Reaching out for support after reading the Essays


WannaBelieve
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Aside from posting genealogy queries on familysearch.org and ancestry.com I've never before posted anything online before due to a fear of "haters" and "trolls", but right now in my life I'm reaching out to faithful members of the church because I'm experience a serious faith crisis.  I found out and read a news article about the polygamy essays when reading non-religious news on sltrib.com. I quickly went to lds.org and ended up reading all of the eleven essays that have been published over the past year.

 

I attended BYU and during my first semester (Fall 1987) I took a D&C class in which the professor told us that Joseph Smith married some of the wives of faithful brethren in order to test their faith. He told us that once the brother had passed the test of faith, Joseph "gave" the wife back. No one, including myself, asked any questions and we all avoided eye contact with the professor because he was very intimidating, spoke in a very loud voice, and had a fire and brimstone style.  I found the information to be very disturbing, doubted its authenticity and never discussed it with anyone until I recently read it in one of the essays.

 

I've served selflessly in the Church my entire life, only read church-approved sources, rarely miss reading the scriptures daily, have raised a righteous family, and genuinely love the Lord..so how come I feel so let down about the Prophet Joseph? I feel like I don't really know him anymore and feel like I've been betrayed.

 

What should I do to get my testimony back on track? I'm open to any suggestions and ask that mean people please don't attack me---I'm genuinely distraught and meanness right now will just make me trust even less than I already do.

 

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Ultimately it is a choice...  You can chose to remember and believe whatever/all spiritual spiritual witness you have received up to this point about God, Christ, the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith, modern revelation, etc.  Or you can choose to let it all go in the face of this new information.

 

Remember that God has always known the truth about Joseph Smith and the church.  Between you and him you are the only one that did not know this the entire time.  So while this is clearly affecting you it does not in any way invalidate the things you have already received from the Lord.

 

So the question is... How much are you willing to trust the Lord?

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I have noticed that all the people I know (well, I can count them with my 10 fingers) whose faith has been shaken by Joseph Smith's polygamy focus on marriage as a mortal union.  Most of them (if not all), see marriage as just a way to have sex.

 

Joseph Smith's polygamy has never caused me a single whiff of faith-shaking.  Not a one.  Because... even when I was still Catholic, I've always held marriage to an eternal standard.  Therefore, when I researched Joseph Smith's polygamy (before I was baptized), the first impression I got is the doctrine of Eternal Marriage (something absent from Catholic teaching) and everything I read was held up to that doctrine.  This was one of my important journeys in conversion because it confirmed something I've always believed my entire life but was not as clearly supported in my religion.  Pre-mortal Existence and Eternal Marriage - both absent from the Catholic magesterium - are pillars of doctrine that have rooted me in the LDS church.  I have a very firm, super unshakeable testimony of Eternal Marriage and Eternal Families and its importance in the Kingdom of Heaven.  And Joseph Smith's marriages strengthened that testimony.

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Aside from posting genealogy queries on familysearch.org and ancestry.com I've never before posted anything online before due to a fear of "haters" and "trolls", but right now in my life I'm reaching out to faithful members of the church because I'm experience a serious faith crisis.  I found out and read a news article about the polygamy essays when reading non-religious news on sltrib.com. I quickly went to lds.org and ended up reading all of the eleven essays that have been published over the past year.

 

I attended BYU and during my first semester (Fall 1987) I took a D&C class in which the professor told us that Joseph Smith married some of the wives of faithful brethren in order to test their faith. He told us that once the brother had passed the test of faith, Joseph "gave" the wife back. No one, including myself, asked any questions and we all avoided eye contact with the professor because he was very intimidating, spoke in a very loud voice, and had a fire and brimstone style.  I found the information to be very disturbing, doubted its authenticity and never discussed it with anyone until I recently read it in one of the essays.

 

I've served selflessly in the Church my entire life, only read church-approved sources, rarely miss reading the scriptures daily, have raised a righteous family, and genuinely love the Lord..so how come I feel so let down about the Prophet Joseph? I feel like I don't really know him anymore and feel like I've been betrayed.

 

What should I do to get my testimony back on track? I'm open to any suggestions and ask that mean people please don't attack me---I'm genuinely distraught and meanness right now will just make me trust even less than I already do.

 

Could you be a bit more specific? What exactly is it that's causing unease? Is it the practice of polygamy itself? The new information that Joseph actually practiced it? That Joseph was sealed to others' wives? The public way these articles are getting showcased in national media?

 

This is a broad topic and I think some focus is beneficial.

