A Funny Thing Happened Tonight at Temple Square

So, we went downtown to Temple Square tonight to look at lights and fountains. Nothing surprising there, we do that every year. This year, however, we were treated to a gem of an experience.

We had walked across the street to the City Creek Mall, to look at the fountain show (really dazzling, but so short as to not make it worth the wait), and we were lining up at the pedestrian crossing to go back into Temple Square.

At that corner was a man standing on a concrete platform holding a lit-up sign that said, “Joseph Lied”. He was shouting all kinds of anti-mormon rhetoric, mostly about how the God of the Bible wasn’t the same as Joseph Smith’s God, and bla, bla, bla.

I’ve heard it all before. I grew up with my Evangelical Christian friends trying to convince me that there were no more prophets or revelation, or that we were saved by grace, not by works, and any of a number of reasons why they were right and I was wrong. I had learned to tune them out.

Suddenly I noticed that the young family standing in front of me were singing, “Silent Night”, kind of as if in protest of the protester. I picked up on it, and started singing along.  She turned around right away and smiled, confirming my suspicion. By the time we finished and started to loop it around again, a lady behind me had joined, and my father, standing next to me was singing along.

It wasn’t long before the entire crowd standing there waiting at the crosswalk was singing strong, “Silent Night, Holy Night,...”

And he and his partner went quiet.

Then, just as we were finishing the loop, someone a few behind me started singing “Oh, Come, All Ye Faithful”, and he didn’t have a chance to start up again.  We were all enjoying singing along and smiling at each other, and observing how the contention had faded, when the light dinged, and it was time to cross.  We kept singing as we crossed, and didn’t stop until the song ended, and the preacher was lost in the back distance.

On the way home, my boys commented on how the spirit was there and I pointed out how gentleness can overcome shouting.  It was a very powerful message to me.

Mark has a lifelong testimony of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (the Mormon Church). Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his Dutch Oven blog.

The Grass and The Willow

A Fable For Our Times

So, the story goes that there was a big, tall, full willow tree atop a small rise, surrounded by a grassy meadow.  It had been there for years.  Many who traveled the roads by the meadow would stop and rest in its shade before moving on.  They used the great tree as a landmark to know where to travel and how far they had come.  It seemed like it had always been there and always would.  It was fixed in place, immovable.  The idea that it had once been a weak little sapling was long forgotten.

Below it the grass also grew tall, but not so much as the tree, obviously.  As the breezes and winds blew the grass would sway and swing, bending to the slightest shift and motion in the air.

Not the tree, of course.  Oh, the leaves might swish a little, but the tree was strong against even harsher winds.  It stayed, sturdy and tall.

Until one night a storm arose like no other before it. The winds and the rains hammered the hilltop, whipping the grass and the tree in its frenzy.  Wave after wave of harsh force smashed against them.  The tree strained to hold together as branches snapped and tumbled.  The tree held on with all its might, but finally, its shallow roots were unable to stand against the force of the wind, and with a loud crackling, it toppled over, smashing to the ground.

In the morning, the winds were again calm and the sun rose, drying the raindrops off the dying tree and the grassy meadow.  The grasses rose up and again danced and swayed in the breeze.  Their roots were deep and intertwined, and their blades flexible to move with the winds but still remain in place, still growing, still alive.

OK

So, I was reading yesterday an old response to Jerald and Sandra Tanner’s many anti-Mormon and anti-Joseph Smith books, and I started to see a trend. The more I read, the more I realized that the reason many good, faithful church members fall to anti-mormon propaganda is, in fact, our own fault, culturally.  We cling so rigidly, dogmatically to details that we think are facts, when those “facts” are, in fact, not certain.  Then, when those “facts” are challenged, our roots don’t go deep enough and so, aren’t strong enough to adapt and flow with those winds, and we fall.  Maybe our roots aren’t intertwined enough with others, strengthening each other, and so, we fall.

For example:  Detail Dogma might say that the Book of Abraham was the literal translation of the exact writing on the scrolls that Joseph Smith acquired. Some experts, cited by the Tanners, claim that the writings translate differently, and are not at all what Joseph wrote as the Book of Abraham.  But do we REALLY know what happened?  Do we REALLY know how it happened?  Is it not possible that Joseph Smith saw the texts and had a visionary experience that brought about the revelation of the Book of Abraham?  Is it possible that Joseph, with God’s eyes and inspiration, saw more in the drawings and text than others have?  What is the difference between “translation” and “revelation”.  There is so much that we don’t know.  So, should we rigidly cling to the superficial dogma, or should we sink our roots deeper to the underlying belief that the Book of Abraham is sacred scripture, however it arrived?

Another example: For years and years, we were told that the native american tribes were descendants of the Lamanites.  Some scientists did some studying and claimed that DNA testing disproved that theory, saying that the DNA of native americans was more asian.  We took a look at our beliefs and we said, essentially, that maybe there were other groups here, too, and they mixed.  Then, further DNA studies showed that it's not so cut and dried, scientifically, anyway.

We often want our histories and our stories to be clear, to be black and white, but life isn’t that way.  It’s often messy and our heroes aren’t always so heroic.  That doesn’t mean we stop believing in them, though.  We just have to be flexible.




Mark has a lifelong testimony of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (the Mormon Church). Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his Dutch Oven blog.

October 2013 General Conference, Controversy and Compassion

General Conference has always been a time of great controversy.  It seems that everyone who has a beef with the church or wants to push their own agenda onto it kinda comes out of the woodwork to make their statement.

