Possible purge of the Maxwell Instutute?

[_moksha]

Dr. Smith writing hit pieces at the behest of an apostle is the proverbial feather in the cap. I imagine he will be seated on the dais at the next FAIRSaints Conference.

FAIR play might also dictate a hit piece on Gina Colvin by Scott Lloyd.

[_Doctor Scratch]

Midgley is still holding forth:

Blair:

It is really easy to recognize when you are doing PR work by trying hard to put the best possible face on both past events and now even Elder Holland's remarkably thoughtful and carefully written scolding of the Maxwell Institute. He made it clear that he and all the other Apostles want to see the Maxwell Institute follow Elder Maxwell's insistence that there should never again by what he called any more uncontested slam dunks. For example, I approve of a few things that are in the works or have been made available though the presently constituted Maxwell Institute. But you will have to demonstrate that there has been or is now any inclination to respond to any critics of the Church of Jesus Christ, which Elder Maxwell insisted should be part of the Institute that bears his name. And Elder Holland stressed that point in his talk, did he not.

I recently demonstrated that a book written by an Australian Latter-day Saint historian called Mormon and Maori had intentionally well documented and truly remarkable Maori Latter-day Saint historical narrative, and butchered the Book of Mormon along the way. Please show me how anyone associated with the current regime at the Maxwell Institute has published a response to this kind of poor scholarship, set out in categories borrowed from and explanations borrowed from secular religious studies. There is much solid evidence of how Maori seers prepared the way for our missionaries and their message that she ignores or tries to explain away.

Right now we have a recently published collection of essay edited by Gina Colvin and Joanna Brooks that does much the same thing for the faith narrative of Maori. This was done by Gina Colvin who helped edit this book and who contributed the first essay in that book. Colvin a Maori scholar who has joined John Dehlin in public criticism of virtually ever aspect of the Church of Jesus Christ., And she has set out the same claims about found in the Australian historians account of the grounds and special contents of the faith of Maori Saints. While there are some excellent essay in this collection, most are packed with rubbish. One of the essays was written by Tom Murphy whose claim to fame was that he was once almost excommunication for apostasy and his dreadful attacks on the faith of Latter-day Saints. With this in mind, who exactly is at all inclined to dirty the hands by striving to prevent what Elder Holland quoted Elder Maxwell as seeking, using a basketball metaphor, no more slam dunks.

Until or unless there is more than merely tinkering with a mission statement, and actual deeds and not mere words, then I remain profoundly disappointed in how the goes with the Maxwell Institute. When the captain and senior officers of a ship in battle or in grave danger give the orders, the sailors should do exactly what they are told to do. When they do not care to follow or do not agree with those orders or have a different agenda, then the lives of those on such a ship are likely to be in grave danger. I was simply stunned and also deeply disappointed when I suddenly realized that others at the Maxwell Institute had no intention of lifting a finger to defend the faith. I was shocked when Jerry Bradford who was one of my students when I first started teaching at BYU told me that "we" do not take orders form Salt Lake, and half a dozen times told me that Dan and the associated editors of the FARMS Review should never have published a defense Elder Packer from those who were publishing truly disgusting and insulting criticisms of one they called Darth Packer, and so forth. I was also annoyed when he told me that the donors who helped pay his more that six figure salary, and fund his retirement and provide him with excellent medical care, had exactly no say in what he did with those funds. i still wonder about how I could have been so naïve about people who I thought I knew and loved.

(emphasis added)

Wow--the guy really cannot keep his mouth shut. So "donors" paid for the work that went on at the Maxwell Institute, including the salaries and "fees" for the Chair and Editors? Quite interesting, and quite a departure from what we've been told in the past.

Does anyone know what he's referring to vis-a-vis "Darth Packer"? As best I can tell, this phrase turns up in one of the Tanner's newsletters, but I can't find the "defense" that Midgley and DCP published--though I wonder if he's referring to the piece on SHIELDS. And if that's true, then I don't blame Bradford for washing his hands of that nonsense.

In any case, it seems to me that Midgley's remarks on Bradford are at least borderline slanderous. He should very seriously consider retracting them.

[_Fence Sitter]

For those who want to read the full context of the arguments going on back and forth in the comments section at sic et Non here is a link.

Midgley is apoplectic.

