Truthiness never was happiness…

Mormons are taught to base their beliefs in the church on a spiritual witness rather than facts. A testimony is considered the most important possession a member may have:

"I would like to say to you, that is the strength of this cause, the individual testimony that lies in the hearts of the people. The strength of this church is not in its buildings, in its chapels, in its offices, in its schools; it is not in its programs or its publications. They are important, but they are only a means to an end, and that the end is the building of the testimony - a conviction that will weather every storm and stand up to every crisis in the hearts and lives of the membership." (Gordon B. Hinckley, Area Conference Report, August 1971, Manchester, England, pp. 160-161. As quoted in Testimony, pp. 8-9)

So how do Mormons gain a testimony? Brigham Young said that Joseph Smith appeared to him in a dream and discussed how one can recognize the Spirit:

"They can tell the Spirit of the Lord from all other spirits; it will whisper peace and joy to their souls; it will take malice, hatred, strife and all evil from their hearts; and their whole desire will be to do good." (Manuscript History of Brigham Young, February 23, 1847; as quoted by Marion G. Romney, in Conference Report, April 1944, pp. 140-141)

Thus, Mormons believe that truth can be known through one's emotions and desires. They are encouraged by church leaders to reject any evidence that conflicts with this spiritual witness of truth. As taught by Apostle Thomas S. Monson:

"Remember that faith and doubt cannot exist in the same mind at the same time, [cognitive dissonance] for one will dispel the other…Should doubt knock at your doorway, just say to those skeptical, disturbing, rebellious thoughts: 'I propose to stay with my faith, with the faith of my people. I know that happiness and contentment are there, and I forbid you, agnostic, doubting thoughts to destroy the house of my faith. I acknowledge that I do not understand the processes of creation, but I accept the fact of it. I grant that I cannot explain the miracles of the Bible, and I do not attempt to do so, but I accept God's word. I wasn't with Joseph, but I believe him. My faith did not come to me through science, and I will not permit so-called science to destroy it." (Thomas S. Monson, "The Lighthouse of the Lord," New Era, February 2001, p. 4)

While faith certainly plays a role in the spiritual life, should it be allowed to displace observable facts? Must one surrender objectivity whenever it comes into conflict with spiritual beliefs? How can one know whether spiritual experiences are not simply emotional reactions? What about Mormon priesthood blessings where the individual pronounces what he believes to be the Lord's will, only to have the opposite occur? Or disciplinary councils where men, equal in righteousness and sincerity, receive conflicting spiritual promptings about the appropriate course of action?

"Mormons will at this point inject that a certain kind of feeling experience supercedes any level of external evidence because the feeling experience is actually a member of the godhead telling them a truth. This seems viable if one could know that the feeling state they're having is actually the Holy Ghost telling them something. How would they know this feeling state is the Holy Ghost? And how would they know what the meaning of the feeling state is? Because someone in the organization has told them what it is. So, Catholics have their truths confirmed by this feeling experience, as do Born-again Fundamentalists, Jehovah's Witnesses, Mormons…How reliable could this be as an ultimate source of truth?"

[But my feeling state is better than your feeling state…]

"Confounding the ability of church members to honestly look at such a question is the indoctrination process that begins in early "programming." Throughout the Mormon experience comes the indoctrination of knowing. "I know the church is true" programming and a discouragement of questioning the truth of Mormon scriptures and leaders strongly inhibits the process of an honest and ongoing search for truth. Mormons are typically unable to see this in themselves. The ability to objectively see this in their experience runs contradictory to the programming of knowing. But if we were to discuss this in the context of another religion--for example: The Jehovah's Witnesses, [Scientologists, Branch-Davidians, Fundamentalist Mormons, etc.], then Mormons can clearly see the error in someone believing they know the truth and then shutting off the process of ongoing critical examination and continued searching. Such individuals are dismissed by Mormons as being closed-minded--all the while missing that very quality in themselves.

And of course the indoctrination process is what confounds the feeling experience method of truth. If I am a Jehovah's Witness, and have been "programmed" to revere the founder Pastor William Russell as inspirational, it is likely that I will have strong feeling experiences about him and the doctrines he introduced. I will have been taught this is the Holy Ghost telling me what is truth. I know it is true because I have had this powerful warm feeling." (William Gardiner, How Obvious Would It Have to Be? )

Church members are effectively told that they should never doubt or question. Had Joseph Smith followed this admonition, he would have never inquired as to the truth of the churches of his day. Growth and the emergence of continued spiritual enlightenment is a product of continual doubting, searching and questioning.

