these scholarly and learned approaches are focused on digging up some arcane story or set of facts that, while interesting, eventually just become one more hurdle for a substantial number of less scholarly people whose testimony may be wavering.

I'm no scholar, and I need to read these articles and think about it more, but I sometimes feel that we evaluate the leaders unfairly. We do not have their perspective, as it is very difficult to empathize with a prophet, IMO.

[Sleeping in EQ]

Originally Posted by Indy Coug

No, I found his definition of who is an alternate voice to still be a bit vague. I agree in principle to the points both Mauss and Oaks made, even if repeated readings of Mauss has caused me to be bothered a bit about the tone taken in some of his points.

Maybe my mind is too empirical given my statistical background, but I continue to have a hard time understanding what distinguishes a voice from an alternate voice.

Elder Oaks is most concrete on this when he writes that "In most instances, alternate voices are heard in the same kinds of communications the Church uses to perform its mission. The Church has magazines and other official publications, a newspaper supplement, letters from Church leaders, general conferences, and regular meetings and conferences in local units. Similarly, alternate voices are heard in magazines, journals, and newspapers and at lectures, symposia, and conferences."

I think the "in most instances" is about as specific as we're going to get. It's reasonable to infer that he's mostly (but not exclusively) concerned about published ideas and ideas being circulated through independant Mormon forums. He's probably alluding to Dialogue (of which he was once a contributor and member of the Editorial board with people like Mauss), Sunstone, and the like, but the timing of his talk lends me to believe that he may have also been concerned about the super-patriot publications and conferences that were fairly popular at the time (Bo Gritz's and Cleon Skousen's). It wasn't long after his talk that several hundred of those folks were ex-communicated. It also coincides with instructions for BYU faculty to steer clear of the Mormon History Association.

He seems to have a related concern about how material from these alternate sources is used in the Church. This is a more touchy concern in some ways as for the most part only those who are checked into the alternate publications even know what's being discussed in them (this is less true today, with the Internet, than it was when he made his remarks in 1989). When somebody drops something provocative on a Sunday School lesson the stakes for both good and bad fruit to be born are raised.

[UtahDan]

Originally Posted by creekster

...but I sometimes feel that we evaluate the leaders unfairly. We do not have their perspective, as it is very difficult to empathize with a prophet, IMO.

Impossible more like. These are my thoughts aswell, interesting as I find many of the tangents that get taken up.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by UtahDan

Impossible more like. These are my thoughts aswell, interesting as I find many of the tangents that get taken up.

I agree it is a very difficult job. However, after a while it is difficult for them to understand our perspectives as well.

I don't envy them their jobs, but the days when everybody knew each other must have been wonderful days to explore Gospel topics, as latent fear didn't grip everybody that one was a wolf in sheep's clothing.

[Sleeping in EQ]

Originally Posted by creekster

Good question and I admit I have not had a chance to actually read the articles yet. But I sometimes wonder if the reason so many of the leaders fear encouraging diversity of thought and opinions is based on a couple of factors that may be hard to fully grasp if not in their shoes: 1. They believe the church is true, down to the very base, and believe that we are engaged in an eternal struggle to save souls on earth in the face of an increasingly successful adversary. If you have a true conviction and witness of the truthfulness of the gospel and that deviation from its principles will result in your alienation from eternal blessings, then you act to try to preserve as much activity among members as possible. 2. I wonder if they look at this in a utilitarian way, so to speak. There are a lot more fence sitters who would be bothered by too much openness than there are scholars who will leave the church. As a function of numbers, IOW, they are choosing the path that they believe (or are inspired to follow) which will result in the greatest good for the greatest number of members. 3. The diversity in thought crowd more often than not (notice I did not say always) contributes little to topics that are needed for eternal salvation. If the focus of the scholar crowd was improving prayer or increasing service it would be more appealing to the leaders, but more often than not (and this is my guess as to what Oaks was referring to) these scholarly and learned approaches are focused on digging up some arcane story or set of facts that, while interesting, eventually just become one more hurdle for a substantial number of less scholarly people whose testimony may be wavering.

I'm no scholar, and I need to read these articles and think about it more, but I sometimes feel that we evaluate the leaders unfairly. We do not have their perspective, as it is very difficult to empathize with a prophet, IMO.

I would qualify your third point: Sometimes the topics scholars focus on are only important to their own faith. Often they're using historical situations to figure out what a prophet is, what prophets do, how agency and structure interact and so on. These questions can be very important to a scholar's faith but seem (with an emphasis on "seem") to be less important to those who "simply" want to be obedient. When rank-and-file believers find contradictions in their faith they can suddenly be very thankful that others have put significant effort into thinking such things through. Then, and only then, do they usually see how important such things can be for bolstering belief.

[creekster]

Originally Posted by Sleeping in EQ

I would qualify your third point: Sometimes the topics scholars focus on are only important to their own faith. Often they're using historical situations to figure out what a prophet is, what prophets do, how agency and structure interact and so on. These questions can be very important to a scholar's faith but seem (with an emphasis on "seem") to be less important to those who "simply" want to be obedient. When rank-and-file believers suddenly find contradictions in their faith they can suddenly be very thankful that others have put significant effort into thinking such things through. Then, and only then, do they usually see how important such things can be for bolstering belief.

I don't disagree with this qualification, but it is quite a tightrope act to set policy for a church in this area. My guess is that leaders hope that if members are allowed to incubate their testimonies long enough that when this sort of trial comes they will be able to come out the other end through personal study and inspiration.

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by creekster

I don't disagree with this qualification, but it is quite a tightrope act to set policy for a church in this area. My guess is that leaders hope that if members are allowed to incubate their testimonies long enough that when this sort of trial comes they will be able to come out the other end through personal study and inspiration.

And perhaps this is the empirically safer route, who knows. It is less satisfying, as the "innoculation" concept seems helpful and wise.