Ten Shocking Mormon Beliefs

That are not really true.

I stumbled across this list of “Top 10 Most Weird Mormon Beliefs – Shocking Revelations” a few days ago on the Atheist Adam blog. As I am a Mormon I thought I would see just exactly what was so shocking. I have been participating in religious dialogue and debate online since I was in High School. I have come across all kinds of claims about what Mormons “believe”. So I am not unaccustomed to seeing outrageous claims about what I believe. This time it was no different, I was not surprised. The supposed “beliefs” were all either blown out of proportion/taken out of context, or just plain false. Here are few of the “shocking revelations”:

10. The earth is 7,000 years old. There is no official statement by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints about the age of the earth, but many Mormons (and many Christians of some sects) believe that the age of the earth is on the order of thousands of years rather than billions calculated by widely accepted scientific methods.

I love how they introduce this one, “Here is the weird belief, but it isn’t really an official belief. But I bet a lot of them believe in it!”. Like the article says, there is no official doctrine about the age of the Earth. The Church is also neutral on the issue of evolution. Members may make up their own minds on issues like this. I accept evolution along with many other Mormons I know personally. I fail to see how letting people make up their own mind is a “weird belief”.

9. Mars and Venus have dry rivers. The dry rivers on Mars and Venus were the source of the flowing rivers on earth. The theory is that the dry rivers on Mars and Venus \”match\” the rivers on Earth and that proves that all three planets were organized from the same source.

8. Dinosaur bones come from other planets. LDS Church Institute instructors teach that fossilized dinosaur bones are from creatures that lived on other worlds that were destroyed in the creation of the earth.

Ok, I will admit it, they got me on these two. By that I mean I have no fracking clue where they came from! I thought I had seen all of the off the wall, ridiculous, and blatantly false claims of what we, Mormons, believed. Seriously, I may have to shake this authors hand for coming up with some supposed beliefs held by Mormons that I have yet to come across. At least the guy is not lacking in the imagination department.

4. Also on the subject of Native Americans, the preface to the Book of Mormon from 1981 indicates that descendents of Lehi are a \”remnant of the House of Israel\” and were ancestors to American Indians. However, the DNA of Native Americans indicates an Asian origin.

This is one of the claims that is taken out of context and out of proportion. It is true that LDS believe that a group of Israelites came to the Americas before the time of Christ and that they interbred among the local population, hence the reference to ancestors. But it is not official that they were the primary ancestors and the majority of LDS scholars believe they were not. The issue of DNA is one that has been debated a lot. There have been numerous responses to the claims that DNA evidence proves the Book of Mormon wrong. Going into any kind of detail here would take way too much time but anyone interested in reading more about it can look here, DNA and the Book of Mormon.

2. Mormons believe that after the resurrection, Jesus visited America and there he performed miracles and taught.

Well, he actually got something right. We do believe this. Unfortunately, I fail to see what is so weird about it when looked at from a religious point of view. The only way I think someone could find it strange is from an atheist point of view where all religion is viewed as strange.

1. Kolub is a star mentioned in the Book of Abraham as being closest to the throne of God. The Book of Abraham is canonized by the LDS church, Mormon fundamentalist organizations, and other LDS sects. Kolub inspired \”Kobol\” in Mormon Glen A. Larson\’s Battlestar Galactica universe.

First of all, it is “Kolob”, not “Kolub”. If you are going to publish of list of “supposed weird beliefs” some group holds, at least get your spelling right! Oh well, at least he got the Battlestar Galactica reference correct. Now to put this belief in context, usually Kolob is twisted to make the claim “Mormons believe God lives on a planet called Kolob”. Too bad Kolob is not referenced as a planet, but a star.

"Kolob" is the name given to the star closest to the throne of God in Abra. 3:3. It is introduced in an effort to teach Abraham that there is a hierarchy in all things. There are many stars, and one star is "closest" to God. In a similar way, there are many intelligences, or moral agents, some greater than others. The greatest of these is God.
Thus, "Kolob" is introduced in a rather peripheral way in an effort to teach about the supremacy of God:

Howbeit that he made the greater star; as, also, if there be two spirits, and one shall be more intelligent than the other...And the Lord said unto me: These two facts do exist, that there are two spirits, one being more intelligent than the other; there shall be another more intelligent than they; I am the Lord thy God, I am more intelligent than they all. (Abra. 3:18-19, italics added)

