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Posted: **Thu Jun 01, 2023 5:03 pm**

Hi everybody!

We had an incredible guest on last night's Mormonism Live show!

His name is Joe (last name withheld); a former seminary teacher of 14-years who quit about ten years back over a loss of faith.

Joe's father-in-law is the stake president; and the FIL arranged for my old mission companion, Kyle McKay, current Church Historian, to have a sit down with Joe in his living room on Saturday, April 22, 2023, to answer Joe's questions about church history.

And Joe taped the whole thing.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCCa0dv ... rt_radio=1

A good time was had by all!

Posted: **Thu Jun 01, 2023 11:45 pm**

Indeed!

Posted: **Fri Jun 02, 2023 5:15 am**

Any chance of a transcript?

Posted: **Fri Jun 02, 2023 2:17 pm**

How intelligent and educated insiders maintain faith is a fascinating question for me, and hearing Radio Free Mormon's former mission companion and current Church historian, Elder (and attorney) Kyle McKay have a frank and respectful conversation with a smart and highly educated doubter was a delight.

At some point, Elder McKay quotes an Enlightenment thinker (John Locke?) that says something to the effect that revelation is unreliable because you don't know if the revelation is from above or below. The hosts were bewildered by why McKay, a believer who hangs his hat on divine revelation, would bring that up. Here is my theory as to why: McKay heard that quote and was sincerely troubled. He's generally aware of most of the issues that trouble the rest of us, but he brushes all of that away by conceding that it is messy going in and messy going out. He says the problem isn't God, Jesus, the Holy Ghost, or the gospel. The problem is the people! So he chooses to not think about the evidence and focus on revelation.

Then he hears a good argument for why he can't trust revelation, either. To rationalize his faith in the revelation of his choice he falls back on the convenient trope that revelation is only trustworthy when it is consistent with what the scriptures and living prophets say. But in the back of his mind he knows that doesn't work, because that goes back to trusting people, not the Holy Ghost.

With all that cognitive dissonance bouncing around in his mind and Joe reminding him of all the reasons he secretly doubts, he has a brilliant idea. If the Locke quote causes McKay to doubt his own beliefs, maybe McKay can deploy it against Joe to make Joe doubt his beliefs. Sure, his own revelation might not be true, but everyone else's might not be true, either. (Of course it doesn't work because Joe's beliefs aren't based on revelation, but McKay doesn't understand that.)

It reminds me of that scene from Young Sheldon where the 9-year old genius is sitting in Church and hears the following:

"Sometimes people say to me, 'Pastor Jeff, how do you know there is a God?' And I say, 'It's simple math! God either exists or he doesn't. So let's be cynical. Worst case scenario, there is a 50-50 chance. And I like those odds!'"

To hear Sheldon's response, watch the rest of the clip (1:46):

https://www.tiktok.com/@karsontate4/vid ... 5371788549

Posted: **Fri Jun 02, 2023 2:42 pm**

Analytics wrote: ↑
Fri Jun 02, 2023 2:17 pm
How intelligent and educated insiders maintain faith is a fascinating question for me, and hearing Radio Free Mormon's former mission companion and current Church historian, Elder (and attorney) Kyle McKay have a frank and respectful conversation with a smart and highly educated doubter was a delight.

At some point, Elder McKay quotes an Enlightenment thinker (John Locke?) that says something to the effect that revelation is unreliable because you don't know if the revelation is from above or below. The hosts were bewildered by why McKay, a believer who hangs his hat on divine revelation, would bring that up. Here is my theory as to why: McKay heard that quote and was sincerely troubled. He's generally aware of most of the issues that trouble the rest of us, but he brushes all of that away by conceding that it is messy going in and messy going out. He says the problem isn't God, Jesus, the Holy Ghost, or the gospel. The problem is the people! So he chooses to not think about the evidence and focus on revelation.

Then he hears a good argument for why he can't trust revelation, either. To rationalize his faith in the revelation of his choice he falls back on the convenient trope that revelation is only trustworthy when it is consistent with what the scriptures and living prophets say. But in the back of his mind he knows that doesn't work, because that goes back to trusting people, not the Holy Ghost.

With all that cognitive dissonance bouncing around in his mind and Joe reminding him of all the reasons he secretly doubts, he has a brilliant idea. If the Locke quote causes McKay to doubt his own beliefs, maybe McKay can deploy it against Joe to make Joe doubt his beliefs. Sure, his own revelation might not be true, but everyone else's might not be true, either. (Of course it doesn't work because Joe's beliefs aren't based on revelation, but McKay doesn't understand that.)

It reminds me of that scene from Young Sheldon where the 9-year old genius is sitting in Church and hears the following:

"Sometimes people say to me, 'Pastor Jeff, how do you know there is a God?' And I say, 'It's simple math! God either exists or he doesn't. So let's be cynical. Worst case scenario, there is a 50-50 chance. And I like those odds!'"

