Introduction to Greg Matsen and the Cwic Show

John Dehlin [00:00:00] Hello, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories Podcast. I'm your host, John Dehlin. It's December 5, 2025 and today I'm over the moon, ecstatic to have on the show a fellow Mormon themed YouTuber by the name of Greg Matson of the Quick show or Quick Media.

Greg Matsen [00:00:20] Correct.

John Dehlin [00:00:20] Hey, Greg.

Greg Matsen [00:00:21] John, how are you?

John Dehlin [00:00:22] Good. Thanks for coming on Mormon.

Greg Matsen [00:00:24] Yeah, happy to be here.

John Dehlin [00:00:26] And I'll just say for a long time, well, some of the consistent criticism we get on Mormon Stories, especially from the believing side, is that number one, Mormon Stories isn't balanced enough, that we don't have enough, you know, believers on to counterbalance the critics. And then also there's been the criticism that people who leave the church or ex Mormons tend to be more politically liberal, whereas people that stay sometimes might be more politically or socially conservative. And that Mormon Stories has not been balanced in terms of representing people on the faith spectrum or the political spectrum. And I feel like we've always tried to have believers on the show and I think throughout our 20 years, you'll find lots of believers on the show and apologists. But I always love to have people on the show that can represent healthy belief, that can provide a framework for healthy belief for those who want to believe. Because as far as I'm concerned, Mormon Stories Podcast is not anti belief, it's not anti LDS church, it's not anti Christianity, it's not anti theism. It's more just trying to hear people and their stories and also try and just engage in dialogue. So for all those reasons, in addition, lately we've really been trying to figure out what it means to be peacemakers in this space with all the polarization and all the contention online. You know, I've wanted to figure out, along with others like Beau Euler and Julie Hanks and Janice Spengler, how do we make peace? How do we build bridges, how do we talk to each other more than about each other or at each other? And, and so I hit up Greg a few weeks ago to grab lunch. We grabbed lunch. He said he'd be willing to come on the show. And, and Greg, I'm super happy that you do it.

Greg Matsen [00:02:26] Yeah. Well, I hope this goes well. I think it will.

John Dehlin [00:02:30] I do too. And, and I guess here's one thing I want to say to my normal viewers and listeners. Today's episode is not going to be about me grilling Greg on things like church truth claims. We're probably not even going to get into truth claims or history that much, only to the extent that Greg wants. What I told Greg that we would sort of talk about today would be his faith journey and then, you know, his perspective as more of a social or political conservative. And frankly, I'm more interested, Greg, in ways that we can establish common ground versus ways that we can establish differences. So that's. I think, if you. Do you agree that's kind of what we agreed to? Kind of.

Greg Matsen [00:03:20] Yeah, absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:03:21] Yeah.

Greg Matsen [00:03:21] Sounds right.

John Dehlin [00:03:21] But also, I. I want to feel like we can just have a pleasant conversation. You can ask me questions you want vice versa, and we can just have a couple of good hours.

Greg Matsen [00:03:31] I think that's the best way to do it. Okay, great.

John Dehlin [00:03:33] All right, so do you want to give people a little bit of introduction about who you are and what you do? Because I think most of my viewers and listeners may not even know who you are or have never watched Quick Quick show before.

Greg Matsen [00:03:47] Yeah. So Quick show is a podcast. I do. It's mostly on YouTube and on podcast platforms. I've been doing that for, I think, since 2018. So one of the longer ones standing out there as an independent. I'm completely independent in what I do. My wife and I decided to do this back, what, seven, eight years ago. And basically what I started doing was I started going into a cultural. Really landmines, where I was really sitting for a long time by myself in this, but talking about church culture, talking about culture more broadly. I think the first ones I did. I think I did do some gospel topics type of shows, but I started doing what I call dinner with Millennials. And what I wanted to do was. With millennials.

John Dehlin [00:04:49] Millennials.

Greg Matsen [00:04:49] With millennials, yeah. So what I wanted to do was we've always had very robust discussions with our family at dinner, and we talk politics, we talk culture, we talk philosophy, we talk everything. And so I wanted. I just wanted the listeners to hear what our dinners were like. And so I just plopped a yeti mic down in the middle of the table and recorded our conversation for, you know, hour to two hours.

John Dehlin [00:05:14] Your kids were millennials at the time?

Greg Matsen [00:05:17] My kids. Well, they still are, right? They still hold that generational term, but my oldest kids are millennials. And they go the millennials. And then I've got, I think, three of them. If we look at the technical ages, there are. Three are millennials and one is Gen Z. And there is a difference. There's definitely a difference there. So, yeah, we have these discussions and put them online and come. Follow me. Came along. My wife says, you're doing this. I've Always had my nose in the scriptures. So I did those four years of Come Follow Me, but eventually, after about the first year or so, I couldn't hold back anymore, and I started doing what I originally had intended to do, which was more of a cultural podcast.

John Dehlin [00:06:00] Okay, and so if you had to describe the Quick show, what would you say its framework is, its bias or its perspective, or even what its mission is?

Greg Matsen [00:06:15] Yeah, I would say that it is talking about current events, philosophies, looking at culture today through a believing, faithful Latter Day Saint lens and giving commentary on that. That's primarily what Quick show does.

John Dehlin [00:06:34] Yeah. Okay.

Greg Matsen [00:06:35] And can I describe what the name is, by the way?

John Dehlin [00:06:36] Yeah, please.

Greg Matsen [00:06:37] Okay. So Quick is cwic. And it's a. I actually started off with something very different where I was. It was called Mormonado.

John Dehlin [00:06:48] Mormon Auto.

Greg Matsen [00:06:49] Mormonado. Like a uto adobe. Oh, Ado at the end. Like, I like Spanish more. Menado. Right, exactly. And I had this guy figure on there that was. It was one of the. The boy. What is it? Freeberg. Right. One of the. Freeberg. Arnold Freeberg. Right. It was one of his. His paintings of Moroni or Mormon or somebody. I can't remember who it was, with kind of a Clint Eastwood Zorro hat on top, you know, and. And then it was very different colors, but that's what I started off with. And then the whole Mormon thing came along, and so I had, you know, I thought, I need to change the name on this. So I changed the name to Quick. But quick is an Old English word that means alive and intelligent. And so going back, you know, if you go to Jacobean English with the Bible and you look at, like, you know, my spirit is quickened kind of thing, if you go back further into Old English, back into the, you know, 10th, 9th century, that the root of that is quick CWIC. And it was really much more about being alive or intelligent, something that was alive and intelligent. And so that's where the name comes from.

John Dehlin [00:08:02] Nice. And if you had a goal for the show, what would the goal be?

Greg Matsen [00:08:09] Awareness. I'm not really an activist. I'm not worried about being an activist. I would not say in terms of even the purpose or mission of the podcast is not being apologetic. I suppose I get into that sometimes, but really it's awareness. I want to put awareness out there. What are you looking at? I'm very into agency. I want people to see what's out there. Make a decision for yourself. I might probably give you my opinion, and I might even be passionate in that opinion, but I think primarily I want to get awareness out there. When the whole what I would call woke madness came out there, and there's still quite a bit of it out there, I wanted people just to see where this comes from, why it is that you send your kid off to college and they come back with different terminology, different words. You know, how do you understand what's happening and you know, what's the DNA that brings us to this point, right. With George, Floyd and everything else that started to happen. So that's, you know, as far as a philosophical poli sci kind of a framework, that's. That's where I would want awareness to be. You make your own decision. What do you want? What do you want to do about this? But if you're aware of things, okay, maybe I can handle these in a different way without rebounding to some hardcore, tighten the screws fundamentalist type of point of view with things. Right. Because I think that's the danger of that. I mean, you can, you can rebound all the way over to a place that is damaging as much on that end as it is can be on the other side.

John Dehlin [00:09:52] And tell me if this is a appropriate framing or come from sort of a concern that LDS culture might be becoming too. I guess we'll use the term politically liberal, and especially at places like byu and straying more LDS culture might be straying too much from core LDS doctrinal principles. And so when you say awareness, it's to say, hey, this is what's going on in our culture and in byu, sometimes there's a concern that we might be getting too progressive or liberal or as you say, woke. And to say, let's not let the pure doctrines of the church get polluted or diluted, is that.

Greg Matsen [00:10:52] Yeah, that's right. I would say that's true. Yeah. And I would say, you know, I don't. Liberal isn't the right word for me. I don't really, you know, liberal. It's interesting, in the us, liberal has a very different meaning than it does elsewhere in the world. I mean, in many places you go to the UK and you say liberal. That's the Tories. You know, it's like that's a totally different thing because they're used to pushing back hard on hardcore socialism in Europe. Right. But it's liberal. You know, my favorite professors at byu, I went to byu. My favorite professors at byu, except for maybe one or two, were liberal professors. Right. Because I enjoyed the way they talked. There was new interesting things that I was hearing that I hadn't heard before. So liberal is not, I think, the right word. I don't mind liberal at all. I think liberal is actually a necessity to some degree. What I don't like is when it goes off the rails. And that's where I think we've been, and I think that's where we've come to. And it's not just the church. It's a Western cultural phenomena that we're going through right now, where I think that the left has a harder time checking itself than the right does. Not that the right's about to have a big problem, but I think the left has had a tougher time checking itself because it is so much more based on a worldview of tolerance and allowance for things. Right. And so it allows more to happen, I think, on the left quicker. And that seems to be, to me, I think that is a pattern that happens over time, and it just kind of circles back and forth and back and forth, and I think that's where we're at. I think we'll see a very possibly a swing in that to the other side soon.

John Dehlin [00:12:34] So you mean left, meaning sort of Democratic political positions in the US and the right, meaning more Republican or conservative political.

Greg Matsen [00:12:44] Yeah, I don't like using the parties as much.

John Dehlin [00:12:46] Sure.

Greg Matsen [00:12:46] I mean, that's, that's a reality, I suppose. I don't really go against the Democrats, you know, I don't. I like to, I prefer to look at the issues, the underlying issues and the philosophies. And what does this, where does it come from and where is it going to go, you know, and, and how does it look to me in a larger pattern of, of a movement, so to speak, and where it's going. But, but, yeah, sure.

John Dehlin [00:13:11] Okay.

Greg Matsen [00:13:12] Yeah.

Greg's Personal Faith Journey and Background

John Dehlin [00:13:13] So let's talk about your, your faith journey, if that's okay. Again, I, I, I think that there's a lot of people in the world that are healthier if they have a healthy, faithful perspective. And so that doesn't work for everybody, but for those who need or want that. I love to hear people's faith journeys. So talk a bit about your Mormon story. And were your parents lds? Were you raised in a normal, traditional LDS household or not? And how has your faith journey kind of evolved from childhood to adulthood?

Greg Matsen [00:13:52] Yeah, yeah. So I was raised in, I hesitate to say orthodox, but a practical, perhaps practical, orthodox family with practical orthodox parents. I grew up in Orange County, California, an amazing place to grow up in the 70s and 80s. I was right there on the beach. Grew up with the ocean and everything. You can think of with the ocean. From surfing to sailing, to diving, that was my life and that was what I loved to do. But we were, my dad was, you know, it's a different day. I know that you're, you've grown up the same way to some degree, but it was, it's so different than being in the, what are the, the Mormon belt. What do we call this?

John Dehlin [00:14:44] The Book of Mormon belt.

Greg Matsen [00:14:45] The Book of Mormon belt, whatever.

John Dehlin [00:14:46] Jello belt.

Greg Matsen [00:14:47] Yeah. Because the culture's just iron curtain.

John Dehlin [00:14:50] I've heard lots of. Yeah, yeah.

Greg Matsen [00:14:51] The culture is just so different. And so, you know, I felt like we were a strong group of youth, for example, but I had a high school of probably 2000 and there might have been 40 of us, 50 of us. And so you're kind of a tight knit group and I think there's a lot of positives to that. And so, yeah, so I grew up with that as a teenager. Never any real big questions or problems with the church. You know, at that time I never had issues with the church. There was a time when I was a teenager, as I said, I was a big sailor, loved sailing and my Buddy had a 29 foot Erickson. His dad had a 29 foot Erickson. And we had actually gone out when I was 18. We had graduated. I had gone to BYU for a year and then left and stayed a while. I went to BYU when I was 17 and, and then came back home and hung out with my friend and we started plotting and getting approval for going, getting a, a circumnavigation of the globe in, in. In his dad's boat. And so that was my plan. I was not going on a mission.

John Dehlin [00:16:10] Did. Was your testimony a normal teenage testimony at that point?

Greg Matsen [00:16:14] Yeah, I think so, yeah. I didn't have any issues with anything

John Dehlin [00:16:17] seminary and all that stuff.

Greg Matsen [00:16:18] Did the seminary. Graduated from seminary, early morning seminary, traveling half an hour to get there in the mornings.

John Dehlin [00:16:26] Wow. But you weren't thinking mission.

Greg Matsen [00:16:30] I was not thinking mission. Certainly not in the latter half of my high school career. I was not thinking mission. And my parents never pushed it on me at all. There was never a push, which is really odd to me because I would have expected my dad, looking back, that he would have been, you got to get this son. You got to do this and then this and then this. But he never did. And so I had this plan and honestly my plan was I'm going to have fun until I'm about 35 years old and then I'm going to get serious about life. That was my idea. That was my whole plan. And roam the world and see all the sites and explore things and people, and that's what I was going to do. I had a big spiritual experience when I was 18 and that changed my plans, everything for me. And I don't want to go into detail on that, but it was a big deal to me. And so I decided to go on a mission. A lot of people were surprised and ended up going to Mexico City on my mission. That was an interesting thing because I had. And I don't know if you've ever done this or any people in your audience. I'm sure some have, but I decided when I was going on my mission, I was kind of a loner, quiet loner, introvert guy got into a little bit of trouble, but. So I wasn't reserved, but I wasn't social. But I decided that when I was on my mission, I was going to change who I was. And it wasn't even just guided by. It was to some degree, obviously, but it wasn't just guided by, well, I need to be a more righteous person or something. It was like, no, I don't like who I am and I'm going to change who I am. And so every day for two years, I would wake up and tell myself, I will be a different person today. And that was my primary goal, that I needed to be a better person. I needed to be somebody different. And then I had some scriptures that I would read every night before I'd go to bed that kind of led me towards some of these things of courage and, and standing up for what I believed and, and knowing who I was. It was, was important to me. So my mission was great. It was an incredible experience. One of the top baptizing missions in the world. So I had a lot of activity, a lot of people to teach. What years this was. Boy, now I'm aging myself here. That was 85 to 87. Okay, great. Mission president who taught me how to study and I became pretty close with him and it, yeah, it changed everything. So I was, I was, I came home a completely different person than what I left.

John Dehlin [00:19:29] Isn't that one of the best parts about a classical Mormon upbringing is just kind of self improvement, just trying to be a better person? I totally relate to that.

Greg Matsen [00:19:39] Yeah, yeah, I think it is. I mean, it can, you know, some people bring something like that and it leads them into things like perfectionism and can have a dark side and you can have it. It can have a dark side, sure. Absolutely. But, but I think the overall idea of the framework of Mormon theology in a restored gospel is you can always improve, you can keep improving and get better.

Growing Up LDS in the 80s and Early Married Life

John Dehlin [00:20:05] We were both kind of raised in the 80s. I know that for me there was a real Bruce Armacon, Joseph Building Smith kind of angle to the gospel, to gospel doctrine was that, and signs of the Times.

Greg Matsen [00:20:19] And second, you could almost call that a 20th century.

John Dehlin [00:20:21] Yeah, yeah.

Greg Matsen [00:20:22] View. You go back to Joseph F. And.

John Dehlin [00:20:24] Yeah, yeah. Were you into that stuff, Bruce, our Mormon doctrine?

Greg Matsen [00:20:28] Yeah, I read all of those things. Doctrines of salvation.

John Dehlin [00:20:31] Me too.

Greg Matsen [00:20:32] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:20:33] Spanish did you read? Because I read those in Spanish.