In an effort to make the Church look bizarre, many critics mock the idea of "God living on the planet Kolob." This is false as God does not live on Kolob. Kolob plays no real role in LDS doctrine or discourse. The only other mention comes from a 19th century hymn, which uses Kolob in its first line to describe the glorious life of those who return to God:[1]

From: http://en.fairmormon.org/Kolob

It seems the person who posted this got the entire article from another website as this same post has turned up in Google at multiple sites all linking back to the same location, a site called The Secrets of Mormons. I assume who ever took the article and reposted it on the blog I found did so because of confirmation bias. If you wish to criticize a set of religious beliefs, this is the worst way to go about it. One look at the source site, The Secrets of Mormons, should have been the first clue that the information is most likely faulty. The site reads like a bad infomercial. Nearly every other line is in a different font size, random sections are bolded and underlined while others are in random colors, even the cliché “But Wait! There’s Even More…” phrase appears.
If you want a good laugh, go check out that site. If you want to know what we, Mormons, actually do believe then just ask us. If you fall for the scam of The Secrets of Mormons, then not only will you be out 37 dollars, but you will be laughed out of the room the first time you confront a Mormon about their “weird beliefs”.

God Botherers

I thought this little piece was funny and worth sharing. It is by a stand-up comedian in the UK.

There's "probably no God", apparently. I read it on the back of a bus last year, courtesy of an advertisement paid for by the British Humanist Association. Mind you, then the Christian Party countered with its own series of ads claiming: "There definitely is a God." For a period last year, in fact, all my spiritual guidance came from slogans painted on buses. If confronted with an ethical dilemma, I'd stroll down the high street and wait for the number 42 to trundle past with "Morality itself being a construct, only your conscience can be your guide" written along the side.

But now that the bus wars have died down, the consensus seems to be that it's unlikely there's a God. Ever since Richard Dawkins wrote his book on the "delusion" a few years ago, the anti-God industry has enjoyed a boom period. The shelves have been crammed with titles such as God Is Not Great, 2,000 Years of Disbelief, 1,000 Tiresomely Reiterated Anti-Church Arguments, and so on.
An atheist Christmas service at London's Bloomsbury Theatre was a box-office smash. Dawkins is now the most popular God-basher since the days when Christians used to be fed to lions. You can hardly have a nativity play without the bespectacled bogeyman storming the stage, scattering the little shepherds and angels with a cry of "Where is the proof of this?!"

In short, atheists are becoming as annoying as believers used to be. 

Read the whole thing here.

Is God just a delusion? First Meeting Notes

The notes from the first meeting of the Purdue Reading Group discussion on The God Delusion are up. You can read the section of the book that was discussed here for free. It seems at the beginning of the meeting they went over the differences between the words Theist, Deist, Pantheist, and Atheist.

Differences between Theist, Deist, Pantheist, Atheist:
- A theist believes in an intelligent god who cares about the created world.
- A deist believes in an intelligent god who created the world, but doesn't care about it.
- A pantheist (like Einstein) doesn't believe in a creative god, but rather believes in a set of rules that the universe follows. In this sense, god is the universe.
- An atheist doesn't believe in any sort of god (or doesn't care).

On to the section from Dawkins book about Undeserved Respect, here are the notes from the meeting.

Does religion get undeserved respect?
1. It's not a question of respect, it's a question of power.
2. The government can't control religious groups
3. Thus it's pragmatic to not fight against religion
4. The example of the cartoons printed in Danish newspapers isn't about privileging religion, but rather it's about fear.
5. "...the restraint of British newspapers derived less from sensitivity to Muslim discontent than it did from a desire not to have their windows broken." (p. 48)
6. It was brought up that the examples that Dawkins uses aren't normal, and are even in some cases "weird," so the conclusions aren't logically valid. In order for the conclusion to hold, it has to hold in all cases, not just in some special cases.
7. Why is it bad to use Freedom of Religion as an argument, yet it's okay to rely on Freedom of Speech? The founding fathers didn't differentiate between the two; they are both part of the first amendment.
8. The term "Ethnic Cleansing" may not be used to give religion special respect, but might just be a form of political correctness.
9. In the Irish civil war, calling them "Catholics" and "Protestants" would force people worldwide to take sides in the conflict, and it would escalate the conflict.
10. Following in the political correctness vein, religion gets respect from the media. This encourages the public perception that religion is set apart, and should be treated with care.
11. Last point, people tend to hold their own beliefs (be they religious or otherwise) with a special reverence. This means that they would feel personally attacked when other people talk negatively about their beliefs.

