TAL BACHMAN RESPONDS TO PRESIDENT KEYES
Posted: Fri May 02, 2008 3:07 pm
Tal himself asked me to post the following on the FAIR blog, but as I pointed out, I'm banned from there and thus cannot comply.
Tal also wanted me to post a link from here to there once it was up, but rather than wait for John Larsen to post it and then put up a mere link, why not just save time and post Tal's entire letter of response right here, right now?
Here it is:
-----BEGIN-----
Pres. Keyes,
I am surprised by this letter. I have been posting about my meeting with you, literally, since the day after we had it. The very night we had it, I came home pretty much in shock, and wrote up an account of it in my computer diary, and then posted it under the alias "Rosebud" on a bulletin board (exmormon.org) I found the next day. Yet today is the first time I've ever heard of you denying much of what you said that night.
To be honest, I'm not sure how much to say in public response to you, because I feel a deep appreciation for you. You were instrumental in me feeling relief from an exruciating cognitive dissonance. I walked into your office that night feeling like I had a thousand pounds on my back, having found out that I was wrong about everything most important to me in life, bewildered and upset, and I walked out light as a feather. And honestly, I'm not sure that that would have happened if someone else had been sitting in that stake president's chair. For that, I will be forever grateful to you. I also feel grateful because you did the same thing in a private meeting about a week later for Tracy, in which, according to her, you repeated many of the same things you'd said to me.
I also know from our meeting and subsequent emails how much church life and service mean to you, and I have no particular desire to spoil that for you. I believe that church members are a lot better off with sensitive and candid leaders like you, than with dogmatic, domineering types. I also appreciate the effort you made to empathize with, and hear, Tracy and me. As I said in my original MD post, you're always welcome as a friend to my house for those reasons. I feel that I owe you big time.
Three of the more trivial matters: I've never meant to claim that you said your MP made up stories. In writing, I had in mind the "rah rah" motivational speeches, numbers-announcing, competitions, etc., that you mentioned in the meeting, and which you referred to again in your recent letter. My apologies if my wording was unclear or misleading.
About the Book of Mormon characters you felt you were in the presence of, I remember you speaking of just how real that seemed, as though they were really there with you, and I understood you to say that part of this experience was an element of spiritual communication. Are you saying there was none?
Lastly, not sure if you were misled by an overexcited correspondent, but I said only that I "guessed" you were no longer stake president, because some months ago, an out-of-the-blue email correspondent said she'd heard there'd been a change, and I assumed the average term had expired and someone had replaced you. Not sure what the big deal is on this, though.
These items seem pretty trivial. More important, I suppose, is the question of what you conceded about the truth claims of the church. And on this, you ask how we can have such different recollections of the same meeting. To be really honest....I'm not sure that we do.
And.................
While a part of me is burning to respond in detail....my deep appreciation for you, and my admiration for your wife and her desire to protect you and all that is most precious to you both, and my sympathy for the hurt she must feel, leaves me feeling that I should stop here.
I understand that my remarks may have put you in an awkward position; but I want to ask that in the future you refrain from claiming I have been incorrectly reporting your comments in our meeting, or that Tracy has incorrectly reported your comments in your subsequent meeting with her. (Do that, and some of your other comments, like your "spin doctor" comment which I've never repeated, will most likely go with me to the grave...).
I have a deep appreciation for you and wish you all the best. Please do us both a favour now, and stop.
Let me know if you want to hang somewhere where we don't talk about this anymore. (I'd consider raquetball).
Regards,
Tal
-----END-----
Tal also wanted me to post a link from here to there once it was up, but rather than wait for John Larsen to post it and then put up a mere link, why not just save time and post Tal's entire letter of response right here, right now?
Here it is:
-----BEGIN-----
Pres. Keyes,
I am surprised by this letter. I have been posting about my meeting with you, literally, since the day after we had it. The very night we had it, I came home pretty much in shock, and wrote up an account of it in my computer diary, and then posted it under the alias "Rosebud" on a bulletin board (exmormon.org) I found the next day. Yet today is the first time I've ever heard of you denying much of what you said that night.
To be honest, I'm not sure how much to say in public response to you, because I feel a deep appreciation for you. You were instrumental in me feeling relief from an exruciating cognitive dissonance. I walked into your office that night feeling like I had a thousand pounds on my back, having found out that I was wrong about everything most important to me in life, bewildered and upset, and I walked out light as a feather. And honestly, I'm not sure that that would have happened if someone else had been sitting in that stake president's chair. For that, I will be forever grateful to you. I also feel grateful because you did the same thing in a private meeting about a week later for Tracy, in which, according to her, you repeated many of the same things you'd said to me.
I also know from our meeting and subsequent emails how much church life and service mean to you, and I have no particular desire to spoil that for you. I believe that church members are a lot better off with sensitive and candid leaders like you, than with dogmatic, domineering types. I also appreciate the effort you made to empathize with, and hear, Tracy and me. As I said in my original MD post, you're always welcome as a friend to my house for those reasons. I feel that I owe you big time.
Three of the more trivial matters: I've never meant to claim that you said your MP made up stories. In writing, I had in mind the "rah rah" motivational speeches, numbers-announcing, competitions, etc., that you mentioned in the meeting, and which you referred to again in your recent letter. My apologies if my wording was unclear or misleading.
About the Book of Mormon characters you felt you were in the presence of, I remember you speaking of just how real that seemed, as though they were really there with you, and I understood you to say that part of this experience was an element of spiritual communication. Are you saying there was none?
Lastly, not sure if you were misled by an overexcited correspondent, but I said only that I "guessed" you were no longer stake president, because some months ago, an out-of-the-blue email correspondent said she'd heard there'd been a change, and I assumed the average term had expired and someone had replaced you. Not sure what the big deal is on this, though.
These items seem pretty trivial. More important, I suppose, is the question of what you conceded about the truth claims of the church. And on this, you ask how we can have such different recollections of the same meeting. To be really honest....I'm not sure that we do.
And.................
While a part of me is burning to respond in detail....my deep appreciation for you, and my admiration for your wife and her desire to protect you and all that is most precious to you both, and my sympathy for the hurt she must feel, leaves me feeling that I should stop here.
I understand that my remarks may have put you in an awkward position; but I want to ask that in the future you refrain from claiming I have been incorrectly reporting your comments in our meeting, or that Tracy has incorrectly reported your comments in your subsequent meeting with her. (Do that, and some of your other comments, like your "spin doctor" comment which I've never repeated, will most likely go with me to the grave...).
I have a deep appreciation for you and wish you all the best. Please do us both a favour now, and stop.
Let me know if you want to hang somewhere where we don't talk about this anymore. (I'd consider raquetball).
Regards,
Tal
-----END-----
