Q: “I find it interesting that the day before he was killed that Joseph Smith drank wine and don’t Mormons have to be temple worthy to worship in the temple and one of the things that make them temple worthy is that they can’t drink alcohollic beverages? So wouldn’t that make Smith not be able to enter the Celestial Kingdom when he passed from this earth if he wasn’t temple worthy at the time of his death?”

A: The simple answer is that drinking wine wasn’t considered a violation of the Word of Wisdom at the time of Joseph’s death. As stated at FAIRMormon.org:

The text of the Word of Wisdom forbids “strong drink” (D&C 89:5, 7), which was initially interpreted as distilled beverages (hard liquor). Beer, unfermented or lightly fermented wine, and cider were considered “mild drinks” (D&C 89:17) and therefore acceptable (note that verse 17 specifically permits “barley…for mild drinks”). The complete prohibition of alcoholic drinks of any kind only became part of the Word of Wisdom following the temperance movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries; Presidents Joseph F. Smith and Heber J. Grant supported the movement and Grant made complete abstention from alcohol in any form a requirement for a temple recommend in the early 1920s.

1. I truly wanted to know if the LDS Church was true.

2. I studied and prayed and followed the formula in Moroni 10:3-5 to get a testimony.

3. I didn’t receive an answer, therefore the LDS Church isn’t true.

This is often followed up with the statement “I’ve never had a spiritual experience that told me or led me to believe the LDS Church was true.”

In some cases people have expressed that they’ve never had any spiritual experience whatsoever, and therefore they are certain there is no God. Others say they’ve had spiritual experiences that lead them to believe in God and/or Jesus Christ, but not the LDS Church, Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, etc.

I propose that these people have not received knowledge that the LDS Church is true because they do not want it to be true.

In bringing up this idea to those with whom I’ve discussed the matter, some are offended and angry. They tell me they did indeed want to know if the LDS Church was true, and they cried and pleaded with God to tell them, but they received no answer, and they cried when they realized it wasn’t true. I don’t intend to cast doubt on whether these people wanted to know if the Church was true, but this is different than wanting the Church to be true.

How do I know that, at least in some cases, these people did not want the Church to be true? Because; 1) they placed the burden of truth on the Church rather than on those sources against the Church, and 2) their behavior changed after they “discovered” the Church was “not true”.

If someone wants the Church to be true, they will fight to believe in it and will discount all evidence against it until there is something that provides absolute proof against it. There is no such proof against the LDS Church. Oh, I know people think they have proof, but they don’t. They have circumstantial evidence that depends on assumptions. The challenge detractors of the faith have is that the burden is on them to prove a negative. Those I’ve talked with have required far less than negative proof, which is what anyone who truly wants to believe the Church to be true would require. Instead, those I know who have left the Church have assumed the Church was false based on limited evidence and faulty assumptions.

With regards to behavior, if someone leaves the Church and immediately began a life of debauchery boozing it up, sleeping around, selling crack, spitting, cussing, and burning flags, growing a beard, betting on cock fights, etc., you would naturally and logically assume they were simply looking for a way out of the Church because what they really wanted was to participate in these types of activities. I don’t know anyone who has left the Church and gone on to participate in all those activities, but in some cases I have seen people participate in one or more of these activities, and do so in such a manner as to make one wonder. But I know of others who have left the Church and have continued to live very good, “Christian” lives. They might even work harder at being good than they did while a Mormon, which would seem to lay waste to the charge that they’re merely lazy.

In making the claim that one must want the Church to be true in order to discover if it is, I open myself to the criticism “Well of course if someone wants the Church to be true then they’re going to feel good about it.” Allow me to clarify what I mean, because I’m not necessarily saying someone has to want the LDS Church to be true, but that they want the doctrines to be true, or they simply want to know what the truth really is and they’re open to it being anything. I think the following story helps explain.

