Introducing Riley Davis, Former Seminary Teacher

John Dehlin [00:00:00] What would make a high school seminary teacher for the LDS Church or the Mormon Church resign his calling, finish his teaching on a Friday, and come on Mormon Stories podcast on a Monday. Hello everyone, and welcome to Mormon Stories Podcast. I'm your host, John Dehlin. It is August 4th, I believe, 2025, and today we're interviewing Riley Davis. Hey, Riley.

Riley Davis [00:00:24] Good to be here, John. Thanks for having me.

John Dehlin [00:00:26] Yeah, you literally your last day working for the CES for the church education system as a high school seminary teacher was a couple days ago, was Friday.

Riley Davis [00:00:37] Absolutely. Yeah. I cleared out my office and left my keys and I've got one day in between my last job and my new job tomorrow, so.

John Dehlin [00:00:46] And you decided to use Mormon Stories as a way to fill that one day off.

Riley Davis [00:00:52] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:00:53] So obviously we're going to be talking about what, what it's like to be a CES teacher or a high school seminary teacher or religious educator for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints or Mormon Church in 2025. But we're also, I think, gonna be talking about the faith journey. You know, to what extent are historical or doctrinal or cultural or bureaucratic issues affecting Latter Day Saints or Mormons these days, and also how those things might or might not spillover for church educators and for church employees. So this is gonna be, I'm guessing, shorter but still long form classical Mormon stories interview, carrying on the tradition of interviewing former CES teachers. So we've interviewed Grant Palmer, we've interviewed Mark Osland, we've interviewed Laura Schnell, David Bachavoy. Dave Bacavoy. You probably know the church educators better than me.

Riley Davis [00:01:56] Well, not as many on here. Cause it not going to lie. Mormon Stories isn't something we're really allowed to watch. So it's only been recently that I've started to see those. But Dave Bacavoy is one of my heroes. So I definitely loved those episodes.

John Dehlin [00:02:10] Yeah. So we'll make sure to include those in the show notes because this is not the first and likely won't be the last long form interview. And like I, you know, we always have certain types of interviews that are almost guaranteed yeses and they're going to be people working for the church inside or recently in the church inside who can give us an insider's view of what's going on in the church. Church educators, high level leaders in the church like bishops, relief society presidents, stake presidents, mission presidents, and higher. You know, they're always going to be welcome on Mormon Stories as well as we're always going to do regular stories, people on the street, et cetera, et cetera.

Support Mormon Stories Podcast

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Riley's Mormon Upbringing in Utah

Riley Davis [00:04:07] Well, I grew up in a very Mormon community out in Syracuse, Utah.

John Dehlin [00:04:14] Tell our viewers and listeners outside of

Riley Davis [00:04:15] Utah, where that is so just northern Davis county about half hour north of Salt Lake here. And my dad grew up just a few minutes from here actually. But yeah, I grew up in Syracuse. I remember on the ward maps that they used to print out in those old days where you had all the different houses and stuff like that, there were only two or three blank houses. Like we knew who everyone was. Pretty much everyone were members of the church out there.

John Dehlin [00:04:44] Subdivision.

Riley Davis [00:04:45] Yep, yep. And so I grew up out there.

John Dehlin [00:04:48] I were your parents raised in the church, temple, married, all that stuff.

Riley Davis [00:04:52] Yeah. So like I said, my dad was just from right out here in Salt Lake and he is one of six kids, I'm one of six kids. He's of pioneer stock going all the way back to, to the Nauvoo days. I mean, as much as you can trust family histories, I, it's, I'm a little more skeptical now. But like according to his family history, Joseph Smith stopped on his way to Carthage and bore testimony that Mormonism is true and stick with it, for in it is eternal life. So and so he comes from a very devout Mormon family, my mom's family. She, when she was younger, she didn't Grow up a member of the church.

Riley Davis [00:05:35] So she grew up in Montana, Kalispell, Montana. And her family, it was actually not in Montana, I think it was Wyoming. But they found the missionaries converted and from the get go were very, very faithful. After that conversion, within a few weeks my grandma went from new convert to Relief Society president and they've just been faithful ever since. So I've got it coming from both sides, but goes a lot further back.

John Dehlin [00:06:07] And when you say in terms of siblings, where are you in the birth order?

Riley Davis [00:06:11] Yeah, so I'm the oldest of six. Okay. It's a very just big patterned Mormon family. Boy, girl, boy, girl, boy, girl. Every two years, all of our names end in ey, so it all goes in line there, but.

John Dehlin [00:06:24] Okay, okay. So we, you know, we've often asked people kind of to what extent they had the traditional Mormon upbringing. We don't necessarily have to dig into that today. Let me just ask you, to what extent did, did you have a traditional Mormon upbringing?

Riley Davis [00:06:41] Very. And I, I feel like the church pressures and stuff really came into my life through my dad's leadership position. So my dad, ever since I was young, probably eight, he was in the bishopric, then high council, then bishop, and then got called into the stake presidency. So you think five years for bishop and eight years for stake presidency, that's like it's the major.

John Dehlin [00:07:09] Half your life, right? More.

Riley Davis [00:07:11] Well, half my life now even. But speaking of my young self, like, I never didn't have a dad who was involved in high demand leadership callings and that it really caused a lot of strain for me, just the pressure of having your dad be the bishop. I looked up to him just so much and didn't feel like I could ever let him down, let alone confess. Right. And so you end up just harboring things and it's just not a healthy mental space for an 1112 year old to be in.

John Dehlin [00:07:47] So the age window where your dad was your Mormon bishop was kind of what, early teens?

Riley Davis [00:07:53] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:07:54] That's the worst.

Riley Davis [00:07:55] Yeah, yeah. No, and the thing is like you, you just can't. You've got these doctrines saying, well, confess and forsake. That's how you know that someone's a man has repented of his sins, but you've got this 13 year old kid who's like, no, I, I can't. My dad's perfect, he's the bishop. I, it would change how he looked at me and all these things and eventually like for a 12 year old to be going through in their mind and saying, yeah, I, I would rather be separated from my family for time and all eternity than have to go confess to my dad and just saying, like rationalizing, oh, just live a really good life here. And then it' mind boggling that we make these kids go through these mental. Just, it's, it's rough.

John Dehlin [00:08:49] And those who follow Mormon stories will know that, you know, even though there's hundreds and hundreds of possible sins, when we're talking about 12, 13 year old Mormon boys, there's only one or two sins that we're talking about, right?

Riley Davis [00:09:02] No, absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:09:03] It's, it's, you know, the church really emphasizes don't look at pornography and don't masturbate. Was that your experience? That was talked about a lot growing up.

Riley Davis [00:09:14] It was huge. And the thing is, I was so scared of pornography, I would never let myself really. And besides, it was before smartphones, so it was a little easier to stay away from pornography and stuff. But when it comes to masturbation, just the idea that this 11 year old, this 12 year old kid is next to a murderer, because that's the gravity.

John Dehlin [00:09:38] Were you taught that?

Riley Davis [00:09:39] Yeah, yeah. And the thing is, my parents, there have been a few times where I voiced things to them and they're like, no, that's not what we taught you, but it's what the church teaches us.

John Dehlin [00:09:51] For those who have never heard this before, what specific scriptural passage or passages or general authority quotes gave you that impression that masturbation was close to murder?

Riley Davis [00:10:03] I mean, the idea that, well, it's Alma talking to his son corianton. Right. So Alma 39 or something like that. But just talking about how sexual sin, which Corianton had been guilty of, is the most grievous of all sins, second only to the shedding of innocent blood. And then you second that with people saying, okay, well now you've crucified Christ afresh. And that takes it to even a new level. Because then you're not just, oh, you're second to murder, but you're like crucifying Christ afresh. You're murdering the most perfect person.

John Dehlin [00:10:42] Where does that come from? So let me just talk this through. So Christ lived 2,000 years ago. He suffered in Gethsemane for all our sins, died on the cross. Where in the world does anyone get the idea that to sin now is like him getting re crucified? Where does that come from?

Riley Davis [00:10:58] There's a New Testament passage that talks about crucifying Christ afresh. And I, I don't know if it was Elder Holland or who it was in Our Mormon leadership that has brought that in. Maybe it was Elder Holland Souls, Symbols and Sacraments, that classic kind of scare tactic away from sexual.

John Dehlin [00:11:18] At the BYU married school.

Riley Davis [00:11:19] No way.

John Dehlin [00:11:20] When he and Patricia gave that talk. Really? Yeah, I was there.

Riley Davis [00:11:23] Well, yeah, I mean for years on my shelf in my office as a seminary teacher, they, they made it into a nice book that was sold at Deseret Book and it sat up on my shelf and yeah, there's just. So. I just don't real. I don't know if we understand when we're the typical TBM true blue Mormon, like just going through it. I don't know if we take a second to stop and understand how potentially harmful these things are, especially for the youth just being a kid and feeling those things like we've, we've got this beautiful doctrine of family. Families can be together forever, but the emphasis is on the Can I. I was just like meaning cannot. Yeah, exactly. So they can be together forever, but the default is not being together forever.

John Dehlin [00:12:14] Right.

Riley Davis [00:12:14] And unless you're in the highest tier of the highest degree of the kingdoms of glory, you're not going to have that celestial family.

John Dehlin [00:12:24] Yeah.

Riley Davis [00:12:24] And so as, as a teen just feeling like, holy cow, I've messed up, I've sinned. Sexual sin is second to mur things. It just, it was a really depressing place and it led to a lot of depression on my part and even to self injury and thoughts of suicide. And so I just can't underscore enough how important it is that we, we talk to our kids about those things and that we let them know that, that yeah, the church may portray this and we don't like to see him as a harsh God. And my mom will say, well that's not the God I taught you, but any God that's going to rip your family away from you if you don't live up to this standard in my mind is like that.

Religious Scrupulosity and Adolescent Struggles

John Dehlin [00:13:16] So just to check in about your childhood, pre adolescence, was your Mormon upbringing before the law of chastity stuff and puberty come into play. Would you say your Mormon upbringing was what?

Riley Davis [00:13:30] Yeah, it was, it was just typical normal, good. Yeah, yeah, it was. I, I really think until those dynamics, I never had a reason to feel like I was going to hell. You know, I, I had a great childhood and my parents are phenomenal. They honestly are some of the most loving and kind people I've ever met. So it was, it was all very.

John Dehlin [00:13:53] So it's like, it's like coming into adolescence learning about the law of Chastity about repentance. It sounds like it's like a psychological train wreck.

Riley Davis [00:14:03] Oh, yeah, absolutely. I mean, and the whole time I, I've just been very involved in leadership in the church my whole life. Like deacon's quorum. Yeah, deacons, Quorum president, teachers quorum president first, not elders, but priest quorum first assistant, which. And eventually once my dad was released from the bishopric, I was able to confess to my next bish. And it felt weird, like I'm his first assistant and I'm supposed to be setting an example for the quorum and all this stuff. Yeah, 17, I think. And so that's like five years of lying.

John Dehlin [00:14:43] I mean, I don't know. Accused of lying, but like, no, please.

Riley Davis [00:14:47] And it get you.

John Dehlin [00:14:48] It was five years of lying.

Riley Davis [00:14:49] Yeah. It gets to be just those mental gymnastics and saying, oh, but I think I have been forgiven. Right. You know, because you, you hear about the Alma, the younger stories and all these stories in the scriptures and these people didn't go confess to an ecclesiastical leader and you're like, okay, well if I have that experience, then, then I'm good.

John Dehlin [00:15:14] If Alma in the Book of Mormon can feel, I mean, Jesus hadn't even been born yet.

Riley Davis [00:15:18] No.

John Dehlin [00:15:19] Right. So if Alma can, without a bishop, receive forgiveness for his sins, then maybe a 12, 13, 15 year old Utah boy from Syracuse can also not have to tell his dad that he's doing this and extra murder and receive forgiveness.

Riley Davis [00:15:37] Or Omni or all these other people or Paul, like, you've got all these examples. So there was a lot of like really heartfelt like, no, I'm going to go to the temple and if I feel good, if I feel like peace, then I'll know God has forgiven me.

John Dehlin [00:15:54] And that's justification why?

Riley Davis [00:15:57] Because you, you need to feel like, I mean, according to Mormon doctrine, you're not allowed to go into the temple if you don't live up to the temple recommend. And so you're, you're trying to balance this of like understanding, okay, where am I at with God? But in Mormonism, it feels like the only window into where you're at with God is via your priesthood leaders. Which actually led to some just almost like an obsession. Not in a weird way, but I felt compelled to confess from that moment when I finally, after like you said, five years of struggling with this feeling like I'm not gonna have my eternal family of just dealing with this on my own and feeling so weighed down, when I finally did confess to that next bishop, the feeling was so overwhelming and so Peaceful and so good that I was like, I.

Riley Davis [00:16:53] I need to always feel like it actually becomes this compulsion of. I got to the point, like, I always tried to live the law of chastity in my dating life and all those things. But the smallest thing I would feel like I would have to go and tell to the bishop just because he was the window into how God feels about me.

John Dehlin [00:17:17] Yeah.

Riley Davis [00:17:17] If I talk to the bishop and he says, you're good, you can go to the temple. I know if I were to die right then that I would have my eternal family.

John Dehlin [00:17:25] Yeah. So you've heard the term scrupulosity?