[_Dr Exiled]

Midgley definitely needs to tone it down. The brethren aren't into public rebukes as Midgley so emotionally wants to believe and Peterson's firing seems to be out of character. I think circumstances perhaps dictated the firing (it happened right before Romney was nominated and perhaps the brethren wanted to have a softer, less vindictive scientologist approach that wouldn't generate bad pub for their guy?). Anyway, I think Hodges view of the Holland speech is more reality than what Midgley wishes to believe. If the brethren really wanted to rebuke the MI, it would have been in private. Holland, if anything, was playing politics, throwing the angry apologists a bone, if at all.

[_Kishkumen]

BYU has always been in a difficult position because of its special mission. Nowhere was this better illustrated than in the decision to bring FARMS on campus. The decision in both academic and spiritual terms was a complete disaster. The FARMS guys were publishing intellectual garbage and attacking fellow Mormons.

Whatever one may say in criticism of the new Maxwell Institute, the end of the DCP FARMS Review was a pure blessing for the university and the church. It was an absolute catastrophe of a publication. People like Midgley, Hamblin, DCP, and Greg Smith were shamefully unchristian in their behavior. They were and are, in my estimation, behaving like bullies.

If the leaders of the LDS Church think that protecting their faith means bullies should be employed to spy on and smear members of their own church, then they are woefully mistaken. The continued instances of bile and venom over at the Interpreter show that no one has learned very much about being a Christian in the apologetic effort and they are unlikely to learn now.

The only thing that I agree with these guys on is that there should be apologetics. It is just a pity that the guys they have leading the charge are often so poorly behaved as they do it. I don’t see how they help the faith. In certain regards there could be no greater discredit to the faith than the behavior of its defenders. Some apostolic messages have obviously been ignored.

[_Gadianton]

Thanks for the timely updates, professor.

Case in point:

I recently demonstrated that a book written by an Australian Latter-day Saint historian called Mormon and Maori had intentionally well documented and truly remarkable Maori Latter-day Saint historical narrative, and butchered the Book of Mormon along the way.

Boy, do I regret not putting my top ten list of failed Interpreter articles together for this year. This was slated as my number 1. Other than a pingback, the comments section scored goose eggs. Nobody cared. Why should the Church promote work that nobody cares about? even with all the Interpreter supporters showing up to slam the new MI, a lot of the core Mopologetic work being published there isn't getting much attention.

Think about this: DCP's blog is a pretty good small-scale Mopologetics venture because he's got his following, he allows certain critics to persist there, but these critics are pretty detached from Mormon-centric criticism, and then the apologists gang up on them and declare victory. At the same time, the author tells tales of "elsewhere on the internet" and then just says the story as he sees it and everyone pats him on the back. He doesn't dare provide a link to this board for any topic. Why is that? Doesn't this imply that likewise, the Church may not want to build a repository of links to articles critical of the Church, especially when nobody knows about them in the first place?

Dehlin cases are different, how to respond could go either way, but these are relatively infrequent and doesn't require an institute with a dozen or more researchers.

[_Everybody Wang Chung]

Boy, do I regret not putting my top ten list of failed Interpreter articles together for this year. This was slated as my number 1.

Dean, I'm sure I speak for many when I say a top 10 list of failed Interpreter articles would be a very interesting read. I would love to see it become an annual favorite, much like Dr. Scratch's Top 10 list.

[_Doctor Scratch]

My God, this thing is really blowing up. This comment was posted to Dr. Peterson's most recent entry, and I predict he (DCP) will either ignore it or delete it:

Dr. Peterson, I would appreciate your comment on some statements recently made by Dr. Midgley:

1. Dr. Midgley: "The fact is that Professor Peterson was invited by Elder Quentin Cook, an Apostle yet, to join him and five crucial Seventies, and Scott Gordon and Laura and Brian Hales to prepare a proposal that was eventually presented to the Area Committee, which consist of the Twelve Apostles, and by the Seventy who are currently assigned in Salt Lake, on how best to replace the Maxwell Institute as an agency to defend the Church of Jesus Christ from its critics, including those critics who might still be nominal members of the Church. This group met three times to carefully prepare a proposal for the consideration of the Twelve Apostles. And Professor Peterson delivered their recommendations to a meeting of the Area Committee. Those proposals were well received and many of them have already been implemented."