President Woodruff was ordained an apostle on April 26, 1839, and just a short time later left for Great Britain. The following is an anecdote from his service there:

“When I arose to speak at Brother Benbow’s house, a man entered the door and informed me that he was a constable, and had been sent by the rector of the parish with a warrant to arrest me. I asked him, ‘For what crime?’ He said, ‘For preaching to the people.’ I told him that I, as well as the rector, had a license for preaching the gospel to the people, and that if he would take a chair I would wait upon him after meeting. He took my chair and sat beside me. For an hour and a quarter I preached the first principles of the everlasting gospel. The power of God rested upon me, the spirit filled the house, and the people were convinced. At the close of the meeting I opened the door for baptism, and seven offered themselves. Among the number were four preachers and the constable. The latter arose and said, ‘Mr. Woodruff, I would like to be baptized.’ I told him I would like to baptize him. I went down into the pool and baptized the seven. We then came together. I confirmed thirteen, administered the Sacrament, and we all rejoiced together.

“The constable went to the rector and told him that if he wanted Mr. Woodruff taken for preaching the gospel, he must go himself and serve the writ; for he had heard him preach the only true gospel sermon he had ever listened to in his life. The rector did not know what to make of it, so he sent two clerks of the Church of England as spies, to attend our meeting, and find out what we did preach. They both were pricked in their hearts, received the word of the Lord gladly, and were baptized and confirmed members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The rector became alarmed, and did not venture to send anybody else.” (In Cowley, Wilford Woodruff, p. 118.)

The constable who was sent obviously didn’t want to believe in the LDS Church, nor did those clerks sent after him. But they evidently were interested in the truth, whatever the source, and when they heard it they recognized it. Consequences of joining the LDS Church were secondary to them.

Much of the reason why these three so easily joined the LDS Church has to do with the culture of the time. Doubt about religion in general was nowhere near as prevalent as in the developed nations of today. People were more apt to believe things of a spiritual nature generally, as they are in many places of the world today, although not so much in the United States and western Europe. People today are more hardened, jaded, doubtful, skeptical, etc. and that may not be their fault so much as merely the result of the environment.

The point is that it’s not that someone has to want the Book of Mormon or the LDS Church to be true to know, they have to want the doctrines taught by those sources to be true. And in saying that, I am not saying they have to have a preconceived notion of those doctrines, but that upon hearing them they have to be appealing.

A case in point is the doctrine of eternal marriage. If someone hears that upon becoming a faithful member of the LDS Church they can be joined with their family in a marriage that will not be merely ’til death do you part, but for all eternity, lasting beyond this life, but that doesn’t sound like something they want, then they will not receive a testimony of that doctrine. Partly because they will not likely take the steps to gain a testimony of that doctrine, but also because why would God give them a spiritual confirmation of it if it’s not something they want? In doing so, God would be giving them knowledge that does no good for them, but only places them in a position of knowing something they don’t want to know, which opens them to more condemnation than they would otherwise be subject to.

Likewise if someone wants to believe there is no God, they will never find out if there is one. If someone wants to believe that only the Bible is true, and that nothing else is, they will never gain a testimony of the Book of Mormon. If one does not want to believe that modern-day prophets exist, they will never gain a testimony of Joseph Smith’s calling.

It is only when someone hears the message of the gospel, likes it, and wants to know if it’s true so that they can live it, and then take the steps necessary to find out, that they will find out. This is what sincere faith looks like, as opposed to idle curiosity.

One last comment…there is this issue of time. Some will say “I wanted to know if these things were true, and I prayed and studied for two years and I never got an answer.” Well, maybe God was testing you to see if you really wanted to know, and it would have taken three years. For others perhaps it would take 10 years, maybe 20 for others. When we put arbitrary time limits on God, we are showing that we do not have real faith. I don’t mean that a lack of real faith is a character flaw, I mean we don’t really want that thing, the object of our faith, to be true. If I really want the LDS Church to be true, if I want the things it teaches to be true, I will go through all the actions of being an active member even if I don’t have an answer. Or even in the face of doubt and evidence against the Church. This is the definition of faith. If one has an answer that something is true, they have knowledge, not faith. Therefore, if someone says they left the LDS Church because they didn’t receive an answer, the lack of an answer is not the root cause, but rather a lack of faith, or a lack of wanting the LDS Church to be true.

Now, if someone does not want the LDS Church to be true, what can be done to convince them? Nothing. It is like trying to convince someone who doesn’t like chocolate that they really do. If our goal is to spread the gospel we should not be engaged in trying to convince those who have no interest. We should be focused on finding those who already do want it to be true, but simply don’t know about it yet, or have misunderstandings but are ultimately seekers of truth. For those who don’t want the gospel to be true, we might as well stop trying to convince them and just love them as they are, regardless of whether they ever join the Church or not.