Riley Davis [00:17:28] Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah. I've never. I haven't been officially diagnosed or anything, but I've done a lot of looking into, and I think it would definitely apply to me and my life and especially. And I think it probably was developed in that time period where I was just feeling so trapped, so alone, feeling like I couldn't tell anyone what was going on.

John Dehlin [00:17:50] Yeah. So, for those who are new to Mormon stories, we've covered scrupulosity quite a bit. It's what I did my master's thesis on back in 2009 and 2010. I helped develop a treatment for scrupulosity. Scrupulosity is religious obsessive compulsive disorder. But instead of washing your hands compulsively or hoarding compulsively, or, you know, turning light switches on and off compulsively, or whatever it is, it's, you know, manifested in things like praying compulsively, ruminating compulsively about your religious worthiness, or hyper confessing to your ecclesiastical leader. If you've heard, if you know someone who experiences these types of things, or if you do, or if you remember being that way, Google religious scrupulosity and you can learn a lot.

Riley Davis [00:18:41] There's a lot out there.

John Dehlin [00:18:42] Yeah.

Riley Davis [00:18:43] Thankfully. And I feel like the conversation is turning and we're starting to see even church leaders kind of caring about the mental space of these youth and stuff. But I just remember. I just remember as a member of the bishopric, going with the young, the brand new deacons in our ward, who now are like, 11. So this is, like, tiny. And I remember just looking at them and thinking, like, are you worried about the things that I was worried about when I was here? Like, are you in your head saying, I'm not worthy to be here? I. I remember going in and saying, like. Like, well, I'll go in. And when they confirm me, if they lay their hands on my head and Actually confirm me rather than saying, wait, something's not right.

John Dehlin [00:19:28] It's like, yeah, oh, you must not be worthy.

Riley Davis [00:19:31] Exactly. And so when brother so and so laid his hands on my head and confirmed me, I left saying, oh my

John Dehlin [00:19:37] gosh, I must be worthy.

Riley Davis [00:19:38] Thank heavens I'm worthy, you know, and just these kids, they're not developed and what we teach them matters. It their minds are going at a thousand miles an hour trying to backflip over all of these religious dogmas that are really harmful.

John Dehlin [00:19:56] Funny story, someone close to me was breaking some, was sitting on his mission, and a general authority came to visit the mission and shook hands with all the missionaries. You probably know where this is going. And he's thinking, oh my gosh, oh my gosh. When the general authority shakes my hand, what do you think he's thinking? You can.

Riley Davis [00:20:17] As soon as he touches my hand, he'll know that I'm unworthy. He'll ask to see me after. But they just go down the line.

John Dehlin [00:20:25] They're just people. When the general authority didn't stop and call him in, he actually lost his faith, or it was a major blow to his faith because he's thought, well, if he doesn't have the gift of discernment, then I know I'm unworthy. So maybe things don't add up anyway.

Riley Davis [00:20:44] Yeah, no, it makes sense because just you live in this kind of mythical world growing up where, I mean, obviously angels show up and give people golden plates or direct them to golden plates, and you live in this world of miracles and all that stuff. So obviously it would apply to you. And so you start reading into things like that.

John Dehlin [00:21:06] And the crazy thing is, and we've covered this a million times on Mormon stories, but pretty much everyone's masturbating, including the bishops and the stake presidents and the mission presidents. And so like, it's totally manufactured. It's completely ubiquitous statistically. And yet everybody's stressed out or guilty or lying or shaming. It's a weird setup.

Riley Davis [00:21:30] And it's weird with masturbation, specifically because I feel like in the church we can't even say that word. Right, right. And so pornography. I had it drilled into me just like pornography. If you were to struggle with that, your the lowest of the low. It's awful. You're terrible. And so I was able to stay away from that. But with masturbation, they kind of say, well, don't do anything that would bring feelings, arouse the powers those feelings in yourself. And you're like, just it. Because no one ever Talks about it, it just lives in the shadows. And people like, this is literally to the point where people hurt themselves and when people choose to take their lives. And so I just.

John Dehlin [00:22:19] Okay, wait. So like that's. My impression is that just like we've talked about, like a gay or lesbian Mormon sometimes feeling suicidal over the conflict between their sexuality. Are you saying you're aware of this dynamic of, of prohibiting masturbation or pornography or intense shame or guilt around masturbation or pornography can lead to things as serious as self harm, suicidal ideation, or even suicide attempts?

Riley Davis [00:22:52] Yes, in the sense that it was there for me. I never attempted, but I absolutely felt so ashamed. I mean, we have this narrative too. Why was the flood all right? Why was it okay for God to wipe out all those people? And the answer that I got told is, well, they would have kept sinning and it would have been even better for that. It would have been better for them to die and have the sitting cut off than to live throughout their whole lives and keep sinning. And so as this teen, I'm just like, well, I'm. I'm struggling with this. I've tried to stop. I cannot stop this. And would it be better to. To cut those sins short?

John Dehlin [00:23:37] Oh, because if God can kill all the children, you know, during Noah's ark time, it means that if you're wicked enough, you probably deserve death.

Riley Davis [00:23:49] Yeah. And the idea is.

John Dehlin [00:23:51] Never thought of that before.

Riley Davis [00:23:52] Well, and just the idea that it was. I remember being told it was merciful for God to kill those people because they would have made it worse for themselves by staying alive and keeping living throughout their whole lives. And so. Or Laban, it's better that one man should perish. Just this idea. The God I believed in was one who was so harsh and so just final like that. Hey, if you're really not going to get your life together, it would probably be better to end it than to keep sinning.

John Dehlin [00:24:25] Yeah.

Riley Davis [00:24:26] Wow.

John Dehlin [00:24:26] I just, you know, the. I'm having thoughts I've never had before, 20 years into this podcast. But like, yeah, if, you know, you're not going to be in the celestial kingdom, but currently you're sinning at the terrestrial level. In your terrestrial kingdom level, in your mind, you might think it's better to die than to keep sinning to put you in the telestial level. Although you're also taught that, that, that suicide is a sin.

Mental Health Crisis and Suicidal Ideation as a Teen

Riley Davis [00:24:56] Yeah, no, it's true. And honestly, once you're at that low. Yeah, I, well, once you're contemplating like, methods and Stuff like that. It's just. It's just a really. It was a super, super low part of my life. And honestly, I feel like the thing that brought me out of that depression and just that shame spiral that I was in was I. I got a job at a scout camp camp in the summers, and I feel like I just was good at things and I started to gain that confidence and to. To really just say, no, I'm. I'm someone, like, worth something, you know? And so I. I feel like that kind of helped lift me out of it. And then I really didn't experience depression like that again until I eventually started working for seminary and institutes.

John Dehlin [00:25:49] Okay, we'll get there. Okay. Wow. Well, we just jumped right in. That's pretty intense. Thanks for being willing to share such hard stuff. I should also add the church has this weird blood atonement doctrine that came from Brigham Young, where Brigham Young would teach people that sometimes you do people a favor to murder them versus allow them to keep sinning. And that came from Brigham Young. It's called blood atonement. Look it up. It's a thing. So that can get mixed into all this.

Riley Davis [00:26:19] If you want a lot of the original documents. Mormonr.org the BH Roberts foundation has their collection on blood atonement. It's the best that I've found when it comes to going back to original primary documents and stuff. So.

John Dehlin [00:26:33] Okay, we'll have Brooklyn add that to the show notes, which you can find@mormonstories.org okay, really quickly, what else were you into in high school besides church leadership as a. As a team?

Riley Davis [00:26:45] I mean, honestly, I. Once I started at that scout camp, I felt like my confidence was boosted. I ran for student body office. I was like the ninth grade pre or vice president, sophomore president, junior president, sbo. I was one of the vice presidents and stuff. So very involved in, like, school leadership every summer. I never really did sports and stuff because every summer I was gone at different scout camps, either Yellowstone or I worked on Catalina island at a scout camp out there as well.

John Dehlin [00:27:20] What high school did you go to?

Riley Davis [00:27:21] Clearfield High. Okay, Go Falcons.

John Dehlin [00:27:24] Okay, and so what year? Just so I can get the chronology in my mind, what year did you graduate from high school?

Riley Davis [00:27:33] 2010.

John Dehlin [00:27:34] Okay, so you're in high school from around 2006 to 2010?

Riley Davis [00:27:38] Yep.

John Dehlin [00:27:39] Right. Okay. When did the church get rid of the Boy Scouts of America?

Riley Davis [00:27:44] That was way later. That's like 2017 or 18 somewhere. Maybe later.

John Dehlin [00:27:52] So one of the funny dynamics historically with Mormon culture prior to the Church getting rid of the Boy Scouts of America program is that a really super devout Mormon boy might get his Eagle Scout, which is the highest rank of Boy scouts, by age 13.

Riley Davis [00:28:11] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:28:12] What age were you?

Riley Davis [00:28:13] So I had all of my merit badges except for the last three. There's three that take three months rather than a few days. And so I had my Eagle Scout project done at 14. So I was ready at 14. And then the ironic thing is I got into Scout camps and loved Scout camp so much, I didn't bother to get my Eagle until I was like, right before 18. So you got.

John Dehlin [00:28:39] You got it?

Riley Davis [00:28:40] Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. So I'm. I'm an Eagle Scout, and my parents were on the ball, just awesome Mormon parents. I was painting the. The crosswalks up at the local elementary and doing. Doing our Eagle Scout project. And so. But yeah, so scouting was a big part of my life, and I loved. I loved that the church was involved in it, and I was pretty heartbroken when they stepped away too.

John Dehlin [00:29:04] So I just out of curiosity, the church in 2025 is famous for an epidemic of child abuse within the Boy Scouts, and that's one of the main reasons they got rid of it was because there were, I don't know, my understanding is like 80,000 actual claims of child abuse just within the LDS Church and the Boy Scouts of America. Were you aware of any claims or allegations of child abuse?

Riley Davis [00:29:31] Absolutely not in a Boy Scout context.

John Dehlin [00:29:33] Okay, that's good.

Riley Davis [00:29:34] And so it. Honestly, later on in my story, those finding out about the church's abuse history was a huge part of my deconstruction. While I was in there. I. I never saw or had anything in my quorums. I just had really loving, awesome Scout leaders growing up that we had a great time and worked at camps, and it was awesome. Awesome.

John Dehlin [00:29:57] So, yeah, that was my experience. I loved the. My Boy Scouting experiences too. Overall. Okay, so student body officer, church callings,

Riley Davis [00:30:07] hiking outdoors, rock climbing.

John Dehlin [00:30:10] Okay.

Riley Davis [00:30:10] Yeah, perfect.

Confessions, Dating, and Bishop Interviews

John Dehlin [00:30:11] Okay. Do you want to talk about dating at all?

Riley Davis [00:30:15] Yeah. Yeah. So. And I guess that'll come full circle later and stuff. But yeah, when it comes to dating, like I said, I always tried to. To live the church standards, the law of chastity. But as a teenage boy, you struggle. Right. And so definitely once I had confessed that first time to my bishop, I had finally confessed. And honestly, I think what brought me in for that confession was I knew that I had more to confess than just the masturbation we had talked about earlier. I felt like things had gone a little bit Too far with the girl that I was dating. And so that kind of.

Riley Davis [00:31:02] Whereas it's ambiguous with the lesser issues. Right. It was like, no, I absolutely need to go talk to a bishop about this. And so I went and confessed and ended up up breaking up with that girl because I knew I wanted to serve a mission and I didn't want to be near anything that could potentially stop me from serving a mission.

John Dehlin [00:31:33] So you did have. And it sounds like it was a pretty positive encounter with your bishop around.

Riley Davis [00:31:38] Oh yeah. No, he's a fantastic guy. And I think the reason I could go is because I just trusted him so much. Like I said, when it comes to bishop roulette and scout leader roulette and even parent roulette, like, I, I've won all those things. I had a really great experience. If you can set aside the psychological stuff that I went through with it really quickly.

John Dehlin [00:32:04] Utah Mormon culture has this weird group dating kind of thing. And then there are all these high school dances.

Riley Davis [00:32:11] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:32:12] And you're not supposed to ever really take the same person. Tell me if this was true for you, like on more than one high school dance throughout your high school career. And then you're always trying to find groups to go with. So you're never like alone with a human. Dating ages, do you want to talk about your experience?

Riley Davis [00:32:33] For sure, yeah. I mean, the dating ages, it was really strict. I, I did start kind of seeing someone when I was 15 and I felt like it was so sketchy for me to be seeing someone or to kiss someone, you know. But I remember it being strict enough that in my seminary class actually, because seminary classes are different in the sense you've got multiple grades all in the same class, 10 through 12. And so as I was a freshman, my birthday's pretty late in the year, so I was a 15 year old freshman for like, like or not freshman, sophomore my whole 10th grade year.

Riley Davis [00:33:11] And I remember I sat next to this senior girl in seminary and I found out later that she had wanted to ask me to the girls choice dance. And she asked my parent, her mom asked my mom, and my mom said no because I wasn't 16 yet. So you couldn't, couldn't go to the dance until you were 16, even though it was like a month or two away. So yeah, the dating ages, it, it was very prescribed. Sixteen is when you can start and then you got to keep it in group settings and stuff.

Riley Davis [00:33:43] And that's eventually why I chose to kind of call off that relationship was because it, it wasn't the kind of dating, we were serious about each other, you know, and so it wasn't the kind of dating that the church really prescribed. And I. I just knew I had seen.