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All through Scriptures we read of humans who were flawed tools in the hands of God.  Moses was not allowed to enter the Promised Land because of his disobedience.  Peter denied Christ three times, and Paul (under his previous Saul persona) killed many Christians. 

 

Some people have picked up this idea that all prophets are controlled by God like puppets, and that everything the prophet does or says is inerrant.  When the prophet's flaws are later revealed, these people become very conflicted.  

 

Einstein had a child out of wedlock, but that's not a reason to doubt the theory of relativity.  This is not a totally fair comparison to religion, because Einstein never claimed to speak for God.  But the basic idea is the same.  If a person stumbles upon some great truth or becomes the conduit for divine power, it doesn't follow that the person is perfect in all things.  My understanding is that Joseph Smith himself regarded revelation as a slow, collaborative process, sort of like gradually chipping away at a block of marble to release a beautiful statue.  And I think he had a desire to restore parts of the ancient church and saw some divine streaks in the concept of polygamy that he thought made sense in his time.  If that led to things we now regard as very odd, it doesn't change our need to find and follow streaks of the divine in all things.

 

Someone (Richard Bushman, perhaps) once said that he actually liked the idea of God speaking through flawed humans.  I've always believed that God is the compass who aligns and orients us but does not force us down specific paths.  Having a compass doesn't mean we'll never get lost.  It just means that we will eventually find our way home.

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Seconding what Anatess said, if you let us know what particularly struck you, we could more specifically help.

 

Lacking specifics, I'll hit the generics.  In LDS culture we tend to idolize prophets as being perfect, which isn't correct.  Prophets are *fallible* men that God talks to.  God doesn't instant make them perfect-- far from it.  In addition to the examples PolarVortex provided, we have examples like:

     Noah getting super drunk and dancing around naked in front of his entire family

     David killing another man to steal his wife

     Balam being so bribed by the world's riches his donkey had to lecture him to get him back in touch with God.

I don't know how in line with the Lord's will Joseph Smith's actions were.  Truthfully, I"m not his Judge, so it doesn't really matter to me.  Either way I know that he was a fallible human being whom God talked to.  I know he was a prophet because I know that the Book of Mormon was divinely inspired, cause that's what God told me.

 

If something has shakened your faith, I would start at Square 1: what is it, is it in solid state, or are there questions?  Good.  Now let's move on the Square 2, and check that one out.  Carry on to each line upon line.  Don't try to eat an elephant in one big gulp.

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The holiest among us are not always holy.  The wisest among us is not always wise.  One's faith should not rely on how we view others or even how others view us, but how we view ourselves and our relationship with our Creator. 

 

Joseph Smith was a holy man.  I have no doubt of this.  

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Neither do I hold any doubts.  My own father has always been my rock.  He was the last of a long line of forefathers who were raised in a traditional Native American way and was greatly loved by his people.  I've gone through life, I've heard people recount stories of how he was as a young man that do not always fit with the image I've grown up with.  These stories, even if true, do not diminish the reverence with which I hold of him.  This is my choice:  to cast away that which has been my anchor because of what others may say or to hold close what I know myself to be true.  Faith in God or in the prophets is much the same.  We each make choices as to whether we will accept them or not as our anchors in the trials of life.  While others may not always agree with our choices, they are our choices.

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Recently my son went in to get the flu vaccine. Everyone he trusted told him he would not need to get a shot, that it would be administered nasally. The nurse came in with a medical tray that included all your standard tray stuff (like bandages for instance) and started putting on her gloves. Everything about her behavior said she was giving him a shot (putting on gloves, prepping a tray, just looking medical). Even she tried to reassure him that she was not giving him a shot. His cognitive dissonance had the words of trusted individuals pitted against what he was observing.

 

I'm glad I didn't have him express his concerns on this forum. He would have been met with a stream of "don't worry about it, you're totally getting a shot. It's not that big a deal."

 

Why are we jumping to "yeah, Joseph did some stupid things. He's still totally a prophet though." I can get that with bankruptcy, poor business acumen, or just being too forgiving or trusting of people he should have second-guessed. I don't understand where you say a prophet is acting as prophet but it maybe is errant or fallen. We've canonized the revelation (D&C 132). It's something we have to own up to so long as it's in our scriptures. Throwing Joseph under the bus on this one requires questioning Brigham through Wilford in practice, and all the way to Kimball who continued to leave it in the 1981 edition of the scriptures.

 

By the way, it turns out my son trusted the right people because it was just a nasal spray - not a shot.