Greg Matsen [00:20:35] I don't think I read them in Spanish.

John Dehlin [00:20:36] They were at the distribution center in Guatemala, so I bought that was pretty smart. Probably it was a way to learn Spanish, but also to read books I hadn't read before, so.

Greg Matsen [00:20:45] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:20:46] You read them in English.

Greg Matsen [00:20:47] Yeah. So I, I, you know, I, I, I had a smart mission president. He was actually Gordon B. Hinckley's doctor.

John Dehlin [00:20:55] Oh.

Greg Matsen [00:20:56] And he, he said, look, take all of these things. And he showed me at that time, which is impressive, that he was kind of outside and could see all this. He said, look, this is a specific thread and understanding of the gospel. And, and he supported it and sustained everything. But, but it was, it was not. He, he said, look, you need to look at scriptures overall. That's what you have to look toward. And so, but yes, I did study all those things and, and it wasn't until I got home from my mission that I started getting into, like, nibbly and, and things like that where that just was, I don't know. It was very enriching to me to read him. It took me a while to understand him, but.

John Dehlin [00:21:37] Well, you were BYU and Nibley would have been there.

Greg Matsen [00:21:40] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:21:40] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Greg Matsen [00:21:41] I wish I would have known who he was at the time, but I never took a class from him.

John Dehlin [00:21:45] I didn't quite know who he was either. I had heard things about this eccentric professor, but I didn't know about classic Mormon apologetics when I was at byu. Yeah. So you finish your mission on sort of gospel cloud nine, like feeling really good about your faith and, and what the mission gave to you was a good experience.

Greg Matsen [00:22:10] Yeah, absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:22:11] Okay.

Greg Matsen [00:22:12] Yeah. I had, I had a clear view of who I was and, and what I wanted out of life.

John Dehlin [00:22:16] Okay.

Greg Matsen [00:22:16] Which was very different from where I was before.

John Dehlin [00:22:18] Yeah, yeah. Mission. That's. Again, missions are one of the great, for many very positive aspects. Many of the people I talk to who leave the church still wish that their Kids could have some sort of Mormon mission like experience because it's hard to replicate that.

Greg Matsen [00:22:37] Very difficult.

John Dehlin [00:22:38] Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what'd you do after your mission?

Greg Matsen [00:22:43] Dated.

John Dehlin [00:22:45] Did you go to BYU Provo?

Greg Matsen [00:22:46] Yeah. Okay, so BYU Provo. Dated a lot. You know, it's interesting. I looked today at the dating rituals and how difficult things have become is so difficult. I mean, you've got kind of this, to some degree, I'm going to say a little bit of toxic femininity against men and toxic masculinity against women. That kind of is an underpinning some of this. But social media is difficult because you're going to know someone immediately before you actually go out with them, but you're going to be able to check who they are, see everything about them, and make a decision about someone without maybe even spending time with them. And then, of course, the dating apps are. I think they're horrific in the terms of selection. And I think that's one of the issues of our people getting married so late now is it's very difficult to get to know somebody and you're swiping left and swiping right, and I think it's a difficult thing. But anyway, I dated a ton. I loved it. I loved meeting new people, loved meeting new girls. I'd go out on dates two or three times a week and just enjoyed that process of getting to know somebody a little bit and talking to them and being social. Right. And being social. And then soon after that, I decided that I wanted to be married. I wanted to be married soon. So at 23, I got married.

John Dehlin [00:24:13] Nice.

Greg Matsen [00:24:13] To my wife. Current wife today.

John Dehlin [00:24:16] So you've been married more than 32 years?

Greg Matsen [00:24:19] Yes, I have been married almost 37.

John Dehlin [00:24:22] That's amazing. Congrats.

Greg Matsen [00:24:23] Yeah, thank you.

John Dehlin [00:24:25] That's an accomplishment.

Greg Matsen [00:24:26] Yeah. Yeah. Almost 37 years. And then we had our first kid a year and a half later. And, you know, I started living that life. You know, I'm providing for this family and building the life that I'm hoping to want, but. And then, of course, going through normal struggles like everybody goes through when they're building a family and working on a marriage and trying to be a parent, et cetera.

John Dehlin [00:24:51] What'd you study at byu?

Greg Matsen [00:24:53] I studied finance.

John Dehlin [00:24:55] Okay. Yeah, okay.

Greg Matsen [00:24:57] Finance. But really went into an entrepreneurial world very quickly. And so I've had little small companies and sold most of those off, and some successful, some not.

John Dehlin [00:25:09] Let me ask you this, just because it was such a prevalent part of my experience at byu. And I'm curious if you experienced this back then. So there were actually. Okay. So you had mentioned, I think before we rolled tape that. Oh, no, no. During this episode you said some of the liberal professors at BYU are some of your favorites.

Greg Matsen [00:25:28] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:25:29] Like, do you have examples? Because I. Yeah, I don't remember names. Okay.

Greg Matsen [00:25:33] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:25:33] Well, let me tell you why I'm asked. So. So I took these. So I grew up very conservative. Lds, orthodox come to byu. Very literal. But I, I, like Bill Bradshaw was teaching biology. There were these honors colloquium classes. Even Frank Fox of American Heritage.

Greg Matsen [00:25:56] That's the only name I remember.

John Dehlin [00:25:58] Frank Fox. Yeah. Well, you know, I had these. You know, the reason I'm bringing this up is because you have had strong feelings about BYU in recent times.

Greg Matsen [00:26:09] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:26:10] And what it's doing culturally. There was a huge culture war going on at BYU when we were both there. Were you aware of that at the time? No, no. So like Joanna Brooks was marching women to the Capitol and they were marching for abortion rights. There was Cecilia Farr and Gayle Huston talking about praying to mother in heaven in the English department. They were let go. You know, as professors. The whole September 6th stuff happened that

Greg Matsen [00:26:40] happened shortly after I was gone.

John Dehlin [00:26:41] Yeah. And David Knowlton is. It was a gay BYU professor who was let go. And I had several professors that were like telling me the earth isn't 6,000 years old. There was no global flood. You know, abortion rights are complicated. Adam and Eve weren't literal. Like all these really progressive, liberal, almost very unorthodox teachings at BYU in the late 80s and early 90s. So it's been my impression the BYU has gotten way more conservative than when I was there because a lot of those professors got weeded out. I'm curious if you've ever thought about the fact that wherever BYU is today, it might actually be more conservative than when we were there.

Greg Matsen [00:27:29] I don't know if I agree with that.

John Dehlin [00:27:32] No, I'm not saying I'm right.

Greg Matsen [00:27:33] Yeah. I don't know if I agree. I just think that that has gone on. I mean, how do you live in an academic world? I mean, look at academia, look at the universities, especially humanities, and feel like you want to be a part of it to some degree. For some people, the Harvard of the West.

John Dehlin [00:27:48] Uh huh.

Greg Matsen [00:27:49] And not have that as part of the people you're bringing in. I mean, they've been, they've been educated under certain mentors, they've gone through their PhDs, you know, in certain areas where there's a very different idea of, you know, it's very, very much more of a secular approach, obviously, that you're going to get. So it's, I think that that is, you know, maybe there's a pendulum that swings back and forth.

John Dehlin [00:28:14] That's possible on that. For sure. For sure.

Greg Matsen [00:28:16] Yeah. I, I, I do think that recently, with the change of culture in America, those voices became much louder at BYU in a sense of, okay, we've got, I mean, look, you've got the institutions of the United States. Most all the institutions are, I would say, captured by the left. Right. The holdout was business until Occupy Wall street and then Occupy Wall Street. When's the last time you saw a massive protest against big business? Right. It just hasn't happened. It changed. You had the new human resource departments come in. You had DEI policies going throughout all the big business, and everything changed at that point. And so they've grabbed that. And so I feel like it was like, okay, well, we've got the support, we've got the infrastructure kind of in place for these professors at byu, and I think that they were just much more confident about expressing things and saying. They still are. There's several of them that still are saying things.

John Dehlin [00:29:24] Well, I'd say that definitely on matters of science, like, I was also taught evolution was a viable, credible theory.

Greg Matsen [00:29:32] I think that's pretty common in byu.

John Dehlin [00:29:36] The one thing that definitely got more vociferous is the LGBT stuff. That was not in any way prevalent when I was there.

Greg Matsen [00:29:44] Right.

John Dehlin [00:29:44] Like, it has been the past 10 years.

Greg Matsen [00:29:45] Right.

John Dehlin [00:29:46] But anyway, okay, we could talk more about that in a bit. I want, I want to just say, like, I'm going to just pause to my viewers and listeners and say, you know, you are here. For those of you who are, are my listeners who tend to be politically or socially liberal or progressive or Democrat or whatever you call it, you are hearing terms that you normally might not hear on Mormon stories. And I just want to say I think it's important that we talk to each other and that we hear different perspectives. And I don't. One of the things I don't like about classical, let's just say the left over the past 10, 15 years is this idea that we can't quote platform people because they have different views than us. I think part of the problem with polarization is that we've stopped learning how to talk to each other. So I'm just gonna say viewers and listeners be tough, that if you're hearing concepts from Greg that you're not used to, just think how political and social conservatives have felt, listening to Mormon stories over the past 20 years,

Greg Matsen [00:30:58] we need

John Dehlin [00:30:58] to get good at hearing different perspectives and talking to each other. So I'm just gonna acknowledge that there may be some of you who are cringing or not liking some of the things we're talking about, and I want to challenge you to go deeper, because if we don't learn to talk to each other, we're sunk. That's my opinion. So, anyway, I agree. Okay. That's why I'm really glad you came on. And so. Okay, so you, you graduate from byu?

Greg Matsen [00:31:24] I did not graduate, no. I left just about a semester, a little bit more than a semester of credits left. We had a kid, and my dad said, you're on your own.

John Dehlin [00:31:34] You just. Financially.

Greg Matsen [00:31:34] So I just like, yeah, I'd be like, okay, well, this may not work real well.

John Dehlin [00:31:39] Did you, like, overall, did you leave byu, feel like you had a good experience or not or.

Greg Matsen [00:31:43] Yeah, I did. I, you know, it's interesting because at first, when I first went to BYU my freshman year, again, I was 17 years old. I mean, I was the youngest person in my class growing up every year, you know?

John Dehlin [00:31:53] Me too.

Greg Matsen [00:31:54] I was the last day of the cutoff.

John Dehlin [00:31:56] You August. I'm August.

Greg Matsen [00:31:57] No, for California, it was, it was the end of November.

John Dehlin [00:32:00] Oh, okay.

Greg Matsen [00:32:01] And so, you know, and my dad wanted to hold me back. My mom didn't. I wish he would have, you know, but it's just such a different experience, especially for a boy. But when I first went to BYU, I was Mr. Rubble because I was in culture shock. I came from Orange County, California, where I was listening to punk and new wave, and, you know, there was some of that going on there. But I came and I saw people from Idaho and from Wyoming, and it was so different to me from the what they wore to their hairstyles. It was, it was strange. I felt like I was in a different country, and so I didn't, I felt like I didn't fit in. Now, I found my California buddies, you know, pretty quickly, but. But it was odd to me. I, I, I, I, I'm not even to say what the shirt said, but I went to the university mall and I had a shirt made. And I'll say what it was, okay. It said, utah sucks. And I wore it to school consistently, right? Because I was just like, this is, you know, I was not planning on staying very long, and I left. I did leave for a while. It wasn't until I came home from my mission that I, that I went back to byu. I just you know, the tight restrictions, the honor code, some things of the honor code. We had a guy, I will say this, we had a guy that I was at DT Deseret Towers, which are gone now, and we'd hang out on the lawn, a bunch of us, and we'd order Domino's Pizza and bring the Domino's Pizza in. And there was this guy that would hang around there. And it was so odd to me. While he was there, he was dressed like a cowboy. He was obviously five, six, seven, eight years older than us. But he said he was a student. Well, it turns out he was an undercover cop.

John Dehlin [00:33:58] Oh.

Greg Matsen [00:33:59] And it's, you know, for byu. And it was the weirdest thing. It just threw me off so much when I was there. It's like, why, what, what is this,

John Dehlin [00:34:07] like, surveillance kind of stuff?

Greg Matsen [00:34:08] Yeah. Like I'm 17 years old and, and this guy's trying to hanging around. Turns out that there was some friend of a friend who was an athlete that was, you know, into some stuff that wasn't so great and against the honor code. And so I guess he was looking for adjacent, you know, individuals or something. But anyway, it's, I, I, I felt I had reason to rebel in, in an area that I was very unaccustomed to and, and felt as a violated. But I, I felt a little bit like, what, what is this all about? You know, why, why is, why is somebody looking into me? You know, what if I'm sitting here going to school, I have no, no reason for somebody to be looking at me like this. So anyway, great experience when I came back, you know, I was a kid, so I would say some of that rebellion was probably just teenage angst, basically. But I, when I came back, I had a great experience at byu. Loved it. Met a lot of really good people, really good friends that are still friends of mine today. So that was a good experience. When my, once I started dating my wife, my education got a lot better because I always went to class and, you know, we had a lot of classes together and, and she's a straight A student, so. So that helped a lot. And then. Yeah, and then we got married and started our family.

John Dehlin [00:35:35] So you didn't leave BYU because of, like, cultural or social. No, not objections.

Greg Matsen [00:35:40] No, no. I was very positive for me at that point.

John Dehlin [00:35:41] Okay. You just needed to get, start making money.

Greg Matsen [00:35:43] Yeah, I had, I was, my hand was forced. That was my dad's rule. It's just like, go, go make it happen. You're married. Go make it happen. And, and so that's what I had to do.

How His Faith Developed Over 37 Years

John Dehlin [00:35:55] So for the 37 years you've been married and LDs, how. How did your faith progress? Nor

Greg Matsen [00:36:06] how did it progress? I. I think that.

John Dehlin [00:36:09] Or develop or.

Greg Matsen [00:36:10] Yeah, yeah. I think naturally having a spouse and having kids helps a lot with that.

John Dehlin [00:36:19] You were temple married, right?

Greg Matsen [00:36:20] We were temple married, yeah. And, you know, brought up our kids with the gospel, did all the little check marks, you know, that you would do. We had, you know, my wife was very good with those types of things. And, you know, we'd get up early to do scripture study. You know, even when the kids were little, we'd get up before school, 5:30 in the morning, and we were doing scripture study. When we moved to Arizona, we did that too. And, you know, even in California and well, in. By the time my kids started going to seminary, we were in Arizona. And so they didn't have early morning seminary there. But we did it. We did the early morning scripture thing. And, you know, outside of a few years in my early 30s, where I started with some doubts, I wouldn't call it a faith crisis at all. But it was like, this is interesting. And this was, you know, I was one of the early adopters on the Internet. I was in the tech field. Do you remember Prodigy?

John Dehlin [00:37:19] Yeah, absolutely. It's like aol, right?

Greg Matsen [00:37:21] Yeah, like AOL and Prodigy.

John Dehlin [00:37:22] Yeah, yeah.

Greg Matsen [00:37:23] So I remember doing that and, you know, plugging my cable into the phone jack. Yeah, exactly. And then you have this page just kind of slow come in, you know, on a webpage. Come in. So I started looking at that and started seeing some other ideas about the church and some new information about church history and especially, you know, especially Joseph Smith and that I had not heard before anywhere. And. And so that was, you know, that started to throw me off a little bit here and there, but I was never inactive. You know, I never, I doubted. I just doubted for a while there for a few years. You know, is this really real? Why is this something I wasn't told before? Why am I learning this now? But then I got beyond it and now I look back at it, and as someone who is, you know, a tbm, you know, it's like, that's true.

John Dehlin [00:38:18] Believing Mormon for those who don't know what the acronym means.

Greg Matsen [00:38:22] Yeah, it. I'm glad it happened. I don't think there's any way for someone who has a faithful faith journey. I don't think that you can get to where you need to be without that. I really don't. And if you haven't had it wait, those things are going to come and you have to, in my perspective. Right. You have to make that part of the process.