Riley Davis [00:34:03] I still remember sitting outside my dad's office when he was the bishop, and I remember talking to a guy who was a priest. I was a deacon. We just got back from collecting fast offerings like we used to do, go door to door, taking people's money. But I remember sitting next to this older boy in the ward, and he was telling me about a scout camp on Catalina island that he worked at. And it kind of inspired in me. I want to work there someday. Which I did. But I still remember he was waiting to go in to meet with my dad as the bishop, and he was there to confess.

Riley Davis [00:34:43] And he had had multiple sexual partners. And as a result, he was forbidden with the raising the bar, was forbidden from serving a mission. So I just remember as a teen being like, I can. I can't let that be me. I can't go near. I can't have these relationships. I can't really date people seriously or one on one. Because I've seen what it does. And what it does is like, he was really earnest and really wanted to serve, and the church just said no. My dad wanted to let him go as a bishop, but he couldn't.

John Dehlin [00:35:21] Yeah. Yeah. And so that made you feel what?

Riley Davis [00:35:26] Just a lot of, like, anxiety, a lot of fear. Just like, no, gotta call off that relationship. The spirit's telling me to. Compelling me to, because I need to stay pure, I need to stay worthy, because I want to be a missionary.

John Dehlin [00:35:43] You have a little story about the. The fire hose. Do you want to do it?

Riley Davis [00:35:48] Yeah. Yeah. I. There. It was just a quote that really resonated with. When it comes to these, like, compulsions, just the idea that when I first confessed to my bishop, and it just felt so good, so overwhelmingly good, that I was like, I am good with God, you know?

Riley Davis [00:36:07] And just later on, I. I heard a quote that really resonated with me. And it's like, if you start a fire and then offer to put it out, that doesn't make you a firefighter. That makes you an arsonist with a hose. And how so? I. I really just feel like the church starts this issue if you start the fire. Yeah. So I. If the church starts, even if you're willing to put it out, the shame, all this stuff, and then they're like, go to your bishop. Your bishop will help you put out that fire. That doesn't make them the good guy that they, they started the fire and then they give you the solution. And then it's just this cycle because human.

John Dehlin [00:36:47] You're saying the church starts to fire.

Riley Davis [00:36:49] Oh yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [00:36:50] You feel good guilty.

Riley Davis [00:36:51] Exactly. So the guilt, the shame that the church throws on you, they're like, oh, is your life on fire? Well, we've got a solution. Go confess to your bishop. And it feels good. But the fact that they were responsible for that guilt and that shame, it, it doesn't it. I feel like they're more responsible than they would like to be for those things.

John Dehlin [00:37:15] So. And then just you touched on it a little bit. But, but, and we can do, if we want, maybe a safety warning to people that this is a sensitive topic. So take care of yourself and anyone who might be listening or viewing. But we're going to talk about self harm for just one second. You've already mentioned this.

Riley Davis [00:37:32] Yeah,

John Dehlin [00:37:34] but how would it occur to a Mormon teen in Syracuse to self harm? How would that even happen? And then, you know, how long does that last and how do you work through that?

Riley Davis [00:37:48] Yeah. So I remember in ninth grade just being at like my all time low, just feeling just unworthy, just awful about myself. Like I really didn't have much to contribute to just life in the world, you know, and feeling like out of my family I'm the unfaithful one and they're also perfect. And so I, and I also remember being really overwhelmed by the pain and suffering of others. I had some friends who were going through in my mind just so much harder things than I was. They, whether it's their families were splitting up or one had been sexually assaulted or all of these. And I just thought, man, these people all around me are suffering so much more than me.

Riley Davis [00:38:40] And me with all of the blessings, I have great parents, I can't complain about anything and I still can't get my crap together. And so I was super depressed and some of my, a couple of the people who I talked with a lot in high school were super depressed too and as well had been self injuring, had been cutting themselves. And so I was just at such a dark place that I was like, I just want to feel anything other than the guilt and the shame and the awfulness that I feel all the time.

John Dehlin [00:39:21] So the idea is I'm feeling so much pain that if I cause myself very significant physical pain, what that'll distract me or take my mind away from the psychological torment I'm feeling?

Riley Davis [00:39:34] Yeah, and just different endorphins and stuff that are released as well. I, I still remember 10th grade or not 10th grade. It might have been junior or senior year but I ended up doing like a 15 page report on non suicidal self injury because it just fascinated me why that would be a help or a release.

John Dehlin [00:40:01] But it's quite common. I don't know if it's less common in men, but it's less discussed.

Riley Davis [00:40:07] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:40:08] In a male context almost everything's less

Riley Davis [00:40:11] discussed when it comes to your mental and emotional state.

John Dehlin [00:40:15] Yeah. So do you have any thoughts on how you were able to work out of that?

Riley Davis [00:40:19] If you were, I mean time or. Honestly, it was.

John Dehlin [00:40:24] Was it like you said, the Boy Scouts gave you meaning and purpose?

Riley Davis [00:40:26] Yeah, I, I feel like. And not even the program because when it comes to the program and merit badges I could take it or leave it it with the Scouts leadership. But I, I just worked for some really amazing people. Just some incredible people who had a way of taking these youth who worked for them and letting them know no, you are awesome and you're doing a fantastic job and, and you contribute and you're needed and you can do hard things.

John Dehlin [00:40:55] Yeah.

Riley Davis [00:40:56] And so I feel like I came away from that. Like. No, I've, I've got something to share with the world. I still remember them being concerned when I got up there and we went to do our swim check and to go show that we could swim in the freezing glacier fed lake. I still remember the wife of the camp director being concerned because she saw some cuts on my arm as we were doing the swim check and just wanted to make sure everything was okay. But I really feel like, like that helped pull me out of it. Just feeling purpose and driven. I knew I wanted to be a teacher at that point.

Riley Davis [00:41:37] I mean when you're up there teaching sailing or rifle shooting, whatever you're doing. I, I knew I had a passion for helping that age of youth that I had struggled so much. And so I left there with just a passion and, and feeling like I had something to contribute to the world.

John Dehlin [00:41:56] So maybe if you're trying to get better, it's not by like repenting and praying and going to your bishop and it's not necessarily even by trying to stop. What you do is you find meaning and purpose and things that make you excited, things that make you feel accomplished or good about yourself. Then there's less distress you're experiencing and so less of a draw to need to mask or self medicate that distress away through self harm.

Riley Davis [00:42:27] Absolutely. And the irony is the whole addiction portion of it kind of fades away. Like what? You're like, no, I can never repent and never be clean of this. Right. All of a sudden it's a non issue. Right. Because your life is fulfilling and you don't need to, like you said, self medicate. And so, yeah, I. I just found a lot of fulfillment there and it felt like it pulled me out of that. That depression. And for years, I didn't feel depressed.

John Dehlin [00:42:58] Nice. Okay, beautiful. Anything else you want to say about high school before we go to kind of mission?

Riley Davis [00:43:07] No, no, I think just. Just a lot of. A lot of time in. Whether it's my callings or my dad's callings, just those callings take a huge chunk out of the. The Mormon youth's life. The for those who have parents in high demand callings. It happened later. But even after my dad got released from the Stake Presidency, my mom was called as the Stake Relief Society president, which, other than Relief Society general boards and stuff like that, that's the highest a woman can really get. And so the church just asks for a lot of time.

John Dehlin [00:43:44] Yeah. And I'm torn because on the one hand, you know, there are lots of fun or interesting things a kid might do that, looking back, they may wish they had been involved with. On the other hand, there are a lot of worse things a teen can be doing than being a Boy Scout camp leader or a priest, you know, bishop's assistant or whatever, or serving on the seminary council. So, like, I'm torn between thinking, oh, but are people spending their time on things that are true and useful and authentic and intrinsic to their values? Maybe not. But also, they're being kept busy and giving opportunities that at least give them some sense of meaning and purpose and identity. And it's hard for me to know whether it's net good or net bad.

Riley Davis [00:44:32] Totally.

John Dehlin [00:44:33] Do you have a sense for whether it was.

Riley Davis [00:44:36] I mean, when it comes to everything I was involved in and stuff, I. I loved my upbringing, you know, and I really would never say anything bad about it. It was a great way to grow up. But also anything that leads you to contemplate hurting yourself, maybe not that great, you know, and so I don't know what it would have been like without it. And when it comes to, like, seminary council and stuff, you just remember reminded me I actually didn't love most of my seminary teachers.

John Dehlin [00:45:05] I was gonna ask you that.

Riley Davis [00:45:05] Yeah. So I didn't.

John Dehlin [00:45:07] Wait a minute. You became a seminary teacher, but you didn't like your seminary?

Riley Davis [00:45:10] So I did. I still remember in ninth grade being like, okay, the two Career options for me is I could be a seminary teacher or a bodyguard for the church because I, I just really, I really wanted to be that faithful Mormon boy. Boy. And so I liked my ninth grade teacher. But then I had this window most of high school where I just felt like they were just feeding us just the basics. And I wanted like meat, meat. You know, I was at home reading Mormon doctrine. I was like getting my mom in trouble a little bit when her non Mormon friends over and they're talking about hot drinks or Coca Cola. And I'm like, well, actually in Mormon doctrine, you know, Coke products very well could be included in, in the word of wisdom.

John Dehlin [00:45:58] Yeah.

Riley Davis [00:45:59] And so I was like going into the signs of the times. I was like going deep. And so then you show up to seminary and it's just this basic kind of fluff. I remember I had one high school teacher that I really liked and it's because he did go into it a little bit more in depth. But I mean, I was kind of like, I would slough seminary a lot, you know, and there was even one point where we had 8th period seminary and the teacher had for. I wasn't a fan of this teacher, but the teacher had forgot to scan some copies. So we ran out of the classroom to the copy center.

Riley Davis [00:46:35] And while he was gone, I stood up on a desk and set the clock forward. So the whole class got out. We were. They. A girl in the class was like, brother, so and so do you realize what time it is? And so he closed, we said a prayer and we all left like 15 minutes early from seminary. So I was able to tell that to my seminary students later and be like, hey, I get not loving seminary. And I tried to make it more than that, but yeah, I always really wanted more.

John Dehlin [00:47:03] Yeah. So you weren't sloughing because you didn't care about the gospel. Oh, no, you sloughed because it was not challenging and rigorous and exciting enough.

Riley Davis [00:47:14] And that's when we used to expect more of our seminary students too. I was required to read all four standard works, whereas today it's it. The bar just keeps getting lower and lower and lower.

John Dehlin [00:47:28] Yeah, yeah, we'll talk about that. Okay, so where was your testimony by the time you're graduating from high school?

Preparing for and Serving a Mission

Riley Davis [00:47:37] Really, really strong. And I actually had a year up at college before I went on my mission to go Utah State University. And at that, heck, yeah, I love it. But. But yeah, so I, I knew that I wanted to be a teacher and I had gotten a scholarship where if you taught for four years in the state of Utah after they would pay for four years of tuition. So I got my tuition all paid for up at Utah State.

Riley Davis [00:48:06] Had a great first year. I think while I was up at Utah State, there were some times where I kind of wondered where my testimony was at. It was the first time I wasn't like the president of everything, and I kind of got lost in the ward and so trying to figure out what. What I thought, what I believed. But by the time my mission call came at 19, I. I was just all in. You know, I. I don't know if I would say. My whole growing up, I was looking for that light switch experience where you're like, wow, I know. And then Elder Bednar has the.

Riley Davis [00:48:45] The parallel with, rather than a light switch with Elma the Younger, seeing the light. Right. It's one dramatic thing. It's more of a sunrise. So I considered mine more of a sunrise in the sense that, you know, I.

Riley Davis [00:48:59] This feels true. This feels good. Even the temple, going through the temple, which is super weird and culty, you know, but going through the temple that first time, I just looked around at all these people I trusted and loved and was like, well, it's gotta be okay, because I love and trust all these people and they're okay with it, you know, so.

John Dehlin [00:49:24] Totally okay. So let's see. What year did you go on your mission?

Riley Davis [00:49:34] So, yeah, I graduated in 2010, year up at college, and then I served. Served from June of 2011 to June of 2013.

John Dehlin [00:49:42] So you missed by a few years the lowering of the mission age.

Riley Davis [00:49:48] I actually was on my mission when President Monson announced it.

John Dehlin [00:49:51] Okay.

Riley Davis [00:49:52] So everyone was super excited, and that huge influx of missionaries was going to come in, but I was winding down my mission when. When that was announced.

John Dehlin [00:50:02] Okay, okay. So you. It was. It was Hinckley before Monson.

Riley Davis [00:50:07] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:50:08] So you would have been a missionary while Hinckley was still alive, is that right?

Riley Davis [00:50:11] No, he died when I was in high school.

John Dehlin [00:50:13] Okay, so you.

Riley Davis [00:50:14] So, yeah, Monson was the. Was the prophet who signed my little card, my little authorization to preach.

John Dehlin [00:50:20] Yeah.

Riley Davis [00:50:21] That we kept in the back of our white handbook.

