Best. Podcast. Ever. Thanks Consiglieri!

[Hagoth]

https://www.mormondiscussionpodcast.org ... ong-roads/

To our Critical Thinker Laureate,

You probably went to a pretty good school, you have obviously read a few books, and you, my friend, are certainly not a dodo.

[RubinHighlander]

Here here and Hosanna!

Just finished listening. Since the conference talks analysis by Bill, this was the one story that really stuck in my brain; I was happy to have further discussion from Bill on this one. This goes along with my disdain for the current prophets calling out the older ones that they did not have further light and knowledge when they made mistakes on things like the blacks and the priesthood. Can't have it both ways! But they sure do try.

[blazerb]

Holy crap. That was amazing. Thank you.

[consiglieri]

You folks are so kind. Thanks for the support and encouragement!

It couldn't come at a better time!

I really appreciate you!

All the Best!

--Consiglieri

[No Tof]

I agree with the comments already posted and wish to add my thanks for your great work.

The music at the end of this podcast made me wonder who it was being played for?

Looking forward to your pint of view for a long time to come.

[No Tof]

I just wanted to add that the below waterline shot to the ship regarding the epistemology of Mormonism should result in a mad rush to jump to the right road.

This sums up very nicely why we no longer believe.

[Hagoth]

The hypothetical story at the end really drives home the absurdity of the whole thing. Truly brilliant, my friend. I seriously considered driving all the way up to the NW just to give you a big man-hug.

[consiglieri]

The music at the end of this podcast made me wonder who it was being played for?

Ambiguity can be a beautiful thing.

[consiglieri]

The hypothetical story at the end really drives home the absurdity of the whole thing. Truly brilliant, my friend. I seriously considered driving all the way up to the NW just to give you a big man-hug.

That is super kind of you, mi amigo. Just be sure to leave room between us for the Book of Mormon.

[consiglieri]

I just wanted to add that the below waterline shot to the ship regarding the epistemology of Mormonism should result in a mad rush to jump to the right road.

This sums up very nicely why we no longer believe.

Thanks for the kind words!

I couldn't have done it without Elder Holland . . .

[Margarita]

Yes...Elder Holland has been so helpful lately Consig. You rock. (This is Jeanne)..so happy to run into you here. Hugs and appreciate your podcasts.

[consiglieri]

Thanks so much, Jeanne!

And great to see you here!

[deacon blues]

While listening to your podcast, I was reminded of 1st Kings 22, where God sends a lying spirit to entice King Ahab to go to battle, and his death. I was also reminded of Joseph Smith, who presumably received a revelation to practice polygamy, but chose to do so dishonestly. The LDS God fits in with the Loki/trickster God persona. I wonder: why did this persona seemed to appeal to Joseph Smith? I don't have answers, just impressions. Are they right? How will I know?

[MoPag]

Excellent podcast! I love me some RFM!!!!

Also you have a very nice voice.

[Emower]

I listened to this with my wife last night. I was curious what a TBM's take on it would be. She told me that she takes something totally different from the story than I did or than the podcast intended.

She felt that Elder Holland's point was to express that rather than it being a wrong road, it was a different way of being right. She acknowledged that what he said seems incongruous with what he meant. But she expressed that a God who knows us intimately, might send us down a road that seems wrong to us at the time, but that in the long run might benefit us. We had a discussion about what to do when the wrong road appears to be staying in the church. She does not know how to reconcile that with what the church teaches which is to stay in the boat.

She does not view this as God playing head games or being a trickster, rather as knowing what we each need at the time we need it. This is not the type of God I want to believe in and that led to a long discussion on my parsimonious view of God.

It seems that all of our discussions boil down to her being a TBM is OK with punting the football to the next life by saying "Well, we don't understand it now, but maybe later we will understand." Elder Holland's story is an extension of that attitude. I have a hard time respecting that attitude, and it is not one that I can keep.

[Palerider]

I listened to this with my wife last night. I was curious what a TBM's take on it would be. She told me that she takes something totally different from the story than I did or than the podcast intended.

She felt that Elder Holland's point was to express that rather than it being a wrong road, it was a different way of being right. She acknowledged that what he said seems incongruous with what he meant. But she expressed that a God who knows us intimately, might send us down a road that seems wrong to us at the time, but that in the long run might benefit us. We had a discussion about what to do when the wrong road appears to be staying in the church. She does not know how to reconcile that with what the church teaches which is to stay in the boat.

She does not view this as God playing head games or being a trickster, rather as knowing what we each need at the time we need it. This is not the type of God I want to believe in and that led to a long discussion on my parsimonious view of God.

It seems that all of our discussions boil down to her being a TBM is OK with punting the football to the next life by saying "Well, we don't understand it now, but maybe later we will understand." Elder Holland's story is an extension of that attitude. I have a hard time respecting that attitude, and it is not one that I can keep.

Even if we were to give Holland the benefit of the doubt that he's trying to tell us that God sent him down the wrong road because he needed to know for sure which was the right road...that's not the way the Biblical God works. If an individual is asking honestly and sincerely, they get a straight up answer.

If God doesn't change as the Mormons are want to say, then your wife needs to reconcile that....

[Charlotte]

Thank you for the podcast! There are good comments at the site.

David: So the concrete evidence that the dominant narrative is false. What are we to do now as members of the church. Turn back and fix the damn narrative.

This! But do members - who don't control the narrative - wait in vain?