Steve Lowther, a former LDS apologist, described his experience with religious emotions in this way:

"In my own awakening from apologist to critic, one of the epiphanies I had was about trusting the "Whisperings of the Spirit". Missionaries encourage investigators to employ this technique to find out the truth.

What are these whisperings? As a new convert, I had remarkable, exhilarating experiences after long, fervent prayer. I set aside my doubt as best I could and struggled for that special witness. I got it in no small measure.

But as I was uncovering for myself one embarrassing (for the Church) morally depraved event after another straight out of the Church's own publications, I asked myself how this huge number of non-faith promoting events could be reconciled with my testimony. After all I worked long and hard, and invested a great deal of mental and emotional energy into it.

After asking myself if Mormons could be practice self-deception, I could only answer that, yes indeed it has happened innumerable times, repeatedly with members of the human race. After all, those religionists who disagreed with Mormons were proof of it, at least to Mormons.

Now the emotional products of a testimony are very satisfying. It never occurred to me that there could be deception involved. After all, one knew it was the truth because of the nature of the experience. When asked how I knew, my reply was the familiar "You won't understand unless you have had it happen to you." It simply was an experience that felt entirely right!

Yet, in the end I had to confront that these religious emotions were just that -- emotions. If God provided a unique gift to the human soul, it couldn't be the gift of emotions. Many members of the animal kingdom experienced most of the range of emotions I have felt over the years. So what set humans apart from the rest of the animal kingdom?

Intelligent reasoning. If God gave us anything to discern truth, it was what was learned through the ideal of uncorrupted reasoning. Mormons are notoriously easy to dupe. They are by nature trusting and unsuspecting, and will develop 'testimonies' quite easily about things, whether it is multi-level marketing schemes, or 'promising' investments. So why should their religious perceptions be any different? Why should mine?

If a person were to apply careful observations, investigation and logic to these schemes, there would be little or no deception ultimately. But it takes courage to peer into the eyes of our sacred cows. It is not easy to admit to the fallacy of that which we have held sacred. Ironically it takes humility, the very principle taught as necessary for acquiring a religious testimony.

But with reasoning, you do not start off exercising enough faith to put doubts out of your mind. You do not preprogram yourself to suppress thinking about the contradictions that always make their appearance. You do not have to have blind obedience to the faith of someone else. In short you are not required to put your trust in the arm of flesh."

WARNING—WARNING—WARNING—WARNING—WARNING—WARNING—WARNING

I am about to post some material that some members may find offensive to their faith…If you do not want to be offended, I suggest you QUIT READING right now.

Ok, I warned you.


Commonly used Mormon "proofs/arguments" (from RfM boards)

Argument from the round earth

1. People once thought the Earth was flat
2. The earth was actually round
3. Therefore all of modern science, including archeology, is wrong.
4. Therefore the Nephites are real.
5. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from Nibley.

1. So you see. And then it all comes out. And the definition of "Woohoo" is actually from a Hittite tablet we find buried in the Red Sea under a chariot (which I asked some grad students to explain and they couldn't) and it said "woohoo boohoo foofoo". Now in ancient mystic Egypt, before they invented papyrus, "woohoo boohoo foofoo" was the name of the God of the "multi-layered" heaven, and therefore you see that the ancient pre-literate Egyptians were actually Mormons at heart!
2. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from The Three Nephites.

1. There are three immortal white guys who have been walking around North America for 2000 years.
2. Some Native American legends talk about "white ghosts".
3. I bet those stories are about the Three Nephites!
4. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from evolution

1. Evolution says life on earth is the result of natural processes and humans arose in Africa.
2. But we know that God made Adam and Eve in his image and they lived in Missouri (before Zelph did).
3. Therefore the church is true.

The argument from aversion to celibacy

1. In the Kingdoms of Heaven, only those in the Celestial Kingdom will be married.
2. And they'll be polygamous.
3. The rest of you will be neutered.
4. I would like to live in Heaven forever with a harem of hot immortal women, rather than be neutered.
5. Therefore, the church is true.