John Dehlin [00:50:24] Okay, really quickly. So sometimes ex Mormons or, you know, really doubting, questioning Mormons, once they really get into learning about church history and podcasts and CES letter, you know, they're always like, oh, the church is going down. You know, like there's an epidemic of people leaving. And they kind of think that because now they've learned about the CES letter or Mormon stories or Radio Free Mormon or whatever that like it's a churchwide epidemic. But like, I just dropped off some people close to me to the MTC today, you know, in August of 2025. And you know, they were like leaders and missionaries all along the way where I was rolling down my window and talking to them and nobody recognized me.

John Dehlin [00:51:12] Nobody had any idea who I was, which might blow the mind, you know. And I've been doing Mormon Stories podcast 20 years. My excommunication was tweeted in the New York Times. You know, I've been on Hulu and, and like Good Morning America and Nightline and just MTV and a gazillion TV shows talking about Mormonism and most Mormons have never heard of me or anything I do or Cesletter or any of the other things. So, like, how is that possible that. Well, can you talk about what exposure did you have to the Mormon or ex Mormon or liberal Mormon Internet prior to 2013?

Riley Davis [00:51:54] We'll say, oh, prior to 2013, virtually nothing.

John Dehlin [00:51:58] Isn't that wild?

Riley Davis [00:51:59] Because you have crazy.

John Dehlin [00:52:00] You would have gotten a mobile phone at some point, right?

Riley Davis [00:52:03] Yeah, yeah, no, I had a phone in 9th, 10th grade and you access to the Internet and I guess smartphones I came home from. My people had smartphones in high school. Okay. But not everyone. Okay. People still had the razor flip phones and stuff like that.

John Dehlin [00:52:19] So you're a little early for smartphones in high school.

Riley Davis [00:52:21] Yeah, when I came home from my mission, I was blown away because everyone was just looking at their smartphones all the time. It almost happened while I was gone.

John Dehlin [00:52:28] Got it.

Riley Davis [00:52:29] But John, you're off limits to faithful Mormons. Like honestly Mormon stories. Oh, yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:52:35] Or anything like it.

Riley Davis [00:52:36] Or anything like unto it. Right. You know, but did you even hear that they existed?

John Dehlin [00:52:41] Like CES letters?

Riley Davis [00:52:44] I. I knew they were there, but they're all lumped into this. This group of anti Mormon stuff, anti Mormon literature and even podcasts and anti Mormon podcasts and stuff. Honestly, for me, it wasn't until I was a CES teacher and a seminary teacher where I'm like, no, I need to be informed about the issues because students are coming to me with these things.

Riley Davis [00:53:14] It wasn't until then that I was exposed to really most when it comes to tricky church history topics. I dove right into those polygamy and race and priesthood, those things. That was probably just after. It was after mission. Okay, okay. But yeah, as kind of a college student, you know, I really dove into those. But it wasn't until, honestly, you going on Rick Bennett's gospel tangents was. And he doesn't. He does a fantastic job. It's still safe, you know, in the Mormon sphere. And so that. And then also I really looked up to. Or look up to Dan McClellan. Your interviews with Dan McClellan. It wasn't until those. I'm honestly just barely starting to. To really listen to Mormon stories and stuff because it seemed so off limits.

John Dehlin [00:54:08] And just to be clear, I don't ask any of that to be self referential. I just. I'm always blown away by the power and the impenetrability of the Mormon bubble. Oh yeah. And so I'm just saying. 2011, 12:13. The Internet's going crazy. This is ordained women time. This is the gospel topic.

Riley Davis [00:54:26] Kate Kelly.

John Dehlin [00:54:27] Kate Kelly. Mormon stories, CES letter, gospel topics, essays. And I just want to be clear, you've heard of none of that up through your mission?

Riley Davis [00:54:36] If anything, like the Kate Kelly stuff. Stuff. If anything, it's like, oh, that's so sad. That's so sad that these women chose to go against women and men because there were supporters from both sides. But. But it's so sad that they would choose to go against the prophetic leadership.

John Dehlin [00:54:54] Yeah, right.

Riley Davis [00:54:55] You know, so it's very insular and we'll talk about it later, but in our seminary classes, we're kind of taught to narrow their scope, like divinely appointed sources. Sources. They drill that into them. They can only look at divinely appointed sources, which I had such a hard time with.

John Dehlin [00:55:13] Yeah. Okay. So your mission. Let's. What's worth mentioning about your mission in your. Yeah, you get called to where?

Mission Experiences in Buenos Aires

Riley Davis [00:55:21] Yeah. Buenos Aires West Mission. So I thought it. It's the best mission in the world. Right. And my mission president is kind of a typical finance bro, you know, like, he was like the CFO of DirecTV or something. We used to. In Argentina, you don't really knock doors. You clap at the gate, you know, and then they call you forward. So every time we'd be like clapping doors. Which wasn't often because we usually found tons of people just as we walked around. But whenever we stopped at a house and we saw they had a DirecTV dish where like President Carter's already been here. We can get in this house.

Riley Davis [00:56:00] Right. And so. But yeah, so he, he was just very business oriented. We actually went into the mtc. I was his group that was in the MTC when he was in the mtc. So he got to Argentina a little bit before us. But we were all there for the June.

Riley Davis [00:56:21] The June, like big Big general authority thing where they had, like, six of the 12 on the stand. And Elder Bednar spoke and really hammered home the you've got to be a pure vessel kind of thing, you know, like, you've got to be able to get out of the way of the spirit and let it work through you. And if you're not clean, then you can't do that. Which led to more confessing in the MTC to my branch president. Right. I remember.

Riley Davis [00:56:52] And it's kind of weird looking back on it. I have a totally different view of it now, but my branch president, because we're all in little branches, little church units in the mtc, there was one night where I was like, do I need. I'm praying. Like, do I need to confess? Am I good? I felt like I was good last time I confessed to my bishop. Do I need to confess again? And was there something that I left out? Was there something I forgot? Right. Just that scrupulous thought.

Riley Davis [00:57:20] And my branch president. So this really old dude walks in to our dorm up at the mtc. So we're like, on the third floor of the mtc, and this old guy comes walking up the stairs and just to say good night to us, I guess. I don't know. But I later found that he had been impressed that someone needed to talk. And so I was able to call him aside while he was up there in a young men's dormitory. Right. Which is weird. But. But I called him aside and was able to confess, and he's like, you're fine, you know? And so the scrupulosity continues there.

Riley Davis [00:58:03] And honestly, my mission president was very focused on. On numbers. And obviously you always say, well, each number represents a person, you know, and you try to tie it back into. We're caring. And I really did care about the people on my mission, and I think most of the missionaries did, but there was definitely a focus on numbers. He. One change from the last president to him was he started publishing all of our numbers in a weekly newsletter that got sent to everyone.

John Dehlin [00:58:36] Yep. They did that in my mission.

Riley Davis [00:58:37] Yep. So. So the previous mission president hadn't. But. But the idea is everyone in the mission will know if you talked to at least 200 people on the street this week. Because that's the idea. Just contacts, just looking for new people.

Riley Davis [00:58:54] You should be talking to at least 200 people. And if. If you're not doing that, then it's kind of a shame thing. And if you're. Yeah, the people who get, like, highlights on their names because they had 13 baptisms that week and stuff like that. So it was just very numbers driven. I got pulled into leadership really quickly on my mission, too.

Riley Davis [00:59:16] I only had three transfers. I had my trainer for two transfers, a Peruvian companion for one transfer. And then I got pulled into being a zone leader. So I never really got the district leader experience. I got pulled right into zone leadership, but I had a fantastic experience. And it's probably because as a zone leader, you're working with some of the cream of the crop, you know, and so you don't have to deal with companions that are dragging you. You're having to drag them along and stuff like that. But yeah, yeah, there's a wide.

John Dehlin [00:59:51] For those who don't know, there's a wide variability of, like, how many mission. How many baptisms a Mormon missionary might obtain on their mission. You know, there are some missions so difficult that if you. If you, you know, you may get none of, or you may get one or two in your whole two years of your mission, then there's others that'll get a handful. 5, 10, 20. And then there's some missions like in Latin America or the Philippines or now Africa, where you can get 10amonth and sometimes 120 or 150 or 200 baptisms during your two years. I had about 120. There were other competing ships on my mission that had 40 in a month.

Riley Davis [01:00:32] Month, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:00:32] What were the numbers like in Argentina when you were there?

Riley Davis [01:00:35] So we, at least for the first two years of my mission president's time, we were trying to go for 200 baptisms in a month as a whole mission. For the whole mission. And I know, like, the most I. We ever had was we had a baptismal day with 12.

John Dehlin [01:00:52] 12 people in one baptism.

Riley Davis [01:00:54] Yeah. So. And so I want to say it was probably near a hundred or so. So for me, but I still remember Elder 2amonth about. Yeah, yeah. So. But Elder Ajukaitis, who he. I think he's still a member of the first quorum in the 70s from Brazil, but I remember him coming down. And first of all, he just shamed the crap out of so many missionaries. Just if you like pinpointing him. Hey, how many people did you talk to on the bus here? Zero. Well, you're failing as a missionary. How many people did you talk to on the subway as you came here? Zero. You're failing as a missionary. And he. He was dead set on. If you aren't baptizing every week or at least like an average of a baptism a week, then you're you're not living up to your potential as a missionary.

John Dehlin [01:01:48] Is there a word in Argentinian Spanish for, like, floho or slacker?

Riley Davis [01:01:53] Yeah, yeah. For him, he would drop the cane on us. He would bajar lacania. And so he would just come in really harsh. But, I mean, Perez Oso. Yeah. Lazy.

John Dehlin [01:02:08] Okay, got it. Okay. But it sounds like you were in leadership positions and had a decent number of baptisms and probably felt like you had a successful mission.

Riley Davis [01:02:19] No, I felt like I had a great mission. And honestly, it was only the only time that I felt like my mission president was, like, let down or whatever with me. I felt like because we were baptizing all the time, I was helping other missionaries, we were moving the mission forward. But there was one point on my mission where just that over scrupulous brain. Hey, things aren't going well right now. Is it because there's something in your past? Is it because there's something there that hasn't been repented of, you know? And I went in to basically confess to my mission president then. Even though you're on a mission and you're, like, doing the Lord's work, like, should be fine, you know?

Riley Davis [01:03:05] But I. I felt like he was really let down. Just like, oh, no, you were one of the good ones who isn't coming to confess to me, and now you're coming to confess me too. And I felt like from that point, my worth in his eyes was, like, much less. Because I'm sure he was just exasperated with all these missionaries coming to confess to him all the time, you know?

John Dehlin [01:03:27] Yeah. Okay. Did you do the full 24 months?

Riley Davis [01:03:31] Yeah. Okay. Yep, Yep. June to June. And I loved it.

John Dehlin [01:03:36] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:03:36] Like I said.

John Dehlin [01:03:40] Wait, that was. Mind.

Riley Davis [01:03:42] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:03:42] Right now we were second to Chile. Vina del Mar. That was the first.

Riley Davis [01:03:46] Oh, really?

John Dehlin [01:03:46] They were getting over baptisms. A thousand baptisms a month.

Riley Davis [01:03:49] Crazy. Yeah. And now we can see. I. My first companion was a casualty of that. He was Chileno, and he was one of the kids who they're like, want to come play soccer? Just football, baptisms.

John Dehlin [01:04:04] Well, if he was on a mission, he wasn't a casualty.

Riley Davis [01:04:06] Yeah, actually. But was a success story. It's true. And that also, that helped me a lot to know, you know, it doesn't matter if they stay active. Right. Because Elder Parker was there for me. Right. He. He was so pivotal in my mission experience. And he was baptized as, like, this young kid playing soccer, fell off the radar, and then eventually got reactivated and served up missions. So you're like, hey, it's all good, you know, And.

John Dehlin [01:04:37] And, yeah, when I. When that stuff happened on my mission, there were soccer baptisms, I was, like, really disgusted. And then I learned that it had happened in, you know, the baseball baptisms in the British Isles in the early 60s. And then I found out they had happened in Japan, and they had kind of always been there. I guess now I hear you say that probably why they keep reappearing. And reappearing is because in some sense, it works. Even if you get 10% or 5% of those remaining active, at least missionaries aren't feeling discouraged, aren't feeling lazy, aren't feeling like their time is worthless. They're getting numbers. And then if only 5% remain active, hey, that's better than 0%, right?

Riley Davis [01:05:22] Totally. And the thing is, I came home from my mission just on fire, you know, just ready to go. And as mission presidents do, that last interview is very much on what you're supposed to do from here on out, which is go get married. Right. He said the. Your whole goal in life is to achieve every covenant you can. Once you're sealed, your goal is to help everyone else receive all the ordinances. And so I came home from my mission just like, I got to find my spouse, I got to get sealed. It's the last ordinance, at least the last ordinance they'll tell me about.

John Dehlin [01:06:01] Okay, so you finish your mission honorably, come home, and then what do you do?

Riley Davis [01:06:06] Just head back up to Utah State? And so I came home from my mission and started up. It was even before school started. I had three years left to go up at Utah State. And even before school started, I was dating someone and feeling like, hey, I think I found the girl I wanna. I wanna marry. And so then you just dive in, you know, and you. You pray, is this the right thing? And you feel like peace about it. So therefore, you know. And so I was engaged within six months of coming home from my mission.

John Dehlin [01:06:43] What year is this?

Riley Davis [01:06:45] So 2013. Okay, so, yeah, I was engaged within six months. And then I. As we keep dating, because we had only dated for three, four months before I proposed. As we keep dating and I start meeting her family and seeing the dynamic of her parents together.

