As to age, I think there’s a pretty significant difference is maturity between 18 and 19 – especially for that subsection who simply mature socially later that others.

I understand the difficult logistics of setting up a new mission or rapidly expanding a mission in a high baptism (and likely developing status) country (e.g., sub-Sharan African countries seem to be areas of growth but I’m sure they aren’t the easiest places in which to organize a mission), and I don’t criticize the decision. However, had we the ability to funnel those additional missionaries into new missions in high baptizing areas or expand existing missions, I think you would have seen significant convert baptism growth. Mission growth and corresponding convert baptism gorwth may simply be a few years away as the Church expands its ability to rapidly deploy the increased missionary workforce to places where they can be most effective.

I live in Southern California and recall going to UT to visit my family, who all live there. I tried to initiate a conversation on the essays but they had literally no idea what I was talking about. I sent them the link. They never read them.

Similarly, as a Gospel Doctrine teacher I also mentioned the existence of these new essays in case anyone was interested in them. Maybe three members came up to me afterward to express joy that someone else had read them. No one else asked me how they could learn more.

My guess is that there are plenty of members that similarly have no idea what happened last November either.

I think the Church is doing its best to share new information with those that are asking for it, but is not particularly interested in the average member getting involved. So General Conference has, and will, continue to ignore all of this stuff for the sake of the average member. I really don’t think the Church is at all interested in the average member becoming invested in all of this.

Peter (#19.8 and the entire #19 subthread) I am sure it is tougher outside the Mormon core, where at least the liberal side of Mormon thinking is available in scattered conferences and certain geographical enclaves. Overseas Mormonism tends to represent a narrower range of Mormon views. But LDS leadership as well shows a narrower range of opinion these days, at least in public statements. Once upon a time (like the 1970s) comment sense and reasoned discourse was mainstream Mormonism. It’s not dead yet, but things have changed. And the recent emergence of something like a siege mentality among the leadership is not helping. I wish I could be more optimistic.

The JSPP and the gospel topics essays are positive moves. Let’s hope for more moves like this.

I really appreciate what you said about Jesus coping with 1st century Palestine – it perfectly represents the shock I have been experiencing losing a lot of the naive trust I used to have in the Apostles as generally reliable and facing a future where it looks like I am going to have to live with a much more conflicted and frustrating but perhaps much more healthily realistic experience of how things really are and how life is for most people without absolute certainties like those I’ve been used to. That’s a very healing and encouraging perspective to offer – thankyou.

I don’t think we are yet in a fully totalitarian system and I agree with you that our experience of the Church and its core values has been mostly very much the opposite, as I hope I have acknowledged – that’s why I am so flabbergasted that experienced apostles have gone so off-message. Hopefully the overall trajectory is still towards openness, but by really digging their heals in to resist key aspects of these reforming trends they are forcing previously harmonious wards and families to polarise and turn on each other, and it has been happening in a bad way for several years now. In my circle of acquaintance and friendship that has included 2 bishops, 2 bishopric councillors, 2 gay missionary companions and members of my family. Spend some time in the bloggernacle and there are countless tales of families torn apart because of the legacy of lying about Church history and treating the loyal opposition who habe served faithfully in the church all their lives as enemies. (This is a phrase Oaks made up by the way as far as I can tell – I’ve never ever heard members describing themselves with that label, but I’m happy to adopt it now! Must get a T-shirt made…By definition a loyal opposition whose loyalty is not questioned is the most essential defense against tyranny and madness in any organisational leadership, most of all in the Church. If you start looking for it, there is loyal opposition all over the place – Nathan the prophet to King David, Jesus to the Sanhedrin, Paul to the First Presidency of Peter, James and John.

My alarm is that actions follow words like the Third Reich followed ‘Mein Kampf’ and we have some key apostles slipping into their teaching and guidance to the whole Church membership specifically totalitarian concepts. I have already experienced the consequences of the anti internet mantra in the last Conference in the thinking and teaching of some people at church who got that message loud and clear. Just as we liberal futurists clutch on to any phrase or teaching by GA’s that protects our world view, I can only imagine what overt and subtle impact these words are going to have:

‘Some of this opposition even comes from Church members. Some who use personal reasoning or wisdom to resist prophetic direction give themselves a label borrowed from elected bodies—“the loyal opposition.” However appropriate for a democracy, there is no warrant for this concept in the government of God’s kingdom, where questions are honored but opposition is not (see Matthew 26:24). (A scripture about Judas! JUDAS!!)