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I attended BYU and during my first semester (Fall 1987) I took a D&C class in which the professor told us that Joseph Smith married some of the wives of faithful brethren in order to test their faith. He told us that once the brother had passed the test of faith, Joseph "gave" the wife back. No one, including myself, asked any questions and we all avoided eye contact with the professor because he was very intimidating, spoke in a very loud voice, and had a fire and brimstone style.  I found the information to be very disturbing, doubted its authenticity and never discussed it with anyone until I recently read it in one of the essays.

 

Hi WannaBeleive -

 

Your religious education professor wasn't wrong; the problem is that his knowledge wasn't complete.  My recollection is that Joseph Smith did first broach the topic of plural marriage with Heber Kimball (and possibly John Taylor as well) by asking them if they would permit him to marry their wives; after each agreed, Smith told them that their sacrifice was unnecessary and proceeded to teach them the doctrine of celestial marriage and seal them to their wives.

 

 

I've served selflessly in the Church my entire life, only read church-approved sources, rarely miss reading the scriptures daily, have raised a righteous family, and genuinely love the Lord..so how come I feel so let down about the Prophet Joseph? I feel like I don't really know him anymore and feel like I've been betrayed.

 

Because you had expectations of Joseph Smith that now, you think, turned out to be incorrect.  It's a natural reaction.

 

I would suggest you do the following:

 

1)  Keep close to the Spirit, and to the things you do know.

2)  As Pres. Uchtdorf said, "doubt your doubts".  This isn't a catchphrase, or a sound byte.  It means deep consideration of questions like:

  a)  How, specifically, are your expectations of Smith being challenged? 

  b )  Are you sure the factual revelations really challenge those earlier expectations of Smith?  Or is it actually assumptions we draw from those new facts, that cause the problem?  (E.g., it's a "fact" that Joseph was sealed to women who already had living husbands, and also two fourteen-year-olds; but the notion that he actually had sexual relationships with any (or all) of these women is an *assumption*--one not warranted by actual fact in any case.  (See Brian Hales' website at josephsmithpolygamy.org, especially his page on polyandry, and then cross-reference it with Hales' biographies of each of Smith's wives for a case-by-case study of what led each individual woman to be sealed to Smith)

  c)  If the facts--not the assumptions, but the facts--require a change in your expectations of Smith, are those modified expectations of Smith still consistent with the conclusion that he was indeed a prophet of God?

3)  Get to know Joseph Smith.  The LDS Church isn't in the business of writing biographies; it's in the business of inspiring people to good conduct--and so naturally, to the degree that it is going to draw upon the life of Joseph Smith in trying to inspire good conduct, it's going to draw from the aspects of Smith's life that are deemed worthy of emulation in this day and age.  That's an important part of getting to know Joseph--but it isn't all of it.  There are a lot of "scholarly" works on Smith that are little more than thinly-veiled hatchet jobs; but there are also some fair-minded analyses (Richard Bushman's Rough Stone Rolling is an excellent start) that candidly talk about Smith's weaknesses and failings.  And of course, the D&C is replete with references to Smith's personality flaws.

Edited by Just_A_Guy
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I don't have an issue with it at all either.  I believe when the Lord revealed the concept of sealings, it wasn't quite clear what the rules of who sealed with who and how families were to be connected.  A lot of people wanted to be sealed to the prophet Joseph.  I believe some marriages were commanded by God, and others were at the request of church members.  So a lot of women were sealed to Joseph, some who had husbands already.  Big whoop.  I still doubt that many (if any) were sexual in nature. 

 

I am really surprised church members are shocked at this.   The first question anyone asks when they find out my faith (or that I am from Utah) is how many wives I have (probability goes up the further you are from Utah).   And if you know church history, you should know that Brigham Young used Smith's polyamy in court proceedings to try to gain control over church property in the hands of RLDS/Emma Smith. (he lost by the way).  So, it's not like we've exactly been hiding it.

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Guest LiterateParakeet

Wannabelieve, you might find some helpful answers at fairmormon.org

 

http://en.fairmormon.org/Table_of_contents.org

 

Also Terryl Given's Letter to a Doubter is really good:  http://www.mormoninterpreter.com/letter-to-a-doubter/

 

If you like Letter to A Doubter, you might also enjoy the Givens (Terryl and his wife, Fiona) book on doubt: 

 

http://www.amazon.com/Crucible-Doubt-Reflections-Quest-Faith/dp/1609079426/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1418449207&sr=8-1&keywords=Givens+Doubt

 

Best wishes!