John Dehlin [00:38:53] I love that. So for those, you know, there's going to be people, lots of people listening to you right now who are going through that.

Greg Matsen [00:39:00] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:39:00] What are some, do you have some tips you can give people about how you made it through and, and as you've maybe consulted with others, what, what advice you give to others to help them make it through? Because, you know.

Greg Matsen [00:39:13] Yeah, it's common. I'll bring up the, the wise words of Shrek. He, I. What is he, Was he an ogre? Is that what he was something? I think it was an. Right. So he says to someone on that show, he says, you know, ogres are like onions. We have lots of layers. And I think that's the way the truth works. And this isn't just with the gospel, with the church or Christianity or religion, period. It's with everything. I think, and history especially. I think that if you have pulled back one layer of the onion and you're like, wait a minute, this is not the way the onion looked a minute ago. I think for my recommendation to someone is understand that there are more layers you haven't gone through. There are more layers and they might even be more hits against what your faith is, or they might be light that comes in and says, oh, now I understand this because I think everyone needs to go through a process of, well, these are my primary teachings. This is what I was taught in primary because I was a little kid. And maybe at times we don't do a great job of keeping the onion slightly pulled back, those layers slightly being pulled back as kids grow up. And there was a lot, I think, that was held back for so long from the church. And I get it, they wanted to. They're worried about testimonies. They want to be faith promoting in everything that they do. But as the Internet has taught us, you cannot put your head in the sand on things. You just can't. And you've got to be exposed to things. You've got to, you know, that doesn't mean you need to chase after things, but you've got to be exposed and you've got to be able to stay ahead of things with the truth. And the only way you can do that in the Internet age is to those onions. Layers are going to keep coming. They're going to keep coming. And I'm just saying that there are more layers. For someone who's having a faith crisis that might say to you and not everyone's going to have the same experience. But that might say, okay, now I get it. I see how this is the way it was or this isn't exactly the way it was described to me when I first saw it.

John Dehlin [00:41:47] I've heard some faithful Mormon believing. Mormon historians say that like obviously a shallow understanding of church history is setting, is setting us up for disappointment. And then you go like a few inches deeper and you're going to feel like leaving. But then if you go a few more inches deeper than that, you can actually end up having your faith strengthened by going deeper. Does that, that's how I look at it.

Greg Matsen [00:42:19] You know, it's like, it's like, you know, it's like the doors you got to break on through to the other side.

John Dehlin [00:42:23] I think, you know, Morrison quoted on Marvin Stores.

Greg Matsen [00:42:29] So I, I think that that's, that's part of the thing. You've got to get through that other side and, and, and, and see that. And you know what, it's, it's the same thing. Look, look, for example, and, and I think that you can look at anything and dissect it. We're very much in a mode of, of, of critical theory and postmodernism right now, both which do the exact same thing, which is critique. Right? Critique comes actually, even though it's a French word, it comes from the Germans. And in the time of Kant when he was going, he was the first one to use this term really this way. The connotation of critique is to break down that it's not to even just change, it is to break something down. And that's what critical theory is all about. And you can do that to anything. So I could do that to you and I could break you down and dissect you and deconstruct you and say, look, John, look at all these things you've done wrong. Look at these mistakes that you've made. Look at the errors that you've made. Are you a good husband? Are you a good father? Are you a good person and bring all this out, you know, and you could do the same thing to me, right? Easily. Because I have a lot of faults and I've done a lot of stupid things and made a lot of mistakes. I think you can do that with anything. I can go through history and I can look at US history and I can critique it and break it down and dissect it and say this is horrible. This is a bunch of slave owning founding fathers and that's what we're built on. And you know, you can do that with anything because we're in a fallen world and things are not black and white. And so that's. That's how the perspective that I have on the church and that's the perspective I have on the restored gospel is I think that there is a truth. And to get there, you've got to. You've got to work. You've got to work at it.

Navigating Church History with a Faithful Perspective

John Dehlin [00:44:25] Are there books or podcasts that. Or YouTube channels that you found particularly helpful in acquiring an accurate but more faithful historical perspective that you would recommend? And I. I'm putting you on the spot. You may not even are here. It's okay if you don't have anything come to mind. I just want to give you a chance to give recommendations to anyone who.

Greg Matsen [00:44:51] Let me think about that as we go along.

John Dehlin [00:44:54] Yeah, okay.

Greg Matsen [00:44:55] I mean, apart from quick, quick, quick show, you mean?

John Dehlin [00:44:57] Yeah, yeah.

Greg Matsen [00:44:58] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:44:58] But you don't do history and truth claims much, right?

Greg Matsen [00:45:01] I don't do history and truth claims much. I do. I do gospel.

John Dehlin [00:45:05] Yeah.

Greg Matsen [00:45:05] Right. I'll go through gospel topics quite a bit. Scriptures or principles and.

John Dehlin [00:45:10] Okay.

Greg Matsen [00:45:10] I. I've got a book coming out soon that's basically on these lenses that I've developed to look at scripture and how to understand what's actually going on at times. And I talk about those lenses quite a bit. Right. In how I see something. So, yeah, I cover that kind of thing quite a bit. In fact, sometimes, yeah, that's important. I kind of get in the mode of going through that, but I also apply it to culture. I think that's probably the most important thing. I mean, is it practical or not? Are these things practical or are they not practical? I'm a very practical theologian, so to speak. I don't. Give me something that is practical.

John Dehlin [00:45:55] Yeah. Okay. So you. You emerged from your faith questions or doubts with the stronger testimony.

Greg Matsen [00:46:05] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:46:06] How did you get from there to wanting to start a YouTube channel?

Greg Matsen [00:46:13] You know, when I was early on, before email even really hit, when I was very first married, I wanted to put together a newsletter and I was send it out to a few people, and I want to thought, hey, this could end up being a great thing to do to send out this physical newsletter to everybody. And I called it the Home Front and I wrote a few issues of it, and it was kind of the same type of thing. It was gospel and practice and a little bit political. So I always had that desire to do that. When this was a discussion that my wife and I had had for a few years before. I Actually started doing it, actually. Mormonado was a website all the way back in 2014, I think, and mormonado.com mormonauto.com I still own it, but there's nothing up there. I should have never taken it down, but it's the Wayback Machine.

John Dehlin [00:47:14] Probably has screenshots.

Greg Matsen [00:47:15] Oh, yeah, okay. That would be cool. Yeah. But there's about a thousand links on there. It was mostly gospel, but it was also very cultural. And then I had some commentary that I had written up and put on things. I like to go into things and I. I like to really shine a light on something that is said by the brethren. Right. Or. Or something that is in the scriptures or something that is in Mormon culture and, and look closely at it. And, and that's what I did. The links that I did were things like that. Right. Things that would. Would apply to a Latter Day Saint and their perspective and my opinion of whether or not it was right or it was wrong or maybe we ought to at least look at something else here and talk, you know, what is love? What are we talking about with what is love? You hear this a lot. You hear it in the scriptures a lot. And I think that we usually interpret it wrong. Right. And so I, you know, talk about different things like that. Very fundamental, basic types of principles.

John Dehlin [00:48:23] And so you did Mormonado for many, many years. Started with the newsletter, then it was a website. Yes. And then at some point, it.

Greg Matsen [00:48:31] And then. And then my wife says, you got to do it. You gotta, you gotta go out there and get on YouTube and start. Start up a podcast and a YouTube channel. And so I'm like, okay, I'll do it. If I've got your support, I'll spend the time to do it. And those seven years ago, seven or eight.

John Dehlin [00:48:47] Okay, okay. All right. Well, that's helpful. Let's shift a little bit. Maybe just talk topics for a little bit.

Top Concerns Facing Latter-day Saints Today

Greg Matsen [00:48:56] Sure.

John Dehlin [00:48:56] So let's just have you start talking. Let's just say there's a lot you love about the gospel, maybe everything about the gospel, but let's just say you have a top three to five concerns about misunderstandings of gospel principles or directions that you feel like our culture might be going. What are like the three to five biggest concerns you have about where the church or the doctrine. Let's just say the culture, people's perception of the doctrine might go astray. That really inform your urgency to want to talk about these types of issues. Like what's. Should we start with number one?

Greg Matsen [00:49:42] I'm bad at ranking, but I'll start with one.

John Dehlin [00:49:44] Yeah, okay.

Greg Matsen [00:49:44] I could do one of those. So I talk about this idea of a teddy bear Jesus.

John Dehlin [00:49:50] Okay.

Greg Matsen [00:49:51] And a teddy bear Jesus is basically all mercy. There's no justice, there's no, it's all comfort. It's all, you know, all invitation, which I agree with. But it, but it's, you know, I look at, for example, Moses's Sinai experience and the golden calf a little differently than I think most people do. I think it's kind of actually a sleight of hand that's happening there. I think that, you know, the idea of that is. And this kind of goes along with a lot of what I talk about, but it's. Moses has to go up to the top of Sinai. He's got to ascend, right. To be able to meet God up, going up and, and he's supposed to have all of the children of Israel do the same thing. They're going to see the face of God. It says that they're going to see the face of God and they're going to rise up with him, right. And eventually ascend up Sinai. Well, of course that's not what happened because they decide they don't want to see the face of God. And so what do they do? Well, what they do is if you look at the, in Exodus, I'm trying to think of the chapter, but in Exodus, when they are making the golden calf, Aaron actually is doing that during what he calls the festival of Jehovah. So it's the festival of Jehovah that he's doing this with. And so in my mind, I believe what is happening there is they are making an idol, a golden idol of Jehovah, right. As an animal. And yeah, they've got the Egyptian background and everything else, but I don't think it's just some pagan thing. And so what are they doing? They're taking God because they're not willing to do what is necessary to ascend. And they're taking him and they're pulling him down and saying, no, we want you to be down here for us.

John Dehlin [00:51:30] So making God in our image, making

Greg Matsen [00:51:32] God in our image and not going through a process of, I just call it ascension. Right. Not wanting to go through the process of ascension because it's hard. It's a hard thing to do. So Teddy bear Jesus would be, yeah, we're going to make our own golden calf. It's going to be all lovey dovey. It's going to be comfort. All is good. And I understand that some people, especially at first if you've been through a trauma, if you have had, you know, people have. There are unspeakable things that happen with people. And that first step might just need to be, I'm loved and I need that comfort. I need to know that there's no question that that is true. But that's not all there is. I don't believe. I think there is so much more to looking at who I can become and change. And that whole process is going to go through, you know, a telios. A telos of ascension and growth and becoming something different. So a lot of the topics, you know, that I'd be concerned about would be those types of things. A teddy bear Jesus is a very evangelical Jesus and love my evangelical brothers and sisters. I do a lot of interfaith work, but theirs is a little bit different than that. Judgment isn't really there. If you believe and you accept, it's kind of like you're good to go. And, And I think that there's just a lot more there that they, that they're, that they're missing from the restored gospel. So.

John Dehlin [00:53:01] And let me just try and put some meat on the bones just so I understand. Like, I. Let me just see if I can understand what you might mean by teddy bear Jesus. It's. It's this idea that Jesus was about kindness, patience, humility, long suffering. It's the walk a mile in the footsteps. Don't judge, forgive not 70 times 7. It's. I've done all the, all the work for you. You just need to accept me. Tolerance for the, you know, support for the poor, support for the sinners, support for the marginalized. That's what Jesus. This is the idea that Jesus was all about the poor, the marginalized, the downtrodden. He's all about kindness and love and forgiveness and patience. Like, I think that's a fair reading of at least a lot of what Jesus seemed to be emphasizing.

Greg Matsen [00:54:06] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:54:07] Okay, so you don't have a problem with any of that?

Greg Matsen [00:54:09] Zero. No. That has to be there.

John Dehlin [00:54:11] Okay.

Greg Matsen [00:54:11] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:54:12] So that's a part of.

Greg Matsen [00:54:13] Yeah, I'm just saying don't stop there. It stops there. Yeah, it oftentimes stops there. And it's not like. Because it is. Look, I mean, I'll go back to my marriage. Right. Marriage is something you have to work at. You have to work at it. It's not like, okay, we just accept each other. We're going to go to the altar, and I do, and everything's hunky dory. It's good to Go. It's the same thing. I mean, in fact, that's even an example in the Scriptures. You've got the bridesmaid and the bride, and you have to work at it. You have to be able to work at this and grow and develop into something that becomes so much more and so much more fulfilling. Hopefully, if you're both committed to that, that you have to go through that process, and that requires sacrifice, that requires difficult times, that requires, you know, taking on the burdens of that other person, that maybe they've done something wrong, maybe they made a mistake, maybe something bad happened to them. You know, I've. You know, as a spouse, I. I want to take on the burdens of my wife, and I know she wants to take on the burdens of me, and we do. Right. And so I think it's the same type of thing, and I'll get to this in a minute, but I think that it all comes down to this whole idea of religion and certainly Christianity. It comes down to a relationship. And what is that relationship about? Is it just, I'm five years old, I'm 10 years old, and daddy's there to put his arm around me and comfort me, or is it, oh, I'm becoming more like him and. And are. I'm an adult, and I have a different type of relationship with him completely. That's my point. I think that you've got to have kindness, you've got to have watching out for the marginalized, and you're watching out for the poor. Tolerance. You've got to have all of those things. But I think they all have to be tethered to truth and into an order. And I believe that that's actually what he said and that's what he taught.

Drawing Lines Between Activism and Peacemaking

John Dehlin [00:56:13] Yeah. So. And I, like, I. I was at a peacemaking conference at BYU a few weeks ago, and you had come out with an episode with Dr. Ralph Hancock.

Greg Matsen [00:56:27] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:56:28] Where you were talking about Patrick Mason's book on peacemaking, I think. And so the. The. I wonder if part of the question that you're exploring is this idea of who do we draw within the circle and who stands outside of the circle? So, for example, I guess we could say LGBT people. I don't know. We could even say, let's just say, ex Mormons or critics who have left the church or apostates. I don't know, other groups. But there's this idea that some would have of, let's. Everyone's invited and everyone should feel a part, and everyone should be treated with kindness and love. And then I. What would, like, what would your response be to, oh, but then. But then the other side, let's just say the. The peacemaker side would say sometimes conservative rhetoric gets too harsh. Sometimes it's too. It almost comes across as bigoted. And I know it's a charged word. And I'm not accusing you of that. I'm giving you. I'm wanting you to have a chance to respond to that. Because they'll say, if you're too harsh, if you're too critical, if you're drawing people outside of the lines, then you're excluding people and you're not showing that unconditional love, and it starts to feel like it's exclusionary and. Or even, let's just say bigoted. And I'm not, again, not launching that word against you. But where are you trying to draw lines or say we need to be tougher, that's still consistent with Christ's core message. Does that make sense?

Greg Matsen [00:58:22] Yeah, I think so. Let me try and respond to that. I think that I don't think I should be drawing lines, for example. I don't think I should draw lines. I think there is an invitation for everyone. I think it's all the same. I don't think that God excludes anyone himself. I think it is a matter of what we choose and what we want. Right. So if there are marginalized people, for example, if you've got LGBTQ individuals that you're saying are outside of a line, I don't know exactly what you mean by that, but outside of the doctrine, so to speak, or the. Well, like the plan of exaltation, basically.

John Dehlin [00:59:02] Well, like, so what, what I heard. And this was just kind of what I heard when, when, when you and Dr. Hancock were talking about Patrick's book, there was sort of this concern that if we're too permissive, if we're too. If there's, if there's a perceived agenda that we're trying to get the church to be more tolerant and accepting or embracing of lgb, want to live as LGBT people, in other words, be same sex, married, whatever, that, that. That's where peacemaking, as I understood your argument, goes too far. If you're trying to be an activist to get the church to be more accepting and. Or tolerant of, let's just say, gay, lesbian people, then you've. Then we're taking it too far. There was some sort of critique of, let's just say, Patrick Mason's approach to peacemaking, and I don't think I fully understood it other than there being a real deep concern about what I think you feel is activism or desire to change the doctrine.

