The big question hanging over Rom at this stage, for me anyway, is whether he's going to resort to the ad hominem type of apologetics that attacks the man, and not the subject (or both). From his thread on MAD, it unfortunately appears so. It's nothing short of grandstanding. All he had to do was give me a nod and we could have had a civil debate. I also believe that what drives much apologetics is not facts, or realistic and balanced assessments which admit of "difficulties" (think of Roberts here), but "pure testimony". And that's the big problem. Once you have a "spiritual witness", it often turns out exactly as Shades described in his Exit Story:
Let's take, for example, the first, biggest, and most fundamental misconception promoted by the Church: Every educated, rational, intelligent, thinking person in the world bends the conclusion to fit the facts, right? If you think the world is flat, but sail off in one direction and wind up back where you started, then you bend your conclusion (the world must actually be round) to fit the facts (since I couldn't have come back here otherwise). Mormonism does the exact opposite: The facts are bent to fit the conclusion. The conclusion is that the Church is true, and all the facts are bent into the most ludicrous shapes to fit this conclusion. Post-Mormons have a phrase for it: "Mental Gymnastics." If some contrary evidence shows up which would lead one to believe that the Church isn't true, for example, all types of illogical arguments are postulated to discredit or reinterpret the evidence. When all else fails, one of a family of pat answers (secret weapons?) is whipped out: "There are some things we weren't meant to understand in this life," "God doesn't give us all the answers since he occasionally wants to test our faith," "Read your scriptures more and it will all make sense," or something like that. As for me, I could no longer do the mental gymnastics required to remain a believer. I had to start being honest with myself.
This is it in a nutshell, but having said that, there's nothing wrong at all with abiding by a spiritual witness. The problem arises when one tries to prove the Book of Mormon true through material evidences, or when material evidences are used as a "faith-booster", and sometimes shoddily so. I know apologetics is often qualified by the statement that they are not after proof, but I've never believed this. If the Book of Mormon had fatal flaws as a history text (and I believe it does), it would quickly be abandoned as history. And this is what truckloads of apologists-cum-critics have done, and I believe that Roberts was well on his way to doing this, if he had not already done it privately but maintained a "spiritual belief" in the Book of Mormon. Of course he would have spoken publicly of it "as if history" from Conference pulpits. Do you suppose he would express any doubts from a Conference pulpit? But in private conversation he offered radical re-interpretations of Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, and not very long before he died. It is simplistic to paint a portrait of Roberts only from his public addresses, without seriously weighing his private reflections, but this is exactly what apologists have done, and this is what they do all the time - conveniently ignore or rationalise away competing evidences that would be weighed in the balance by any serious scholar. So it becomes a case of demonising the opposition, or just excommunicating them if they don't follow "the Party line". Once the serious challenges are out of the way from the view of the faithful, and relegated to unbalanced reviews in a medium solely there for "faith protection", the Titanic continues on at full speed ahead, and members will have to read more balanced critical reviews and opinions from other sources.