This sounds a lot like the infamous Improvement Era article in 1945

(http://www.fairmormon.org/perspectives/publications/when-the-prophet-speaks-is-the-thinking-done)

that said “When our leaders speak, the thinking has been done. When they propose a plan–it is God’s plan. When they point the way, there is no other which is safe. When they give direction, it should mark the end of controversy. God works in no other way. To think otherwise, without immediate repentance, may cost one his faith, may destroy his testimony, and leave him a stranger to the kingdom of God.”

I’m with George Albert Smith who wrote the following to a local minister concerned about that statement:

‘The leaflet to which you refer, and from which you quote in your letter, was not “prepared” by “one of our leaders.” However, one or more of them inadvertently permitted the paragraph to pass uncensored. By their so doing, not a few members of the Church have been upset in their feelings, and General Authorities have been embarrassed.

I am pleased to assure you that you are right in your attitude that the passage quoted does not express the true position of the Church. Even to imply that members of the Church are not to do their own thinking is grossly to misrepresent the true ideal of the Church, which is that every individual must obtain for himself a testimony of the truth of the Gospel, must, through the redemption of Jesus Christ, work out his own salvation, and is personally responsible to His Maker for his individual acts. The Lord Himself does not attempt coercion in His desire and effort to give peace and salvation to His children. He gives the principles of life and true progress, but leaves every person free to choose or to reject His teachings. This plan the Authorities of the Church try to follow.

The Prophet Joseph Smith once said: “I want liberty of thinking and believing as I please.” This liberty he and his successors in the leadership of the Church have granted to every other member thereof.

On one occasion in answer to the question by a prominent visitor how he governed his people, the Prophet answered: “I teach them correct principles, and they govern themselves.”

Again, as recorded in the History of the Church (Volume 5, page 498 [499] Joseph Smith said further: “If I esteem mankind to be in error, shall I bear them down? No. I will lift them up, and in their own way too, if I cannot persuade them my way is better; and I will not seek to compel any man to believe as I do, only by the force of reasoning, for truth will cut its own way.”

I cite these few quotations, from many that might be given, merely to confirm your good and true opinion that the Church gives to every man his free agency, and admonishes him always to use the reason and good judgment with which God has blessed him.

In the advocacy of this principle leaders of the Church not only join congregations in singing but quote frequently the following:

“Know this, that every soul is free
To choose his life and what he’ll be,
For this eternal truth is given
That God will force no man to heaven.” ‘

So Elder Oaks has retrenched back as far as 1945. Ironically the year we defeated the Third Reich. No wonder the members were freaking out having risked their lives fighting Nazis and coming home to that as the hometeaching message of the month. You couldn’t make it up!

I would argue that this is a lot worse than the Septenber Six situation because Oaks’ focus is not on identifying insidious threats in the rarified world of Mormon academia. He’s saying they are everywhere. They are in your ward! And they are Judases. And if they protest that they are loyal they must be lying because ‘there is no warrant for this concept in the government of God’s kingdom’ – like Judas they will betray you to the Romans to be crucified. I’m not looking forward to being potentially seen as a Judas-like threat with no warrant to consider it ok to use my ‘personal reasoning and wisdom’ to be selective about agreeing with direction from the prophets, specially when they are telling me it’s helping rather than harming children and teenagers to forbid them from receiving the covenant-making saving ordinances of Jesus Christ and the companionship of the Gift of the Holy Ghost while they sit through years of primary and youth lessons insisting these things are essential for happiness, or maybe people with a single drop of african blood in them cannot have the priesthood or go to the temple. Or Adam is Elohim. Or Civil Rghts were a communist conspiracy. Because they are infallable aren’t they, therefore there is no reason to even think that their government gets anything wrong when they speak in General Conference. ;)

I should note I did not grow up in the United States. So I’m not sure I’m quite biased by the American view although I think people outside the US tend to disparage US culture too much. Admittedly sometime it is the problem.

Having been at BYU in the early 90’s during the so called September Six and warning of alternative voices I kind of wonder at the portrayal of the present being worse. This seems the most open the church has ever been. It’s publishing documents, engaging with difficult history and more. I just don’t see the embattled stance with feminists or intellectuals. That’s not to deny a certain conflict at times, but there are reasons for that on both sides.

The idea that Mormons aren’t to question I confess just seems crazy to me. I just don’t see it and have never seen it. Admittedly now I live in Mormon central in Utah county. And this is much more a peer pressure thing that will vary from ward to ward. However just as I’m loath to extrapolate to the whole Church on the basis of a few wards in Provo, perhaps the opposite is true too.