Riley Davis [01:07:06] And her mom was on her second marriage already, but even how she treated this second husband, I was just like, whoa, that is not okay. And then, as I said, start to look at our relationship. I'm like, you're behaving like you've been taught, you know? And so I started to see these red flags. And so Then luckily I. I had a bishop who I went and talked to him just like, I don't know what I should do. I'm engaged, but I don't feel good about it. But that bishop had happened to when he was a young man, get engaged and then call off the wedding.

Riley Davis [01:07:43] And so, so it really impacted. Showered me, and I'm like, God knew I needed this bishop, you know? And so I called off the wedding. And it was hard, but. But just kept going and almost got engaged another time and then did get engaged another time. I was just really focused on, like, I, I gotta keep moving forward in the gospel.

Post-Mission Life, Marriage, and Early Adulthood

John Dehlin [01:08:06] So the church rushed you into getting engaged, and you dodged a bullet because you had a leader that fortunately helped you feel okay about calling off something you knew was probably wrong.

Riley Davis [01:08:18] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:08:19] So that's good.

Riley Davis [01:08:20] And so I was just full force in the church throughout college years, you know, and eventually, once I got done with my degree and I moved down to Davis county to start teaching high school, I was a math and Spanish teacher. I chose to make Spanish my minor so that I could. Could keep that gift of tongues, you know, Like, I always felt like. Like the gift of tongues and interpretation of tongues was part of what, like the. My spiritual gifts, you know, which is

John Dehlin [01:08:52] a total redefinition of those words.

Riley Davis [01:08:54] Oh, my gosh.

John Dehlin [01:08:55] Not what Joseph Smith meant.

Riley Davis [01:08:57] No. And it's not what the scriptures meant. Yeah, there. There's just so many problems with it. But I really felt like when I got to my mission, I got there and I. I had learned enough Spanish from high school that I understood Argentines. They. They don't speak super fast. So like some of the Chilenos or other people maybe I had a hard time understanding, but the Argentines, I felt like I could understand right off the bat. And so I felt like that was my gift and I wanted to keep harnessing it through teaching. And so I taught Spanish and math at first, but I. I mean, I got back and started teaching as a young starting teacher and got engaged again.

Riley Davis [01:09:39] And that situation, we. We had been dating for a little while and I. I proposed. She said yes, but she dealt with a lot of relationship anxiety and her parents were. Relationship had a lot of hard components to it as well. So she ended up calling off that engagement.

John Dehlin [01:10:02] So you had like three engagements.

Riley Davis [01:10:05] Yeah. So counting. Counting. Well, counting my wife, there was one in between where I almost proposed.

John Dehlin [01:10:10] Okay.

Riley Davis [01:10:11] But I didn't. But I had two failed engagements and then eventually proposed to my wife. But I do attribute a ton of that to. I was Just trying to be a good Mormon boy and do the right thing, you know, that's the next step.

John Dehlin [01:10:24] Yeah. Just because it's fun. I love parallels. You and I were at Utah State at the same time, so I was at Utah State. Really, 2004 to 2015, and I was excommunicated at Utah State in 2015.

Riley Davis [01:10:40] Really?

John Dehlin [01:10:40] So we were there, and I started Mormon Stories, and I was teaching at the counseling center there in the. You know, in the student center at caps.

Riley Davis [01:10:49] Really.

John Dehlin [01:10:49] So we. It's almost guaranteed we were there. See each other walking down the. You know.

Riley Davis [01:10:54] For sure. Yeah. I was there from 13, when I got home from my mission to 16. Yeah. So. Yeah. And I never. I wouldn't have known who you were.

John Dehlin [01:11:04] No. It's good. Of course. I mean, I. I don't ever want people to think I think I'm important.

Riley Davis [01:11:08] No. No.

John Dehlin [01:11:09] But, you know, it's just to reinforce this idea of a bubble. Right.

Riley Davis [01:11:14] Yeah. And they work very hard to make sure that you don't go outside of what the brethren have said.

John Dehlin [01:11:21] So, like in 2015, when you were at Utah State, we're at the same university. I'm teaching in the counseling center. I'm getting excommunicated again. It's tweeted nationally, internationally.

Riley Davis [01:11:35] Still don't hear about it.

John Dehlin [01:11:36] You never heard about the whole thing?

Riley Davis [01:11:38] Nope.

John Dehlin [01:11:38] At all?

Riley Davis [01:11:39] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:11:40] That's wild.

Riley Davis [01:11:40] Or if anything, it was just. Oh, man. People can leave the church, but they can't leave the church alone. And then you hear. You hear something in the news, you deal with that sound bite and you set it aside.

John Dehlin [01:11:52] Yeah. Yeah. Because all the time I get these comments on YouTube or Spotify. How can anyone be a Mormon in 2025? They're just stupid. You know what I mean? And it's. That's. The whole reason I'm bringing this up is it's not stupidity. It's not that people who are Mormon in 2025 are low IQ or whatever. It's that we're raised with the psychological social conditioning to just either not ever look at any news source or information source that could challenge our faith, or if we bump up against something to

Riley Davis [01:12:32] just turn it off and respond in a certain way.

John Dehlin [01:12:35] Know.

Riley Davis [01:12:36] Yeah. The information control is. Is real, and it's really problematic.

John Dehlin [01:12:40] Yeah. Or from the church's standpoint. Awesome.

Riley Davis [01:12:43] Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it kept me in for so much longer than I would have been, because even at this point in college, I feel like I had some good institute teachers at the institute up there who tried to, as Much as they were allowed.

John Dehlin [01:12:57] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:12:58] In their sphere.

John Dehlin [01:12:58] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:12:59] To really be progressive and. And so I started to just say like I wanted to be, be just the greatest Mormon scholar. You know, I wanted to know all that there was to know and to have read the whole works of Hugh Nibley and Mormon doctrine and all those things. And so that's when I started really getting into the tough issues like polygamy, blood atonement, stuff like that and diving in and I felt like, no, I know all this stuff. And so even when I would hear anti Mormon stuff, I was the apologist who was like, I know that stuff and I know how to respond to it.

John Dehlin [01:13:37] Yeah. It really sounds like your Mormon upbringing was a lot like mine in the 80s. Because if you're reading Bruce Al McConkey.

Riley Davis [01:13:46] Oh yeah.

John Dehlin [01:13:46] Joseph E. Lee Smith defines to gospel questions. Yeah. That, that defined my Mormon upbringing in the 80s and it sounds like. And that's become less and less common the newer the generation generations, but somehow in the 2000 and teens you're channeling that ultra orthodox, almost fundamentalist with the lowercase F. Yeah. Mormon upbringing.

Riley Davis [01:14:09] No, totally. And I, I think it's in, in my blood too because my dad's side of the family. I mean my great uncle is like Alvin Rulandire, who is. Yeah. And so he was intense. Oh yeah. He, he had his, his things and it's crazy.

John Dehlin [01:14:27] Is he the one who taught like different races, different levels of valiancy in the pre existence? Black people were the least value in the pre existence and then, you know, maybe Middle Easterners and then maybe, you know, Indians and then Chinese and Japanese were more on the more righteous scale because the skin color was more white. Is that dire?

Riley Davis [01:14:52] I'm not sure about that directly, but. But yeah, he was, he was actually. I think he's one of the only people who've been an apostle but not a member of the quorum of the 12.

John Dehlin [01:15:04] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:15:04] Because he was brought in as an extra counselor in the first presidency with all these race issues going on in the heart of it. And he was one of the devout. He's the one who leaks to the conservative faction that Hubie Brown's trying to get the, the ban lifted in the 60s. Yeah. And so I, I just feel like we had a lot of that just Mormon just like scholarship, pseudo scholarship. Like when you're a general authority, it's almost like you're a scholar because what you say has value, you know, and so. But yeah, just super orthodox answers to gospel questions. Mormon doctrine. And that was even More me. I don't remember my parents reading that stuff, but I was always interested in it.

John Dehlin [01:15:47] And he was family. Dyer was.

Riley Davis [01:15:49] Yeah. So he's my great uncle.

John Dehlin [01:15:51] Great uncle, yeah.

Riley Davis [01:15:52] So like in my family pictures, I can see like my grandpa and great grandma all in the same family reunion photo with Alvin R. Dire. So.

John Dehlin [01:16:02] Okay. So is there anything else you want to talk about? Kind of your, you know, you get married, what year in the temple.

Riley Davis [01:16:09] So that would have been 2018.

John Dehlin [01:16:12] 2018, yeah. Anything else worth talking about? So when you graduate, you're a major in.

Riley Davis [01:16:19] In mathematics education with a minor in Spanish teaching.

John Dehlin [01:16:23] Okay. And your idea is to go into high school or church education?

Riley Davis [01:16:28] High school. At this point I, even though when I was really young, I had thought about seminary, I had some really influential math teachers in high school and I just loved it. I was passionate about it. And so yeah, the plan was just high school and I started teaching and then my wife and I teach in Cache Valley or no, Davis County. So I went right back. I taught at Syracuse High was my first teaching job.

John Dehlin [01:16:53] That wasn't your high school?

Riley Davis [01:16:54] No, no, I, it was built. I like my class would have been the first degree graduate. So I had friends graduate from Syracuse High, but I was part of Clearfield where they've gerrymandered the, the boundaries to go out to Clearfield, but, but yeah. So came home, started teaching after that second engagement failed. Not long after that, my wife Ashley and I had actually met up at Utah State. We worked in the Hub, you know, just on the first floor. The Hub. We were both food service workers. I remember working like one shift with her there.

John Dehlin [01:17:31] Like the food cafeteria. Which, which restaurant? Little thing just like, oh, the sandwich shop. Sandwich shop.

Riley Davis [01:17:36] So we made sandwiches together. Yeah, exactly. So I remember talking to her and realizing, oh, you worked at a scout camp too. Well, I did too. And we connected over that. And then I, I was probably engaged at that point, so nothing happened. But five years later she moves down for an elementary at ed teaching position in Davis county. And we both go to boot scoot and barn boogie steak swing dancing thing. And we, we re met there and recognized each other. And from then on it was, it was pretty quick because that would have been in the fall. And then we were married by June.

John Dehlin [01:18:15] Well, you're. By that point you're starting to push menace to society.

Riley Davis [01:18:18] Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. So I'm like what, 25 or 26 and she's a year older than me. And so we were just grateful. Like at that point it seems like Your options start to, like, slim down and. But we were just like, this is such a cool, awesome person. And we dated, and the pressure was still very real with her, but it was really hard on Ashley.

Riley Davis [01:18:46] She, like, relationship anxiety wise, it was really hard. Hard for her there as well. And so the whole pressure. I had been through two fit engagements at this point, and I was like, I need to know that this is something like, that we're willing to, like, move forward with. So I don't know that I have a lot of time to. To just date and see and stuff. And I feel bad in retrospect for the pressure that I feel like that applied because she knew she wanted to date me, and she knew this was a good thing, but she was having such a hard time moving forward. So just that pressure, it's. It's brutal.

John Dehlin [01:19:28] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:19:29] But gratefully, like, man, it's just been the absolute best case. Like, we're. Our deconstruction has been very much in sync.

John Dehlin [01:19:40] Oh, yeah. Yeah. We're getting.

Riley Davis [01:19:42] Yeah. Which has been very, very, very good. But so you were engaged for, like, let's. Well, she actually wouldn't let me propose for a long time, and so I only proposed. She finally said, yeah, I think you can propose to me.

John Dehlin [01:20:00] And you dated how long?

Riley Davis [01:20:02] So from, like, the fall, like, October or. So our. Our first date was like the high school version of Macbeth at the local high school. And then. Then so fall to June, we were married, but she didn't tell me I could propose to her until, like, May.

John Dehlin [01:20:19] Okay, so it sounds like you dated, what, six months? Seven months?

Riley Davis [01:20:23] Our engagement was a whopping, like, one month.

John Dehlin [01:20:25] Okay.

Riley Davis [01:20:26] Because, yeah, we knew with teachers it was best. We're both teachers. It's best to get married in the summer. She finally feels comfortable saying, yeah, you can propose to me in May. So I propose. And were engaged and married and married by June. Brigham City Temple.

John Dehlin [01:20:43] Okay.

Riley Davis [01:20:44] So she grew up in Riverside, Utah, just north of Tremont.

John Dehlin [01:20:47] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:20:48] And so Brigham City was kind of in between. And it's a beautiful temple.

John Dehlin [01:20:51] Yeah, it's Boyd K. Packers temple.

Riley Davis [01:20:53] Yeah, it is. All the peach blossoms everywhere.

John Dehlin [01:20:55] Okay. That year.

Riley Davis [01:20:56] That was 2018.

John Dehlin [01:20:58] Okay. All right. So should. And. And you're a full orthodox believer. She is. When you both get married.

Riley Davis [01:21:06] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:21:06] Right.

Riley Davis [01:21:06] In fact, everyone at work, my teaching co workers, joked, they're like, oh, you're gonna get married soon. Because I just got called this elders corn president in my singles ward. So I'm like, all in. And the stake president who called me as elders quorum President would later be my boss in seminaries and institutes.

John Dehlin [01:21:28] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:21:28] So it kind of was laying groundwork there as well for the future. But.

John Dehlin [01:21:34] And what's. For those who don't know what's elders quorum president for the never Mormons out there.