 I’m not surprised, either.  It makes sense.  This is where the saints are gathered, with the authorities, and the media.  You’ve got the Ordain Women movement, and the Gay and Lesbian movement and the Mormons Are All Going to Hell movement, and they all have a place in the great wide “Supermercado de Dios” (“God’s Supermarket” - a phrase I learned in Honduras).

 This time, there were two talks that spoke directly to my own agendas, in very powerful and reaffirming ways.  They calmed the controversies that had been brewing for a long time in my soul, and left me feeling quite weightless at the end.  I wish I could find transcripts this soon after the event, but I haven’t been able to find them.

 The first, and probably the biggest (for me) was Elder Uctdorf’s talk on Saturday morning.  I was driving home from a book signing, and listening to it on the radio.  I ended up in tears.  Let me set it up for you.

 For a long time, as I’ve interacted with many different people who have many different ideas about the church, I’ve encountered many with negative things to say about the church.  Frankly, there’s a lot of material to draw from:  Polygamy, the Mountain Meadows Massacre, the Missouri wars, the Adam/God theory, the ERA, the Salamander letters, the political involvement by the church in many issues, including California’s Proposition 8, and even, on a small scale, the expansion of the Provo MTC.

 In my own mind, I had come to be (pretty much) at peace with most of these issues by arriving at a personal understanding that the leaders of the church (historical and current) are humans, and that God allows his human representativess to make choices.  Sometimes, those choices are good and wise, and other times, not so much.  In other words, I truly believe that God leads this church, but that sometimes we humans get in the way, and He allows that as a part of our growth.

 One thing that has consistently bothered me about these things is the way the church has handled the dissent.  Either they’ve ignored it, shouted it down, or simply excommunicated those that were dissenting.

 The tone of the talk by President Uctdorf was finally one with openness, compassion, reconciliation, and forgiveness.  And by “forgiveness”, I mean both extending it, and asking for it.  A member of our highest governing body (the First Presidency) stood up in General Conference and admitted that we have, now and in the past, made mistakes.  That was HUGE.  It confirmed all that I had been feeling, yet wondering about, for so long.  A massive weight was lifted from me. My spirit and mind are both still reeling from the lightness I’m feeling, even days later.

 Then, if that wasn’t enough, in the afternoon session, Elder Holland talked about mental illness, particularly depression.  He talked about how important it is to recognize it and to treat it, even with contemporary professional methods.  He said we wouldn’t send someone with appendicitis home to “study and pray”, but we’d send them to the hospital for an operation.  He called on everyone to treat those with mental health issues with compassion and support.

 While I don’t really know if I would be diagnosed with an actual clinical depression, I’ve been through long periods of “down” throughout my life.  I’ve gotten therapy from time to time and dealt with a lot of my issues.

 It was very nice to hear from that grand pulpit that I’m OK.  That I can be healed, and that I can take steps to be healed.  Another weight lifted.

So, say what you wish about the controversies and the agendas, my two big problems felt, if not resolved, at least at peace.

Mark has a lifelong testimony of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (the Mormon Church). Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his Dutch Oven blog.

The "First Vision" of the "Mormon Prophet"

Was Joseph Smith a prophet?

I recently read a fascinating article over at Meridian Magazine about the historical perspectives of Joseph Smith’s Theophany, or what we in Mormon parlance refer to as “The First Vision”.

For my non-mormon friends, here’s the story in a nutshell:

Joseph Smith, when he was a teen, was very confused about religion.  There were a lot of churches and preachers contending with each other and he couldn’t figure it all out.  One by one, his family members joined one sect or another, or stayed away from them all completely.

He read in James, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God...”, and decided to pray about it.

He went to a secluded grove of trees, knelt down and prayed.  At first he was surrounded by darkness, and after struggling against that, was surrounded by light.  He was visited by to glorious “personages” who he identified as God the Father, and Jesus Christ. They told him to wait, and that the truth would soon be restored.

You can read the accepted, canonized version of this story here: http://www.lds.org/scriptures/pgp/js-h/1?lang=eng

But, therein lies the trouble.  Because there are not one, but several different versions of the story, all of which are purported to be written by or spoken by Joseph Smith himself.  Many detractors from the church like to use that as the crux of proof that Joseph was a fraud and a liar.  The author of the Meridian article, Steven C Harper, studies the variations of accounts and sees a more affirming point of view.

Was Joseph Smith a prophet?

I kinda think the whole thing is fascinating.  I mean, really, it all comes down to faith, doesn’t it?  None of us were there in the grove, and none of us actually saw what happened.  Just like we weren’t there outside the tomb when the resurrected Jesus appeared to Mary.  None of us were there when Moses parted the red sea, either, at least not in our mortal forms.

On a more micro-viewed level, none of us were there when each of those accounts was written or spoken, either.  We don’t always know who the audience was, nor what the purpose of the discussion. Atheist scholars for many years have said that the four Gospels prove that Jesus wasn’t the son of God because they all disagree, and they don’t tell the same story.  Believing scholars say that each Gospel was written to a unique audience, and for a unique purpose.  Both cite valid academic and historical arguments.

So, was Joseph Smith a prophet?

I, myself, believe.  I have seen many historical arguments that show me he was a complex, flawed human, just like the rest of us.  But I believe him when he said, “And now, after the many testimonies which have been given of him, this is the testimony, last of all, which we give of him: That he lives! For we saw him, even on the right hand of God.”  D&C 76:22-23

Mark has a lifelong testimony of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (the Mormon Church). Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his Dutch Oven blog.