This ends up being yet another fruitless quest, because it’s so darned difficult to convince someone they don’t believe in something that they think they believe in. Mormons use the King James Version of the Bible, which is accepted by most Christians as being legitimate, so it’s not as though anti-Mormons can say they’re using a different version of the Bible than is commonly accepted.

One can point out that they don’t interpret scriptures the same way the rest of Christianity does, but this also poses problems, because there’s no way to prove what the correct interpretation is. You can amass evidence and build a case, but in most cases there’s no bulletproof proof, and of course Mormons aren’t going to accept what most Christian believe, because they claim to have modern-day prophets and other scriptures that tell them how to correctly interpret the Bible and they could care less what Christian scholars have said for the past 1,500 years. Actually, it’s not that Mormons care less, but they don’t give what has been commonly accepted much weight just because it’s been around for a long time.

So if you want to spend time trying to convince Mormons they don’t believe in the Bible you’re more than welcome to, but trust me, you’re just going to get frustrated in the end.

Q: Mormons think the fall was necessary to bring about God’s plan, so why would Satan encourage the fall? Wouldn’t that be helping to bring about God’s plan? Wouldn’t he have tried to get Adam and Eve NOT to eat of the fruit, so no spirit children would get bodies?

Also, if God had a plan for all spirit children to come and get a body, but then sent Adam and Eve to earth telling them not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge which would bring about procreating…doesn’t that make Him a God of trickery? He essentially was saying “Don’t eat the fruit! (please please please disobey me and DO eat the fruit so all the other spirit children can get bodies!) Sounds deceptive. Could you please give the Mormon theology behind this belief and how it makes any sense? Thanks.

A: Disclaimer: My answer here is my own speculation, and should not be interpreted as anything approaching LDS Church doctrine.

In LDS temples Mormons watch a video that tells the story of the creation of the earth and the Garden of Eden. In that story, most of which would be familiar to any Christian, God puts Adam and Eve in the Garden, and tells them they can eat any fruit of any of the trees except the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, which we will hereafter refer to as the TKGE. Lucifer/Satan tempts Eve into partaking of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, Eve gets Adam to eat it, and Adam and Eve are kicked out of the Garden (the Fall) into the world we live in today and they have kids, etc.

Where Mormons differ from some of Christendom is that we believe that the Fall was a necessary and planned event, hence the question above of why Satan would participate and encourage an event that was necessary and planned, as though he were helping God. If Satan wanted to frustrate God and tick Him off, why not get Adam and Eve not to take the fruit? Great questions! Here’s my theory…

It’s all about timing. That is, it was God’s plan all along for Adam and Eve to eat the fruit, but for it to be done in God’s own time, when things were prepared. What Satan was doing by getting Adam and Eve to eat the fruit was to try and take control of the process himself and mess things up, not to do something that otherwise would have been done, but to do it at a different time than it would have been done. When God told Adam and Eve not to eat the fruit, he wasn’t saying “Don’t eat it now or ever” he was saying “Don’t eat it until I tell you to.” But of course he didn’t need to add “until I tell you to” he just said “Don’t eat it.” He’d come back later and say “Ok, now you can eat it.” But Satan did it before God did.

Why do I think this is the case? Because in that movie Mormon watch in the temple there is a part where God confronts Lucifer after he has given Adam and Eve the fruit and God asks “What are you doing here?” and Lucifer responds “I am doing that which has been done in other worlds.” God asks “What is that?” and Lucifer again responds “Giving of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil to them.” referring to Adam and Eve.

This seems to suggest that this is not the first time this process of introducing humans to a planet has occurred. It also appears to suggest that whenever a planet is populated, there is a “Garden of Eden”, although perhaps with a different name, and there is an Adam and an Eve, although also with different names and certainly different and unique individuals.

Lucifer appears to be attempting some humor with God, saying “Hey, what’s the big deal with me giving them the fruit? I’m just doing what is normally done.” But of course this is like the 4-year old child who feeds his 2-year old brother a huge bowl of ice cream and when he gets caught by his parents plays innocent and says “Hey, I’m just feeding him like you guys do!” Yeah, right. And “yeah, right” to Lucifer. Of course we know neither the 4-year-old nor Lucifer is innocent. Lucifer is trying to take the place of God, just as he did in the pre-mortal existence. “Fine, you’re going to kick me out of heaven? You won’t give me your glory? Well, I’m still going to go ahead and play God and let’s see how you like it.” seems to be the attitude Lucifer has.