My sense from the rest of your comments is that you just have a pretty distorted view of what life in the US is like. Perhaps because most of it comes from newscasts focused on the most sensationalist elements? (Americans tend to have distorted views of Europe for the same reasons – with some thinking that terrorists are blowing things up left and right) It’s hard to say much beyond that what you portray just isn’t my experience. And I’ve lived in some of the highest crime ares of the country.

When you talk of a one size fits all totalitarianism, well again you’re getting into extreme hyperbole again. I am probably not the typical person but I really don’t feel any pressure to conform and certainly don’t see anything akin to you describe. I’m not saying that’s not how you feel. I’m sure it is. Just that it’s hard to say much not knowing the details of what caused you to feel that way. I can but say I’m skeptical. Of course people feel what they feel regardless of what’s going on. I’ve been in wards where I felt disconnected at the same time other people in the ward thought it the best ward ever. That didn’t make me feel any better.

My sense is Mormonism is completely about thinking for ones self. However what some people mean by that is attempting to reformulate the church in their image so they feel more comfortable. (Note – I’m not saying you’re doing this – just that it’s a phenomena I’ve noticed) Of course the church and members will react against that. Can the Church be all things to all people? Well ideally what counts is the core, and we love those around us who think differently from us. Imagine how Christ must have felt being in the primitive society in 1st century Palestine. If you learn much about what society was like in such times it’d be shocking to us. If Christ could come to love people in such a mysogynist, racist, horribly violent culture how can I not easily love those who come from a quite enlightened culture? If I need the church to be the society I feel most comfortable in to be a part, what does that say about me? (And here I’m critiquing myself and not others – when I feel somewhat disconnected from people in my ward as I sometimes do I ask myself what I can do better to serve them)

I agree that it has generally been the christian denominations who have watered down their expectations of traditional christian ‘righteous’ behaviour in areas like sexual activity and religious observance in the home that have seen plummeting attendance. I have for decades very closely watched the Church of England dwindle to irrelevance in my country because it lost confidence in its own beliefs, its senior clergy became too politically focused and stopped speaking the language of the gospel in ways that ordinary people could resonate with and understand, and dropped the prostelyting ball so most of their congregations went into an exponential tailspin where they aged fast and were not replacing the members they were losing. Many congregations have been snuffed out entirely and a LOT are about to reach that point. Some ‘Evangelical’ C of E groups decided to save the day, creating a set of missionary discussions called the Alpha Course based around more traditional fundamentalist beliefs which is now used by a lot of denominations (I used the youth version when running a Christian Union at the school I teach at) combined with more ‘charismatic’ worship, which has propped things up a bit. I have a friend applying to train as a vicar and she is finding that the big emphasis is on counselling skills and grass roots pastoring in what they look for in trainees. But the overall trend is rapid decline for them in the developed world while increasingly the bishops and clergy of the developing world call the shots, not always in ways the liberals like as they are inclined to be very socially conservative and that tension has threatened to split the Church several times. If more forward thinking senior leaders had focused more on staying relevant to ordinary people and speaking their language instead of obsessing about party politics and very public struggles with the government about social issues they would still have a much bigger membership base to give them influence today. I see our leaders spending alot of time shmoozing politicians and pressure groups, which is also the Public Affairs priority here and globally now, and adopting assumptions and language they have perhaps naively borrowed from the more extreme family values groups like ‘the natural family’ (hypocritical on so many levels bearing in mind our polygamy – I’m a very reluctant temple polygamist myself).

While I don’t think we should lose confidence in our faith and doctrines and Christ-focused best bits and unique selling points of temple and deification, we are at extreme risk now of the other major mistake the C of E leadership made which was giving up the ambition to convert everyone and shifting mentality in the 1980s to managing decline. They concluded that their day in the sun had passed and converting the world is too difficult and unrealistic and reframing themselves as the lone voice in the wilderness, a small conscience for the nation, not an essential and significant part of the future of the nation and the world. It feels like something similar has snapped in Deseret, triggered particularly by losing the battle over gay marriage, and the leadership are hunkering down, disconnecting from the cheerful and confident ambition to fill the earth and the belief that every person in every country needs and wants what we can give them that was so positively embodied on Gordon Hinckley’s attitude and approach.