Greg Matsen [01:00:13] Yeah, yeah. First of all, I mean, I've had Patrick on my show.

John Dehlin [01:00:16] Yeah.

Greg Matsen [01:00:16] And talked with him and totally.

John Dehlin [01:00:18] And I'm guessing he'll come back on. Y' all will talk at some point. Maybe.

Greg Matsen [01:00:21] Yeah, yeah. And he's, he is. We are in talks right now. I mean, actually, I need to get back to him right now. And by the way, Ralph and him are in talks right now from that episode.

LDS Theology and Same-Sex Attraction

John Dehlin [01:00:31] That's great.

Greg Matsen [01:00:32] And so I think the critique is not a matter of exclusion. It's a matter of tethering things to truth. Right. And so, you know, I know there's a way to look at religion and Christianity, whether it's Latter Day Saint theology or it's, you know, Protestant evangelical theology in a way that says, well, God is saying you're accepted and you're not, or you're accepted and you're not. And I don't believe any of that. I don't think that that's true. Now, as an example in Latter Day Saint theology, do I think everybody's going to be in the celestial kingdom, that everyone's going to have exaltation? I don't. I mean, what is it? The gate is straight and the way is narrow? Is. I think that that's, that's true. But it's not because he's excluding people. Right. I don't, and I don't think the church excludes in that way. I think it's a matter of what do you choose? Who do you want to be? What do you want for your life? What do you want for eternity? If you believe in an afterlife, where are you going to self select. That's how I look at it, you know, and so if I've got a belief that there is an exaltation that requires marriage between a man and a woman and creating a family and having those types of relationships onward. Okay? And someone says, well, I have same sex attraction. I'm gay, and that's not what I want. Okay. To me, it's like, okay, you choose you, you be you. Right. I don't, I don't look at it like, well, you're, you're going to hell, or you're, you're, you're not going to make the exaltation. I understand the argument that comes in and says, well, I, I want to show you what maybe could be a more fulfilling way. Maybe, but you need to choose for yourself what you want. And, and if you want that. And it's different from what I see as exaltation. That is your choice and you get to do it. You get to be who you want to be. You self select what you want and I don't think there's any loss of love from God for that. I don't think there should be any loss of love from me or anybody else in that circumstance. You be you, you choose what you want and we all self select.

John Dehlin [01:03:01] And where do you have feeling like there was a long time where the church would teach and it was maybe common Christian understanding that the feelings of same sex attraction were sin or temptations of Satan or just choice. Whereas I think modern social science, slash even medical science would say it's more brain development and what happens in the womb and not really a choice and not really changeable that attempts to change sexual orientation just cause damage and aren't effective. So if, what do you do when a gay person might say, I don't choose this, I don't want this. It's not a matter of choice. It's literally how I'm wired. The idea of me being with a woman is aversive. It makes me want to throw up. It's just not how I'm wired. But to call it a choice, it's literally how I was made. They might even say God made me this way. Do you. And I'm not trying to put you on the spot, so only.

Greg Matsen [01:04:06] No, I like this question.

John Dehlin [01:04:08] Okay. Okay.

Greg Matsen [01:04:08] No, I like this question. No, I think first of all, I think 50 years ago you and I would have probably thought the same thing that the church did back then.

John Dehlin [01:04:16] 30 years ago.

Greg Matsen [01:04:16] Okay, 30 years ago, sure. So, yeah, I believe that there is a mixture with some people, maybe it's all one or the other, that there is nature and nurture. Nurture. I've spoken to several gay men that, that had bad experiences when they were young and really bad experiences and they felt that was a part of the way they feel. And, and others I know, I have very good friends who have that. I've known their kids since they were born and I knew when they were two years old. Yeah, he's gay.

John Dehlin [01:04:49] Okay.

Greg Matsen [01:04:50] You know he's gay. And, and so it's. And you know, I'm going to get a lot of pushback from some of my audience on saying that. But it's like, sorry, I know what I see. You know, and so for those not a choice, for those not a choice, no, the way they are, that nature that they have and that to me is Very difficult. That is a burden. That is a trial. That is. Because even out, you know, take the church out of the equation. It's not the norm. Right. It's not the norm. And so it's. You're different. And that's difficult. That's a very difficult thing. And then you talk about something like the power of sexuality. I. I can't imagine the way, you know, I'm wired and having that cross. Wired over toward men and. And not feeling that I have that fulfillment, so to speak. Right, right. I can't imagine it. And I don't pretend to. Yeah, right. I think it's an immense problem. I think it's in terms of something that we need to understand and sympathize with as best that we can. Right. Having said that, I think also that. And I know you've talked a lot about this, but I think that. Let's say that I had. Which I don't. But if I had an LGBTQ son, let's say, for example, and. And he came out and let's say he was a teenager or whatever it was, you know, my. Hopefully, and I believe it would be, you know, but my wife and I's reaction would be, look, we love you no matter what. That's the number one thing you need to know. There is no difference in how we feel about you. There is no difference in our relationship, and our arms are here around you no matter what, and there is nothing that I wouldn't do for you. Right. Having said that, you know, I would start talking to him about his options and what he wants in the future. And the reason I say that is because, yeah, if. What do you want again? What do you choose? What do you want? If you want to have the gay lifestyle, if you want to live that way, you know, that is your choice, and you're. I'm never going to be able to deter you from that. You're. Or you're. You. You make up your own decision on that. But I do know that, let's say down the road, let's say you did marry a woman and it was difficult for you, and it doesn't seem like the most natural thing for you to do, and you had kids, and it's 20 years down the road after your marriage and you have four kids, what would you do for your wife and what would you do for your kids at that point? Because I could ask you the same question, even as a heterosexual man, what would you do for your wife and what would you do for your kids? How far would you go for them. Right. And I feel like, okay, do you want that? I know it would be unbelievably difficult, but do you want that? And maybe you don't, maybe you don't. Okay, here's why I think this could be good. And here are the downsides to it. Right. But, but for me, beyond, I believe my sexuality, you know, when the rubber hits the road, there is nothing more important to me than my wife and my kids. And, and so regardless, even sexuality, even my sexuality. And so is that what I want? I have the ability to make it. It might be the toughest decision you ever make and you might be setting yourself up for a very difficult time. Again, I'm not in those shoes, so I can't say. But awareness, like I said before, be aware of all of these things and you choose what you want. And here's why I would choose hope. I think this, this is why I think it's important in my relationship with God and why I might choose this. But you self select, you choose, you get to choose, you get to have your agency. And I think that God feels that way. I mean, I think that agency is supreme.

John Dehlin [01:09:11] Yeah. And just to kind of, for the, let's just say the gay or lesbian people that I've known, I think there's a couple responses they might have. And well, when you talk about a teddy bear Jesus, what I think you mean by that is that the gospel is and should be at times extremely painful and difficult to follow the path of ascendancy and, or exaltation. And that means it's going to be at times extremely painful and brutal.

Greg Matsen [01:09:46] And so that's right.

John Dehlin [01:09:48] My research shows that to be celibate, to choose celibacy, if you're a gay man, Mormon man, you choose celibacy. You're choosing a psychological and physical state worse than lupus.

Greg Matsen [01:10:02] And you've already acknowledged, yeah, it sucks, that would suck.

John Dehlin [01:10:04] No, but I'm almost like toxic. And your life might end 10 or 20 years early with depression and anxiety and self loathing, so really, really horrible stuff. And I think when you talk about Teddy bear Jesus, I think what you're saying is when Jesus gets beat and tortured and crucified, what we're to take from that is maybe our fate as Christians won't be quite that bad, but it can be 60 or 70% that bad. And that's part of, in your view, the path that Jesus requires for exaltation.

Greg Matsen [01:10:44] I do.

John Dehlin [01:10:45] Is that what you're saying?

Greg Matsen [01:10:45] I do believe that. I think that it's going to be difficult. I think opposition is a part of the plan. I don't think there's any growth without opposition. And some of it is horrific. It's interesting because I think you have the idea of harm and the idea of suffering. To me, when you have the context in place that says, I'm going to go through this, I know it's going to happen, and I know I have to deal with these things. I've got a child that died early. I've got an accident that paralyzed me. I've got, you know, whatever. We all have horrible things that happen to us and to our family members that it's a matter of, okay, are we somehow, to me, the idea of saying suffering is a part of the plan to some degree, even though we're trying to minimize it constantly, you know, that, that, that is going to be a part of the plan. And it's a matter of, can I master this? Can I overcome it? And I'm not just talking to LGBTQ individuals as anybody myself. I've had some horrific things happen to me. Can I deal with it? Can I overcome with it? And maybe I don't.

John Dehlin [01:12:05] I'm thinking of, there's a Jubilee episode that I was a part of with, like, Cardinalis and Kwaku and, oh, a couple years ago maybe when this came up and Carden talked about, I have cancer, and that's horrible. And, you know, the gay people on the panel, you have. Being gay, I do want to represent their. Sometimes their point of view, which Jillian Orr reflected in that Jubilee episode, which was, stop calling my sexual orientation a burden. It's not a burden. It's religion that makes it a burden for me. It's beautiful for me. It's lovely for me. My same sex sexuality is as healthy and as beautiful and as inspiring as your heterosexuality. It takes religion to make me feel like it's a burden. Okay, what would you say to that?

Greg Matsen [01:13:00] I would say that, okay, great, that's your choice. Run with it. That's. That's what you decide. Run with it. You know, I don't. Again, I don't think that religion does that, because you're either choosing it or you're not. You choose religion. Are you going to choose the religion or are you not going to choose it? That's up to you.

John Dehlin [01:13:20] But if they say, yeah, but your God's going to keep me out of

Greg Matsen [01:13:22] exaltation, you care about what I believe, why you care about what I believe.

John Dehlin [01:13:25] Okay, right.

Greg Matsen [01:13:26] Yes, it is. But. But I do get to have my beliefs. I do get to have my beliefs. You get to have your beliefs. But I love you. But I love you. Right. And so I hope you can be as happy as you can be. Right.

John Dehlin [01:13:42] I loved when we went to lunch, you told me a story about a gay friend that you have made over the years. Like if somebody says, you know, Greg doesn't like gay people or Greg is homophobic or whatever. Yeah. For those who would say your position is homophobic, I know that's deeply insulting.

Greg Matsen [01:14:00] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:14:00] Would you like to address that, that accusation and why that is not only hurtful, but maybe not true?

Greg Matsen [01:14:07] Well, because it's because I don't think I love anybody different at all based on their sexual orientation. I don't think there's any less value, more value, nothing. I don't see any difference there whatsoever. And regardless of what path someone is going to choose, why should I look at their value as a human being and the love that you would have for them as, as anything different? That doesn't change a thing. Right. At all to me. And, and I do have gay friends. And I, I, you know, it doesn't, that doesn't. And I don't believe that God, that's a difference with God. I don't think that that's a difference. You know, I think it's you, you choose your path, you choose your life, you have agency. Here's again, I would say, here's what I think is really great over here with the restored gospel and with the church. I think that this is amazing. I think it's incredible. But choose what you want. Just be aware of these different options and choose what you want to do. And everybody gets to do that. We self select our life. We self select, for the most part, we self select our eternity. And I think that I don't look at a church or a God that is excluding anything or anybody at all.

John Dehlin [01:15:26] Yeah. And I'll just say my research showed that mixed orientation marriages have like 70% divorce rates.

Greg Matsen [01:15:34] Yeah, I know you did a study once on this.

John Dehlin [01:15:35] They're a disaster for the straight spouse and for the children and for the mental and physical health of both of the married partners. And celibacy is even worse. So like, I almost feel like to say it'll be a tough road or difficult road isn't doing quite justice to how horrific.

Greg Matsen [01:15:56] Here's the problem I would see with that. Right. The problem is, is I know a lot of gay men that are married to women. And again.

John Dehlin [01:16:03] You do, you do.

Greg Matsen [01:16:03] I do personally. Yeah. And, and so how do I say that to them?

John Dehlin [01:16:11] And they tell you that overall they're feeling positive about the approach they're choosing.

Greg Matsen [01:16:18] They would never leave their family, they would never leave their marriage, they would never leave their kids. That is their primary goal is to be. These are men, I'm talking about actually a couple women, but primarily the men. They're a husband and a father and that is what they want. And, and even I, and I, I've seen other studies that aren't quite as high as yours, but you know, I'm not discounting the fact that that is again, a very difficult road. And that's actually what I was talking about in terms of suffering or a burden. And when you choose religion, you know, I'm not, I'm not saying that it's a burden for somebody that they want to be gay and they want to live with a same sex partner and that's what they choose. That's, you know, that's fine. The burden comes. If you want to choose that religion like the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and you buy into and you believe in the plan of salvation, then there is a burden there you're going to carry. It's not that it's a cancer or anything else. It's just that that is a burden to some degree. Right. So I forgot where I was on that.

John Dehlin [01:17:25] But anyway, you know gay men that basically are married to women who love their wives, love their kids and are committed, devoted husbands.

Greg Matsen [01:17:37] Yes, several.

John Dehlin [01:17:38] And committed to the gospel.

Greg Matsen [01:17:39] And I think there's a lot more than people realize because they don't come out to most people.

John Dehlin [01:17:43] Yeah, no, I think there's something there where that does exist and it's a very perilous path to take. So anyone who would advocate and say, oh, you're an 18 or 21 year old gay Mormon kid, go marry a woman. Which unfortunately I think the church did for many decades, they would say, I think so, to gay Mormon men, return missionaries, just marry a woman, start having babies and things will be okay. I think that was not necessarily good advice. No.

Greg Matsen [01:18:18] I think it's putting your head in the sand.

John Dehlin [01:18:19] Catastrophic advice.

Greg Matsen [01:18:20] It's putting your head in the sand. I don't think it's. Again, I think to me, as a believing Mormon. Right. I, I think that's the best option. Right. I do think it's the best option, but it might not be your option.

John Dehlin [01:18:34] Like if your daughter came to you instead of marrying a gay guy, would you be concerned or would you be

Greg Matsen [01:18:39] like, of course I'd be concerned.

John Dehlin [01:18:40] Okay.

Greg Matsen [01:18:41] I mean, sure, I would be concerned because there are the same issues that we're talking about here. Right. Because that's going to be a very difficult thing. That doesn't mean I wouldn't support her.

John Dehlin [01:18:50] Right.

Greg Matsen [01:18:50] I mean, she's in love with him if he loves her and I feel like he's really good to her and they want to, you know, great, let's, let's make this work. Let's make it happen and let's give you as much support as we possibly can. But again, going with those men, for example, and those women, to go back to them at this point where they've already gone through this, and let's say it is as high as what you say is 70%.

John Dehlin [01:19:12] Divorce.

Greg Matsen [01:19:13] Divorce, you know, with someone with same sex attraction. Right. How do you say to those that aren't, well, why go be your authentic self, Joe, go just why are you doing this? Just go be your authentic self. Right. When their authentic self and their sexuality has a lot less to do with, with the preciousness of their wife and their kids. You know, that's what I don't understand is that that look on that is like. And if, you know, if in Latter Day Saint theology, if I'm looking at the fall and I know that this is something on earth that we all are going to go through and we're going to have these adversities. Why go, why choose to go in the first place? Well, there must be some kind of long term good overall where we would understand that this is the process and that's one of the more difficult ones. That would be without doubt, that is, and I probably have some of these men come back to me and say, stop saying that, Greg. It's not. But I understand those that would go through very difficult times and I've seen those marriages not make it also. You're going to self select.

Polygamy, LGBT Issues, and Church Doctrine

John Dehlin [01:20:34] So when I was trying to understand what you were meaning about activism and your concerns about activism, tell me if I'm right, that there, there's you, you would see the proclamation on the family as doctrine. True?