So is there trickery on God’s part? No, I think He was going to give Adam and Eve the fruit himself, in his own due time. Of course he knows the future and knew what would happen, but it all ends up playing into His hands anyway, which must be incredibly frustrating for Satan. As for why Lucifer didn’t try to keep Adam and Eve from eating the fruit, that would have been a fruitless endeavor (pun intended), because Lucifer knew God was going to give them the fruit anyway. Lucifer couldn’t prevent them from eating the fruit, he could only get them to eat the fruit at the wrong time, so he committed as much mischief as he could within the bounds by which he was constrained.

Q: How do Mormons explain Isaiah 44:6?

This verse says that God does not even know of another god. Now if Mormons believe that God the Father is married to multiple mother goddesses, who He would clearly know of if He was, then how can the possibly claim to believe the Bible and deny the basic doctrine of Isaiah 44:6.

A: Let’s start by reading the scripture:

Thus saith the LORD the King of Israel, and his redeemer the LORD of hosts; I am the first, and I am the last; and beside me there is no God.

Sounds pretty cut and dry, right? Beside me, there is no God, right? Not a lot of room to interpret that any other way. Or is there?

If we skip forward in Isaiah just a tad to Isaiah 47:8, 10, we read this:

Therefore hear now this, thou that art given to pleasures, that dwellest carelessly, that sayest in thine heart, I am, and none else beside me; I shall not sit as a widow, neither shall I know the loss of children:

For thou hast trusted in thy wickedness: thou hast said, None seeth me. Thy wisdom and thy knowledge, it hath perverted thee; and thou hast said in thine heart, I am, and none else beside me.

(emphasis added)

This isn’t God speaking, this is the city of Babylon. Is the city of Babylon saying that no other city except Babylon exists? As duly pointed out by FAIR, this would cause some consternation to the city of Ninevah, who in Zephaniah 2:15 states:

This is the rejoicing city that dwelt carelessly, that said in her heart, I am, and there is none beside me: how is she become a desolation, a place for beasts to lie down in! every one that passeth by her shall hiss, and wag his hand.

So what are we to think? Obviously these words weren’t meant to indicate that no other cities existed. They clearly indicate the supremacy, authority, excellency, and/or superiority of these cities. Applying this same interpretation to Isaiah 44:6 we can see that what the scripture clearly means is that God is supreme, and there is no other God at his side, or on the same level he is on. In Isaiah 44:6 God is speaking to people who had a lot of trouble with worshipping idols or other gods, and this scripture was meant to say “You’ve got all these other gods you worship, but I don’t recognize them, they don’t even exist, there is no other god you’ve got that can compare to me. Drop your idol worship and your worship of false gods and worship me.” It was not a statement that there are no other gods, or that man cannot become like God, but rather that there is no other god man should worship, and that the gods these people were worshipping were false gods.

Today Mormons in the United States are overwhelmingly Republican. It’s not unusual to get into a political discussion with a group of Mormons and hear someone say “I just don’t understand how someone can be a good Mormon and be a Democrat.” This is due primarily to the contrasting views of the Republican and Democratic parties on abortion, sexual matters, the family, and limited government. Conservative Mormon Republicans often see liberal Democrats as sex-crazed maniacs who want to do whatever feels good and ignore the consequences, or blame the consequences on conservatives and pay for them with somebody else’s money. In other words, there is quite a bit of alignment politically between conservative Republican Mormons and conservative Republican evangelicals.

But do the beliefs, actions, or results, of either major political party truly match up with Mormon doctrine and culture? That’s the question that has arisen in my mind as I’ve been reading Latter-day Liberty: A Gospel Approach to Government and Politics by Connor Boyack. Boyack posits that Mormon doctrine matches up mostly closely with libertarian thought, not to be confused with the Libertarian Party. That is, Boyack promotes the idea that persuasion is better means of improving society than force, and uses extensive quotes from LDS Church leaders as well as scripture to back up his assertions. In doing so, he presents a compelling case for Mormons to have no great loyalty to either the Democratic or Republican parties, but to first and foremost be an advocate of liberty.