Now a massive hopeless cloud has descended and everything outside the Mormon bubble is being presented as even more dangerous and sinister and threatening than ever when in fact a lot of trends like teenage pregnancies are moving in more positive directions. I think President Hinckley would have noticed that. These guys don’t seem the type to let facts get in the way of or in any way compromise what they have decided reality is. The current apostles have taken a LOT of specific measures in their teaching and excommunications and policies to pull up the drawbridges and dig a moat around the borderlands of the Church where there used to be gay Mormons and intellectual Mormons and uncertain Mormons and politically liberal and socialist Mormons and feminist Mormons and reforming ‘loyal opposition’ Mormons. And their children for goodness’ sake. It’s as if they’ve turned a flame thrower on all the family tents clustered in the distance but still pointing towards King Benjamin’s farewell sermon and blessing because they are too far away and they can’t be bothered any more to send his messages of hope and comfort that far.

Despite all the recent begrudging opennes about embarrassing Church history they are finally prepared to associate themselves with publicly, step by step a new version of a very old system is being constructed at the same time where the only people welcome now seem to be those who keep their questioning to a minimum, who don’t challenge the leadership and how they have defined their authority and power in any way, who don’t put blind or at least very short sighted faith above ‘reason and their own wisdom’ to quote Dallin Oaks. The ideal young Mormons of the new Reich / Year Zero are completely uncontaminated by everyday things like pornography and learning by researching what different sources say about something on the internet (like we used to check out a range of books on a topic from the library.) It is literally the opposite of good educational practice to only look at one source of information when researching anything, particularly of that source is clear about having a biased agenda, yet as a teacher I am hearing Apostles of God telling the Church’s teachers and entire membership over and over to only trust or look at their own propaganda.

That is such a betrayal of all the messages I have been taught growing up in the Church that valued intelligent understanding and education ajd what the temple endowment teaches about all truth being part of a divine whole. And now Elder Oaks has, hopefully naively and not intentionally, announced the final phase of any dangerous cultic totalitarian take-over of a community – having disconnected the core membership from the rest of society or the world, you then have a refining purge of those that remain in which you create a membership of totally devoted and unquestioning obedient people by proclaiming, as Oaks literally did in his talk, that the biggest remaining problem is the enemy within – the fifth collumn, the secret traitors. They are not a loyal opposition – they are your enemies and God’s enemies. Unless they submit completely to the leaders’ will in every way, if they dare to think for themselves or apply wisdom and common sense from their own experiences instead of completely believing whatever the current party line is, they must be rejected and expelled. That’s basically What Elder Oaks said in his talk, and then confirmed that he has turned into a pharisee losing his grip on the spirit of the law with his insensitivity towards non-Mormons killed or made homeless in the terrorist bombings and Fiji cyclone. Only God’s chosen tribe counts and only their prayers for safety matter or get heard.

It’s like he’s evolving into a spiritual Donald Trump – hence my concern about the trainwreck these people are making of my once increasingly incusive and compassionate and cheerful Church from their right wing American subcultural paradigm which they apply now to the whole world and to me personally. I’m loyal opposition. Everyone who believes we are still on a step by step journey towards perfection individually and collectively that we are still far from completing should be loyal opposition. We are loyal to our Church and our Lord, and we are constantly looking for ways to Serve him and buld His kingdom more perfectly and more effectively, which HAS to include constant critical analsyse of everything. That’s what they used to teach us anyway.

The Purpose of the Book of Mormon is to salvage the credibility of the Bible and its message in the modern age. This is the moment for us to come to the rescue. We could be the people stepping into the breach as the unambitious Protestant denominations decline into oblivion. The churches that are still thriving in the developed world are both doctrinally fundamentalist and confident in their principles and expectations, and have lively, involving worship and communities in which much is required and much is given. But many good people who would join a church are put off that because they are not at all comfortable with happy clappy and over-emotional irrational preaching and worship styles, and by the sad fact that many of these megachurches are led by people making a fortune from their members in very corrupt ways like the worste of the televangelists. We can offer the world a rational faith, a mostly unembarrassing worship style AND inclusive, demanding and fulfilling supportive faith communities. We have the best of both worlds, but these atitudes and behaviours from the top are creating a major obstacle between us and the people who need and would respond to what we could give them. And they are even chasing many of our best and brightest members who everyone has invested years of effort and time in developing out of the Church they should be helping to lead confidently into he 21st century.

So I’m not saying that traditional bible-based values are the American or toxic thing in Europe putting people off joining our Church (and although it took a while to start, America is rapidly going the same way Europe did in the 1980’s regarding church attendance generally which has put the wind up the religious right there.) I like to think that if I can be a Mormon so can anyone else. It is that too many of our leaders are being totalitarian and sinister in their demands of members’ minds and freedom to think for themselves.