Riley Davis [01:21:39] So I was in charge. Well, basically they told me if. If the bishop and his counselors aren't there, then you would be the one on the stand presiding. If there's no stake leadership, but basically

John Dehlin [01:21:51] in a congregation of.

Riley Davis [01:21:52] Let's say you're in charge of. So in our list, we have had 800 people on our. 850 on our ward list.

John Dehlin [01:22:01] Male members? No.

Riley Davis [01:22:03] So that. That was probably male and female. Okay, 800. About 400 of those are male. And I was in charge. I was the elders quorum president. And all of those men would have been in the elders quorum in a singles ward pretty much. And so I was in charge of ministering to their needs, calling a presidency, calling counselors to help me administer to these people. But most of what we did was try to purge the lists. And we. We just had so many people just in. In that area, Davis county, there are just so many people who are missing in action. And so you're just trying to.

John Dehlin [01:22:45] What do you mean purge? How do you purge a list?

Riley Davis [01:22:47] So basically we would use software to try to find people's actual addresses and send their records where they're supposed to be.

John Dehlin [01:22:57] So these are. These are records that. That shows their address in your ward boundaries.

Riley Davis [01:23:01] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:23:02] But they likely moved away.

Riley Davis [01:23:04] Exactly. Or they just don't want to be contacted, which is really the case with most of them.

John Dehlin [01:23:09] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:23:10] You know, but are a huge thing. It's just unruly. You can't. Like when you've got 400 plus people, but only 100 of them are coming to elders quorum.

John Dehlin [01:23:21] So you're talking 25% activity rates. Wait, wait, let's slow down. So 2018.

Riley Davis [01:23:28] Yeah, 2018.

John Dehlin [01:23:30] So seven years ago, pre Covid in Davis County, I would say one of the four strongest, most devout Mormon counties in the world. It's like Utah County.

Riley Davis [01:23:42] Solid.

John Dehlin [01:23:44] Davis County, Cache Valley, like, you know, Rexburg area. Like, there are more. There aren't many more devout counties in the Mormon church than Davis County. Definitely top five, I'd say.

Riley Davis [01:23:57] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:23:57] In Davis County, a couple years before COVID a singles ward, Elders quorum has a 25% activity rate of men.

Riley Davis [01:24:08] Yeah. Probably around there.

John Dehlin [01:24:09] Wow.

Riley Davis [01:24:10] Because yeah, we were over 800 as a whole Ward Ward. About half of that were the men yeah. And then in our ward meetings on Sunday, you'd only have like less than 200 people out of the 800.

John Dehlin [01:24:23] Yeah, that's.

Riley Davis [01:24:23] And so Elders Quorum. Yeah, we, it, it was just this task. We used to just give people slips of paper. They would print out slips of paper of all these names that we don't know who they are. And there was a senior couple actually called to do this. The senior couple would print out names and send everyone out on this search for people. And so you would go to the address and ask, hey, is so and so here? And if they say no, they don't live here anymore, you're supposed to try to figure out where they've gone so we can send their records along. Because the idea is no one can minister to them if they're not.

Riley Davis [01:25:03] Don't know they're there. So this is a loving thing. We got to get the records out of our ward. Ward, which makes our lives easier because it's not unruly, but then also sends it to somewhere where they can potentially be helped by their local ward.

John Dehlin [01:25:16] What was your sense of the activity rates in Argentina when you were a missionary there?

Riley Davis [01:25:23] Less than my elders corpsman.

John Dehlin [01:25:25] So yeah, so maybe 10% activity rate.

Riley Davis [01:25:28] So there, the wards, you could have a thousand people in a ward and only in only a. A hundred or two coming.

John Dehlin [01:25:36] Yeah. So I mean, this speaks to the idea that in, you know, in 2025, the LDS Church claims what, 17, 17.5 million members. But the truth is maybe a quarter of those are actually actual attending church self identifying Mormons.

Riley Davis [01:25:55] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:25:56] Is that fair?

Riley Davis [01:25:56] Yeah. And when they've pulled people on the self identification, it's all always even lower too. So.

John Dehlin [01:26:02] Yeah. Okay. So yeah, so maybe there's really only 4 million active believing, attending Mormons in the world even when the church claims 17.5.

Riley Davis [01:26:13] But those 4 million go hard.

John Dehlin [01:26:16] No, it's true. Okay, so when you're. So it's 2018, Nelson's now president.

Riley Davis [01:26:25] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:26:26] And you're elders quorum president in Davis County. County. And you're noticing 25 activity rates. Is there a point you're going, why are all these people inactive or not?

Riley Davis [01:26:38] Honestly, I, I was just like, wow, isn't it awesome that there's so much work for us to do? You know, like I'm just like, I remember Elder Ballard came and spoke to our, our Elders Quorum presidency and the elders Quorum presidencies of the Stakes and the Coordination Council and just said, we want you to focus on inactive return missionaries and send Someone to their house.

John Dehlin [01:27:04] Interesting.

Riley Davis [01:27:05] That speaks the language that they served with on their mission. Oh yeah. So he's like you. We want to try to help bring back these memories of their faithful times on their missions. Send someone who speaks Portuguese, send someone who speaks Spanish. And yeah, so we would go and try to try to help rekindle those, those testimonies.

John Dehlin [01:27:29] Did you ever get a sense for why people had lost. Why these returned missionaries had lost their testimonies?

Riley Davis [01:27:35] Honestly, most of them, like, it was just, I. I'm sure I wasn't in a place to hear the real reasons, you know, most of them, them didn't have much of a desire to talk to us, you know, most of them it was just like, hey, how do I get my name off this list? How do I, how do I make sure you guys don't come back again? You know, you try to take it with a smile, just like when you were on your mission, you know. But yeah, so they're basically just like,

John Dehlin [01:28:08] kitty, can you leave me alone?

Riley Davis [01:28:10] Yeah, yeah. So I don't know that I really heard many like testimony issues there. I mean, maybe you've got the classic like, oh, well, they struggle with church history, you know, and you kind of write it off. They're not faithful enough to, to take this church history as it is, you know, and so there was some of that. But yeah, the activity rates it. It didn't really concern me. It was just like, hey, we got a lot to do, let's get go, you know, and just always staying really busy. And I mean, that calling did end when I got married though. Cuz you're no longer in the singles ward.

Riley Davis [01:28:50] But they didn't, they sure didn't keep me out of church leadership for long after that either. Because after that, once we were in the married ward, it was like directly onto. Within weeks, I was the ward mission leader, which at that point was a member of the ward council and so just very involved in missionary work and similar things. Reactivation. And then not long after that, I was elders Quorum president again in the Mary's ward and then onto the bishopric in the married ward. So.

John Dehlin [01:29:24] Okay, okay, so let's see. Are there any other parts about your orthodox Mormon experience that are worth discussing or do we shift to now how things start unraveling or how you end up teaching CES too? I guess that's important.

Riley Davis [01:29:41] I guess, yeah. I was still very much in that orthodoxy and that's what drove me to it.

John Dehlin [01:29:46] Okay. Yeah. So how'd you become a. Well, let me ask you this. So when I was growing up in the 80s, I viewed CES instructors. Cause I'd been to EFY, especially for youth. Youth conferences. You know, I knew about, you know, Jack. What's his name?

Becoming a CES Seminary Teacher

Riley Davis [01:30:06] Welch. No, he's the FARMS guy.

John Dehlin [01:30:09] There were, you know, like John, by the way.

Riley Davis [01:30:10] Oh, yeah, yeah. You know, like Smith John, by the way. Yeah, I listen to all those CDs.

John Dehlin [01:30:16] Yeah, yeah. You. You. You grow up and you learn about these. Or Brad Wilcox, you learn about these church educators that are funny and they're spiritual and they are knowledgeable. And for me, the closest thing I could think of is I thought of CES instructors like Navy SEALs, like Mormon Spiritual, Navy SEALs or Green Berets. Right. Elite, most spiritual, most knowledgeable. Like, yes, you can become a lawyer or a doctor, but if you are really sharp, you can get into CES and become a CES instructor. And it's incredibly competitive.

Riley Davis [01:30:57] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:30:58] Like you would be told, unless you're like super elite or AP on your mission and are brilliant and funny and charismatic, don't even apply because it's probably harder than med school to get in. So that's how I perceived the CES Church educator, religious educator, Mormon role. Now, what was it like for you? You're teaching high school. What was it like for you?

Riley Davis [01:31:25] Oh, yeah, well, like I said, with some of my seminary teachers, it was like that, right? I had the one who really went in depth with the Book of Mormon. I was like, this is so cool. And he's bringing in Hebrew and all these different things.

Riley Davis [01:31:39] And so in that case, yes, absolutely. And the John, by the ways, I listened to his Squeaky clean comedy CDs in the car on road trips. You know, like, they're really held up as these guides, you know. But then I had other seminary teachers that I was like, I don't want this fluff. I could teach the class better than this, you know, and that a lot of that arrogance. Just high school. But.

Riley Davis [01:32:03] But yeah, it was. It is super, super competitive. And I hadn't really thought about going into it for that. I always just wanted to be the math teacher who, if kids have testimony stuff, they can come talk to me, you know, But.

Riley Davis [01:32:18] But my mom actually had taken the Religion 471 class, which is an institute class that you take basically as a trial to see if they want to let you try to be a seminary teacher. So you go through this, like six months of just kind of teaching in the Savior's way, teaching techniques and how to study how to plan a Lesson and stuff like that. And then you teach the class at the end and you get a chance to. If they like how you taught the class, then they might put you in front of students, you know. So my mom took that and she, she liked it.

Riley Davis [01:32:57] She liked the idea of being a seminary teacher. But in the end when they, they offered her a student teaching position, which is the step before actually getting hired, but they counter offered and said, hey, we know that you have kids at home at stuff and stuff, so if you feel like a lighter job would be better for you. We also have an administrative assistant position, which is like a secretary for the seminary building. And so my mom chose to, to be an administrative assistant. She still is for seminaries and institutes.

Riley Davis [01:33:37] But seeing her go through that class, I was like, I'm a math teacher. I want to teach more like Jesus. You know, I, I want to teach like the Savior did. So I'm just going to take this not because I want to be a seminary teacher, but because I want to be more Christ, like, right? And so I start taking the class. And Ashley went to me to a bunch of the institute class classes, but man, just the religious anxiety. I remember driving home from the first class and she's like, what happened to you? Like, why are you so anxious in these classes? And there's just so much pressure, so much pressure.

Riley Davis [01:34:17] Like in so much competition, you're in this group of 50 people and they're like, okay, well maybe a couple of you might student teach. And that's not even the job, you know. And so. But I remember just starting to have a lot of that scrupulosity come back as I'm trying to become a seminary teacher. But they liked my class teaching enough that they put me in front of students for 15, 20 minutes. And then they liked that enough that they put me in front of them for a class period. And eventually I got a job student teaching for seminaries and institutes. So. So what I would do is since I was.

Riley Davis [01:34:56] Some people have flexibility in their work schedule. But as a high school teacher, my job hours are what seminary's release time hours are. So I would teach early morning seminary at Clearfield High, and then I would buzz around the block and I was teaching it math at New Ames.

Riley Davis [01:35:15] It's a charter school in Davis county, early college. And so I would teach the early morning seminary class for student teaching, and then I'd go around the block and I would teach the rest of my day math. And that lasted for about six months before, or it lasted for a semester

John Dehlin [01:35:33] Explain to our never Mormons what release time seminary is in places like Utah. And then what's the difference in early morning and release time?

Riley Davis [01:35:40] Yeah, because seminary and institute, seminary is at the high school level. Right. So starting next 9th grade to 12th grade and then institute would be at the college level. We offer those programs worldwide. But in most of the world we, we have a paid employee coordinating who kind of helps all of the stake called teachers teach. But most of them you have volunteers who are asked by their stake leadership to teach early morning seminar.

John Dehlin [01:36:12] Right, that's happened to me. I'm living in Seattle, in Issaquah, Washington. I'm working for Microsoft. It's 2000. My bishop calls me in and says, hey, I think you'd be really good with the youth. Do you want to teach early morning seminary? I say yes. So I teach for a year and a half, early morning, wake up five, get to the church by six, teach the kids from six to seven religion. And I have a church employee who works for CES that kind of oversees me, monitors me, gives me feedback, tells me my lessons are too liberal, too, you know, too, too progressive, too controversial, too edgy, tone it down, that sort of thing.

Riley Davis [01:36:55] Yeah, so that's how it works in most of the world.

John Dehlin [01:36:58] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:36:59] And then in the Mormon corridor, right, you've got these Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Arizona, some parts of Wyoming and Colorado, you've got a big enough demographic that it's worth it for the church, or at least they've deemed it historically worth it to hire a full time teacher. And so that's what release time seminary is, is the students are actually released in their schedule from the school's jurisdiction and they go across the street or to the chapel down the street or

John Dehlin [01:37:33] to often like on school property. Yeah, or like right across the street.

Riley Davis [01:37:37] Yeah, yeah. The church owns all of those properties, but it's right next door, especially in Utah. We've got good relationships with a lot of the schools, so they'll leave a parcel for the church to build one there. But yeah, so release time seminary is when they leave their classes during second period or whatever, come across the street, go up the hill and receive religious education from a seminary teacher.

