On the surface I absolutely agree that her changing story is problematic, but what was jarring to me was that these believers were attacking Warren for changing her story which they confidently stated proved her to be a fraud. This immediately made me think of the First Vision, so I began asking questions that would apply to the First Vision but I never mentioned the church.

One of these believers replied to me that not only does Warren’s changing story prove that she was making the story about being fired for being pregnant all up, but that “with Google you can’t get away with these kinds of things anymore.”

And don’t get me wrong here – Elizabeth Warren had a lot of supporters and apologists for her at the time as well claiming that changing her story did not diminish the truth of it, which was also very similar to how apologetics work in the church. My point is that they could instantly see that *she* had changed her story because they did not agree with her politically, but could never make the connection to Joseph Smith’s claims in founding the church.

Again, I never brought up the church, but if you then took that statement and said “In that case the First Vision and priesthood restorations absolutely did not happen,” they would never agree. In fact I probably would have been thrown out for bringing it up.

But the reality is that the moment we apply the same critical thinking about Mormonism that we do with any other religion, politician, or organization, we can see quickly that the truth claims of Mormonism fall apart when we apply critical thinking using evidence, scholarship, and their own documentary history.

While this might seem incredibly oversimplified, the truth is that applying critical thinking to a core belief is one of the most difficult things we will ever do. As I covered in the spiritual witnesses overview, our brains are wired to protect our core beliefs, which is why an Elizabeth Warren fan will avoid watching that story be covered on Fox News just as a Donald Trump fan would never accept negative coverage of him on MSNBC as fair or truthful. We seek out sources and people that will confirm our already formed beliefs, and putting them to the test is an incredibly difficult barrier to break through even within ourselves.

It’s why so often when I make a claim about church history I am asked some form of ‘where did that information come from?’ To a believer, information is only valid if it comes from a place that they trust as a source of reliable information such as church leaders or church owned entities such as Deseret News, KSL, Ensign Magazine (now Liahona), etc. This is where the church has been so effective at information control, because it immediately makes us question what we’re seeing simply because it’s from an outside source that we’ve been conditioned to distrust.

To be clear I am not trying to imply that members are mindless robots – I’m making the point that when you are conditioned to question outside source, you will do so without even realizing you are doing it. That doesn’t mean you’re “brainwashed,” but it does mean that you have the same confirmation bias that every person has except that it has been shaped and molded by the church since the time you were singing songs in primary.

 

Putting the Puzzle Together and Letting the Pieces Fit Naturally

One thing I’ve pointed out before is that church history is like a giant puzzle where you’re trying to put it all together in a way that maintains faith, but at some point you realize that a lot of the pieces do not fit together in a way that matches the correlated narrative of Mormonism.

That leads us to just set aside certain areas of the puzzle because we know the pieces don’t fit in the way we need them to, and we just move on to another area of the puzzle until we get to a point where the pieces don’t fit naturally and move on again.

Since I’ve started studying church history, one of the most fascinating and rewarding aspects is that the pieces started fitting together naturally once I let go of my previous beliefs and just followed the historical evidence, scholarship, and science behind the truth claims of Mormonism.

Instead of trying to jam pieces together that didn’t fit in order to excuse Joseph Smith changing the First Vision account many times, I saw that the evolution of the accounts actually tracked along with his teachings about the godhead elsewhere and I realized that he was retrofitting the First Vision to match his later theology.

While as believers we tend to just ignore that the priesthood story doesn’t quite add up, as I dove into the accounts I discovered that it wasn’t even Joseph Smith who retrofitted the story of Peter, James, and John into the story, but Oliver Cowdery who would be elevated in the church almost instantly after creating and introducing this story.

Again, I realize that putting the pieces together naturally is a difficult process because it requires us to let go of those core beliefs that many were taught since birth, but once you start to see the pieces fitting together not only does the truth about Mormonism become inescapable, but it’s also freeing to realize that those doubts you had were not misguided, but your brain trying to tell you that things just did not add up.

The puzzle analogy is one that is likely used by all sorts of religions and groups, but I really feel like for me this has been the most rewarding part of doing this overview project. Initially the website started with some of the annotated gospel topics essays, but it never really was intended to try and connect the dots between all of these problems with church history.

By setting up the project in this way, I think it shows that a lot of these problems are actually connected in church history, and that when you take them in totality is actually makes a lot of sense even if it ultimately shows that Joseph Smith was not a prophet of God and that this is not the one true church of God.

I hope that for those of you who have followed along with me on these topics that the order has been helpful and that by doing it in this way that you could see the puzzle pieces start to fit together as well. This was a project that I was asked to do and as I tried to visualize how to best illustrate how you can prove the church is not “true,” I really thought about how you take a puzzle and put it back together in a way where the pieces fit together naturally.