[Zack Tacorin Dos]

The music at the end of this podcast made me wonder who it was being played for?

Ambiguity can be a beautiful thing.

I loved the hypothetical story at the end, and I associated the taps at the end with the hypothetical family perished in the desert. It left me wondering about those who have maintained their faith in a God that communicates and directs through inspiration. I mean, if there is such a God, could it be that he sent some of us down the path of Mormonism to find some unfortunate soul, dying in the desert of Mormonism, so that we could bring that person out to be saved by partaking of truly living waters? That's a God I might be able to get behind. However, I'm probably going to have to get over the fact that I had to spend so many resources including tens of thousands of dollars to help that person or persons. An indifferent universe where I assign the meaning and purpose of finding those stranded in the desert to my Mormon experience seems the better story to me.

But now that you mentioned the beauty of ambiguity, I can see that what I wrote above is a reflection of this man's search for meaning.

At any rate, excellent episode RFM. I can only imagine the time you put into preparing these. Thanks!
Zack

[MerrieMiss]

Great podcast, really loved it. In fact, I already used Holland's story today. A NOM family member asked this morning what I'm going to do when I turn down a calling and the bishop tells me he received revelation I'm supposed to have it. "I'm going to point out that like Elder Holland, the bishop received incorrect revelation so he knows he was wrong to pick me and can pick someone else." I love this - I'm planning to use it all the time.

I listened to this with my wife last night. I was curious what a TBM's take on it would be. She told me that she takes something totally different from the story than I did or than the podcast intended.

She felt that Elder Holland's point was to express that rather than it being a wrong road, it was a different way of being right. She acknowledged that what he said seems incongruous with what he meant. But she expressed that a God who knows us intimately, might send us down a road that seems wrong to us at the time, but that in the long run might benefit us. We had a discussion about what to do when the wrong road appears to be staying in the church. She does not know how to reconcile that with what the church teaches which is to stay in the boat.

She does not view this as God playing head games or being a trickster, rather as knowing what we each need at the time we need it. This is not the type of God I want to believe in and that led to a long discussion on my parsimonious view of God.

It seems that all of our discussions boil down to her being a TBM is OK with punting the football to the next life by saying "Well, we don't understand it now, but maybe later we will understand." Elder Holland's story is an extension of that attitude. I have a hard time respecting that attitude, and it is not one that I can keep.

I don't want to disrespect your wife or anyone else that feels this way, but I don't get it. I don't understand why god would purposely tell you something was right when it was truly wrong. Why is god purposely telling me the church isn't true? Why did he tell someone else it is? Which one is right? If he isn't tricking one of us, then is he telling me I've progressed beyond Mormonism? Is that what I'm learning from this? Did Joseph Smith receive incorrect revelation regarding polygamy so he could learn not to marry multiple women? Did Nephi kill Laban so he could learn killing people was wrong? Was the priesthood denied to people so prophets could learn that doing that was wrong? Where does this end? How do I know it's a wrong revelation and not just a wrong but right revelation? It's a child's argument.

[Hagoth]

I was already familiar with this story and I use it frequently to point out problems with the church's method of epistemology, but Consiglieri really helped me see some things that hadn't occurred to me.

First is that Elder Holland revealed that he doesn't trust his own revelation. He is claiming that he needs to suffer the consequences of getting wrong answer because his revelations aren't clear enough that he can trust them. I think it's kind of funny that he also testified that he has a "perfect knowledge" that God loves us.

The other thing that stood out is the way the church manipulates the concept of personal revelation in a way that gives you no alternatives but what they want. This story might just as well have said "we prayed and God told us to take the left fork, so we did and we made it safely home because we listened to the spirit." Personal revelation is stressed as a special feature of our church that will strengthen our testimonies. To ensure that this is the case we are given a very specific and narrow process in which to exercise this special power. It is always a binary choice and if we set it up correctly it doesn't matter what answer we get, either option should lead us to greater belief in church leaders and their teachings. Right fork or left fork? It doesn't matter; both are the right answer, even if one of them is demonstrably wrong. The only answers that aren't allowed are those that make it look like God doesn't want us to buy into everything the Brethren say. Elder Oaks assures us that those answers come from Satan. In the event of such an answer to personal prayer we are to ignore what God appears to be telling us and default to what the leaders want us to believe. And how do you know this is the case? Because Elder Oaks said so. So no need praying about that one, the answer has been given.

The other thing we hear a lot is that the answer might not be what we want to hear or what we expected, or that we might not be asking at the right time. So if you don't get an answer it might mean that the answer is no, or that we need to be patient and let God work on his time frame, not ours. The problem I have with is that I can get the same quality of answers from my Magic 8-Ball.

When I listen to this story and compare it to the followup where Elder Holland tells us that we should never back down from personal revelation, that we should always trust the Lord and persevere in whatever He tells us, my gut reaction is to consider that Elder Holland might be a dodo. But he has told us in no uncertain terms that he is NOT a dodo. If I take him at his word, which I do, I can only accept that he is, intentionally or not, trying to manipulate me to believe things that even he doesn't believe in order to help me conform to an overall pattern of putting obedience to church leaders above God, reason and personal integrity.

In the end, Elder Holland's story reminds of that cocky, stubborn guy who loses an argument in the face of obvious facts but continues to argue because his ego won't let him admit that he's wrong. What I couldn't be certain of is whether Elder Holland can't admit it to himself or to his son.