The book is well-written, interesting, and educational. And having sold out its first print run within days of its release it seems to be striking a chord. And not only with Mormons, as Boyack’s interview on the Judge Napolitano show on FOX attests.

If you’re a Mormon and politically inclined, this book is a must-read, regardless of your party affiliation. If you’re read it, I’d love to know what you thought of it.

• There is no God
• Mormons are not Christians
• The Book of Mormon is not true
• Joseph Smith was not a prophet
• No one can know the future
• No one knows what happens after we die

Can you see why these statements only lead to fruitless, never-ending arguments? Let’s take the first one, there is no God. How does one go about proving such a thing? Generally people attempt it by making assumptions, such as “If there were a God, he wouldn’t let bad things happen to good people.” But what if the assumption is false? The rejoinder might be “What if by not allowing bad things to happen to good people, God would create a worse consequences?” Thus, there is a logical possibility for why God might allow bad things to happen to good people.

Another tactic is to show how everything we experience could have come about without God, that is, that the creation of our planet and everything on it could have happened without there being a God involved. But this is proof that there is no God, but merely evidence that there might not be a God, or that God might be different than what one had previously believed.

Or take the “Mormons are not Christians” argument. Mormons respond “Yes, we are, we believe in Christ.” The argument then devolves into one of what it means to believe in Christ or be a Christian. But there is no convincing Mormons that they aren’t Christians, so why try?

In the former case, there is, perhaps, no good way to go about things. If the goal is to turn a Mormon into an atheist, it can only be done if an atheistic life already appeals to that Mormon. It will be virtually impossible to turn someone who wants to be a Mormon into an atheist.

In the latter case, the key is to prove the positive. That is, that Mormons have different beliefs about Christ and Christianity than Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals, etc. Mormons won’t disagree with this, although they might make the case that there is more that unites us than what divides us, but if there were no difference then of course we’d all be members of the same religion.

The point is that trying to prove a negative is a frustrating exercise that only convinces the weak-minded or already-convinced. The better tack is to focus on the positive by pointing our verifiable differences. Since everyone is free to make their own choices about what to believe and how to live, the best one can really do, unless one wants to resort to lying, is to present the facts as accurately as possible, and then allow people to make their choice. Trying to prove a negative will only get in the way, intelligent people will see through it, and you may end up pushing people towards Mormonism by using this illogical reasoning as opposed to talking them out of it.

To give some background first, Korihor is this guy who comes out of nowhere and he doesn’t believe in Christ (this takes place before the birth of Christ, FYI) and is trying to convince others in the Nephite society to drop their belief in Christ. Many anti-Mormons do believe in Christ, so you might think this story only applies to those anti-Mormons who are atheists, but I’ve found that anti-Mormons, whether atheist or religious, typically use the same arguments when debating with Mormons, so the story holds lessons from anti-Mormons of any background.

So we start the story of Korihor this way:

6 But it came to pass in the latter end of the seventeenth year, there came a man into the land of Zarahemla, and he was Anti-Christ, for he began to preach unto the people against the prophecies which had been spoken by the prophets, concerning the coming of Christ.

There follows an explanation that the Nephites honored a policy of free speech, and that there were no laws against a man’s beliefs, so this guy was free to go around saying whatever he wanted to.

12 And this Anti-Christ, whose name was Korihor, (and the law could have no hold upon him) began to preach unto the people that there should be no Christ. And after this manner did he preach, saying:

 13 O ye that are bound down under a foolish and a vain hope, why do ye yoke yourselves with such foolish things? Why do ye look for a Christ? For no man can know of anything which is to come.

Ah yes, no man can know of anything which is to come. This argument is typically used by anti-Mormons of the atheist persuasion, and in this they are generally not discriminatory would use the same argument against any religious person. But in doing so, they fall into two traps, the first being that mentioned as the purpose of this post, of saying something that Mormons have already been inoculated against. That is, when an anti-Mormon puts forth the argument that nobody can know the future, the Mormon says “Hmm, that sounds familiar…” Then they look up this scripture, which tells of a man 2,000+ years ago saying the same thing, and they think “Hmm, well, the Book of Mormon certainly seems to have predicted the future, because it already knew what you were going to say, and this adds a bit more credibility to the Book of Mormon as being authentic.”