I really wish I could attend these meetings as I would then know the context of these notes a little better, as of right now I just have to guess the best I can by correlating it to the reading wherever possible. My overall response to the reading was that many of the examples were too extreme (i.e. not common enough) to be taken seriously or are taken to try and show a problem with religion when, in fact, they demonstrate a problem with something else, such as the laws in the US dealing with illegal drugs. I also found the example Dawkins gives that is addressed in point #7 above to be very weird. Dawkins seems to argue that basing something on Freedom of Religion is flawed while basing it on Freedom of Speech is not, yet they are both in the First Amendment.

Everyone is going to want, and generally deserves, at least a little respect for their personal beliefs. This does not mean their beliefs should be above reproach or worth of special protection, or that they would think such. Just that they will probably want anyone who criticizes them to do so with some kind of decency. Ultimately, I can see Dawkins point about religion receiving a lot of respect, but I think he has blown it way out of proportion.

Send an Atheist to Church (Part II)

 The Send an Atheist to Church charity event I mentioned in a previous post has been going on since yesterday. You can read a thorough update on it over at Blag Hag. So far is seems the Baptists (due to someone donating $40) and the LDS are in the lead. I stopped by and donated $10 to the LDS cup before my class today (I am glad the Union has an ATM as I never carry cash with me). I look forward to reading the responses from everyone attending the different church services.

Is God just a delusion?

 There is a new book discussion being held by the Purdue Reading Group. They will be discussing The God Delusion.

Is God just a delusion? Is it the duty of "enlightened" minds to deny
any existence of a heavenly being? Are you lost in the desert, looking
for answers? Then meet us across from Oasis in the Union to discuss
Dawkins' book "The God Delusion."

When: Noon on Tuesday, February 16
Where: Study room across from Oasis in the Purdue Memorial Union
What: The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
Who: Anybody who has an open mind and is searching for answers.

The discussion group has a website and a facebook page. On the facebook page the major points will be posted after each meeting to allow those of us who cannot attend to participate in the discussion. The readings for each meeting will also be posted on the website. I wish I could attend this one but I am in class from 9:30-2:45 straight (no breaks) on Tuesdays. However, I will most likely still follow along on the facebook page and post about it here. I guess I will finally have to break down and buy the book as I cannot stand reading books online and I insist on owning every book I read, which drives my wife crazy. Too bad atheist groups do not give away free copies of The God Delusion like churches give away copies of the Bible.

Send an Atheist to Church

The local Non-Theists Society is doing a charity event called “Send an Atheist to Church”. On Feb. 18 and 19 they will be in the Union with some different Christian denominations (I do not know which ones). They will be taking donations that will go towards the Food Finders Food Bank of Tippecanoe County. With each donation they will ask to which denomination the donation should be associated with. This is to figure out how many non-theists will be attending each church, the more money that is donated on behalf of a specific church, the more non-theists who will attend that church’s services. Afterwards each person who attended a particular church service will write a short piece on their experience. I look forward to reading them. I will most likely stop by and donate on behalf of the LDS Church to see if anyone will attend our services.

Pat Robertson is a True Christian: So saith Dawkins

By now everyone has heard about the earthquake in Haiti. Some are estimating that the death toll may reach 200,000. Whenever a natural disaster of this magnitude occurs one can always count on Pat Robertson to give his, usually illogical, opinion as to why the event occurred. By now his comments on the earthquake in Haiti have been heard by most everyone as they made national news. In case you have not heard exactly what he said, here it is in all its inane glory.

They were under the heel of the French. You know, Napoleon III, or whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, we will serve you if you'll get us free from the French. True story. And so, the devil said, okay it's a deal [...] ever since, they have been cursed by one thing after the other.

His comments have drawn well deserved criticism and condemnation from many groups and people, including other Christians. But, it seems, those Christians condemning Robertson’s bigotry are not in fact “true” Christians, at least according to Richard Dawkins.

Dawkins is not really the friendliest person when it comes to interactions with religion and religious believers. His work on religion generally follows the pattern of painting with the widest brush available and can be insulting even at the best of times (except when it comes to Biology which he is surprisingly good at). But this time his attempt at criticizing religion (and I emphasize attempt) has crossed from the realm of “Extremist Overgeneralization”, to the point where his criticisms become useless, to being “So Stupid, It’s Funny” in his most recent article, Haiti and the hypocrisy of Christian theology.