Greg Matsen [01:20:52] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:20:53] Okay. And that anyone who would try and let's just say work for change in the church to somehow someday accept gay people who are in gay relationships in full fellowship, that that'd be a violation of law of chastity and anyone who would work to, to help advocate for same sex marriage in a temple, that that would be in violation of the proclamation of the family of church doctrine and that should never be allowed. What would you say? To a progressive, faithful Mormon that says, look, church, you know, polygamy was forbidden for the first 10 years in Joseph Smith's time. It was in the Doctrine and covenants that polygamy, DNC101 at the time, the 1835 version prohibited it. But then it changed. And in 1840, Joseph started practicing polygamy. And then polygamy was game on for at least 50 years, if not 70 or 80 years, depending on where you were, whether you're cool with post manifesto polygamy and where you lived. But then they took it back away and now they're even saying you won't have to practice polygamy in heaven if you don't want to. Or you could look at the priesthood and temple ban on black people. They would say, look, the church has made really deep, fundamental, significant changes, even doctrinal changes, because first presidency signed statements affirming the priesthood ban as doctrine in the 40s and 50s. And now the Gospel Topics essay on race in the priesthood is basically saying those were the philosophies of men. That stuff wasn't doctrine, that was men who were racist, influenced by their times. They would say, look, there's been enough change, racial stuff and marriage stuff, that why shouldn't we, why shouldn't we try to advocate for a similar type of change with LGBT people, Especially if they don't choose it in terms of their orientation and especially if it's so awful for them to either be celibate or be in mixed orientation marriages. Why can't God change his views on LGBT stuff and LGBT marriage if he changed stuff on race and on polygamy?

Greg Matsen [01:23:17] Well, why didn't he do it before? We want to see. We don't see any basis for that, for, you know, going all the way back to the Old Testament. There's nothing on that. I mean, there were gay people back then. Why was there no change back then? I think that that is. I think there are core doctrines. I think the doctrine of the family is something that's tied directly to Christ. If you've gone through the temple, you understand that that whole ascension process is also an ascension of moving toward marriage and eternal marriage and between a man and a woman and having a family and producing a family. So, you know, again, the church is not a. The church has a path. Again, you might choose it and you might not. Right? I like it a lot. I think it's incredible. I think it's a great path. I think it's a true path. I think it's real. But not everybody is going to choose that path. I understand that. To me, it's not like the church is being oppressive to somebody because they don't tolerate this or they won't change something. It's like, no, this is what we believe. This is our doctrine. We invite you to join in with us if you want it. Right. If you don't want this, then okay, we love you still. And hey, the plan of salvation is going to allow for glory for everybody at some degree and a way of life for everybody that's going to bring on happiness and joy in your life and you get to choose what you want.

John Dehlin [01:24:40] But the priesthood and temple ban was doctrine before it was rescinded. Yeah. So what? That changed.

Greg Matsen [01:24:48] It did change, but it's not. There were changes in the priesthood before that. There were a lot of changes in the priesthood before that. I mean, you only had the Levites that were holding the priesthood and the sons of Aaron that could be priests for forever. Out of all of the tribes, even of Israel, those were the only ones that could hold the priesthood. Right. And there are differences like that. Now, I'm not saying that was the right thing to do. I don't know. I have no idea. And I don't think you do. And I don't think. I don't know that anybody does, to be honest with you. I have no idea if that was a timing issue, if that was a. I mean, look at what's happening in Africa with the church now. I mean, it's amazing, right? And so I don't know the answer to that question. I have no idea. The marriage thing, however, is a little bit different. You know, that's. And I say this and people get mad about it, but that hasn't changed. That's never changed.

John Dehlin [01:25:36] What?

Greg Matsen [01:25:37] The practice of polygamy has certainly changed, but marriage hasn't changed. Right? Marriage never changed. When you have polygamy or what we call plural marriage, it should be called plural marriages. Right? And this is a fundamental issue that I think needs to be understood. It's. You don't sit down at an altar with 10 women and put everybody into a marriage.

John Dehlin [01:26:01] It's individual marriages.

Greg Matsen [01:26:02] It's individual marriages. It's always Adam and Eve, right? It's always one man on one side of the altar, the other. There's others that might put their hand on their husband's hand or something like that, a first wife or something like that. But the marriage is between a man and a woman. Always. That marriage is between one man and one woman. That has never changed. And the Purpose of it is to build a family, is to have kids and to build a family. And that hasn't changed. Now the practice of polygamy, thank goodness we're not a part of that. I don't want to be a part of that. I hope I don't ever have to be a part of that. Personally, I hope that's never a part of an eternal plan for me and my wife. I don't want that. And I get to choose, right? I will get to choose. I always get to choose. And my wife will get to choose whatever is required of us going into the future. But I don't think marriage to me has never changed.

John Dehlin [01:27:00] There were apostles in the 1910s who I'm sure you know, the sue apostatized from the church because they had believed previous prophets, seers and revelators saying that polygamy would never be taken from the earth.

Greg Matsen [01:27:15] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:27:15] And it was taken from the church. And so they apostatized and they are apostles.

Greg Matsen [01:27:21] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:27:21] So if, let's just say, I know this is speculation, but let's just say the, the LDS church does allow at some point same sex marriage. Would, would it be something you feel like you could pray and work through and come to understand, or could you say confidently now it'd be a deal breaker where you'd be like, nope, that would be a sign that the church was in apostasy or went astray and I'd have to leave or start my own branch. Or could do you think if God made the change with prophets endorsing it, you could find a way to say, well, I guess I was wrong.

Greg Matsen [01:28:01] That is so speculative to me. Yeah, totally, totally. I don't believe it will ever, ever, ever happen.

John Dehlin [01:28:08] But an apostle in 1880 would have never guessed that polygamy would be right.

Greg Matsen [01:28:13] I get it, I get it. To me, the doctrine, let's call it the doctrine of the family, is right next to the doctrine of Christ. So you could say the same thing and say, well, we no longer believe that Jesus actually died for your sins, but he was resurrected, but he never really died for your sins. You don't need somebody to die for your sins. God loves you and that's all that's required and everything's fine. To me it's on level with that saying that there's no spiritual economy that's required through, you know, with an atonement at the center of it. That in my mind, that's the way I see it. I don't think that you could, if that was changed. Yes, I Do think the church would be an apostasy? I don't think there's any question it would be an apostasy. Would I leave? I don't know. I don't think I would. I think I would probably work through it the best that I could, you know, and just not support it, but not because I don't want to. It has nothing to do with that. Right. It's just I think that there is an order that has been around eternally and that order of the family is the ideal. We don't all meet the ideal. I didn't have the ideal family. My parents split when I was six years old. But we tried to make it the ideal and my parents still taught me to look to the ideal with a family. Right. So I think that the ideal is. It's not just an ideal with a family. I think it's a doctrine so core that basically you're breaking apart Christianity when you do that.

Concerns About Political Extremism in LDS Culture

John Dehlin [01:30:03] There are movements you express a lot of concern about sort of liberal or. I don't. My words are liberal or progressive in your words woke sort of left wing Mormonism that's still believing. Some would say there's also kind of this more radical or extreme version of right winged Mormonism, whether it's preparism, whether it's kind of Denver snuffer, like non polygamous fundamental fundamentalism, that sort of thing. Do you, do you have concerns? I think you alluded to this at the beginning. Do you have cultural concerns about an excessively right wing of Mormon culture? And if so, what, what are those concerns?

Greg Matsen [01:30:55] Yeah, the short answer is yes. Can I just kind of lay out how I look at left and right, please? So I think that we are always in a constant process of creation. And the whole idea of Genesis, the beginning of Genesis is not a history of the world at all. I think it's temple liturgy. And I think it's telling us that we are simply. If you look at restored scripture through Joseph Smith, you've got the book of Moses. Moses is in a vision on Sinai. And then all of a sudden after chapter one, he goes right into the creation, right? Abraham in the book of Abraham, he's looking through the Urim and Thummim. It's vision, it's visionary language. And then he goes right into the creation story, right? So to me, I look at that and I think, okay, this is made for the temple. This is taken from visionary work. Visionary, which is perfect for the temple. It's symbolic in many ways. Not that I don't Believe that there was an Adam and Eve and probably a Garden of Eden and things like that. I think that the characters and all those things are true, But I think the tree of knowledge of good and evil and the tree of life and the cherubim, I think these are all symbols that we should be looking at as symbols. But we are in a constant process. I think of creation and I think creation, if you look at the creation account, it's light going into chaos and then creating an order out of that chaos. The elements have always existed, as Joseph Smith says, they're eternal. And so it's the light going into the chaos and then creating an order out of that. I think that we do do the same thing. We do that in our civilizations, our societies. We do that in our families. And so I see the right with a developed civilization, a developed society, developed culture as being kind of the status quo, right? It's the status quo. It's on an extreme level. People call it the patriarchy, kind of the order that is kind of in place. And I see the left as, and I will say chaos, but not chaos just in the sense that we think of, you know, free radicals running everywhere. I think tomorrow is chaos because it's the unknown, right? And the change. It's change and it's. The left is much better at looking toward that. Right? And I think that you, to have movement through time and space and creation, you have to have both. Now, I do believe that you're always trying to put things into an order, but if you stop and you're stagnant, then you are. What are you? There's no creation. There's no life. There's no time. Right? There's nothing still there. So I think that you have to have the left along with the right, and you have to be able to work through both of them. Just like I think you have to have both the masculine and the feminine in a similar fashion. Right? So that's underlying how I look at the left and right. No, I'm not. I'm not. I'm anti overt left just like I'm anti overt Right. I don't. I think that, for example, I don't like the idea of, in the United States government, I don't want a president, a Congress and Senate and a judiciary that are all on the right. That is disaster. That's disaster. Right?

John Dehlin [01:34:24] Because you want checks and balances.

Greg Matsen [01:34:25] I want checks and balances. I want power checks. Right. That's very important. And it's not just that I probably want More on the right, because I want more of that order, so to speak, in place. But I want ideas, I want exploration, I want movement, right in going along with that. Now, today, I think that, well, I know that the left has taken over most of the institutions in the United States. Right Again, I think you've got big business, you have got mostly health care now at this point. You've got law is mostly left leaning. You have education is very much left leaning. You've basically got, you know, media for sure, although that's starting to change a little bit through the democratization of YouTube and other things. And then you've got, you know, family and religion, which are also starting to change and being captured more and more by the left. What happens is then if the left goes too far, which I believe it has, you always end up with a reaction. And the right is the reaction.

John Dehlin [01:35:43] The current right.

Greg Matsen [01:35:44] The current right will be the current right. And the toxic right, which is now starting to percolate, is a reaction to that, capturing of all the institutions and the culture. And the right always reacts. They're not good at anything because they're status quo. So they're reacting to what's changing.

John Dehlin [01:36:03] Right, Maybe resisting change.

Greg Matsen [01:36:07] Yeah, oftentimes. Oftentimes resisting change, yes. And so I see now, okay, I still see the problem right now is the left has the powers of all the institutions behind them, most of the institutions behind them, and mostly the culture. Even though you've got Trumpism running in the government, the institutions are not like that. And then on the right, you're starting to see this percolation where young men are disaffected from the culture in a feminized culture that has gone further to the left. Because you go further and further to the left, it becomes more and more feminized and you've got a reaction to, hey, what is all this woke madness going on here? Where do I belong? Identitarianism has started to take over. And so you get this toxic right that's starting to percolate in the church too. And so that is going to be, I believe, a bigger and bigger problem. I don't see it as a major threat yet because they don't have. They have. The right has. They don't have any institutional power in our culture, they have no institutional power. Now, you could say in the church they do. But in the culture you don't have institutional power on the right.

John Dehlin [01:37:21] Some would say that the Congress, the House, the Senate, the government, sure. The, the Supreme Court and the executive branch are all which I don't like,

Greg Matsen [01:37:29] I don't like that. I don't like that they're all on the right. But that's true. The government is right now because there was a strong enough reaction among the people against the left and because of, you know, what we saw with BLM and George Floyd and all that stuff. Right. I don't know that. I don't think you would have that if that didn't happen, honestly. So. But what the threat becomes then, if they, if they're fighting against institutional power, then you kind of had this groundswell, especially with new media, YouTube, etc. Of a toxic right that starts to percolate and react. The left to me is a wolf in sheep's clothing. It is clothed with empathy and compassion, but the long term unchecked power of that is a wolf. The right is just the wolf.

John Dehlin [01:38:20] What's the, what's the future if left policies get destruction? Destruction? Destruction of what?

Greg Matsen [01:38:28] Destruction of family, destruction of civilization, destruction of order, destruction of religion, et cetera. You've got to have a balance in these things. The right is just a wolf, right? The far right, I'm not talking about conservatives, I'm talking about the far right is just playing. They're just playing a wolf. There's no sheep clothing there.

John Dehlin [01:38:44] What does that mean?

Greg Matsen [01:38:45] It means that they also have the fangs out that will help devour civilization and order and family and religion and goodness and etc.

John Dehlin [01:38:57] Why would the far right do that? How? Why or how? What are the unhealthy proclivities of the far right?

Greg Matsen [01:39:06] Well, where the left. And again, this is just the way I view it. But on the left you have a. You start with liberal, you're loosening things up. It's more liberal. Right. Then you get progressive. Too much change and then you can go all way the way, you know, hard to Marxism and, you know, etc. It's like this unraveling. Yeah, right. The right tights, tightens the screws so far down that what they're saying is we have these massive borders, we have these massive lines between people. You're starting to see anti Semitism much more on the right than you have.

John Dehlin [01:39:36] So recently it's been on the left extreme racism.

Greg Matsen [01:39:39] Extreme racism. Right. The segregation of things immigrant. Yeah, yeah. All of this stuff, you know, is. Is obviously right leaning because there are. There's an overreach in order. I think there's an overreach in that order. And the big tall, thick walls that are put between people and classes, it's kind of like the movement of Christian nationalism. Right. It's like, okay, well, I would say to some Latter Day Saints, I'm like, just, just think about where you are with things and where you make alliances, because there are people out there that if they didn't have the left, you would be the target. Right. If they didn't have the left to deal with, you would be the next target. And this movement of. And it's not very strong right now, but it's brought up a lot. But of Christian nationalism is the same thing. It's just like hardcore nationalism. Right. And then hardcore, basically Protestantism. Right. And we're going to go by the rules of the Bible and we're going to, you know, it's. The pluralism gets, you know, reduced or swept away, basically.

John Dehlin [01:40:53] The Mormons could be next after the left. Yes. So you don't identify as a Christian nationalist.

Greg Matsen [01:41:00] Oh, no.

John Dehlin [01:41:00] Okay. No, yeah.

Greg Matsen [01:41:01] And I will identify as a patriot. I will identify somebody who loves the founding of America and the principles of the consulate Constitution very firmly. And I would, I would, you know, I would fight for that. I would support that. And I do think, unlike Obama, for example, I do believe that America is the greatest country to ever exist. And the reason is not because, well, we're better than somebody else. The reason is because of those founding documents and the way the founding happened as compared to, say, the, the French Revolution. Right. Which is very different.

Christians, Politics, and the Trump Question

John Dehlin [01:41:33] Let me ask you if it's okay, and you don't have to answer any of this, but I'm, I'm curious if, if a left, if a person on the left, or even a certain type of Christian, let's just say a more leftist Christian would say, and I'm, I don't even know if you would consider yourself a fan of Trump or a supporter of Trump. So I don't want to make any assumptions here, but you respond to this how you want. If a, if someone, who, if a Christian were to say God, a Christian, God would never want someone like Trump in the office because of his history of how he treated women, do you. And again, I don't even know where you come down on any of that. But, like, what would you say to someone who said God and, or a Christian would never tolerate a candidate like Trump for his treatment of women, what would you say?

Greg Matsen [01:42:26] I don't know what that even means. What do you mean, tolerate him?