The second trap is that it embroils the atheist in having to prove that no one can know the future. All a Mormon has to ask is “How do  you know that no one can know the future?” Of course nobody can prove that nobody knows the future, so the atheist is then hedged in by having made this illogical statement for which they have no proof. Instead of damaging the faith of a Mormon, they have strengthened that Mormon’s faith in the Book of Mormon, and have portrayed all atheists as lacking logic and reason. Let’s move on.

 14 Behold, these things which ye call prophecies, which ye say are handed down by holy prophets, behold, they are foolish traditions of your fathers.

This one can apply to believers who are attacking the Mormon faith just as well as atheists. Don’t fall into the trap of insulting the prophecies of Joseph Smith or other Mormon prophets, because as soon as you call the prophecies silly, stupid, foolish, etc., then you sound just like this Korihor fellow. Once again the Mormon says “Where have I heard this before…” and when they read Alma 30:14 their faith in their beliefs is strengthened once again and you’ve shot yourself in the foot. The better route is to take a strictly scientific approach. Research the prophecies of Joseph Smith thoroughly, figure out how Mormons interpret those prophecies, and then when you think you’ve found a hole in one, bring it to a Mormon who is an expert in such things and ask them to explain the hole you’ve found.

 16 Ye look forward and say that ye see a remission of your sins. But behold, it is the effect of a frenzied mind; and this derangement of your minds comes because of the traditions of your fathers, which lead you away into a belief of things which are not so.

As above, if you just call Mormons crazy, then they’ll write you off as merely another Korihor, seeing your behavior as predictable and confirming the authenticity of the Book of Mormon. And baseless insults don’t do any convincing anyway, so it’s best to just stay away from calling Mormons crazy lest you damage your own position in the debate.

One thing leads to another, and Korihor ends up arguing his case in front of a high priest of the Church of the people in the Book of Mormon, and this is how it goes at the beginning:

 22 And it came to pass that the high priest said unto him: Why do ye go about perverting the ways of the Lord? Why do ye teach this people that there shall be no Christ, to interrupt their rejoicings? Why do ye speak against all the prophecies of the holy prophets?

This commonly happens in discussions with Mormons. They’ll ask “What’s your problem with Mormonism if it makes people happy?” Unfortunately, many atheist and even Christian anti-Mormons use the same response as Korihor.

 23 Now the high priest’s name was Giddonah. And Korihor said unto him: Because I do not teach the foolish traditions of your fathers, and because I do not teach this people to bind themselves down under the foolish ordinances and performances which are laid down by ancient priests, to usurp power and authority over them, to keep them in ignorance, that they may not lift up their heads, but be brought down according to thy words.

 The reason this argument falls flat with Mormons is because they don’t see things this way. They don’t see their ordinances and performances as foolish, but rather as richly symbolic, educational, and as having a truly positive influence in their lives. They don’t see their leaders as exercising power and authority over them, but as their servants who work for the good of all at great personal sacrifice. And they don’t see the LDS Church as keeping them in ignorance, but as a great source of enlightenment and education. They see the result of their faith as enabling them to life up their heads with confidence, rather than hanging them low with shame. So these are tough ideas to sell to most Mormons because they generally don’t jive with their experience.

 27 And thus ye lead away this people after the foolish traditions of your fathers, and according to your own desires; and ye keep them down, even as it were in bondage, that ye may glut yourselves with the labors of their hands, that they durst not look up with boldness, and that they durst not enjoy their rights and privileges.

 28 Yea, they durst not make use of that which is their own lest they should offend their priests, who do yoke them according to their desires, and have brought them to believe, by their traditions and their dreams and their whims and their visions and their pretended mysteries, that they should, if they did not do according to their words, offend some unknown being, who they say is God—a being who never has been seen or known, who never was nor ever will be.

Again, this won’t ring true with Mormons. You can make the argument that Mormon leaders make money off the books they write and sell to the Mormon faithful, and that a few of the top leaders (we’re talking about a very small handful–all local leaders are volunteers) receive stipends for basic living expenses, but since it’s not that much in either case, and the books are purchased voluntarily, it’s hard to make the case that anyone is “glutting” themselves, or that anyone is being kept down in bondage.