Needless to say, milder-mannered faith-heads* are falling over themselves to disown Pat Robertson, just as they disowned those other pastors, evangelists, missionaries and mullahs at the time of the earlier disasters.
What hypocrisy.
Loathsome as Robertson's views undoubtedly are, he is the Christian who stands squarely in the Christian tradition.
It is the obnoxious Pat Robertson who is the true Christian here.

According to Dawkins, Pat Robertson’s recent comments represent someone who is a “true Christian”. It is not the millions upon millions of people who claim the title of Christian and simply go about their lives trying to live them the best they can without interfering with other people’s lives, but the minority of extremists Christians who preach hatred and bigotry that are the “true Christians”. It is not the people who send thousands of pounds of needed supplies, teams of doctors, and provide much needed shelter, for Haitians who are currently suffering, but the people who claim Haiti somehow deserved the tragedy that befell the nation who are the “true Christians”.

I am not sure I have ever seen someone trying so hard to validate their bigotry. In his flailing Dawkins attempts to marginalize non-extremist Christians (you know, the majority of all Christians) in what I can only guess is an attempt to make his criticisms seem somehow valid as opposed to the overgeneralizations that they truly are the majority of the time. And his flailing does not stop there, it continues in the article.

Where was God in Noah's flood? He was systematically drowning the entire world, animal as well as human, as punishment for 'sin'. Where was God when Sodom and Gomorrah were consumed with fire and brimstone? He was deliberately barbecuing the citizenry, lock stock and barrel, as punishment for 'sin'.

I hope no one tells him about all us Christians who do not take the Bible to be infallible and completely literal. It may cause his little imaginary world he has built around Christians to come tumbling down. Although I find it hard to believe that Dawkins has yet to encounter non-literalists as they have existed for over a thousand years. Any serious study in Christian theology should reveal religious scholars have warned against interpreting scripture too literally since at least the time of Augustine of Hippo (4th Century)†. I realize this advice has not always been taken but trying to imply that it never existed is simply disingenuous.




*Faith-heads, seriously? Where did he pick this term up, an elementary school playground?
†De Genesi ad literam 1:19–20, Chapt. 19 [408] and 2:9

St. Cloud Secular Student Alliance

The Secular Student Alliance is a student atheist group at St. Cloud University in Minnesota. They are a new chapter who is just getting started on their campus.

SSA’s goal is to work as an umbrella organization for students who are without religion. SSA works with atheists, agnostics, humanists and other non religious students.

“The official mission statement is to create a sense of community for every loosely related irreligious group,” Maddox said.
SSA is a non political group. Maddox said members included every aspect of the political spectrum including liberals and conservatives. SSA does take a political stance for separation of church and state, however.
SSA has been tabling in Atwood to promote their group. They have also sponsored a social event which included playing “Apples to Apples” with the Campus Crusade for Christ, ping pong and a movie night.
“The metaphor I would use is we’re trying to say hello to the campus,” Maddox said.
SSA has a committee that works with Campus Crusade for Christ.

What really struck me as interesting is the last bit about the group having a specific committee for working with Campus Crusade for Christ. I think that is a great idea to foster better communication and dialogue between the two groups. I wonder if our local Non-Theists Society has such a group. It would be neat if they did.

 Thanks to Friendly Atheist for original article.

Blog-whoring for Jesus

If you have not heard, the Thomas Society and the Students for Free Thought at Ohio State will be building houses in New Orleans this spring break. Naturally both the groups need to raise the funding required to pay for things such as gas, food, and various expenses. To help with this they decided to hold a live video blogging event which The Amazing Atheist agreed to host. They had quite a few guests including some big names from the atheist community.

What do we have planned for this event? Oh, all kinds of atheist/christian goodness. First, we will have the PZ/preacher event. Then, we will have giveaways such as a signed edition of Ray Comfort’s debacle and a promised signed copy of my novel. Not to mention the special guests like Hemant Mehta, atheist vidbloggers like ZOMgitscriss, and Keith Jensen, the atheist comedian from the Coexist comedy tour.*

Unfortunately I missed most of the live blogging but I did catch part of the discussion with Hemant Mehta. The parts I saw seemed to be a relaxed conversation between friends that was also kind of humorous at points. As for the part with PZ, Thomas gave a short description of how he was planning on the discussion to go and it sounds like it was supposed to be fairly similar. Basically, it was not structured to be some kind of heated debate or argument. This was supposed to be a discussion with the main intention of raising money for a humanitarian trip. I say this because apparently comments made by some Christians, in the chat room during the discussion, suggested some people expected differently.

