My answer to the classroom full of 11 yr olds in your hypothetical above would probably be something like this: “Your Dad has different beliefs but I know him and he’s a good man. Each of you are really at the beginning to being “grown ups” and part of that is deciding what you do and don’t believe.” The rest of the answer would probably depend on the context in which this came up.

Christianity as a whole (including Mormonism) probably needs to focus less on what one believes (Peter Enns “The Sin of Certainty” is on my “to read” list), but that’s a longer topic for another day.

Honestly, I have no interest in persuading you of anything. For my own personal interest, I’d like to see a more nuanced LDS understanding and language for those who disbelieve.

But, it’s not something I’m going to lose sleep over. “The World” has a rich understanding of differing beliefs and I’m perfectly confident to use that language and those metaphors in my home and with my friends.

Best of luck.

As for talking to the little girl, I’d hope I’d go by the spirit. Barring that I’d say people believe different things but then I’d shift the discussion to why it’s important to discover things for ourselves and not believe or disbelieve because someone else does.

Giving the perpetrator access to deathbed confession is not the same as supporting his attempts to avoid answering for them. If the perpetrator is confessing before the judge and asking for the chance to make restitution to the victim, that is one thing for the bishop to be there. If the perp is trying to defend himself, that is another.

I can’t describe what it has done to my testimony to know that allowing an abuser to exercise his priesthood in front of the world is a greater priority to the leadership of the church than to guide him to true repentance.

I go every week. I love the Church, still. But my testimony is like the walnut tree in my grandparent’s house. It bore the most amazing black walnuts, but its heartwood was rotten and hollow. It carried on for years until it became too much and had to be removed.

That is the price.

The term used in the original post was “witch.” Dave was illustrating that there is a certain response to that term in LDS minds. From reading the comments above, it sounds like there are various ways LDS people think about “witch.”

Dave then pivots. Given how “witch” was understood in the past, can LDS believers think about how they use terms like “apostates” and “dissenters.” “Inactives,” “non-members,” “lost testimonies,” “losing the spirit.” We could go on.

The main point of the post, as I see it, is to ask whether there can be a new narrative for those who leave the faith, or whether LDS families can craft new narratives.

Clark, it sounds like you’re in the camp that insists on using the narrative as it is … “Witch 2.0.”

But I’ll ask again, let’s say you’re sitting in a class of 11-year olds and a sweet little girl raises her hand and says, “My Dad was Mormon but he does not believe and removed his name from the records of the church.”

Do you have language to frame this in a light other than the dominant LDS narrative, or are you going to tell the little girl that her dad “lost the spirit” and “lost his testimony”? Can you explain how someone would leave without invoking the “witch” label?

Fundamentally the reason I use the language I do is because of the phenomena in question. Now where things get trickier is when you talk about religion shifting between groups who share those premises. (Say Mormonism and a splinter group from the main body) So if I were to talk about those who joined and maintained their connection with Denver Snuffer the discussion might be a little trickier. But even then, if I’m writing from a Mormon theological perspective about the theology of such matters I’d be hard pressed not to question the spiritual realities behind such experiences.

By and large given the huge place the spirit plays in Mormon perceptions of conversion, how could deconversion be any different?

I don’t mean this in any disparaging way. Hypothetically, how would you describe someone who left another faith like Scientology or Jehovah Witnesses? Did you teach anyone on your mission who left another faith to become Mormon? What language did you use to talk about that experience?

You err in imposing your moral sensibilities on other people. Maybe you, with your baggage, could not do it, and that’s fine, but others with the choice could honorably do it while being morally consistent and morally sensible. Your attitude — your uncharitable imposition of your baggage onto other people — is the sort of judgmental attitude that contributed to the Salem witch trials.

To me, it is easy to imagine a LDS penitent seeking solace from his bishop, and asking the bishop to attend the upcoming sentencing hearing, and the bishop agreeing. This doesn’t mean that the bishop condones the crime, or that he is insensitive or unkind towards the victim who is a member of another ward. In the old days of public executions, a clergyman attended the penitent on the scaffold, even if the victim was present in the crowd and no matter how repulsive the crime. Some clergymen with certain scruples might have chosen not to do so in certain cases, as you apparently would, but I think those clergymen who did attend the penitent did them a kindness which was appreciated by their God.

Stop hating that bishop. Forgive him of what you perceive to be his sin.

Your sympathy and compassion for the felon turns out to be the crushing blow to the victim. And that is why your stance is not the religion of Christ, but the religion of the millstone.

Not only should the Bishop not be in that courtroom, but if he goes he should be immediately released as Bishop. Period. That is the zero tolerance kind of policy the church should have. A bishop may visit the felon in prison. He may visit the felon in private. But never in a supporting role in front of the victim. Ever.

Ever.