In trying to make the case to Mormons that they are not able to enjoy their rights and privileges, you had better be ready to be explicit about what you mean, because Mormons look at this argument and ask exactly that. If you mean they aren’t free to drink, smoke, have sex with whoever, whenever, etc., then you’re not going to get far. Mormons don’t see themselves as being tied down in bondage because they don’t drink or smoke, but liberated. Anyone who has dealt with alcoholism or who has tried to quit smoking can relate. And when one looks at all the potential negative effects of wanton sexual relations including STDs, unwanted pregnancies, bad relationships, drama, divorce, etc. it’s not hard to see how a “boring” Mormon family might be seen by Mormons as liberating compared to a “free” sexual life.

And once again, don’t enter into that course of trying to prove a negative. If you state that there is no God, a Mormon will merely ask “Where’s your proof?” If you ask them to provide proof that there is a God, they’ll merely accuse you of avoiding the question and lacking evidence to back up your claim. If you make a claim, you’ll need proof, and since one cannot prove there isn’t a God, it’s best not to make this claim or other such claims in the first place. You’ll just end up in a fruitless debate that doesn’t get anyone anywhere, except that you might come across as a pawn, merely following the same path as Korihor, and thus supplying Mormons with more evidence that the Book of Mormon is true. You make it easier for Mormons, using Occam’s Razor, to believe the Book of Mormon is a true account of real events than a fabricated story.

Reading all of Alma 30 thoroughly is a good exercise for anti-Mormons. It will show you how not to argue against the LDS Church. You might want to read it several times and then whenever you go to argue with a Mormon check yourself against it to make sure you’re not inadvertently working against yourself.

The problem with this mode of attack is that Mormons sincerely believe they are Christians. You can tell them all day long that they aren’t, but they simply won’t believe you. They’ll tell you that they do believe in Christ, that their church is named after Jesus Christ, that they believe in the Bible, that they believe Christ is their Savior, that their Book of Mormon mentions Christ on average every 2.5 verses, etc., and so from their perspective, they don’t understand where you’re coming from when you say they don’t believe in Christ.

From here, many anti-Mormons will slightly modify their tactic to make the claim that Mormons don’t believe in the same Christ other Christians do. This is similar to making the claim that Muslims don’t believe in God because their conceptions about God and His characteristics are somewhat different than those of mainstream Christianity. Anti-Mormons who follow this line of reasoning will have an easier time finding Mormons who are sympathetic, or at least willing to listen, since Mormons would agree that the conceptions held by mainstream or traditional Christianity regarding God and Christ are different in certain key ways than those held by Mormons.

The problem is that having reached this conclusion and mutual agreement with Mormons, you haven’t established to them that they aren’t Christians, just that they are, perhaps, a different type of Christian. But since the same can be said of Protestants and Catholics, this doesn’t provide much satisfaction.

Conclusion? Trying to convince Mormons that they aren’t Christians is an exercise in futility. They simply don’t buy it. Trying to convince other people that Mormons aren’t Christians can backfire as well, since if you tell someone Mormons aren’t Christians, but they then go to a Mormon church and see that the name of the church is The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and they see all the pictures of Christ in the church, and they hear about Christ in the lessons and sermons, it can spark their curiosity. “How can someone say Mormons aren’t Christians?” they’ll wonder. “I need to look into this some more and figure this out.” This isn’t what you want to happen, so it may be best to just ditch the matter entirely and focus on other aspects of Mormonism.

You see, there are people out there in the world who are quite motivated to work against the LDS Church. These people come from all sorts of backgrounds and are motivated by different things. Some were raised in the LDS Church, some were converts later in life, some have never been members of the LDS Church. Some are angry and bitter, others are cruel, but many are sincere. Some are highly intellectual while others are apparently incapable of even rudimentary logic. Regardless, it has been interesting for me that as I have had discussions with more and more people who are motivated to work against the LDS Church, certain patterns have become quite noticeable, and I’m afraid that many anti-Mormons are simply spinning their wheels, unaware of the futility of their actions. Therefore, I present this section of the website as a guide to anti-Mormons on how to be more effective in their work, or at least less ineffective. That is, this section will perhaps focus more on what not to do as an anti-Mormon, as opposed to what an anti-Mormon can do to be more effective.

Enjoy!