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WannaBelieve,

May be interesting and productive to read:

Shaken Faith ...  Mike Ash

"For struggling members, or family and friends of struggling members, this is the “go-to” book for understanding the emotional turmoil that accompanies testimony-damage, and provides answers and resources to assuage the doubts which may impede faith."     http://deseretbook.com/Shaken-Faith-Syndrome-Mike-Ash/i/5106855

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Guest LiterateParakeet

May be interesting and productive to read:

Shaken Faith ...  Mike Ash

 

Great suggestion Janadele!

 

Wannabelieve, this youtube video is a good intro to Shaken Faith by Mike Ash

 

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To be fair to the OP... The issue doesn't seem to be the fact that Joseph Smith practiced Plural Marriage. The issue seem to be the fact that he was sealed to women who were already married and had living husbands. I can understand the concern, it's a valid one. Personally, when I learned of this many, many years ago I had to research a lot because it was quite an uncomfortable thought and after careful research, I came to my own conclusions and separated fact from assumption.

 

Having said all that, it would surprise me a lot if someone who never heard about it would accept it right away and be perfectly okay without researching about it.

Edited by Suzie
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The polygamy question is a tough one for a lot of people.  Many have been thrown off by it and have had their faith shaken too.  So know that your experience is a common one.

 

I really think this question can be solved the same way every other question is resolved and that is through the Holy Spirit.  God said He would teach us the truth of all things.  So...prove him now herewith. Right?

 

At this point in my grapplings with Joseph Smith, I've come to a place where I don't need the guy to be perfect anymore.  I only need to know that God trusted him to do some work.  And I need to know what was God's work and what was man's fallibility.   I look at all the prophets.  It seems to me that all of them got it wrong on something.  Noah, Peter, Paul, all the guys from the scriptures.  Frankly, I think Brigham got it wrong on race and I wonder if Kimball got it wrong on sex.  Maybe Joseph got it wrong on polygamy.  It certainly seems the church was confused about sealings for a while because they started sealing everybody to Joseph but soon discontinued the practice when they understood better.

 

And I think about the scriptures and what God does to try his people.  He does some pretty radical stuff like chopping off Laban's head and killing Pharaoh's kid and going to war with people and asking prophets to marry their servant woman cause wifey couldn't have babies.  Frankly, I have moral concerns with all this stuff!  But apparently God asks His people to do questionable stuff sometimes.  

 

The only thing we need to know is whether or not God is the author of it.  So to the spirit we must go for the answer.  All the research or reading apologists can't give the reassurance we really need.  For me, a little study was helpful to give a context but it's really been the spirit that I've leaned on to tell me the truth about stuff.  And I'm not even saying I have perfect clarification on this issue.  But I've gotten enough that I'm not really worried about it anymore.

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At this point in my grapplings with Joseph Smith, I've come to a place where I don't need the guy to be perfect anymore.  I only need to know that God trusted him to do some work.  And I need to know what was God's work and what was man's fallibility.   I look at all the prophets.  It seems to me that all of them got it wrong on something.  Noah, Peter, Paul, all the guys from the scriptures.  Frankly, I think Brigham got it wrong on race and I wonder if Kimball got it wrong on sex.  Maybe Joseph got it wrong on polygamy.

 

Kimball got it wrong on sex?  What on earth?!  I don't think so.

 

I'll ignore the Brigham/race thing because people generally tend to be way to stubborn and crippled by politically correct trends to see the bigger picture and to allow a reasonable discussion around it. But Joseph did not get it wrong on polygamy. If you believe that then you are either sorely uneducated on the actual history of it or you are turning a blind eye to something because it bothers you.

 

Basically any principles you struggle with you're default to, "The prophet must have been wrong." Is there any chance that you're the one who's wrong?

 
It is an impossible stretch, in my view, to resolve shaken faith by accepting that the things one sees as problems ARE actually problems but the church is true anyhow. This is logically incongruent. The only viable resolution is to come to terms with these things by a belief that they are within the scope of righteous prophet/seer/revelator behavior and thinking.
 
You're right in saying that the Spirit is the key here. But when the Spirit has witnessed to us that the church is true, that Joseph was a prophet, and that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, it behooves us to the accept that there are viable and reasonable explanations for these men's actions and teachings that would not place them strictly outside qualifying as prophets, seers and revelators.

 

And I think about the scriptures and what God does to try his people.  He does some pretty radical stuff like chopping off Laban's head and killing Pharaoh's kid and going to war with people and asking prophets to marry their servant woman cause wifey couldn't have babies.  Frankly, I have moral concerns with all this stuff!  But apparently God asks His people to do questionable stuff sometimes.  