The Mormon Ontological argument

1. I can imagine having a really great wife.
2. If I can imagine a great wife, I can imagine the greatest wife of all time.
3. I can even imagine having two hundred of them and living forever as a God with them.
4. That would be perfect.
5. Since for something to be perfect it must be real, then my imaginings of perfection must be real.
6. Therefore the church is true.

The Mormon Cosmological argument.

1. Something caused the universe to exist.
2. It wasn't God, because he is part of a society of Gods, and his home is here in this galaxy, near Kolob.
3. It wasn't his God, because he is part of a long line of Gods.
4. What was it?
5. It must have been something!
6. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from Leviticus.

1. Leviticus says that homosexuality is wrong.
2. It also says you should sell your daughter into slavery if she gives you any lip.
3. It also says you should gather your friends and stone your neighbor to death if he sacrifices a bull on the wrong day.
4. Those ideas are all stupid and primitive.
5. Except the one about homosexuality.
6. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from evil

1. God has a plan for everything.
2. He must allow bad things to happen because we learn and grow from them.
3. Yes, even small children who were chopped up by machetes in Rwanda while their mothers watched.
4. Yes, even the kids who were sent to the ovens on the kindertransport in Nazi Germany.
5. You see, horrible things DO happen to innocent people! Just as God planned.
6. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from Anti-Mormonism.

1. Anti-Mormons have all kinds of evidence that the church is false.
2. This evidence is very destructive to the claims of the church.
3. Satan wants to destroy the true church.
4. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from YOUR testimony

1. You claim to not have a testimony.
2. But the only reason you say that is so you can sin like Hugh Hefner.
3. The fact that you deny your testimony is proof you really, deep down, have one.
4. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from numbers

1. There are millions of Mormons.
2. Millions of people believe in Mormonism.
3. Millions of people can't be wrong.
4. Therefore the Catholic church is false and the Mormon church is true.

Argument from obvious falseness – ACTUALLY USED BY NIBLEY

1. Joseph Smith's tale is obviously absurd.
2. It makes no sense on the face of it.
3. Joseph Smith wasn't a complete idiot.
4. If he was going to make stuff up he wouldn't make it look obviously false.
5. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from personal incredulity

1. I can't believe Joseph Smith made the whole thing up
2. He wasn't educated enough to come up with all those names and places.
3. Who could do that? Certainly not me.
4. Therefore, the church is true

Argument of trusting wild claims, (aka: The argument of increasingly wild stories)

1. Joseph Smith claimed to have seen God.
2. He later claimed to have seen God and Jesus, at the same time, no less.
3. He also claimed to have seen an angel.
4. He also claimed to have a gold book.
5. Nobody else EVER saw that gold book.
6. He also claimed to have translated that gold book.
7. He claimed God helped him translate the gold book.
8. He would never make up such things.
9. No really, he was only 14 years old.
10. And 14 year-olds NEVER make things up.
11. For ANY reason.
12. And no 14 year-old could have translated a gold book.
13. And nobody else had ever heard of "Reformed Egyptian" until Joseph Smith invented, er, discovered it.
14. And Joseph Smith, being only 14 years old, wasn't smart enough to make this shit up.
15. And he didn't retranslate the 116 lost pages because God told him not to.
16. And that means God is smarter than man.
17. Therefore the church is true.

Argument of ancestral sacrifice

1. Your ancestors gave up everything for the church.
2. One would not give up so much for something false.
3. They obviously had all the data before them to make this decision.
3. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from Joe's contribution

1. Joseph Smith explained so many things.
2. Nobody has given so many clear explanations (save Jesus).
3. Therefore the church is true.

Argument from lack of evidence

1. The church doesn't provide all the answers.
2. God's plan requires that we not have all the answers.
3. False scholarship tries to provide answers.
3. Therefore the church is true and scholarship is crap.

Argument from "crabs in a basket"*

1. I am a General Authority pretending to be a special witness for Christ.
2. The other GA's seem convinced they really are special witnesses.
3. Sure as hell! I am not going to be the first to admit I am bluffing.
4. If the other GA's secretly think like me then no one else would even think about "blowing our cover."
5. Whew! The Church will appear to be true well past my demise. But I'm still nervous about making prophet in the year 2030. I hope I'll have a Church left.

* In case you have never been to the ocean and captured a basket full of crabs - you don't have to place a cover over the basket because the crabs cling to each other with their pinchers, so not a single one can escape. It's funny to watch. Thus "GA's in a basket."