Today a Guest host is contributing with their First Episode from a series called “Radio Free Mormon”. The First Episode is titled “The Great Mormon History Cover-up”. The episode delves into The Church’s battle against intellectuals and messy history and centers around President Packer’s talk “The Mantle Is Far, Far Greater Than the Intellect”
Disclaimer:
As with all guest hosts, this Episode does not necessarily reflect the views of Bill Reel or Mormon Discussion Podcast.
Request:
Like this episode and others we have had from guest hosts, Such contributions are highly desired. My mission with Mormon Discussion Podcast is to bring great perspectives of Mormon History & Culture that helps struggling Latter-day Saints reconcile difficulties while being encouraged to stay in the Church. If you wish to contribute either a Blog Post or a Audio Podcast Episode please do and send to me at ReelMormon AT gmail DOT com for consideration.
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“Many things can be true and yet harmful to man. Not all truth is useful.”
— Immanuel Kant
(p.43 Lectures on Logic, (translated by J. Michael Young))
I think the speaker of this podcast is missing something.
The author of quote you pulled, in the very paragraph you pulled from, is making the opposite point to what you seem to be trying to make.
“Let us, in every investigation of a cognition,
take it completely alone[,] separated from all foreign questions of use or harm, and in particular when we ourselves have an interest in this use or harm[;] for otherwise partisanship at once states its judgment and deadens 60 all cold reflections of the understanding”
(p.43 Lectures on Logic, (translated by J. Michael Young))
Most people would agree with this statement from a relative perspective – i.e some truths are painful, not useful for certain activities etc. The bigger issue is the practice of censoring information on behalf of others. The issue is that any one person has the right to judge what is good and useful for someone else to know, instead of letting others have access to information and use their own agency to make decisions. This podcast is demonstrating the problem within the church of leaders taking it upon themselves to decide what people should and should not learn. Leaders intentionally mislead through the withholding of pertinent information, which is dishonest.
“Many things can be true and yet harmful to man. Not all truth is useful.”
— Immanuel Kant
(p.43 Lectures on Logic, (translated by J. Michael Young))
If you’re not impressed, read the whole thing. I think that whoever this attorney is, he missed something.
Dear Cliff,
You say I have “missed something.” There is much I don’t know and doubtless I do miss a great many things.
It is hard to reply any more specifically until you can tell me what exactly it is you feel I have “missed.”
RFM
IF think about Elder Holland’s message regarding home teaching, he basically calls out on everyone telling us, dummies – don’t you know our instruction our general guidelines for the whole church and that each ward needs to make local adjustments according to each individual (ward) circumstances.
The problem is members of the Church have made the mistake of assuming the infallibility of our leaders, probably because that is what once they preferred and promoted by subordinates.
At any rate, can’t we just see they are just men doing the best we can. The answer is well yes, if you tell us. So if that is going to be the case going forward, I will make my own calls using my own criteria and just using the Prophets and Apostles as guidelines and not mandatory instructions.
In fairness, they are doing the best we can and now we need a new narrative that can work for everyone. So in the meantime, let’s all just do the best we can.
maybe because leaders never tell members we make mistakes, here are some of them, and here is what you do when you disagree with us and for those who do this they should not be treated as less than.
Thank you so much for this podcast!
You are so very welcome, Vickie!
Thanks for listening!
RFM
Bill,
This podcast is interesting. I tried to locate “Radio Free Mormon” as a separate podcast? So it appears to be, as you say, a “Guest Host”? If so, he should be identified with some information about who he is. Otherwise, it seems to be a bit of a coverup within a talk about coverups?
I hear that but it seems he prefers to be anonymous at present. we shall see.
It is a fair question, Glen.
The reason I choose to remain anonymous is because I have a child on a mission at present for whom the LDS Church is doing wonderful, positive things.
And I would never want to do anything that might hurt my child.
It’s as simple as that.
Thanks for listening!
RFM
It’s not a cover-up when you can go read everything he discussed by picking up Gregory Prince’s biography on Leonard Arrington. It’s sold in the one and only true bookstore (Deseret Book) and picking up a copy of Boyd’s BYU talk.
Don’t accuse him of “covering up” when the content he cited is directly from church owned institutions (Deseret Book and BYU). Yes, what a conspiracy! He’s using a talk by an apostle and a book sold by the church!