Dr. Midgley: "I have been told that Elder Cook told that committee not to even mention the Maxwell Institute. The reason he gave is the Brethren had given up on it."

Dr. Peterson, were you invited by Elder Cook to help prepare a proposal "on how best to replace the Maxwell Institute as an agency to defend the Church of Jesus Christ from its critics, including those critics who might still be nominal members of the Church"? If so, what recommendations did you deliver to the meeting of the Area Committee and which recommendations have been implemented?

Dr. Peterson, have you likewise been told that Elder Cook told the committee not to mention the Maxwell Institute because church leaders "had given up on it"?

2. Dr. Midgley: "One of the proposals was that the Brethren ought to officially endorse the Interpreter Foundation, Book of Mormon Central and FAIR reliable sources of information. That has been done. Then, instead of using tithing money to finance the defense of the faith and the Saints, it was proposed, and accepted, that the Brethren establish an agency to seek donations to help finance Interpreter, Book of Mormon Central and FAIR. This agency is now operating; it is called Mormon Voices."

Dr. Midgley: "I urge you to keep an eye on the annual report that the Maxwell Institute make each year in January. Then you can have a look at what he had to say to and about the Maxwell Institute, including a good idea of what the outside assessment that was made by three outstanding scholars had to say about the drift that has taken place since the purge that immediately led to the founding of the Interpreter Foundation, and then eventually to the endorsement of FAIR, Book of Mormon Central and the Interpreter Foundation and more recently to the creation by the Brethren, after careful consideration, of a coordinating agency to oversee the work of those three independent agencies, and also to raise and disburse funds to help support their endeavors."

Dr. Peterson, is it true that Mormon Voices is an agency that was "establish[ed]" by church leaders? If so, does Mormon Voices operate with church funds and is it operated, in whole or in part, by church employees? In what ways does the Mormon Voices "oversee the work" (to use Dr. Midgley's words) of the Interpreter Foundation? Does the Interpreter Foundation receive funding, or has it received funding, from the church? Does the church exercise any type of editorial oversight/control with regard to the Interpreter Foundation's publications?

3. "[W]hat President Samuelson did not know is that one of the Brethren--Elder Packer, for any who are interested, urged us to have Gregory Smith write that essay. And I have it reviewed by several of the Brethren by sending a copy to Elder Bruce Porter, who had constant contact with the Apostles. He was in charge of all the Apostolic committees, including the Area Committee. And I also sent a copy to the secretary to the Strengthening the Church Members Committee so that the Seventies who constitute that committee comment on it."

Dr. Peterson, is it true that you, as editor of the FARMS Review/Mormon Studies Review, were urged by Elder Packer to invite Gregory Smith to write the Dehlin review essay? If so, how did Elder Packer communicate his wish? Did you, as editor of the FARMS Review/Mormon Studies Review, ask Dr. Smith to write the essay? Did you have the essay reviewed by several church leaders? Did you receive comments on the essay from any Seventies?

Happy New Year!

[Guest]

Boy, do I regret not putting my top ten list of failed Interpreter articles together for this year. This was slated as my number 1. Other than a pingback, the comments section scored goose eggs. Nobody cared. Why should the Church promote work that nobody cares about? even with all the Interpreter supporters showing up to slam the new MI, a lot of the core Mopologetic work being published there isn't getting much attention.

Dean, I'm sure I speak for many when I say a top 10 list of failed Interpreter articles would be a very interesting read. I would love to see it become an annual favorite, much like Dr. Scratch's Top 10 list.

Same here!

And what about the "every Friday" articles that were supposed to be setting a record for unbroken publication? That ended in August, right? Lately the Friday offerings have been re-runs, and old ones, at that, which hasn't helped their reception.

When you make your list of failed articles, please include the one where Watson says he is investigating a set of Book of Mormon names, but does his statistical analysis and bases his conclusions on an entirely different statistical set. Peer review, my ass. That article alone obviates every attempt to present the Interpreter as a professional journal.

[_Kishkumen]

Happy New Year!

What do you suppose this sudden outpouring of previously confidential information tells us about the psychology of the Mopologists and their sense of their own standing in the eyes of the Q15? It would seem they feel rather emboldened by recent events.