To hear Sheldon's response, watch the rest of the clip (1:46):

https://www.tiktok.com/@karsontate4/vid ... 5371788549

Now I realize what inspired this video. https://old.reddit.com/r/exmormon/com ... _satan/ Eta. I don't think Einstein's Spinoza god would qualify for Paster Jeff's god. And Darwin's fear of upsetting his wife probably exposes his real view on god.

Posted: **Fri Jun 02, 2023 3:26 pm**

It’s so bizarre to hear a grown man say “my life’s foundation is built on top of a serial bigamist, married to 14 year olds, who conned people into searching for buried treasure and burned down printing presses when anyone dared criticize him. All you have is doubt, what is your foundation?”

You can’t see how ridiculous his argument is until you’ve left the cult. You think he has a real point and you worry that you don’t have a “foundation.” It’s only when you’re outside the church do you see how rotten Mormonism’s foundation really is. And no amount of FAIRMormon rationalization can shore it up.

Posted: **Fri Jun 02, 2023 3:30 pm**

I haven’t quite finished, but wanted to jot down some thoughts. Joe is reading the letter from Kyle McKay.

First I think the lawyer as historian creating some sort of privilege is illogical on the face of it. Just cause someone is a lawyer doesn’t make any conversation or such able to automatically be privileged. At least that is my understanding, he has to be working as your lawyer, not as the head of the historian’s office. Second Kyle says part of why he believes is spiritual experiences, but he has emphasized how satan can deceive. He has no way to guarantee that his experiences are from god and the Holy Ghost vs Satan deceiving him. He might counter with the fruits or something, but doesn’t seem like it is beyond Satan to play the long game.

My theory as to why we see lawyers in the historian department is that any classically trained historian is going to have a hard time not opening Pandora’s box. They might get excited and want to show more cards than the church is willing. Lawyers tend to by training and years of experience learn how to not give their opponents enough rope to hang them. My mission president is/was a lawyer. He was masterful at making you believe he had promised something, or spoke very clearly, and as things didn’t align and you thought back carefully to what he said, you realizing he never actually promised what you thought he did. Something I recognized when I later took an intro to business law class and learned about avoiding saying things that can be misconstrued as a verbal contract.

Posted: **Fri Jun 02, 2023 4:15 pm**

drumdude wrote: ↑
Fri Jun 02, 2023 3:26 pm
It’s so bizarre to hear a grown man say “my life’s foundation is built on top of a serial bigamist, married to 14 year olds, who conned people into searching for buried treasure and burned down printing presses when anyone dared criticize him. All you have is doubt, what is your foundation?”

You can’t see how ridiculous his argument is until you’ve left the cult. You think he has a real point and you worry that you don’t have a “foundation.” It’s only when you’re outside the church do you see how rotten Mormonism’s foundation really is. And no amount of FAIRMormon rationalization can shore it up.

Yes. I thought, when a TBM, that the lost 116-pages of English manuscript tale was faith promoting. I'd not given that vignette any thought for the decades between my stopping believing and when the South Park episode came out. It astonished me how obvious the 116-pages story shows Joseph Smith was a con man--but I didn't realize that while I was still under the Mormon spell.

Posted: **Sat Jun 03, 2023 12:50 am**

Analytics wrote:If the Locke quote causes McKay to doubt his own beliefs, maybe McKay can deploy it against Joe to make Joe doubt his beliefs. Sure, his own revelation might not be true, but everyone else's might not be true, either. (Of course it doesn't work because Joe's beliefs aren't based on revelation, but McKay doesn't understand that.)

Every apologist knows when the going gets tough, the tough go for a stalemate; they become radical skeptics who doubt the possibility of any knowledge at all.

Posted: **Wed Jul 19, 2023 4:55 pm**

Analytics wrote: ↑
Fri Jun 02, 2023 2:17 pm
It reminds me of that scene from Young Sheldon where the 9-year old genius is sitting in Church and hears the following:

"Sometimes people say to me, 'Pastor Jeff, how do you know there is a God?' And I say, 'It's simple math! God either exists or he doesn't. So let's be cynical. Worst case scenario, there is a 50-50 chance. And I like those odds!'"

Wow—I've never seen the show, but this exchange describes almost exactly what came to mind when I first read Terryl Givens' thoughts about choosing to believe.

Like Pastor Jeff, Givens confuses possibility with probability. Since no one can actually know for certain whether the Church is True, and since there seem to be compelling arguments on both sides, it makes sense to him to put the odds at 50-50. Then, choosing whether to believe becomes an expression of one's values.

The same reasoning allows me to "choose to believe" that the lottery ticket I hold for tomorrow's drawing is the jackpot winner.

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