For goodness sakes Glenn T. Hale!!! Did you even listen to the podcast?!?
The talk was given in 1981.
The book was published a couple of years ago.
Do you see that as significant?
Bill,
Who is the guest speaker for this podcast?
I think it is anonymous at this present moment
It should also be observed that a growing number of people have been disciplined by the LDS Church in recent years for speaking the truth.
It is the LDS Church that has created the hostile environment in which anonymity becomes a necessity.
Is it a “cover-up” to try to avoid that unpleasantness?
Was it a “cover-up” for Jews to hide in German attics?
I am happy not knowing the ID of RFM. There’s a certain feeling in not knowing! He speaks for me. For us. He is all.
He’s the man in Plato’s cave trying to get us out! He’s left and bids us follow.
This pod-caster teaches/speaks, and the lesson resonates for so many of us. I’m not such a micro-manager that I have to manage WHO he is, by knowing WHO.
It’s satisfying knowing WHAT he is!
The WHAT he is:
Free.
Free from fear and constraints. Free from reprisals by a church that’s been neck-deep in that nonsense!
I am pretty sure I know who the presenter is and I am so happy to hear him present more content. He is one of the more thoughtful, articulate, and honest people I have encountered on the Internet.
Thank you for providing this wonderful podcast episode.
Great podcast! Thanks for inviting me to listen.
It’s time to weed out the false doctrines from the True Church.
Noticed how no one mentioned that this is the one and only true church this general conference.
Simply a reference that this is the Lord’s church, but I’m certain that’s god’s kingdom goes well beyond just the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In that regard, the BoM has it right, there is really save it be two churches.
This episode was an amazing outline of many introspective sessions I’ve personally gone through in thinking about church doctrine and truth claims.
Thank you for sharing. Please consider doing more or even starting RFM as its own podcast. You’re very articulate and thoughtful. You must be a good attorney 🙂
Re: Arrington wanting to put the lid on deep archival research that would ‘damage the church and all its officers.’
I wonder if part of it is the 2nd Anointing? That certainly implicates all the officers – it seems pretty clear that GA’s, temple presidencies, maybe MPs (and who knows who else) take part in this super secret, very exclusive/elitist ritual. It started with Joseph, and the church has prized loyalty over honesty ever since.
we may never know what he was talking about.
Bill – Right. It might be something else entirely. Many of us would like to know if there is a smoking gun (if even Arrington wanted to hide things, I’m feeling pretty defeated, testimony-wise). Many people consider certain things to already be smoking guns of non-prophecy (BofA, blacks and the priesthood, etc).
Thanks to Radio Free Mormon for the entire podcast. The most poignant and compelling quote (for me): “Notice that throughout this talk [BKP’s Mantle > Intellect] there is an implicit understanding that the truth destroys faith. Think about that. What kind of a church is it that believes knowing the truth about it will destroy faith in it?” That’s enough to tip me over the edge right there. Feeling terribly disillusioned.
I am sorry to hear about your disillusionment. Sadly we must all go through that to some extent if we are ever to press forward through our comfortable beliefs in order to become real truth seekers. I can tell you on the other side of this disillusionment is beautiful and empowering and fulfilling…. I can’t promise one that they will find a way to stay in (though I hope for all to do so) or whether one feels leaving is the truest path. But what I can promise is once through the dark night of the soul one will almost assuredly not desire to go back to what once was…. to what their sadness is regarding.
Somehow I missed this before. Thanks for the encouragement Bill.
I think it’s important to state that there really is no other pod-caster out there, who is this knowledgable, and articulate. It’s quit refreshing to have all the information which is familiar to this pod-caster (RFM) presented in a manner that flows, and moves along at a rapid, and concise pace. My whole family now listens to, and looks forward to, these great podcasts! And I can tell you, we are having wonderful and meaningful discussions about our faith, our upbringing within the Mormon culture, and our feelings as they pertain to the upheavals within ourselves, as well as within the church, we love. These podcasts, presented by RFM, are helpful to me, and my loved ones: as we talk about the information presented here, and grapple with the more difficult discussions foisted upon us by our church—-from their websites, to the slow realizations of messy LDS history, and history we grew up ignorant of (were purposefully KEPT ignorant of.)
I love the church, but more and more, disdain the leadership thereof. In being authentic to myself, I have to address ALL ASPECTS of this vehicle of my faith. Every part. Or it just doesn’t “go.”
