Analytics wrote: ↑Thu Aug 27, 2020 6:51 pm
What do you mean there objectively is no religious money-making that one doesn't approve of? The world is full of judgmental people.
My impression is that this has toned down over the last decade or two, but historically, Mormons self-righteously looked
way down on pastors of other churches receiving even a modest living allowance in exchange for their full-time employment as pastors. So when I make accusations of hypocrisy, I'm not meaning to imply that somebody getting a living allowance is intrinsically
bad, I'm implying that it is hypocritical to denounce "priestcraft" in others while you are engaging in it yourself.
Attempting to judge Mormonism by its own values, there is clearly a wide blurry line between acceptable and unacceptable first-class educational and religious experiences for the well heeled. For example, I don't think any Mormon would think Steve Smoot is using his position in the Church for unseemly pecuniary gain. In contrast, if, say, Dallin H. Oaks were to announce he was going to lead an intimate group of Mormons on a deluxe excursion to the promised land at whatever the market rate would be for that kind of thing, I think
all Mormons would have a problem with it. Somewhere between those two extremes you get to a line of trading your position in the Church for financial advantage, and I'm arguing that according to Mormonism's own values, that is wrong.
Part of my own sensitivity to this has to do with my own background. You are probably too young to be familiar with this, but there used to be a company that published expensive hard-backed full-color illustrated copies of the Book of Mormon. There were other products in their lineup too, including illustrated biographies of the presidents of the Church, illustrated stories of Church History, and illustrated stories from the Bible.
I have the impression that the copyright of this stuff changed hands from company to company over a series of bankruptcies, but in the summer of 1988, the company was called "Eagle Systems", and they had an 18-year old salesman named Analytics who was trying to sell these books to make some money for his mission.
These books were not cheap--Just the illustrated Book of Mormon, which included a set of cassette tapes that provided a dramatized narration, was $600. And remember, this was 1988. With a group of other Utah college-aged salesmen, we traveled to Seattle Washington and scoured the surrounding stakes, trying to convince families about how great their children would turn out if they knew the Book of Mormon inside and out, and that there was no way they'd learn it better than through our deluxe products. And if they didn't have an extra $600 lying around that was no problem! Zion's bank would loan you the money to buy the books with easy monthly payments for only 22% interest. Yes, the Church discourages debt, but the prophets have said there are two exceptions to that: buying a house and education. And no part of your children's education is more important than their education in the scriptures, right?
I'd say that of the doors I knocked on, about 50% of Mormons were sympathetic with what I was doing, even if they couldn't afford it or otherwise weren't inclined to buy. The other 50% of Mormons thought it was morally wrong of me and my company to try to make a buck off of Mormon scriptures. I took an incredible amount of heat over this, including bishops announcing over the pulpit that I should be avoided, and another bishop who happened to be an attorney actually sending me a cease-and-desist letter.
Ironically, the person who authored and narrated
Illustrated Stories of the Bible for us was none other than George Durrant--the guy mentioned in the Faith-Promoting Rumor blogpost above who advertised his high-profile church callings as reasons why you should hire him as your cruise guide. I took a ton of front-line heat
from Mormons for selling the books that
he wrote. This experience somehow makes me feel entitled to take some of the righteous indignation that was directed at me and pass it on to Durrant.
And that's the rest of the story.