John Dehlin [01:42:30] Like Christians shouldn't. What if someone said Christians shouldn't vote for Trump because he has been divorced so many times, because he has had so many allegations of assault and abuse of women. He's just not, or he's, or he's too profane or he's too mean or hate speech like he doesn't, he doesn't exemplify the virtues of Christ. Christians shouldn't vote for Trump. If someone made that argument, do you even feel like you would have a response to that? I don't want to say, you know,

Greg Matsen [01:43:05] okay, my response would be, yeah, I get it for sure. I'm not real big on, on certainly at least the past that we know of with Trump and his character in those areas. I think that's concerning. I wish we had really good, good people that were really highly competent and capable to run things in the country. But I, I don't think, I don't, personally, I don't feel real good about that. I don't feel that's not just Trump. I don't feel good about that on both sides of the aisle.

John Dehlin [01:43:39] And the discourse, the level of discourse.

Greg Matsen [01:43:41] Yeah, the level of discourse. It's. I just, the reason people would call me a conservative, I think is because I still, I believe in conserving at least the very core truths and order in place. Right. That's probably, I don't like the word for myself, conservative. And I'll have listeners that'll say things like, why don't you just accept saying why are you worried about the liberals saying that that's bad. I don't give a rip what the liberals say or the progressives say. It doesn't bother me at all. I don't want to be locked in by a label self labeling on something when there are several things that happen sometimes on the right that I am just not a fan of. Right. I'm not married to a party. I have been an independent since I was in my mid-20s. Because I don't.

John Dehlin [01:44:40] So you don't see yourself as partisan per se?

Greg Matsen [01:44:42] I am not partisan. The only reason, and I do, I typically would vote Republican, but I don't always is for that same idea that, okay, I want traditional family, I want freedom of religion. I want those policies and laws that are going to support a stronger liberty and put that over what I see now as almost a forced equity law that forces equity instead of self selecting and, and so that, that those are things that I hold on to. But I don't call myself a conservative. I've never called myself a conservative.

John Dehlin [01:45:22] Would you like, what about the idea of, of like the libertarian view that for the example, same sex marriage, hey, let people get married. That's not religion. That's the civil society. Are you, do you have a position on just allowing civil same sex marriage?

Greg Matsen [01:45:41] I knew you were going to ask this.

John Dehlin [01:45:42] Oh, you don't have to answer.

Greg Matsen [01:45:43] No, I want to.

John Dehlin [01:45:44] We don't have to go here.

Greg Matsen [01:45:45] No, no, that's fine, that's fine. I knew you're. I, I literally thought about this when you were going to bring this question up. But, but I, I didn't plan to

John Dehlin [01:45:52] ask this, by the way. Just.

Greg Matsen [01:45:53] Yeah, no, that's fine.

John Dehlin [01:45:54] Yeah.

Greg Matsen [01:45:54] I, I, yes. The libertarian side of me says live and let live.

John Dehlin [01:46:00] Yeah, for sure. Yeah.

Greg Matsen [01:46:01] And, and in that vacuum, there's always a libertarian view, to me is always a vacuum because it doesn't fully work. But I understand the leanings toward a libertarian point of view. However, I will say that I think that from a religious standpoint, I don't know that that has helped much. I don't think that that has really helped a religious cause. In other words, if you're looking at marriage as a religious institution, then that is different. If I'm looking at it as a civil institution, then that is different. So in government it's like, okay, yeah, I probably am like, if I'm just looking at that in a vacuum and it's like, what's the principle? I say live and let live. Just do it. If I'm looking at a religious standpoint, I feel that marriage has a different meaning and marriage is actually defined as a man and a woman. So I have to separate the civil side from the religious side. When I look at that, it sounds

John Dehlin [01:47:07] like you have a perspective that if the governmental policy strengthens religious devotion and a traditional family, you're for it. But if it leads to a weakening of religious devotion or traditional families, then you're going to struggle with it. Even if you don't necessarily care politically, you just want to see as much strengthening of faith and of Christian commitments and of traditional families as possible.

Greg Matsen [01:47:42] That's probably a pretty good assumption.

John Dehlin [01:47:44] Yeah. Okay. All right, really quickly, the, the stuff with immigration, like you could, there's a reading of Christ where he's like, for the poor and for the marginalized and downtrodden, like the ICE raids and stuff. Do you have a, from a Christ, from a Christian standpoint, if you watch those videos of the ICE agents bashing in windows and yanking people out of cars, and I'm sure there's fair and unfair representations of all that.

Greg Matsen [01:48:19] Right.

John Dehlin [01:48:20] How does your Christianity inform what, what you see going on? Not, not with whether or not we love immigrants or Whether or not they should be allowed in the country. But the way that ICE right now seems to be patrolling and enforcing people who are already here.

Greg Matsen [01:48:39] Yeah, and again, I think you're bringing up specific examples here, but no, I don't like the optics, that's for sure. I serve my mission in Mexico and I love those people and I don't want to see harm to them. My opinion on. I will say the opinion on immigration itself is. It's the same idea that I have with the right and the left is I want immigration, but I want it orderly. I want the change I want. You know, I want that flow, but I need. I. You've got to be smart in this world today on who's coming in. If I was in Mexico, I would probably come here. I would probably try to come here even if it was illegal. That doesn't mean. I think it should be open to everybody. But I think we need a way to be able to help people get here that we believe are going to be productive and good citizens, but also have a way of making sure that we're not bringing the wrong people in and having an orderly process. So it isn't millions of people a year. That's a problem. Because there's no way to keep track of that. You don't know where everything's going. That's an issue. I think the way you handle it. First of all, I don't want to see families pulled apart. Not worth it to me at all. Nothing is worth it.

John Dehlin [01:50:06] Dad sent home, so their kids have no parent here.

Greg Matsen [01:50:09] Yeah, nothing is worth it. Worth that. I don't care what your hardline is on immigration. Nothing is worth that. Figure something else out.

John Dehlin [01:50:16] So if ICE is doing that, you're against it?

Greg Matsen [01:50:18] I'm against it.

John Dehlin [01:50:18] Absolutely. Okay.

Greg Matsen [01:50:19] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:50:20] Okay. Yeah. Okay. Overall, let's just say the past 10, the past year, do you feel like America is moving in a better direction, aligned with your Christian values and sensibilities over the past year than it was the previous four or eight?

Greg Matsen [01:50:40] Okay, so you're talking government. Because you see four, eight years.

John Dehlin [01:50:43] Yeah, well, government as it relates to strengthening religion and families. Okay. Honestly. Which I know are your values.

Greg Matsen [01:50:49] I think, yes, in the right direction. My concern is just where does that direction end up?

John Dehlin [01:50:55] Because there could be backlash, like the right. The backlash towards the right came from a ultra left.

Greg Matsen [01:51:03] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:51:03] There could be a backlash the other way.

Greg Matsen [01:51:05] I expect it.

John Dehlin [01:51:06] Yeah, I actually.

Greg Matsen [01:51:06] I expect it 100. And, you know, people say woke is dead and stuff. You know, it's like you don't understand. They the woke own the institutions. I think that's what's going to happen is once they are able to grab the presidency certainly again, and maybe even Congress, it's going to be the mantra is going to be never again, never again will this happen. Right. And, and so I think that's living. That's too much presentism in that point of view. Yeah. I do think though, overall, yeah, sure. Based on what we were talking about, a stronger traditional family, stronger religious liberties, focus on those things. I think it's great. There's actually somewhat of a revival in Christianity right now happening. I think that's part of that to some degree overall with the country. I would say before the last year, and I don't think it has anything to do with Trump in terms of the culture, but I think it's we are before the last year, we are less religious, we're less faithful. The fertility rate scares the bejeebers out of me. I think that is the number one temporal problem in the world right now. It is going to cause wars, it's going to cause starvation, it's going to cause economies to collapse. And we're not addressing it enough. And I don't know if we can. I don't know if there's a way back to it. So that concerns me because I think that that is very anti Christian and anti family when that fertility rate even here in Utah has dropped drastically. Last year it dropped 10 spots among the 50 states. I want to say it's a 1.6. I want to say dropped to Utah's doing that. What's the rest of the country doing? You look at Korea and places like Japan, they've got these fertility rates with massive boomer generation living on benefits and nobody producing anything coming up to produce anything to sustain that. That's. That to me is religion a lot of that family and religion and Christianity are tied so closely together. And I think that that unless we continue on the track we've gone through for about the last year, I think we're in for a real problem.

Women in the Church and Rising Disaffection

John Dehlin [01:53:30] I've seen you mention on Quick a concern about how men in LDS pews now outnumber women and how rates of disaffection among young women appear to be accelerating at a higher rate than rates of disaffection among men. How do you see? I mean, I know you believe the church is led by God and by prophet seers and revelators. There are better minds than that, I'm sure, better hearts and minds than that. From your perspective, how do they. How does God and his leaders turn this problem. Problem around?

Greg Matsen [01:54:09] I don't know.

John Dehlin [01:54:10] Are you worried?

Greg Matsen [01:54:11] Yeah, I am concerned about it. I am concerned about it. You've got men returning to Christianity. You've got women leaving. That includes in the church. I believe it is because of our time in terms of embracing a total woke culture. I do believe that's a major part

John Dehlin [01:54:30] of it, that women are embracing what you call wokeness, and that's making them not want to be Latter Day Saints and. Or Christians.

Greg Matsen [01:54:40] Well, I think there's two things. I think that there is, again, I look at ideals and then agency. You got to have both, I think. And I think that with young women today, the feminism has gone to a point that's so far away from first or second wave feminism, for example, where. Where really it's okay. We need these rights. We need the right to be able to vote. We need the right to be able to have choices and options that have not existed for us before.

John Dehlin [01:55:08] Which you support those things.

Greg Matsen [01:55:10] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:55:10] Okay.

Greg Matsen [01:55:11] Yeah, absolutely. But we've gone so far beyond that now, where I think young women are given these ideas. I told this story before, but I went to my daughter's high school awards ceremony a few years back, and I'm watching this ceremony, you know, it's one evening, and. And I. I noticed they started lining everybody up. We're in the, in the theater, the auditorium, right. And they started lining all the students up. And there were a lot of them, right. And. And I. You can see only some of them, maybe about 15 or 20 of them that are in the auditorium. The rest are in a line out the door. And I just noticed something. I said, God, there's a lot of girls in that line. And as I went through, it was so overwhelming. This is in Chandler, Arizona, right? Conservative. There's. There's not LDS chapels, there's Christian chapels on every corner.

John Dehlin [01:56:10] Yeah.

Greg Matsen [01:56:11] And sure enough, I said, you know what? I'm gonna start counting. I started counting all. They all went through, Right. Three out of every four of the awards were for women, for girls. And I just thought to myself, this is a problem. This is a problem. And it's not that you want to remove something away from girls, but you don't want to remove anything from boys either. Either the way that we're educating them or the ability for boys to be able to move forward is very difficult. But what I'm trying to say is that I think that we have feminized our society. Our consumerism is almost always geared toward Women because they're the ones who spend the money. So all of our advertising, our media, everything is going more and more and more toward women. And then you have guys that become very disaffected because of this problem. What I do see in the church where I don't think that men are out outnumbering women, but I think it's right at about, it's almost, almost exactly the same now. And now all of a sudden you see, you see men, married men coming to church with their kids without the wife. You never used to see that. Right now it happens all the time. We've got two or three of those in my ward. And what I see in the churches is I hope that we're not just going to, we have a very strong focus on messaging to women and maybe not such a strong focus on messaging to men. And I think that we're going to lose more and more women unless we have stronger and stronger men in the church.

John Dehlin [01:57:50] Some would say that it really comes down to this, that a woman, a 25 year old woman can just look around and say in the boardroom, I can be a CEO or a board member in anywhere in corporate America. I can have any job I want in government, I can be a senator or congressman. I could be a judge in the judicial system like anywhere else in the world, even in many religions. I could be a priest or a rabbi. But like in, in the LDS Church, I'm. There are just a bunch of really positions of decision making and, or power, authority that I can't be in those positions. And that's enough to say this place isn't for me. What would you say to a woman that draws that conclusion? And I'll say with the caveat that you said, you said that the family structure can't change because it's always been consistent. But the priesthood has changed. Like you said, the Levites had it and then other people could have it later. So it's expanded. Black people couldn't have it and then black men couldn't have it and then they could like, yeah, what would you say to a woman that just said until the church considers me equal, I don't see a place for me here?

Greg Matsen [01:59:13] Well, so I disagree with the statement that considering them equal, I think it's just different. And I don't think that there is any less value to women. I think that, you know, most of the studies show that Latter Day Saint women are, are very happy and have a lot of joy in their lives. And to me that goes into critical theory. Pretty strongly. It's like victim and oppressor. And I don't think that, I think that that's the wokeness part that I'm saying is driving some women away is because you get to this mentality of everything is based off of a victim and an oppressor. And it has a lot to do with contextualizing harm and suffering. And it's like, okay, well, I have this thing that I call talos versus the oppressors. And it's, it's, are you someone who's going to contextualize some type of harm or suffering and, and, and be able to move through something? Or are you someone that's going to take something and instead of having to internalize and, and accept that there is suffering in life, are you going to push it out to somebody else and say, you're the problem, this group is the problem, that group's the problem, you're the oppressors. And I think that when you take on that mentality in anything, even if it's outside of the church, whether it's gender or, or whether it's class. Right. Sexual orientation or anything else, I think that what you end up at when you're in the church is, oh, we've got 15 oppressive old white men. And, and that's one of the reasons I think there's a real problem with it. I think that having most women that I know and I've been around a while in the church, they do not want the priesthood. Right. And I would say that I'm not a woman, but I would say that the vast majority, and not just vast, the overwhelming majority of women in the church do not want it.

John Dehlin [02:01:10] I think that's factual. And I think last time I looked, more men in the LDS Church want women have the priesthood.

Greg Matsen [02:01:18] I saw that too. Yes, you're right.

John Dehlin [02:01:20] Yeah.

Greg Matsen [02:01:20] And here's why. Look, we've, you know, one of the things that the church gets criticized for is the culture among women of this perfectionism. Right. How many kids do I have? Well, so and so's got that many kids. So and so does scripture study in the morning. You know, you got all this, these boxes you all of a sudden have to check and too much. And I think that's very hard for, for women to. There's a lot of pressure that can build up. If you're looking at it that way, why would you want to add that? Everything else that the priesthood and the responsibilities of priesthood on top of everything else. Yeah, that seems counterintuitive to me.

John Dehlin [02:01:51] Too much but what if that's what's driving young women away is just feeling like, let's just not call it equality. Let's call opportunity.

Greg Matsen [02:02:01] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:02:01] Or decision making.

Greg Matsen [02:02:04] Do you think it is? Do you think it's that they want to be the bishop?

John Dehlin [02:02:09] Maybe they just want to be able to have as much of an influence.

Greg Matsen [02:02:14] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:02:16] Or decision making opportunities.

Greg Matsen [02:02:21] Do you think from your experience in the church, do you think that more women run their own households more than men or men more than women do?

John Dehlin [02:02:31] I mean, I think I, I think there are different ways to have power and I think it can be a spectrum. You know, I think every married couple negotiates its power. Yeah, sure. In its own way.

Greg Matsen [02:02:45] Sure.

John Dehlin [02:02:46] And just say women are power, Mormon women are powerless. Is not true.

Greg Matsen [02:02:50] It's not true. And I think it's in my experience, and I know a lot of people in the church, I would say it's the opposite. Right. I would say that most women are like, I need my husband to step up and lead for sure.

John Dehlin [02:03:07] A lot of Mormon women.

Greg Matsen [02:03:08] Right. A lot of Mormon, like, why? You know, kick him in the butt. Get going. We gotta. I need. Why aren't you leading this? Why? I need you to lead. I've got too much pressure on me. I need you to take some of this. I need you to lead on these things. That's my experience that I have more than anything else. It's. The women are already overloaded with so many things. And if anything, you know, the whole. The thing that never gets talked about is in that family proclamation is the gender roles, because nobody wants to talk about it. But I think that that is what is needed for men to do. And I think that's not in the church. I think that's anywhere. Men need to learn to lead. I think they need the challenge. I think they respond better when they have a challenge like that and when they're at that expectation is in place. And I think that we've lost a lot of that in overall in the culture, but also in the church.