I hope RFM is not simply a “guest”; for that makes us nervous that he will go away, and all this incredible flow of actual history will go away with him.
Keep it coming RFM! God bless! Stay with us!
EXCELLENT podcast! It’s one of the best I’ve heard, and I’ve heard many.
There’s truly been an active conspiracy to deceive the members. Why? Because the truth destroys the foundational claims of the Church.
My shelf has officially been broken.
now you have reconstruct it…. it need not look the same
Just listened, wonderful thank you.
if the truth cannot survive in the light, what truth is it?
Thank you!
This leaked document, a letter from a convert to Boyd K. Packer about his ‘Mantle is far far greater than intellect’ talk is especially poignant when combined with this podcast. (If the link doesn’t work, google 1981 letter from a convert to Boyd Packer, posted February 7, 2017 MormonLeaks)
https://www.docdroid.net/4TC6w93/letter-from-a-convert-to-boyd-packer-1981.pdf.html
Taken as a whole within the historical context, Packer’s talk really is evil.
It is doublespeak, coercive, manipulative, disingenuous, and unprincipled.
I never pored over this talk as a TBM, and I don’t know if I would have recognised it for what it was then.
I never heard this podcast, and just listened. Exceptional.
Gosh,…wouldn’t it be interesting to see what is still in that archive.
I feel ANGRY when I find out, after the fact, that my agency has been messed with–that the ideals of “informed consent” have been arbitrarily taken from me arbitrarily but the decision making of those who are supposedly smarter than I am, and able to make decisions for me because they are so mighty and high up.
This is arrogant at the HIGHEST LEVELS. And to claim God is the author of such choices?
I’m on the outside, and I have to state, my very faith in GOD as a benevolent being has been damaged severely by the position of LDS leadership, that such decisions (like telling lies) is actually the mind and will of God.
Only as I have been able to reconstruct my concept of God by stripping away the double-speak of LDS leaders ABOUT God, have I been able to slowly, painfully, carefully move toward any type of faith at all.
Boyd Paker…you Q15 apostle (even though you are dead)…shame on you. Hypocrite!
“There is great guilt undoubtedly in deceiving the people but it is not so generally understood that there is some guilt in being deceived. For to have any corrupt interest which makes us willing to believe a lie is almost equal to the depravity that tells it. Indeed the one character stands very near the other and if we are deceived it is because there is something in us that lends itself to the deception. If the heart were calm and pure it would not so often be deceived. ”
– Leonard Withington
The link for the original talk has been changed. Here is the new one:
https://www.lds.org/manual/teaching-seminary-preservice-readings-religion-370-471-and-475/the-mantle-is-far-far-greater-than-the-intellect?lang=eng
Thank you RFM. I am enjoying your podcasts and this one I find very interesting since my father was in the CES for 3+ decades. If he were still around I’d love to ask him about this 1981 talk.
Not sure why your post got edited. This is the way it showed up at Radio Free Mormon.
So you know, the very first RFM episode dealt with a point-by-point break down of this (in)famous talk by Elder Boyd K. Packer!
Oh, wait a second! I see that it is this first podcast to which you are commenting!
So good to know folks are going back and listening to the original episodes!
Thanks for listening!
RFM
RFM, this is the best podcast I’ve ever listened to! Thank you for telling the truth about the church. This validates my decision three years ago to resign from the church. I was a devout member for sixty years, but after discovering the problems with church history I knew I needed to be an example to my children and grandchildren and have my name removed from church records. Hopefully my action will be a testament to later generations to allow them to see for themselves the ‘truth’ about the church. My decision to resign was made after countless hours and months of intense research. The shunning and shaming by family and friends I’ve endured since leaving the church has been excruciating and the regrets of the loss of nearly my entire life to a church founded on false teachings is sometimes unbearable… But I’m so grateful that I’m finally free. Thank you for having the courage to tell the truth about the church!
@RFM:
Do you think Boyd Packer came to his cover-up honestly?
That is, Was Boyd Packer unshaken in his faith in the LDS church and its truth claims and he was well-meaning when he exhorted CES instructors to omit truths that are not useful?
In other words, was Body Packer (1) a closet non-believer who exhorted CES instructors to omit truths that are not useful because he didn’t want the fraud exposed or (2) a full believer who was willing not to give people the whole story if it meant that just one more soul would be in the kingdom of god?