John Dehlin [01:38:04] And what's kind of mind blowing about release time is the analog would be imagine if you're in Katy, Texas and kids are, you know, gonna be freshmen at a high school and like they're looking at what classes they're gonna take. Okay, I'll take chemistry, I'll take biology, I'll take history and then electives. They have the option of Bible study as one of their electives that is in their class period schedule. And then they literally have a little Bible seminary on campus or right across the street and hope the bell rings, it's time to go to my one o' clock class. They're literally leaving school, going to a Bible study for an hour as part of coordinated. Like that's. I like, as I think about that without my Mormon brain, that's not normal for the United States.

Riley Davis [01:38:57] Oh, no. Right, yeah. And I mean back in the day we were given school credit for these classes. I think it was Cache Valley where the lawsuit finally went down that they said, yeah, you can absolutely not give credit for these religion classes. But, but, but, yeah. So it's been a part of Utah culture for the last more 100 years. Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:39:20] 100 years.

Riley Davis [01:39:21] Yeah.

How Seminary Works and What Gets Taught

John Dehlin [01:39:21] Okay, so, so why is there early morning seminary in Utah if release time is even an option?

Riley Davis [01:39:28] Well, I, I feel like we'll see more and more of it too. But they offer early morning for a lot of my students. For early morning. When I was teaching, my student teaching, they were students who are just so dedicated. They're like, I can't miss a class in my schedule. I can't. Well, and you think about it, it's not just one class in my schedule. This is an elective for four years.

John Dehlin [01:39:53] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:39:54] Every semester for four years, you're going to, if you're faithful, have release time seminary on your school schedule. So these are the people who I, I feel like I had it easy with my student teaching because they're the ones who, even though it's offered during the day, they were with willing to come early. Right. So, but these were just really dedicated students who didn't feel like they had time in their schedule to take seminary in their school schedule.

John Dehlin [01:40:22] So it's faithful Mormon kids that want to like do all AP classes to go to Harvard or Stanford.

Riley Davis [01:40:28] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:40:29] Or, or get the presidential scholarship at byu. So they want to be taking AP Chemistry two, not Book of Mormon.

Riley Davis [01:40:37] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:40:37] As part of their electives.

Riley Davis [01:40:39] Yeah, absolutely. And the thing is, we're seeing more and more like charter schools. As charter schools pop up, they'll just say, oh, call a Stake teacher for that. And more and more we're seeing Stake teachers. Just recently, just a few months ago, they made the policy that all Spanish speaking classes are going to be taught by stake called volunteers rather than release time teachers and all special needs classes as well. They're trying to move more and more responsibility over to the Stake called teachers in the system right now because they're slimming our workforce down as, as religious educators.

John Dehlin [01:41:22] Okay, okay, okay. So what year are you training to be a full time 7 or 10 teacher?

Riley Davis [01:41:30] So this would have been 2019, leading right up to Covid.

John Dehlin [01:41:36] Okay, so the reason I ask that is because starting in 2014, 2015, you know, Mormon stories is going strong. The CES letter comes out and the gospel topics essays all come out.

Riley Davis [01:41:50] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:41:51] So that's four or five years before your teaching. And that's where the Mormon Church started to like, really realize lots of people are leaving the church because we've been hiding the factual history from them and they feel betrayed. So we've got to start teaching a more faithful version of the history in whatever controlled way we can so that we can't be accused of hiding and deceiving and misleading people. But we don't want to tell it to the, you know, 30, 40, 50, 60 somethings, because it'll cause a faith crisis. But we need to start maybe teaching them young so that we can inoculate them.

John Dehlin [01:42:28] So that's all going on the four or five years leading up to you starting to get into church education. So putting aside your eventual faith crisis, to what extent in your training as a CES teacher did the church have curriculum to introduce these more controversial, complex issues to you? Number one, so you could learn them, and then number two, so you could learn the apologetic responses so that you could inoculate the students you would ultimately teach or not. Like, how did that, how. How did you face that, you know, five years ago or whatever?

Riley Davis [01:43:08] Well, they really didn't have curriculum to expose other us to it at all. No. So really the closest you got to that was L or President M. Russell Ballard gave a talk called For Religious Education and educators in the 21st century. Right. And he was really bold in saying, gone are the days when we can dismiss these questions. Gone are the days when a student asks a sincere question question and the teacher deflects by bearing testimony. And he asked us to know the gospel topics essays like the back of our hands.

John Dehlin [01:43:48] So you would have read that talk, how long, how early?

Riley Davis [01:43:52] For sure. As I was, that was a mandatory reading as I was going through pre service.

John Dehlin [01:43:57] And is that where you learned about the gospel topic sess for the first time?

Riley Davis [01:44:00] I had, I had already like really done a dive into the gospel topic session. And you're just like, see, look, the church is being so transparent. Look, there's all these resources and footnotes. And so they were faith Affirming. Oh, yeah, yeah. For me, it was like, sweet, please, let's address these sticky issues. It's all good. Like, it didn't really phase me at all. And then as I was going in, they didn't have anything to expose us to the issues directly, but President Ballard said, said, no, I'm like the back of your hand. So the level to which teachers did that was varied dramatically. Some teachers didn't really know still what was in those essays, and then some.

Riley Davis [01:44:44] I took that very seriously. And I was like, if my students are going to have these questions or go through these struggles with their faith, I've got, like, the worst thing you could do is. Brother Davis. What. What do I do about this? And I'm flabbergasted and have no idea what they're talking about. So I was really grappling with those things, and I felt like I was really good at the apologetics. I could make it fit. I could make it work, help them know, hey, you don't have to leave. It's. It's okay.

John Dehlin [01:45:15] Okay. So before you were, like, hired on as a full time, eventually you were a full time ck.

Riley Davis [01:45:22] So that happened mid year. It was like, December, and I got a call from the area director saying, we have a position open and we would like to offer it to you. And I asked them, I was like, would that position still be available at the end of the school year? Because I'm mid year, I would hate to leave these students. And on top of that, it takes four years to be vested in the Utah Retirement System.

John Dehlin [01:45:49] So if you.

Riley Davis [01:45:50] If I stayed five more months or four more months, I would have a pension. If I stayed four more months, I would have finished my four years to get my scholarship. And so don't tell me you didn't stay. So I. I didn't stay. But. But I only had to pay back the one semester that I didn't teach. So out of those eight semesters that were paid for, I taught eight semesters in the Utah school systems, or I taught seven. So they forgave seven semesters, and I paid for one semester of tuition.

John Dehlin [01:46:24] So you got almost all your tuition still paid for?

Riley Davis [01:46:27] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:46:28] What about the pension?

Riley Davis [01:46:29] Oh, no, I'm still. Luckily, I'm going back now to the Utah Retirement System, and I'll be able to finish that up.

John Dehlin [01:46:36] But you. Okay, so I'm guessing when you asked if you could wait for more months to take the job, he said that job will be available?

Riley Davis [01:46:44] No, he said, honestly, you're lucky that you got this offer at all, you know?

John Dehlin [01:46:50] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:46:50] And so just being that faithful Mormon, you're like, who cares about the pension? Who cares about. Yeah, I'll have to pay three grand in tuition, but we can handle that. We've been blessed. And. And so I let my school know that I was quitting mid year and hopped over to seminary and Institute. I started at Bountiful High Seminary.

John Dehlin [01:47:13] That also left your school hire dry.

Riley Davis [01:47:15] Yeah, yeah. And luckily it worked out. They had someone who had just gotten off of maternity leave mid year. Okay. And was looking for a job. And so I mostly felt bad for the students. You know, I, I had great relationships with them and they were looking forward to the next semester. And so I, I wanted to be there for him, but it. They understood that this was like a once in a lifetime thing, and so they, they forgave me for that.

John Dehlin [01:47:46] But so you said you. Your first gig was at Bountiful High?

Riley Davis [01:47:49] Yeah, Bountiful High Seminary back when they were the Braves.

John Dehlin [01:47:52] Okay.

Riley Davis [01:47:53] Right. And then I was there for the transition over to the Red Hawks. But yeah, yeah. So Bountiful High Seminary. And I only taught for a few months before COVID hit and was in full swing.

John Dehlin [01:48:07] And I, you know, I. Some people get annoyed that I talk. I actually got a comment last week like, John, it's so annoying that you always like, get into Davis county versus Boun versus. Oh yeah, you know, versus Utah county versus. But oh no, it's a real day. Tell.

Riley Davis [01:48:21] Tell the general authorities kids.

John Dehlin [01:48:24] Okay, hey, talk about that.

Riley Davis [01:48:25] What do you mean by that? So in Bountiful. Bountiful is where all of these apostles and general authority 70s live so that they can commute easily into Salt Lake without having to live in Salt Lake.

John Dehlin [01:48:37] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:48:37] So, I mean, while I was there, like, I, I taught Elder Holland's grandson, Elder Eyring's grandson, Elder Anderson's granddaughter, like Elder holstrom of the 70. Like there were lots of these names that you're like, oh, okay, I, I know that name. And you ask them and yep, that's my grandpa. Yep, that's my dad.

John Dehlin [01:48:57] And what does it mean as a full time LDS seminary teacher to be in a seminary where general authorities grandchildren are attending? What does that mean for. For the church educator?

Riley Davis [01:49:13] It means you got to be careful. Yeah. Because honestly. Well, first of all, they were. Were all great. Like, th. Those kids were just fantastic youth and contributed great as you would imagine in a seminary class. But you always run the risk of. Well, it seems like everything you teach is under a microscope because if Someone goes and tells dad or tells grandpa what their seminary teacher said. They are on your board of directors for the church board of board of education. You know, so, so you always just were especially careful to stay within those orthodox lines when, when you had those students in class. But overall they were, they were great students. But there's kind of that vibe and bountiful even setting the general authorities aside, it's just a very, very devout area and they almost just kind of of need to posture to show that devout nature too.

John Dehlin [01:50:14] Okay, okay, so that's so it was intense but you enjoyed it, is that right?

Riley Davis [01:50:21] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [01:50:22] Okay.

Riley Davis [01:50:22] And so well, what's the training like?

John Dehlin [01:50:27] Do they teach you Mormon theology? Do they teach you Mormon doctrine? Do they just expect you've served a mission so you know this stuff? Do they hand you a manual? What's the education that goes into prepping LDS or a Mormon seminary teacher?

Riley Davis [01:50:44] It's whatever the pre service director wants it to be. So pre service is the system that gets us hired. Right. And so it can vary dramatically from one director to another. And honestly they don't want you to have scholarship. They like, they'll take your at that time. They've actually lowered the bar now so that you don't need a degree to teach seminary. But that's because those people are hired on short term contracts.

John Dehlin [01:51:19] Wait, why would they lower the bar?

Riley Davis [01:51:22] Because they, right now the church is trying to slim down the workforce. So they, they, they want like basically a third of us employed in the next 10 years. Like there should be like two or so religious educators which are career long seminary teachers and a whole bunch of just young off your mission. You're teaching seminary while you're getting your degree and then it's a maximum of five years. Yeah, so they're paying them and they're paying them decent. Like they get insurance and stuff. But I think they've. And it's mixed results. They're in the middle of seeing how it's going to work out, but they've started hiring just a lot younger teachers trying to connect with the students more. And I think it's not a bad thing that they don't have as much scholarship or expertise as well.

John Dehlin [01:52:17] I mean, okay, so just to this is, I'm learning new things and I'm curious about this. So like old model is out of college, you get the CES gig and you spend 30 years as a church educator until you retire, which means five, ten years in you really have been teaching this stuff. And then 20 years in, you've really been teaching this for a long time. And so you're a 40 year old and a 50 year old seminary and institute teacher. Hopefully you're now on the, you know, the EFY circuit or the FSY circuit and you're building your name and becoming more popular. But certainly you're also getting to the point where you're making six figures and having a really good retirement and benefits and health care. So that's the old way.

Riley Davis [01:53:10] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:53:10] And what you're saying is, is they're trying to cut that force back by two thirds.

Riley Davis [01:53:16] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:53:16] And make it people young right out of college for five years, pay them a lot less and in and out, wash them out. Five years, new batch. Other than just cost cutting. Like this is reminding me of when the church moved away from like full time janitor, custodial in custodian, custodians in shop.

John Dehlin [01:53:42] Like some management consultant said, 20,000 chapels across the world, look at how much we could save by firing all the janitors and making members just clean the chapel every week. So one interpretation of this change would be two thirds of church educators cut them off the payroll, less money for benefits and get them young, get them activated and maybe also these newly returned missionaries, it'll give them a spiritual job so that then keep them active, keeps them active, keeps them employed. And then hopefully within that time they get married in the temple, they, you know, start their careers and the church has locked them in.

John Dehlin [01:54:26] So it's cost cutting but also activation of young people who the church is hemorrhaging. And then maybe maybe older educators, 20, 30 years in, maybe they're stale, maybe they're, maybe they're boomers off putting, maybe they're inappropriate or lazy. So maybe you're getting a better quality. I'm just speculating. What do you want to say to all that?

Riley Davis [01:54:50] Yeah, so my, my understanding from this trial, right. Putting these young people in because they basically sat us down and said we're making all of these changes so that you don't all lose your jobs if the brethren pivot with regards to church education.

Riley Davis [01:55:07] So basically changes are coming. We're going to have these younger people and it's been really hard for me to see these young people come in because you can technically get on the career track. So it's a year to year contract. You don't know if you're working the next year. Right. It's a year to year contract with a maximum of five years and you can technically get on the career path if you get your master's they'll consider you.