 

When something seems out of the ordinary, then God is doing "questionable" thing? Wouldn't it make more sense, knowing of God's perfect love, mercy, justice, knowledge, and power, that if something seems questionable to us that it means that we're someone knowledgeable, un-loving, un-merciful, un-just, etc.?

 

Viewpoints such as this strike me as fairly small-minded -- mortal ideology based in a culturally twisted blind existence trying to explain God's works and ways.

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We don't teach about sex how Kimball taught it, all the manuals have changed since his tenure, Brigham Young was a wrong on race (time has shown this to be true and the fact that denying the Blacks the priesthood was never doctrine). You say "But when the Spirit has witnessed to us that the church is true, that Joseph was a prophet, and that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, it behooves us to the accept that there are viable and reasonable explanations for these men's actions and teachings that would not place them strictly outside qualifying as prophets, seers and revelators."

 

Is it really that hard to suppose that our Prophets were/are fallible men? That they do actually pull their pants on one leg at a time like you and me? That they made mistakes? 

 

​Why can't Joseph Smith be a Prophet and someone who made mistakes or showed poor judgement in certain aspects of his life?

 

I am sorry I cannot live in the same vacuum as you. 

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We don't teach about sex how Kimball taught it, all the manuals have changed since his tenure

 

What does this even mean? What, specific, teaching concerning "sex" has changed since Kimball's tenure?

 

Is it really that hard to suppose that our Prophets were/are fallible men? That they do actually pull their pants on one leg at a time like you and me? That they made mistakes? 

 

​Why can't Joseph Smith be a Prophet and someone who made mistakes or showed poor judgement in certain aspects of his life?

 

I am sorry I cannot live in the same vacuum as you. 

 

You're putting this into such all-or-nothing, black-and-white terms. Believing that the prophets were not guilty of major mistakes and sins is not the same as believing the prophets were perfect, nor is it living in a vacuum.

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We don't teach about sex how Kimball taught it, all the manuals have changed since his tenure, Brigham Young was a wrong on race (time has shown this to be true and the fact that denying the Blacks the priesthood was never doctrine). You say "But when the Spirit has witnessed to us that the church is true, that Joseph was a prophet, and that the Book of Mormon is the word of God, it behooves us to the accept that there are viable and reasonable explanations for these men's actions and teachings that would not place them strictly outside qualifying as prophets, seers and revelators."

 

Is it really that hard to suppose that our Prophets were/are fallible men? That they do actually pull their pants on one leg at a time like you and me? That they made mistakes? 

 

​Why can't Joseph Smith be a Prophet and someone who made mistakes or showed poor judgement in certain aspects of his life?

 

I am sorry I cannot live in the same vacuum as you. 

 

 

Let me see if I understand you... so you think that because a specific policy has changed, or method of teaching has changed... then it must have been wrong or of poor judgment?

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Brigham Young was a wrong on race (time has shown this to be true and the fact that denying the Blacks the priesthood was never doctrine).

For the record, this is false.

 

False, false, false, false, false, false, false, false, false, false, false, false.

 

I hope that is sufficiently clear, but just in case it isn't, let me restate:

omegaseamaster75's statement above is FALSE.

 

Denying the Priesthood and temple blessings (past baptism) to blacks of African descent most definitely and provably WAS the doctrine of the Church from the mid-1800s until 1978. That is historical fact. It was. I was there.

 

Whatever it was you were trying to say, you got it wrong by saying that denying the Priesthood to blacks of African descent was not doctrine. Yes, it was. Period.

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For the record, this is false.

 

False, false, false, false, false, false, false, false, false, false, false, false.

 

I hope that is sufficiently clear, but just in case it isn't, let me restate:

omegaseamaster75's statement above is FALSE.

 

Denying the Priesthood and temple blessings (past baptism) to blacks of African descent most definitely and provably WAS the doctrine of the Church from the mid-1800s until 1978. That is historical fact. It was. I was there.

 

Whatever it was you were trying to say, you got it wrong by saying that denying the Priesthood to blacks of African descent was not doctrine. Yes, it was. Period.

 

Well, the recent Church essay "Race and the Priesthood" calls it a policy, not a doctrine.

 

In two speeches delivered before the Utah territorial legislature in January and February 1852, Brigham Young announced a policy restricting men of black African descent from priesthood ordination.

 

I think you rushed a little bit stating almost categorically that it was doctrinal since historically speaking, the issue is quite complex but of course, I am open to see how did you reach that conclusion.

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