They oversimplify and wrap that message up in passion and emotional blackmail. They wake up with tedious regularity convinced that they have a bright new problem-solving idea or solution (Did ANYONE say ‘hasten the work’ in this conference?…) that will fix everything and if they work hard and convince all of us it’s right they can change the world without needing to pause and consider the collatoral damage that will ensue because they were too prideful to learn from history or consult with people on the frontline or make contongency plans for failure. THAT’s the culturally American bit, as spectacularly demonstrated in the Gulf War aftermath. Americans used to be good at that, like the plan to reconstruct a democratic western Europe after World War 2, but they seem to have lost the skill since and replaced steady hard work with get rich quick short sighted strategies.

Added to that particularly culturally American over-optimism and over-simplification is the more universal totalitarian script of one size fits all specifications regarding what is acceptable in thought and dress and who we associate with, just like the pharisees used to insist upon. All this adds up to what is repellant and toxic. Anyone with any sense will see that for the dangerous cultism it is very quickly and want nothing to do with us. Lots of people in my country have reached that conclusion long ago (thankyou very much for that, baseball baptising morons….) It is completely out of step with the times in free societies where the internet empowers everyone who has online access (i.e. pretty much everyone, even in Uganda where there are far more mobile phones than lightbulbs http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-35883649 ) with information and power to understand and choose things for themselves without a very bossy nanny telling them what they should think and do. In trying to scare people away from the internet the GA’s promoting this message (which is not all of them, but they include some very powerful probable future presidents of the whole Church) are in effect trying to diminish members’ ability to think, be informed and resist their totalitarian control. I don’t know to what extent they realise this, but neither naivety or guile are attractive qualities in world leaders.

It is also out of step with everything Mormonism is meant to be about – trusting individuals to think for themselves, and teaching (as ironically quoted TWICE from D and C 121 in different talks this Conference) not through assertions of priesthood authority and fear and control and manipulative guile, but simply through patient gentle persuasion. PERSUADE people of truth and good, in open minded debates with alternate points of view if necessary because truth will hold up to any opposition. ‘Fear not!’ Win the argument, don’t forbid the conversation! Paul taught that we all have things the Spirit has prompted us to teach each other and we all have essential perspectives and gifts. Oaks and Bednar and others are relentlessly shutting down that philosophy and principle by reframing everything they can get their hands on into pharisaism. I see no indication that they believe they can learn anything from us that isn’t just reinforcing their existing mindset. That crucial depth of humility seems to be compromised or missing.

We are only allowed to learn from their ‘prophetic direction’ and the most freedom we are allowed is to ask faithful and safe questions, which they will then answer for us because they give prophetic direction. Well, that’s not how you help future gods stand on their own feet and grow until they are independently the equals of God because they have the eternal glory of knowledge and priesthood power distilled on themselves like dew, not given to them by a priesthood official. I’ve just found this excellent blog by Anonymousbishop while tracking down Bednar’s infamius ‘I am scripture’ statement which says what I’m trying to really well:

http://anonymousbishop.com/2015/08/10/i-am-scripture/

I’d also recommend the latest Infants on Thrones analysis of Elder Ballard’s talk telling the CES people to get educated and not avoid difficult questions. (https://www.lds.org/broadcasts/article/evening-with-a-general-authority/2016/02/the-opportunities-and-responsibilities-of-ces-teachers-in-the-21st-century?lang=eng) This discussion is much less sweary than their usual fare ;) If you can cope with some vigorous derision and a somewhat freewheeling approach I find that they are always a hoot as well as intelligent and perceptive in their ‘smackdown’ analyses, and if you understand satire their Conference parodies and similar are cathartic works of genius.

http://infantsonthrones.com/an-evening-with-elder-ballard/

I’m about halfway through it. One thing that’s really interesting they have picked up on is how Ballard still went on to demonise the internet and those who partake in it by explaining that really ‘pure’ and faithful students won’t need all this intellectual information stuff because they will just have super-faith without it – testimony bearing is enough for the really elect (backed up with 3 stories about this). It is the impure children and teenagers who because they are exposed to the internet will of course have all been inevitably poisoned by pornography who will require additional measures like rational persuasion and answers to questions to get to the same faithful place. Apart from being patently wrong and an arrogant over-simplification of the complexities of real human experience and development, this message emphasises to the Church’s professional educators a hierarchy where the gullible or easily emotionally/spiritually persuaded are the best humans and students, and the the kids asking questions and researching as rational learners are all by his definition impure pornography-addled symptoms of a fallen world. I must try that message in some teacher training at school….

