The MADB Body Count

[_Kishkumen]

The personalities and their presentation at MA&D is like the cheating spouse blaming you for their cheating behavior and doing so with vitriol.

That is a useful and applicable simile.

[_Jeneum]

I didn't leave necessarily because of MADB, but I did leave because of the incredibly weak, and sometimes fallacious, apologetic arguments that I was reading at FAIR and the then FARMS. In my high school years I clung to those arguments, but as soon as I started to actually investigate them (instead of taking an apologist's word for it) I quickly left the Church to practice spirituality on my own terms, without a mediator- "the church"- between me and God.

MADB just helped cement in my mind that most Mormons, just like most mainstream Christians, are incredibly un-Christlike and wouldn't know Him if He showed Himself today. For a bunch of people who act like they have the whole "truth," the majority of them sure are assholes.

[_bcspace]

Participating on MADB, MD, AOL LDD, etc., flawed as they all are (or were) has done nothing but strengthen my faith.

I wouldn't have expected anything else. Would you?

So what's the difference? I have access to and have read all the same materials most others have. It certainly isn't because I blindly believe and I have temptations as much as the next person. Others have grown up in active believing LDS families just as I have.

[_Runtu]

So what's the difference? I have access to and have read all the same materials most others have. It's certainly isn't because I blindly believe and I certainly have temptations as much as anyone else.

I didn't suggest it was. Yes, we have read the same information and reached different conclusions. The difference is that you think my conclusions are not just wrong but based on my sinfulness or dishonesty, whereas I think you just reached different conclusions than mine.

[_bcspace]

I would definitely say that the treatment I have received at the hands of some apologists has contributed to my alienation from the LDS Church.

So you admit that sin was a contributing factor......

[_Runtu]

So you admit that sin was a contributing factor......

Alienation isn't the same thing as unbelief. A lot of people I know stopped believing because they concluded the church wasn't true; they later became alienated from church members because of the treatment they received.

Sounds to me like what Kishkumen is saying.

I still can't figure out why you think it's a good idea to pronounce that others' decisions were based on sin. What exactly is the purpose of that?

[_Aristotle Smith]

I have never contributed to MADB, however apologists did contribute to my exit. Three FARMS productions in particular stand out.

FARMS Review Volume 6 #1. I read this one right after reading New Approaches to the Book of Mormon: Explorations in Critical Methodology. To put it simply that entire issue is a train wreck. Ironically, that issue probably has more big name contributors than any other FARMS review out there. The responses were unhelpful and snide. Many times they didn't even engage the actual issues of the book they were critiquing.

Echoes and Evidences of the Book of Mormon. I read this one to make sure I was up to date on the latest Book of Mormon apologetics before passing a final judgment on the Book of Mormon. The thing about it that was the most funny was that I had read everything, with one exception, earlier in Nibley. It turns out I really didn't need to get up to date on Book of Mormon apologetics, because there hasn't been any new apologetics for decades. The one exception, Sorenson's "How Could Joseph Smith Write So Accurately about Ancient American Civilization?" was the one thing that was new for me. However, it was easily the weakest article in the entire book and completely unconvincing.

Abraham in Egypt. Nibley spends the first 1/3 of the book engaging in a series of ad hominem attacks against anyone who has ever said anything negative about the Book of Abraham. He then spends the next 2/3 of the book avoiding every issue in the Book of Abraham controversy while fishing for any parallel he can find. He mostly just meanders around in vague search of a coherent argument, hoping that if he throws up enough Egyptology people will think he actually answered the criticisms. Even as a TBM I thought this book was stupid.

I really can't say how much these led to my apostasy, but they definitely contributed.

[_Polygamy-Porter]

I have never contributed to MADB, however apologists did contribute to my exit. Three FARMS productions in particular stand out.

FARMS Review Volume 6 #1. I read this one right after reading New Approaches to the Book of Mormon: Explorations in Critical Methodology. To put it simply that entire issue is a train wreck. Ironically, that issue probably has more big name contributors than any other FARMS review out there. The responses were unhelpful and snide. Many times they didn't even engage the actual issues of the book they were critiquing.

For me it was the the good old JBMS.

The most bizarre article that I read in the JBMS was Cumorah's Cave

It made me thankful that I was not trapped by a need to believe in Mormonism as being victim of such a need to believe and stumbling onto real Mormon history is like falling into the tar pit and know you cannot get out, even though you know the way out..

[_Polygamy-Porter]

So you admit that sin was a contributing factor......

I still can't figure out why you think it's a good idea to pronounce that others' decisions were based on sin. What exactly is the purpose of that?

You know he is just being a douche.

[_Runtu]

You know he is just being a douche.

I would hope there's some other purpose besides that, but I can't see any.