John Dehlin [02:03:58] Well, we could talk about a million things. We're almost at. We're at two hours. I made sure. I told you I'd get you out at 4:30. Yes, but I also told you I'd give you a chance to ask me questions or even make criticisms or whatever. You may or may not have time or desire to do that. But I do want to give you a chance if there's anything you wanted to express or a critique or a question. And again, if you have to go, that's Totally fine.

Greg Matsen [02:04:22] I have a few.

John Dehlin [02:04:23] I have a few. If you have time, I want to respect your time.

John Reflects on His Own Faith Transition

Greg Matsen [02:04:26] Okay. When did. In your faith journey, when did you stop believing that Joseph Smith was a prophet and that he translated the Book of Mormon by the power of God? And what brought that?

John Dehlin [02:04:48] So. So prophet. I. Going back to your point about the layers and the onions, now that I'm

Greg Matsen [02:04:56] reading

John Dehlin [02:04:58] John Turner's biography on Joseph Smith, his new biography on Joseph Smith, I'm coming to understand the term prophet differently than I ever did before. And I don't think I have any problem calling Joseph Smith a prophet today in the sense that he was leading this church. And if we just define prophet as the person who's in charge of leading the church, I think I can say, in 2025, Joseph was a prophet. You know what I mean? So I think I was raised. I mentioned Bruce Armaconki and Joseph Fielding Smith because I think I was raised with a very fragile type of Mormonism. Very literalistic, very black and white, very binary. All true or all false. Yeah. I know people that were raised weirdly as, like, sunstone Mormons, where the term prophet was very flexible, where the term scripture was very flexible, where leaders are fallible and scripture is imperfect and doctrine can change. And weirdly, a lot of those people raised with more flexible views on the gospel are able to stay. But for me, it was like, scripture's the word of God and prophets will never leave you astray. And it's either all true or it's the biggest fraud. It's either the Book of Mormon is everything it's ever been claimed or it's the biggest fraud that's ever been perpetrated. That's. That's how I was set up. And I think in some ways, I was set up to lose my faith because I like, that's layer one. That's like superficial outer layer Mormonism.

Greg Matsen [02:06:43] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:06:44] And I don't think that stands. Like you said yourself, I don't think that stands. That's how I came into podcasting. That's how I, in 2001, came into learning about the Book of Abraham and polygamy and the seer stone in the hat in the translation. So as soon as I hit, like, for me, the Book of Abraham was a big blow because I'd never been taught that the papyri had been lost but then found and that Egyptologists had translated it and found that it didn't resemble at all what Joseph Smith produced. So I felt, when I was told, told the basic story of the Book of Abraham as it really happened, 2000, 2001. My cousin, Orem, dermatologist, told me that story. You know what I said to him when he told me the Book of Abraham story? I said, there's no way that's true.

Greg Matsen [02:07:37] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:07:39] You know what I mean? Yeah. Because in my mind the church would have never hid that for me.

Greg Matsen [02:07:42] That's what, that's the firm foundation you're standing on is something that's actually not firm.

John Dehlin [02:07:46] Yeah, totally. No, I acknowledge that. And now I, I could, I. There is a realm where I could see myself still being a latter day saint, but it's in a way.

Greg Matsen [02:08:00] Where do you want that?

John Dehlin [02:08:02] I mean, I, I, There is a, there is a realm where I would want that. Right There would. There are sincere, deep challenges that I have. There are real questions and problems really around the treatment of people that I have concerns about. But I, I told you at dinner and I'm, or at lunch, and I'm not ashamed to admit this. I love the Mormon people. I am grateful for the role the church has played in my life. I believe that some of my listeners and viewers don't like it when I say this. I think the LDS Church on overall does more good than harm. In some cases way more good than harm with the asterisk of when it goes wrong. For some people that really goes wrong, whether it's LGBT suicides or sometimes the way like my wife and others have been treated, whether it's somehow the way the church can handle child sexual abuse or cover ups of abuse or the racist stuff that sometimes has influenced like those things are real problems for me. Right. So for me, when it goes wrong, it can go catastrophically wrong for suit and certain groups of people. But when it goes right, I think Mormonism can be one of the most beautiful things, one of the most beautiful organizations or structures on the planet. So if I could, if I could have a way to reduce that harm to certain groups of people that I care about. There's a universe where I'm still wanting to stay in the church and make it a healthy place. But what I can tell you for sure is that my goal has never been to tear down faith, to get people to leave the church, to harm the church. I feel like I've always wanted to strengthen the church, to make it harmless, people, to make it do more good. And then the only difficult part is I want people I want there because I feel like I was misled about the church and its history and its truth claims. I do want people to know what they're a part of and what they are signing up for. And so I want a candid open discussion of the history and the truth claims, which unfortunately is going to lead some people to leave. But that doesn't mean it's my intent to get them to leave. I just want, I want informed consent. I want people to know the actual history, to know the challenges with the truth claims. And if they're going to have faith, it's in the actual history and it's in the truth claims in the most credible way that they can be considered.

Greg Matsen [02:10:53] So how would you respond to the critiques of you that have said that you may be responsible for more people leaving the church than anybody else?

John Dehlin [02:11:04] I mean, so I, I love that question. Thank you for asking me that question. I, I've been having some dialogues with some of your colleagues and when I'm called anti Mormon, what I want to say is, what do you mean, what's anti Mormon? And then the response is anything that weakens faith. And I would say, all right, if anything that weakens faith is anti Mormon. Joseph Smith, the way he lived his life is anti Mormon. The actual way he lived his life, the Book of Mormon is anti Mormon. The Book of Abraham is anti Mormon. Many of the things Brigham Young taught are anti Mormon. Because it, once you learn about Joseph Smith's polygamy, people are going to want to leave. Some people are going to want to leave when they learn about 14 year old girls and polyandry and, and the fact that he hid and lie about it.

Greg Matsen [02:11:58] But, but do you have, do you have.

John Dehlin [02:12:01] So, so if I talk about Joseph Smith's polygamy, that might cause some people to leave. But as long as I'm not lying and I'm just talking about the factual history that now the gospel topics essays have validated. It's not me that caused them to leave. It was Joseph Smith and his practice of polygamy. All I can say is that wasn't my intent. I don't talk about Joseph Smith's polygamy so people will leave. I talk about it so the people will know what really happened. Now the fact that they leave isn't my fault. It's what Joseph did, not me and the same Book of Abraham. I didn't create that narrative. I didn't create the problem of it being an inaccurate translation or the what Joseph produced not corresponding with what the Egypt characters actually say. So if talking about the Book of Abraham, which I've done, leads people to leave, that's the book of Abraham causing people to leave or Joseph Smith's description of saying that he translated it right. So it can't be put on me that people leave when accurate history or objective truth claims are discussed. I just don't think that's fair to put that on me. Because what you're arguing for is that people should be ignorant or, you know, but it also demeans people. I, I don't think faith works that way. If I were to go to you and try and dissuade you from believing, I swear, if we had sat down at that lunch and I'm like, Greg, let me tell you why the church isn't true, you would have wanted to leave. You would have argued with me and I'm 100% convinced you would have left clinging to the church more than you did when our, when we left our lunch with a very cordial, affirming, supportive lunch. I think the more you attack someone's beliefs, there's this backfire effect where the more they hold to it and even strengthen their belief. So I don't think it works to try and undermine people's faith. So that's why I don't do it. I don't try to undermine people's faith because I think it backfires. All I want to do is, is talk about the honest history and the truth claims and the way people get hurt so that the church does less harm. And so the people who are believers are having a firm foundation of what they believe. And I don't think it's fair to put the disaffection on me.

Greg Matsen [02:14:29] It seems to me though that on a lot of those things, and I don't want to talk a lot about the truth claims and different things like that, but it seems to me that a lot of what you've covered is the, the negative side of those things or a version of them. I think that there are other versions, for example, of Joseph Smith's polygamy. A lot of people think that was, none of those were even. You saw about 14 year old girls. Well, you know, is there, is there any, is there any evidence at all that there was absolutely consummation of those marriages even? There's no, there's no, there's no kids. Right. So, so, you know, again, I'm just saying that it seems to me like there's, there's variations of what we might look at and this is why history is so slippery and it's so hard, it's so easy to critique and so easy to go after and science and Archeology and anthropology. It's constantly evolving based on, oh, we just got this new piece of evidence. We got this. It looks like this. It's always evolving. And so I think it's very difficult to have a single version of what we look at. We all have in our mind a single version of, well, this is the narrative I'm putting together from Joseph Smith to Brigham Young to, to the blacks in the priesthood, the Book of Abraham, which I would privately debate you maybe even on that. But it's. So anyway, I think that what people would say is that oftentimes you're taking. Maybe it's just your opinion. It's your opinion. I also think. One more question, if I could ask.

John Dehlin [02:15:56] Well, no, let me validate that. We have our Mormon stories focused on the critical nature of the history and the truth claims.

Greg Matsen [02:16:04] That's true.

John Dehlin [02:16:06] All I can say is it's because the Church is a hundred billion dollar organization that for 200 years has been telling its side of the story. So I'll say two things. One is, can't we spend some time on the other part of the story, these tiny little podcasts or YouTube channels, relative to the Church's power and influence and wealth and communication ability? Like, if all I do, if I'm just going to echo what the Church has been saying and doing for a couple hundred years, why do I even exist? So of course we're, we're showing a different side. Right? And in that sense it's fair. But, but, but I hope you can see why we're just basically saying, yeah, if you want to hear the Church's side, the correlated, you know, whitewashed or faithful side, you can, you can hear that a gazillion different ways. So here's a different perspective now. Make your own decision. That's one that's, I don't know that that's justified. But here's the second point. I want faithful, believing scholars to come on Mormon stories and give more accurate, more thoughtful, more faithful responses. But the, but the problem is they won't come on. And that's why I was so wanting you to come on. And that's why I'm so happy you did come on. And that's what I want this episode to hopefully represent and lead to. Because I don't think, whether it's politically or religiously, I think we're shortchanged if we continue speaking in echo chambers. Because I can just tell you right now, I don't want anyone, I don't want anyone to leave the LDS Church if, if it's not healthy for them to do so. In fact, I want the strongest, healthiest LDS church out there that is possible, that will do the most good for people and do the least amount of harm. That's what I sincerely want. And so that's. I don't want Mormon stories to weaken the church. I want Mormon stories to make the church stronger and healthier for the members and for the good that it's going to do in the world.

Mutual Respect Across the Belief Divide

Greg Matsen [02:18:27] Think you've done that? Do you think that's what you've done?

John Dehlin [02:18:29] I think I've want. That's been my intention and I. I'm 100 sure. I've. I think to some degree, yes. I think the past 20 years, the church has become more transparent in its history. I don't think it's an accident that, that it. That happened after the Internet got really rolling. I think the Gospel topics essays, there's really good evidence that a lot of the work that we did early on led to the gospel topics essays. I think the church speaks about LGBT people very differently now than it did 20 years ago. It's not telling gay men to go marry a woman. It's not telling gay men that they chose it or that it's a sin, that they even have the thoughts or feelings. I think we, we have been influential in helping the church change its narrative around LGBT people. I do. I think that the church, the temple ceremony has changed significantly from 1988 when I went through. And I think it's more humane, it's less violent, it's probably more true to the core principles and doctrines and covenants that are most important to people. It's probably turning less people off than it used to. And I think that that transparency has helped the church feel motivated to make changes. And so I do think, I do think that we are helping the church do less harm and to be more transparent. I do. Now, yes, people have left, but I, I think, I think you could argue that, that 20, 30, 40, 50, 100 years ago, B.H. roberts, David O. McKay, the Leonard Arrington administration. The church had opportunities to be more transparent about its history. And it chose, in my opinion, to punt on being more honest and open about its history for good reasons. It was concerned about losing people. But there were moments in time when no man knows My history comes out in 1945 with Fawn Brody, when, when Leonard Arrington starts the church history department in 1972, when the September 6th stuff happens in 1993, where they're talking about women and they're talking about post manifesto polygamy and the peepstone in the hat and Michael Quinn's early Mormonism and magic worldview. There are these moments in church history where they could have come clean then and for good, understandable reasons. They said we don't feel ready to be transparent in our history. And then the Internet happened. So to the extent that a lot of people felt lied to, for a lot of people that we've. And I know I'm talking a lot, but for a lot of the people that we surveyed about losing their faith, it wasn't the polygamy, it wasn't 14 year olds, it wasn't polyandry, it wasn't even the Book of Abraham. It was feeling misled and lied to. And so I would just say the church bears a lot of the responsibility of the people who have left over the history and the truth claims because the church wasn't as open and as candid and as forthright as early as it probably should have been. Again, for very good reasons. But I don't think it's fair to blame the people that are now talking about history and truth claims openly and honestly. I think it's more fair to say could the church or should the church have been more open, more honest, more transparent 30 or 40 or 50 or 80 years ago? Is that fair? Is there anything fair to that?

Greg Matsen [02:22:00] It's coming from you. I mean, I'm not going to stand in your shoes. So if that's what you're.

John Dehlin [02:22:05] I see that perspective even a little bit.

Greg Matsen [02:22:07] I see the perspective of the church putting their head in the sand a little bit and not getting ahead of things and not being transparent enough. Absolutely. I think that they could go back and do it again. I think they would change.

John Dehlin [02:22:18] And I think they realize by the way, I get why they did it.

Greg Matsen [02:22:20] I get why they did it too.

John Dehlin [02:22:21] And if I were them at the time, I probably, probably would have made the similar choices.

Greg Matsen [02:22:24] Yeah, they needed the onion example is what they needed, but they needed quick. Well, I don't know about that, but. So the way you're talking right now where you felt like you were, it almost sounds. And I know you weren't, but it was. What I oftentimes see in critics of the church is that they've either left the church or they could be evangelicals or whoever it is that is, that is being a firm critic of the church. They all of a sudden become fundamentalist Mormons in their arguments. You know, they're going to the very well, Joseph F. Smith said this. Joseph feeling Smith said this. And as if they would adhere to every single word or every literal scripture verse. You know, why is that? Is it just a matter of trying to steel man your position? And I'm not talking about you specifically, I'm just saying from that perspective, you've been around a lot of people who are ex mos or nevermos. And why would you need to steel man a position? Or why do you see it as steel manning their own position? Their own position.

John Dehlin [02:23:34] I mean, I hope I'm understanding your question, but let me give you my best answer and then you tell me if I missed it. This goes back to kind of how I think the Joseph Felix smith Bruce on McConkie type of testimony didn't serve our generation well, because we really were taught when the prophet speaks, it's the word of God. We really were taught that the brother will never lead you astray. And what that meant was they would never get anything wrong. They would never contradict each other, that God never changes. And so I think we were set up to say if one prophet gets it wrong, you know, it all falls apart. If there's one problem with the Book of Mormon, it all falls down. And interestingly, I think the newer generations don't care what Bruce Armaconki said. They don't care what Joseph Fielding Smith said. They don't care what BH Roberts did or the stone in the hat. They just care about like, is it interesting or compelling now? But there's something about the way that correlated CES based church instruction set in those in my generation up with an expectation about what scripture is, what it means to be a prophet. It's all true or not. That, I think leads a lot of ex Mormons who are like 40 or older to hold the church frankly to an unrealistic standard.

Greg Matsen [02:24:56] Do you feel that as did that answer even a little bit? Yeah. Okay, so do you feel then that as things started slipping away from you and you see these truth claims and some of these, the transparency wasn't there. Short answer first, because I want to follow up on this. But you felt lied to.

John Dehlin [02:25:17] I felt like the church kept information for me that I should have been told.

Greg Matsen [02:25:22] Do you feel that you were in this, I hope this isn't too personal, but do you feel that in that faith crisis that you were traumatized because of that?

John Dehlin [02:25:36] I mean, I, I, I did experience years of depression and I felt heartbroken. I felt like, I think a kid feels when they find out their dad cheated on their mom and then their Family's broken apart, and you just. It's just like, how could someone that I loved and trusted so much do that? You know what I mean?