Of course many people will not agree with what I’ve written, and there’s nothing I can do about that. But I would ask those who are reading this and who are angry about something I’ve written to let me know because if I did get something wrong I want to correct it, and if the information is correct I want to explain to you why I have come to that conclusion through this research. Again, what I’m trying to do is to show why the pieces fit together in the way this overview is setup and I am happy to answer you if you want to reach out in good faith.

What’s Good About Mormonism Isn’t Unique, and What’s Unique About Mormonism Isn’t Good

As I finally wrap this up, I do want to state here very quickly that the church does do some good things. When I joined as a convert, I loved the focus on family which I felt was a very positive influence on my life. I loved the community the church brought, which has served useful to so many when emergencies arise or someone in the ward was in need.

I don’t in any way want to say that the church is 100% bad – these overviews have only been about establishing the truth claims of the church and the actions of leaders – not about the members of this church, of which most are not aware of the details in these overviews. Personally I do not speculate on what the leaders believe, but I do believe that the members as a whole are well-intentioned people who are trying to do their best to live a better life.

With that said, I do believe that often times the leaders of the church and apologists cite the good that the church does as a way to set aside the historical issues when members have doubts. I think this is a difficult position to take and the reason for that is simple: All churches, community organizations, and groups have great aspects about them.

A phrase I heard early on in my faith journey was that “what’s good about Mormonism isn’t unique, and what’s unique about Mormonism isn’t good.” I believe that overall this is a fair statement because the good things that members often cite are done by many other organizations every day. I did not touch upon finances in these overviews and maybe will get to that down the road, but the church holds over $140,000,000,000 in an investment fund that they do not help the poor and needy with, but have funded two massive church projects with including City Creek Mall.

That is a problem for me because there are so many local charitable causes that actually spend every donation on helping others instead of using those donations to amass a level of cash on hand that rivals the biggest companies in the world. I would encourage all members to consider donating their tithing to local charities that will use those funds to immediately help others instead of being used to purchase large real estate deals, but I realize that is a decision that could have implications for temple recommends.

On the other hand, what makes Mormonism unique is, in my opinion, not good. Polygamy is a horrific teaching and it is still the doctrine of the church today. Both Russell Nelson and Dallin Oaks are eternal polygamists and when they pass on they expect to live with both of their wives to have eternal sex with. I believe this is a horrific idea because their first wives had no say in the matter, and yet their eternity is determined by the men they married and they will be "destroyed" if they do not accept these additional wives.

The temple experience itself was what destroyed whatever testimony I had left and I think is an area that is both unique to Mormonism and, in my opinion, unhealthy. That’s my personal opinion, but the secrecy in the temple is bizarre as have been the practices that the temple has been used for over the years.

In addition to the temple ceremony, I believe garments are a terrible thing that is unique to Mormonism. No one told me about garments before I went to the temple, which as a convert was absolutely jarring to be told about. Furthermore, I never knew as a member that I was wearing Masonic symbols on my long, church-approved underwear, which is another area that just lets you know that there are some serious issues with the authenticity of the temple ceremony as a whole.

While the church claims to have a living prophet, we have yet to receive any meaningful revelations since Joseph Smith. As we covered in the overviews on revelation, even the lifting of the priesthood/temple ban was not a revelation in the sense we think of revelation, but a group statement that would allow use of the Brazil temple. That ban on members with African lineage from receiving saving ordinances is another area that was unique to Mormonism and was allowed to continue in the church for almost 140 years.

Often times the leaders of the church say “we don’t know” when asked about difficult topics, which is so deflating when you realize the entire reason for this church is to have a living prophet who can answer our questions and see a future that we cannot. What good are prophets if they can’t actually answer the difficult questions? I cover a lot of this in our overviews on revelation, but it definitely is something that should be a good thing, but is instead of a big letdown.

Another unique element to Mormonism that sounds great as a member but is really horrendous outside of it is the idea of family separation. In most churches the belief is that you will be with your family after you die – ask any Christian person if they expect to see their family in heaven if you have any doubts of that.

But in Mormonism they create the problem to sell you the solution, and in doing so hold the threat of eternal family separation over you in order to get full obedience to the church. This led many to call Prophet Russell M. Nelson’s April 2019 General Conference talk the “Sad Heaven” talk because it spoke so freely about families being separated for eternity for not doing all of the things that the church requires in order to be together forever.

 

Of course the idea that some people will go to heaven and some will go to hell is not unique, but in Mormonism heaven is tied directly to obedience to the church while in most Christian religions it’s not about obedience to a specific church, but rather being a good person and seeking forgiveness for your sins. If you don’t fully pay tithing, obey leaders, and wear temple garments with Masonic symbols on them, you will become an ‘empty chair’ in your eternal family’s heaven. It’s a really awful use of fear to keep members from looking elsewhere, but it’s effective at controlling the thoughts and behaviors all the same.