And that’s the thing. When you start sifting and pay attention to what the Apostles are actually saying in their often rambling way there is a bizarre mash up of great gospel stuff and pure satanism these days which is very revealing and alarming. We have been raised in the Church to be wary of heresy and philosophies of men mingled with scripture and that’s tragically become a very apt description of General Conferences. (By satanism I mean: Thought control. Obedience prioritised over personal analytical pondering and insight and autonomy to choose how to live. Offering over-simplified solutions or short cuts on the journey of eternal progression. Tail wagging the dog – symptoms treated as causes of our pain and problems, and side effects treated as the medicines to fix us. E.g. The existence of money is not the root of evil. Love of it is.) The Christianity Jesus promoted involves acting on personal spiritual promptings to step out of manmade boxes and rules and have the flexibility to choose from the many good things rather than the one good thing in the Talmud, thus enabling us to minister to all the people around us and bring Christ into their lives through our service and love, no exceptions and noone left behind. When you run the Church the hyper-controlling and inflexible Pharisee way you can only save one tribe as long as they all follow exactly the same religious AND cultural rules and stay away from everyone else. The apostles need to reach outside the tribe and drop the obsessive crusades for lost causes which blow things like campaigning to deny other people non-monogamous non-heterosexual marriages, or calling any degree of pornography exposure an ‘addiction’ or ‘disease’, out of all proportion and become a fatal distraction from the far more urgent things that need dealing with. They need to raise their game urgently and promote the things that will actually save and grow our Church. Some like Uchtdorf are clearly trying to with some very bold statements about some things our prophets have done being indefensible and crushing the flower of the gospel with well-intentioned sediments over the last few years, but it’s hard to hear them over these Pharisee big guns and they will be in charge before he is.

The example of Elder McConkie’s teachings and private –not public– repudiation is an interesting example. While in college I had an institute class at a university in Utah that used, as its text, 12 general conference talks and/or devotionals that the instructor presented as being “on par with scripture” in terms of their importance and truth. The Seven Deadly Heresies speech and Fourteen Fundamentals of Following the Prophet were two of the talks.

I like the quote from S. Dilworth Young. Thank you for sharing.

I certainly do think members should engage such thing in a faithful fashion. So I was a big proponent of what the Church has been doing the past couple of years and wish they’d done it years earlier. I certainly don’t advocate hiding from such matters. I think people should be exposed to them. How to do it I’m still not entirely sure on. The Church has made some great important first steps, but there’s still a lot more to do on this.

These things aren’t “anti-Mormon materials” as you continually refer to them. They are facts. They are included in the essays, for example. As such, they are *Mormon* materials, not anti-Mormon materials (unless you think that the Brethren are now anti-Mormons, which I’m sure you don’t). It would be appropriate to at least make potential converts aware that the essays exist, and potentially address some of the issues in them.

You are a highly intelligent person, but your analogies are off the wall. Won’t even bother responding to them.

Further if we are to model ourselves on the scriptures, we follow their approach.

Finally, I suspect these things come up more than you think. My investigators certainly all encountered anti-Mormon materials. So I certainly don’t mind discussing such issues if they come up. However I’m not sure the typical young missionary is capable of dealing with those issues usually in a fair fashion. I’m fairly well informed, but I certainly wasn’t capable of doing that sort of thing on my mission.

What converts is teaching investigators to go to the Lord and listen to the spirit. That’s the key thing. If you can teach people to find out for themselves then they can grapple with all these issues. Typically with my investigators back in the day if I was able to reach the 3rd discussion before the anti-Mormons got to them they’d understand finding out enough they’d be baptized. Before then though that basic spiritual way of knowing wasn’t in place and they weren’t prepared to engage with such issues in what I’d term a fair way. (I’m sure you’d disagree on all the matters)

“The gospel Christ taught was spectacularly designed to unsettle and disturb, not lull into pleasant serenity. * * * As Elder Jeffrey R. Holland said, the Savior did not preach ‘comfortable doctrine, easy on the ear.'” Terryl Givens, Crucible of Doubt.

I’m with you. Let’s take our blocks and go home.

Or perhaps the Lord wanted it that way. I’m a believer, so I’m accepting the notion that it’s the Lord’s church and He inspires the leaders regarding topics to address at conference. I know, call me naive.