Greg Matsen [02:26:05] I mean, I know what you're saying. Yeah. I don't have the same experience, obviously, that you had.

John Dehlin [02:26:09] I felt heartbroken. You feel heartbroken and then depressed for years.

Greg Matsen [02:26:13] So in a sense, you kind of still hold up. You still have that young and childhood idealistic view of that truth of the gospel, and it's not. And now you're like, well, reality is different.

John Dehlin [02:26:27] Well, now, weirdly, like reading Joseph Smith's biography lately with John Turner, I've gained so much respect for Joseph Smith, and I know my viewers and listeners are gonna throw up some of them when I say that. But, like, having tried to create a community or communities, having tried to help people find each other and support each other, trying to help people build happy, healthy, meaningful lives after religion, and seeing how much of a mess we can make of ourselves, seeing people's lives sometimes unravel when they leave the church sometimes. And most importantly, seeing how hard it is to lead a small group of people, let alone a group of thousands or tens of thousands. I've actually developed more empathy and respect for early and current church leaders than I ever had. And I actually now view scripture. Scripture a lot more flexibly than I did. And I view prophets more flexibly than I did. I. The, the. The. The type of Mormonism that I had when I got excommunicated felt very compatible with the modern church. It's just that I think I. Mormon stories came out too quickly and maybe a little bit too roughly. I think if Mormon stories had come out now, I don't even know that they would have excommunicated me, honestly. Interesting. Yeah. But I feel more empathy, more flexibility, more respect for the church and its leaders now than I ever have, honestly. You know what I mean? I don't feel like I did 20 years ago. I've worked through a lot of that. I think I've matured, and I respect the church and its leaders more than I ever have. And I think I understand the decisions they've made more now than I ever have before. Does that make sense, do you think?

Greg Matsen [02:28:27] A study was done, a BYU study was done a few years back on people that came back to the church has nothing to do with why they left, but people that had come back to the church. And the number one reason that was cited by those individuals was a relationship with God. They missed having a relationship with God.

John Dehlin [02:28:48] Yeah.

Greg Matsen [02:28:48] It wasn't. Oh, there's more information on the Book of Abraham. Oh, there's more, you know, whatever, you know, it was just, just that relationship.

John Dehlin [02:28:56] Yeah, yeah.

Greg Matsen [02:28:57] What are your thoughts on that?

John Dehlin [02:28:58] Yeah, I think I can't. I, I told you this and I'll, I'll say it publicly. I don't, I don't think secularism is the way. I, I don't. If you were to give me a magic, this would be a faithful Mormon's worst nightmare. If you were to give John magic wand and say, john, whatever you want, you wave the magic wand, you get it? I would not eliminate religion and I would not eliminate Mormonism because I don't think secular people have figured out a way to create not just community, but morality, spirituality, a sense of meaning, a sense of purpose, a sense of identity in any sustainable, coherent, lasting, profoundly affecting way. Now, there are individuals that have figured stuff out for them individually, but I care about society maybe even more than I do the individual. And I think in some ways religion is the best we've ever come up with for helping people live happy, healthy, meaningful lives so far. And I'm just not necessarily happy with the, with the practical results of secularism in the lived lives of people. That's not to say on an individual level, I understand, but on an aggregate social level. And so until there's something better, I just want, I don't want religion to go away. I just want the healthiest religion possible. And so, yes, I think there's so many people that feel a sense of emptiness, a loss of spirituality and a loss of God, a loss of connection, a loss of prayer, a loss of spirituality and meaning and even morality and structure. I think that stuff is good. And so it does not bother me at all when people come back to the church.

Greg Matsen [02:30:59] So doesn't it. Don't. To me, the whole reason that that all works is the individual relationship with God. Right. You're speaking of the practical terms, and those are all important things, right? All the community, the morality that's built. But the reason to me that it all works is because there is an anchor in a relationship. You know, that to me is the whole reason for the church. And sometimes people don't use it that way. The church becomes what is worshiped. Right? And it's not the opposite of that. People say, oh, well, Greg, then I guess you have God and you don't need the church. No, I don't believe that at all. But if you change your values hierarchy and you're going to put the church up above God, that's a problem. And I think that in our minds, sometimes we do that. But my point is that those people that are coming back, obviously the idea of the community, the strong community that's there, prayer, all of these different things you're talking about, it's still anchored in. I believe in God and I want a relationship there, and I can build that. What are your thoughts on that, specifically?

John Dehlin [02:32:11] Yeah, and I'll. Even if I. I don't want to one up you, but I would even say that for many of those people, the power is in it being true. You know what I mean? Like, you take away the truthfulness, you take away the magic, you take away the literality of it, and you make it too loosey, goosey, nebulous, New Agey. I think you, you dilute it. So that's, that's the great challenge is that, that's why I don't know that. That leftism or liberalism or even gospel liberalism is ultimately good for the church. Because I think so. Yes. I think there's an inexhaustible desire for humanity to have a relationship with the divine, and that's not going away. And if you take away Mormonism, people replace it with weird gurus or New Ageyou weird stuff, crystals or astrology. Astrology, weird gurus, conspiracy thinking. There's a lot worse theology and, or supernatural beliefs than Mormonism. A lot worse. Right. So that's again, a reason why I'm not eager for people to leave Mormonism, because you can create that hole and then fill it with something much worse. So that's why I want to have more dialogue, but much worse.

Greg Matsen [02:33:48] But you're, but you're, you've been saying that, that the church is not one of those worst things. I mean, I think I said.

John Dehlin [02:33:53] No, I don't, I don't think it's

Greg Matsen [02:33:54] okay to say publicly because I think you said it publicly, but I think you said it might have been even just Stephen Pyticker, but you said outside of maybe LGBTQ issues, you would seriously think about if you had young kids putting them in church. Did I hear that right?

John Dehlin [02:34:12] When I, when you, I mean, it's, it's complicated because. Yes, I, I don't love, I don't love the many of the messages about race in the past. The church is clearly getting better about that. I don't, I don't. I, I'm, I'm very uncomfortable with how women, based on the women that I've talked to that feel hurt by the church. I know that there are a lot of Women who love the church and feel healthy and taken care of. I'm also concerned about the women that say the church harmed them. Again, the abuse stuff is very significant. The child abuse stuff, and the systemic, what I feel, bias that often ends up protecting abusers at the expense of the abused. Like there are significant problems. But there's so much good about Mormonism. There's so much that's good. So I consider myself still Mormon. I've reached out to my bishop and I've said, hey, Bishop, if I came to sacrament meeting, would you be okay with that? I haven't heard back from him yet. It's been a few weeks. But I. I don't know. I'm as. I'm as. I'll answer this way. I'm as unsettled about the state of secularism. I might even be a little more unsettled about the state of secularism as I am about the challenges I see with within Mormon culture. But what I'll say is the LDS Church seems to be getting a lot better and at a very fast rate. And so I don't know if I could. I can't say that I would request to be rebaptized, but if the church were to say, john, we take away your excommunication and you're still a member of. I think I would. I think I would at least occasionally attend. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Greg Matsen [02:36:07] Yeah,

John Dehlin [02:36:10] I think I would. I think. And. And I. I still consider the Mormon people my people, and I still want the church to be its healthiest, best self. I don't know if that even answers your question.

Greg Matsen [02:36:20] Yeah, it does.

John Dehlin [02:36:20] Okay.

Greg Matsen [02:36:21] Answers the question.

John Dehlin [02:36:21] But that's not to say that I'm insensitive to the people who are harmed by the church. And I don't think you are either.

Greg Matsen [02:36:27] Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Appreciate you inviting me on and having this conversation. I've enjoyed it.

John Dehlin [02:36:36] Well, I can't thank you enough, Greg Matson, for being willing to come on the show. For me, bridge building isn't Kumbaya, you know. What did you say Jesus, Soft Jesus

Greg Matsen [02:36:49] or Teddy Bear Jesus.

John Dehlin [02:36:51] It's not. We all have to accept all points of view as valid. It doesn't mean we can't disagree. It's not even that we come. Come to the same conclusions. It's that we can talk to each other, learn to listen and understand each other, not dehumanize each other, not have strawman characterizations of the other. Listen and try and maybe be edified by a direct, healthy conversation. And so I'M profoundly grateful that you would come into the studio and be interviewed and I hope you feel honored and respected in our conversation.

Greg Matsen [02:37:28] Yeah, I do appreciate it very much.

Closing Thoughts and How to Follow Cwic Media

John Dehlin [02:37:31] What do you want to tell people about you and what you do and how they can support you and how they can support Quick.

Greg Matsen [02:37:39] Yeah, I mean, if you go to YouTube, quick show on YouTube is where the podcast is. You can find it also on any standard Spotify and on Apple and et cetera, on the podcast.

John Dehlin [02:37:54] Can people donate to support you if they want to? No.

Greg Matsen [02:37:57] No donations.

John Dehlin [02:37:57] You don't accept donations?

Greg Matsen [02:37:58] No, no donations.

John Dehlin [02:37:59] So that's hardcore, man.

Greg Matsen [02:38:01] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:38:01] Yeah.

Greg Matsen [02:38:01] Well, we're a little different, so. No, but I appreciate the idea. I appreciate the offer, but. Yeah, so that's just. Check that out. The website is quickmedia.com so we do a few things other besides a podcast. But. And yeah. So quickmedia.com you can find out more about me on there and what Quick Media is all about. And listen to the podcast and YouTube

John Dehlin [02:38:27] channel for one last question. For those who are struggling in their faith and want to hang on. Do you have a testimony or words of encouragement for them?

Greg Matsen [02:38:41] Well, this might be a little odd

John Dehlin [02:38:42] on the show and you can bear your testimony. I would welcome that. Yeah.

Greg Matsen [02:38:46] Yeah. So. So for me, you know, they're. There are. I will, if that's all right.

John Dehlin [02:38:50] Yeah, please.

Greg Matsen [02:38:50] I'll just say a few things. It's not the standard thing you're going to hear, but there are three ways that I look at this with truth and what my faith journey has been. The first is I have studied the gospel. Right. I have decades of studying this and I understand people study different, have different conclusions, but these are my conclusions. I have studied. I have put the puzzle pieces together. I don't have them all there, but I can see what the picture is. And I intellectually have a testimony. I intellectually see the truth. I believe. Right. Secondly, and I think this is very important is, and I've said this a lot, faith. I hope if there was one thing I would try and get across to anybody here, regardless of. You can't stand what I've said or you like what I've said. Faith is not belief. Faith is not belief. And so you could believe something, I could believe something. It doesn't matter. None of that matters. Faith is trust. That is the Latin word that it comes from fidere. It is that faith is trust. And trust is the most real thing you can have because it can't lie to you. Trust is not going to lie to you. And so do I have faith in the gospel? Yes. Do I have faith in God? Yes. But the only reason I have faith is because I've tested it, I have proven it. And just like it says in the Book of Mormon, I do the exact same thing as the scientific method. Exactly the same. It is. I am going to experiment. Alma even uses those words. I'm going to take an experiment, I'm going to look at it and I'm going to prove it. I'm going to try it out. That is the only reason you can know, right? And you'll hear a lot of times, well, you don't have knowledge beforehand or knowledge comes. Or rather, faith can't be trust. Faith is just. You got to believe on everything, and that isn't true. You can't do that. You have no foundation if you've done that whatsoever. You have to be able to prove something. And even though it is metaphysical, it is spiritual, it is the same process as science. It's just with your spiritual life, you prove it. And once I have those layers of proof in the way I've lived, I see the manifestation and the fruits of those things. Things now I know, right? You have to be able to do that. That's trust. That's what faith is. And thirdly, I will say that I have felt the spirit. And just like you're going to get in the end of the Book of Mormon and Moroni 10, four, I have had that special witness, and I have that as well. But for me, I need all three of those. I have to have the intellectual side. I've always liked the candy. For me, to some degree, I've got to have the proof and the trust that is built up. And that's the relationship part. I want the relationship, and I have to do that in my marriage. My wife doesn't trust me perfectly. I don't trust her perfectly. We can't. We're not perfect. But you have to build the trust over time. It's all about the relationship. And I think that's what you have to do with the gospel and with God in building a relationship of trust that is based off of experience and proving it. So that's my testimony, I guess, that I would say. And then as far as like anything else that I would look at or somebody who's got a faith crisis and looking at it is just do those three things, put the puzzle together as much as you can, see what the picture is that you get, there are going to be problems. You can't look at any history for example, and say, I have the entire picture. You don't, and you probably never will. But you can start to see a picture in studying things. And if you've gone through one layer and you've pulled it back and you're a little shocked, and it's like, you know, there might be a little bit more to it. Reality is not always pleasant and it's not always, you know, singing a hymn and having, you know, something fluffy and comfortable to wear. So keep going through it and look through the layers and see what's out there on the other end of things. So appreciate you.

John Dehlin [02:43:13] Let me say that, Greg Matson, I respect you and I respect what you do, and I hope y' all will check out. Quick Media.

Greg Matsen [02:43:20] Thanks so much.

John Dehlin [02:43:21] Quick. Quick Show. The Quick Show, Quick show and Quick Media. Yeah. Thanks for coming on. Warm stories.

Greg Matsen [02:43:26] Thank you.

John Dehlin [02:43:26] All right. And if people want to reach out to you, get a hold of you, how do they do it?

Greg Matsen [02:43:30] Best way to do it to be on the website is, is there's a contact form on the website, quick media.com CWIC media.com just right there. There's a contact form on there. You can get hold of me there.

John Dehlin [02:43:41] All right. All right. Well, thanks again, Greg Matson, and thanks to all of you who joined us today on Mormon Stories. If you are mad that I brought on somebody who's more socially or politically right, I would just say think about that for a second, that we've had thousands, literally, of episodes that lead left. Can we not tolerate having some right voices on the podcast? Do we want to live in an echo chamber? And yeah, I just don't want to hear. I want. I want my viewers and listeners in the comments to be respectful to Greg, even if you disagree with him. I want to ask for respectful, thoughtful comments that realize that it's an act of courage and faith for him to even come in the studio and do an interview with me. So I'm going to ask my viewers and listeners to be respectful in the comments. And I don't want to hear complaints that I should not have platformed or. Or invited on the show somebody who has views, socially or politically, that are on the right. Don't even bother. If that makes you not want to watch or listen to Mormon stories, I get it. Go watch, review, whatever makes you feel better. But I don't want to live in a world where across the religious or faith spectrum or across the political spectrum or across the social spectrum, we can't talk to each other. We ignore each other and talk about each other and dehumanize and belittle each other. I don't want to live in that world and I don't want to live in a world where religious people are demeaned and minimized and devalued because I don't think you're better than a if you're a secular, you're better than a believing person. Just like I don't believe you're better than a secular person if you're a believer. So this is the direction I want to go in with the podcast to the extent that people are willing to participate. So you do what you want with that. But that's how I feel. And you don't even waste your digital ink if you hate this direction. Because that's what I feel is important. Anyway, thanks for supporting us today. Thanks for joining us. I do want feedback if you know mormonstoriesmail.com if you've got feedback or ideas. I do want constructive comments. Greg's a big boy. If you want to be thoughtful and kind and respectful in responding to what he has to say, he may even read some of the comments and respond, I don't know. So I always want feedback. I just don't want to hear that we're just not going to even listen to or have conversations with people that are different than us. Yeah, because I don't want to live in that world. Anyway, thanks to everyone who donates and supports to make this possible. Be good to each other. Be kind to each other. We hope to do more bridge building and peacemaking episodes in the future. If you are a more right leaning person or conservative person or believing person and you've got a thoughtful approach or perspective, we invite you to come on too. Help make Mormon stories more balanced. Help make Mormon stories more faith supporting. We just need people to come on and raise their voice. So that's an openness to any of our critics out there who want to see us be more fair or more balanced or more reflective or respectful of the faithful perspective. Be good to each other. Be kind to each other. We'll see you all again soon on another episode of Mormon Stories podcast. Take care of.