 

The overviews have covered other unique elements of Mormonism such as the Word of Wisdom, the anti-LGBT policies, the theft of the true identities of Native Americans and Polynesians, and so much more. You can read the overviews for more on those, but the reality is that almost everything that is true “unique” about Mormonism is just not something that would be viewed as good or healthy by almost anyone who is not already all-in on the church.

 

Again, I fully admit that assessing whether or not the church is good is a subjective matter. I believe that we can prove the church is not true by many different fields of study, but in my opinion the things that make Mormonism unique are not good, and for that reason I do not believe the church is worth my devotion and obedience when I can find the good elements elsewhere without the baggage that comes with the church.

 

This seems to be where most members who study church history end up (not every person, of course), which is what eventually gives us our internal permission and desire to step away from Mormonism altogether. While the process is different for everyone, walking away from a system with such a high level of structure and control over our daily lives comes with a sometimes overwhelming transition.

 

Prophets, Seers, and Revelators

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I’ve mentioned this in the different overviews, but one of the biggest draws of this church to me as an investigator was that we are led by a living prophet who can guide us through these difficult times. I was then taught how we have fifteen men ordained as prophets, seers, and revelators who can communicate directly with God when they needed answers or guidance to lead the church in the right direction.

 

After I joined the only two problems I knew about were polygamy and the priesthood/temple ban on members with black skin, and it never sat right with me that a loving God would allow the church to ban members with dark skin, and it really bothered me once I began looking into church history that this same loving God stayed quiet about the ban but also, we are told, sent an angel to command Joseph Smith to take young women as polygamous brides.

 

Then I noticed that the Doctrine and Covenants pretty much ends after Joseph Smith’s death, although I hung on to what I was taught as the momentous revelations of the lifting of the priesthood ban and the Proclamation on the Family. While there was no steady stream of revelation as with Joseph Smith, they did have these revelations that as a member I felt were confirmation that this church was indeed led by a prophet.

 

The problem, however, is that once you dive in you can see in their own words that the lifting of the priesthood ban wasn’t a revelation, but a meeting to decide how they would open the Brazil temple if they couldn’t allow those with black skin inside. It wasn’t the horrific treatment towards the black community that forced the church to seek revelation, but a business decision as they both needed to have attendance at the new Brazil temple along with giving members there a reason to pay tithing knowing that they would not be deemed worthy to step inside the temple.

 

I covered this in much more detail in the overview on racism in the scriptures of Mormonism, but this is a massive problem in that what is taught as a revelation was anything but a revelation. When it comes to the ‘family proclamation,’ I have learned since going down the rabbit hole that the document was effectively a legal document to provide standing in cases about same-sex marriage.

 

In other words, the two biggest claims to revelations since polygamy was ended (that was not a revelation, either, but a manifesto) were not revelations, but corporate moves to further the interests of the church. We have fifteen prophets, seers, and revelators and they never provide revelations, they can’t foresee and warn the church of something like the COVID pandemic, and they certainly can’t get answers to the problems such as DNA and the Book of Mormon, the Book of Abraham translation, or getting their policies on the LGBT community right.

 

The flipside of not having any canonized revelations since the early days is that they attempt to imply that every change is revelation, such as Russell M. Nelson calling the November 2015 policy of exclusion on the LGBT community revelation just as it was creating huge headaches for the church due to the well documented harm it caused.

 

Again, we can show that the church is not true by using scholarship, history, and their own documents, but when we look at the totality of the church’s history is also shows that these men are not being led by God. When people asked Joseph Smith for answers to the questions of their day, he could rattle off a revelation on the spot in the voice of God regardless of whether or not it has since been proven false.

 

Unfortunately in modern times the leaders of the church realize that when they make definitive statements via revelation that they will be judged for the accuracy of them, which is why they are so terrified to actually do it. Even Russell Nelson rushing to declare the November 2015 policy a revelation completely backfired on him, which forced the church to come up with a new revelation 3.5 years later to erase the previous revelation.

 

I don’t mean to sound sarcastic here, but we have fifteen men that I was told as an investigator are the only fifteen men who could communicate with God, and they never actually reveal anything but generic warnings and promises if we remain faithful and obedient to the church. Again, if you were looking at any other religious leader, church, or organization that claimed to have fifteen men that spoke to God and yet never were able to actually prophecy anything specific that was coming towards us, what would you say about their claims to being the one true church of God?

 

Stealing Our Identities and Selling Them Back To Us

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In the overview about race and the scriptures of Mormonism I included a video of a Polynesian woman who talked about how their identities were now tied to being the descendants of the Book of Mormon people, which is a horrible teaching from the church that steals their true history and cultural identity.