So, I did this little interview with PZ Myers and I think people had unrealistic expectations. I think people wanted to see a knock down drag out fight.

First, that was never my plan. As this was an interview, I wasn’t out to lead PZ into a trap or make him look like an idiot. Some people even wrote that I should tell PZ he is going to hell.

Or, I got this comment a lot, “This preacher is a nice guy, but he obviously doesn’t know his faith.”

Rolling eyes.

Sometimes, I think people really do enjoy rolling in the crap.

However, it was not only Christians who expected a “knock down drag out fight”. It seems many atheists expected it as well, judging from the nearly 100 comments on PZ’s blog about the event. Here are a few examples:

· Yeah, PZ doesn't look as clear but he sure speaks more clearly. The pastor stutters and doesn't make any kind of sense. Another nice guy who doesn't know how to think straight. Sad really.

· The pastor certainly was fuzzy/fluffy in his thinking. And he has no idea of real evidence...

· "Theology is self-correcting, like science."- I hurt my side laughing at that statement.

· Couldn't watch all the way to the end. The pastor just keep ranting on and on. He said he didn't agree with the "God of the Gaps" idea, however, when PZ asked what compelled him to Christianity, he basically pulled out that argument and was ranting on about nothing.

· I really enjoyed the interview. The pastor seems like a nice guy, but never could give a passable defense of Christianity. His tap dancing around the obvious was amusing.

· Ah, after I left the tone concern strategy came into play !
That will soon be all that believers have left to defend their bigotry and superstitions.
So expect more of it...:-)

· Ugh, he was way more fuzzier than PZ despite the connection when it came to the discussions. I figured he would have to be for a guy that seems so understanding and accepting despite holding on to Christianity. It makes me tired just to think of the mental gymnastics going on in his head to make everything fit.

· I might have guessed - a glibertarian arsehole. Well fuck off then.

Posters were even asking for what would amount to a full defense of Christianity from Thomas. After declining to do so there, as the comment section on another person’s blog was hardly the place for such a discussion, he was ridiculed from people claiming he did not want to be “laughed out of the room” followed by claims of attempted “blogwhoring”.

The Thomas Society - blogwhoring for Jesus since 1994!

And those comments are not all. There are still more at PZ’s blog along with an equal amount at Thomas’ blog. All this over a discussion meant to generate funding for a charity trip. Here is a response from Thomas expressing his surprise over the veracity of the comments he received.

I’m trying hard not to post a blistering rant this morning. It seems like people are more pissed that I didn’t confirm their little fantasy that all Christians are people hating morons, so they have to find something wrong. What did they find wrong? That I actually agreed with PZ that some pastors are in it for the money and that science is a good thing. Horrors. Shrug. Oh well.

This whole fiasco made me wonder, we hear atheists ranting about the evils and bigotry of religious followers all the time. Now of those who do so, how many are actually interested in holding a friendly, two-way, discussion with believers? And I am not talking about the larger names in atheism, as it seems those who appeared in this event are, at the least, capable of doing so. I am talking about your every day atheist who participates in the religious debate dialogue. Just how many of them are willing to step back from the constant arguments and insult exchanging and have a relaxed discussion with someone of opposite belief? Perhaps both sides could then come to the realization that the other side is comprised of actual people.



*PZ and the Preacher: Saturday Night!!!

I am a Skeptic

On the site I wrote about in my last post, Mormon Scholars Testify, I found a very interesting testimony written by Ron Hellings from Montana State University who works in theoretical physics. I love his first sentence,

I am a skeptic.

It seems today that many atheists all but lay complete claim to the term skeptic*. A very large number of atheistic organizations include “skeptic”, or some variation, in their name and many atheist blogs talk about skepticism on a regular basis. But what you almost never see or hear is someone saying that it is possible to be a skeptic and religious. I think this is partially responsible to an underlying implication that in order to be skeptical of something, one must either reject it or remain neutral towards it. Thus, the implication is that when directed towards religion, to be a "skeptic" one must, to some degree or another, reject religion. I am not saying that this idea is advocated directly and intentionally, but it definitely is implied in many instances.

His testimony is very worth reading and I suggest it even to atheists as a way to understand why some of us believe.





*Here is an example of the internal debate over if being a skeptic requires being an atheist.