Riley Davis [01:55:35] And so you've got some of these really awesome young people who are really working hard and pounding out a master's in that five years and trying to qualify and all this stuff. And they kind of lead them along in saying, yeah, there's a chance. But at the same time we're going to meet meetings where they're saying, by the way, we're cutting this many FTEs, these full time equivalents, we're cutting these and sending them to Africa.

Riley Davis [01:56:01] So these people are like, yeah, I'm trying to get a career long job, but we're literally going to trainings where they're saying, yeah, we're reducing 40 positions in the release time education sphere and sending all of those funds to hire people to coordinate in Africa because their need is more than ours.

John Dehlin [01:56:22] So I'm confused. Only for this reason. Yeah, why would they be cutting when the church has 300 to $500 billion in assets? It's not like the church is poor. So it's not like oh, we're running out of money and so we got to cut here to then invest over here. It's more like the church is literally adding, adding I don't know, 20, 50 billion a year to its net worth. So why couldn't it just add more educators in Africa and keep educators in along the Mormon corridor? Did anyone ever ask that?

Riley Davis [01:56:56] That's a great question. And I sarcastically in meetings would bring up, oh well, it's because the church is low on money, you know, but

John Dehlin [01:57:08] how do you speculate so?

Riley Davis [01:57:09] Oh, I, I think it's because the church is going to eventually just like we, we got rid of the boy Scouts, it's, it's good in certain areas, it's not good in other areas. We want to be a global church all on the same page. The vast majority of the church is already doing the stake called seminary teacher, early morning kind of thing. And I don't know how that would work out with the buildings we already have here in, in Utah and stuff like that. But they've already cut. So all the Spanish classes are shifted over to stake called teachers. All of the special needs classes are now state called teachers. That's as of like a couple months ago that they did that. I really feel like what they're doing is cutting the workforce down in that group of religious educators that were in the classroom.

John Dehlin [01:57:59] Yeah.

Riley Davis [01:57:59] Are now going to be the coordinators helping to train and help all of these stake called teachers. If the church were ever to go to early morning slash, if not early morning, find volunteers who can teach during the day to take a class period here or a class period there.

John Dehlin [01:58:18] So just because I'm kind of nerding out a little bit like 40, 50 years ago, whenever they came up with release time, you know, clearly they said okay out in the mission field, which meant anywhere that wasn't it. Utah, Arizona, so Texas. You know, I guess there aren't enough students to justify, I guess there wouldn't be enough students to justify full time salaried positions. But then there would be such a need for church education along the corridor that I guess that could justify the cost, you know, the salaries and the benefits are whatever. So I guess I can see that. Although that doesn't totally make sense because there were also a gazillion members in Utah, Idaho and Arizona.

Riley Davis [01:59:04] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:59:04] So they could have just made it a calling here, just like they made it a calling quote in the mission field. So.

Riley Davis [01:59:12] Well, the mission field side, the mission field side of seminary and church education came after. So what I think think is when 100 years ago when seminary starts here and starts to develop the church education system, they started by hiring these teachers like you would a teacher. But it wasn't until I want to say Neil A. Maxwell was the commissioner of education when it actually seminary started spreading all over the world. So that was a later thing. It's okay. We're having a good experience teaching our youth. You here, how do we do that on a global scale? And so it wasn't feasible.

John Dehlin [01:59:51] And so now go to high school in the early 80s. It's, it's, it's worldwide by that point. But maybe you're saying in the 70s or 60s seminary wasn't worldwide in the

Riley Davis [02:00:01] church, Is that what you're saying? Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:00:02] So okay, I heard about that, about

Riley Davis [02:00:04] the early morning program like th, that kind was trying to fill the need of how do we bring church education further.

John Dehlin [02:00:14] Okay. So maybe one generation older in Texas who would have grown up in the 60s, didn't go to seminary as a Mormon kid in Texas in the 50s, 60s and 70s.

Riley Davis [02:00:27] Yeah. And I'm not exactly sure when it developed.

John Dehlin [02:00:30] Okay.

Riley Davis [02:00:30] But I know at least here my grandparents like went to the Granite High Seminary, which was the first seminar seminary building. Like they, they had like Truman Madsen as their seminary teacher and stuff. So it's been here in Utah for a lot longer than it has been outside.

John Dehlin [02:00:47] Okay, okay. So as seminary distributes, starts in the Mormon corridor, then they start spreading it globally, but with volunteers out in the quote, mission field instead of staffed Positions at some point now in the modern times, they've realized, you know what, we can just now contract the corridor positions, save a lot of money, energize our youth, give them jobs, but then save a ton on benefits and retirement and salaries potentially with the ces. Full time teachers along the corridor.

Riley Davis [02:01:27] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:01:28] Is that right?

Riley Davis [02:01:29] Yes. And have more control over our teachers. I really feel like a big part of this is in a calling capacity. You have absolute control. You have absolute control. Think about it. If, if you're teaching and you're too edgy or whatever, you've got your employee over you who lets you know that. But if you ever got out of line, they would just call someone else. They just release you, you swap, done, it's gone. But when people's livelihoods and pensions. Pensions. I wasn't in the era of pensions, so I left a pension with the district, but didn't come into a phase where I could have had a pension here.

John Dehlin [02:02:05] So these new, these new hires in the CES is just hourly.

Riley Davis [02:02:10] So. So it's hourly for them. I have like 401k benefits and I was, I was in like one of the last windows to get hired as a career long. They call us religious educators rather than full time teachers. Teachers. Okay, so. But I even missed the window for a pension in church education.

John Dehlin [02:02:30] So the Church is decreasingly offering pensions to its, to its educators. Yeah, that's news to me.

Riley Davis [02:02:37] Yeah. And the thing is they argue, they're like.

John Dehlin [02:02:40] While they're like growing in wealth.

Riley Davis [02:02:41] Exactly. Yeah. And the argument is, well, you actually, if the stock market behaves and you're investing in your 401k and they're very generous. Generous. And they're matching like that's their retirement package. But the argument is you'll make more investing. But basically it just means they, it's all on you. If something goes wrong, you deal with it rather than the Church paying you a pension. Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:03:06] It's weird that when the Church is in its wealthiest and its wealth is growing at the highest rate, it's cutting costs in its educators. And honestly, it's got to come down, it always comes down to business. So it just must be. The Church has decided they're not getting the return on investment in their Mormon corridor CES instructors, they're not getting the value, the activity rates, the commitment, the education, the faithfulness of these kids coming out of Utah, Arizona and Idaho. They're not getting that value. You. So it's not worth the money. That's got to be what they've concluded.

Riley Davis [02:03:46] And I don't know because what we're hearing from like Chad Webb, the head of seminaries and institutes and all that stuff they keep re emphasizing, it's almost like they want to have their cake and eat it too, because they keep re emphasizing all the time, hey, when we do our in depth surveys of who stays active and who doesn't, when we do do this seminary is always at the top of the list. They keep hammering like no seminary. You guys retain people. You guys are on the forefront. Yeah. You know, and so the importance of this. But they at the same time want to. There's just so many complexities when you, you've interviewed CES employees.

Riley Davis [02:04:32] Like there's so many complexities when it to comes comes to a job where literally if you get the wrong bishop, if you say think the wrong thing, you're gone. And do you have work experience to get back into the field? It's just really complicated. And I feel like the stake called teachers, when it's all just volunteer, they can just switch them out and it gives them a lot more ability to control the narrative.

John Dehlin [02:05:00] Okay, I'm going to speculate one more thing.

Riley Davis [02:05:02] Do it.

John Dehlin [02:05:02] So like, you know, Grant Palmer, does that name mean anything to you? So he was, he wrote a book called An Insider's View of Mormon Origins, which came out in the early 2000s, I think by signature books. And that book was earth shattering at the time because it started out by saying an insider's view, meaning it's someone who was an employee on the inside who had access to, you know, it's implied he had access to privileged information, which he did because back then when you were in CES for 30 years, which he ended up being, he had access to the vault, he had access to church archives, he had access to top church leaders.

John Dehlin [02:05:45] And so 30 years into his career, when he then comes out with the book saying, I've been an insider for 30 years and let me tell you what I know about Joseph Smith and the first vision and the peep stones and the treasure digging and the polyandry. It shook the church in the early 2000s and it was influential to my testimony.

John Dehlin [02:06:07] So that was before the CES letter, but that's an example of a CES related headache for the church before the CES letter. What were you gonna say?

Riley Davis [02:06:18] This goes way, way back further than that.

John Dehlin [02:06:21] I mean, tell us.

Riley Davis [02:06:22] I. The church has a legacy of having issues with forward thinking educators and then discarding them in really inappropriate and harsh ways.

John Dehlin [02:06:33] Any names?

Riley Davis [02:06:34] Yeah, I mean, the The Peterson brothers and the Chamberlain brothers in 1911 at BYU, the evolution controversy. And I've read you can go to BYU and you can look at these heartfelt letters, letters they're writing to general authorities saying we just know that if we don't teach them some way to deal with evolution, these people are going to leave. They've got to be able to harmonize it. They've got to be able to see both things. But Joseph F. Smith at that time, it's not comfortable. And so they, three of the four get fired and then the. Well not fired. They chose to resign because that. They basically said change your teachings on the Bible and evolution or resign. And then the last one who stayed ended up resigning a year later. And then you go to the Eugene Englands and the Lowell Bennions.

John Dehlin [02:07:27] Yes.

Riley Davis [02:07:27] Of the world. And one of my heroes who doesn't get a lot of air time is Heber Snell. He was a religious educator.

John Dehlin [02:07:34] He.

Riley Davis [02:07:35] I think why I resonate with him so much is our training in biblical. Biblical studies. But he went to the University of Chicago, got his PhD in biblical studies.

John Dehlin [02:07:44] Probably very fond Brody times.

Riley Davis [02:07:45] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:07:46] Part of the 30s and 40s.

Riley Davis [02:07:47] Yeah. The Chicago experiment era when Joseph F. Merrill this really just unafraid truth is truth where it's found on heathen or on Christian ground. Like he's like, we're not, we don't have anything to fear. And they're sending these people to get these legit degrees and they, they don't like what they get back. And so. But he was, they come back believing

John Dehlin [02:08:09] the age of the earth is billions.

Riley Davis [02:08:10] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:08:11] And evolution's true.

Riley Davis [02:08:12] And higher biblical criticism. Right. You know, talk about what is that? Oh, I mean, so Chicago, the University of Chicago especially their divinity school was the cutting edge of theology and forward thinking thought. And here we have church educators going to Chicago. That's where Sydney Sperry went. And Heber Snell, in his personal writings actually and in his later interviews in life saw, saw Sydney Sperry as kind of a sellout. And whereas in the church we're like, literally it's the Sperry Symposium, Religious education Symposium.

Riley Davis [02:08:49] Like we like praise him because he's the one who came back with the degree and was willing to still be an apologist. Whereas most people go and get these degrees and they're like, no, I mean, mean when it comes to higher biblical criticism, like the authors, the like different pseudo Pauline letters. Right. Letters that weren't actually written by Paul or the different ways that the text, biblical and scriptural texts were compiled over time. You come back and you have to see things differently.

John Dehlin [02:09:20] That the Bible's flawed, that it was made by men. It was written decades or generations after the people whose names are on the Bible.

Riley Davis [02:09:27] Exactly. I mean, I did.

John Dehlin [02:09:29] It contradicted critics itself. All the Dan McClellan stuff.

Riley Davis [02:09:31] Oh, yeah. Later on, the Isaiah problem was one of the clinchers for me. Isaiah and the Book of Mormon. And we can talk about that. But. But yeah. So all of these just loving educators. I don't know if you can find educators better than the Lowell Bennions of the world. And Lowell Bennion. After Heber Snell got kicked out of church education, it's really cool to see his Hebrew Snell's correspondence with Joseph Fielding Smith at this time. But Joseph Fielding Smith is writing, like, says he has issues with the book that Heber Snell literally was asked by his director to write. They're like, you have expertise in Bible. Write us a book on the Old Testament. So he does. And Joseph Fielding Smith doesn't like it. He's like, why. Why don't you say that? Ezekiel 37. The two sticks becoming one. How come you don't say it's clearly

John Dehlin [02:10:26] the Bible in the Book of Mormon?

Riley Davis [02:10:27] Yeah, yeah. He's like, why don't you reference the Bible in the Book of Mormon and Hebrew? Snow's response is, because I don't teach things that aren't true. You know, like. And so just these great educators who just chose to stick to their guns or the low. Lowell Bennion actually used to. After Heber Snell was kicked out of church education, he started teaching Bible for the U. And Lowell Ben started the Institute of Religion at the U. So he would have Heber Snell come stay at the U. Institute with them. And just these wonderful educators who just love kids.

John Dehlin [02:11:00] We mean the University of Utah.

Riley Davis [02:11:01] It's true for the. Yeah, yeah. But. Yeah, just. They love their students. They love them, and they want to build a world where Mormonism will work. But the church, just as soon as you step out of the bounds that the current authorities are comfortable with, they. They discard stardom like they're nothing.

John Dehlin [02:11:21] Where do you read if someone wants to read about this Snell guy? Where do you read about that?

Riley Davis [02:11:25] Well, that's actually a project that I've. I've been working on. I transcribed his autobiography up at Utah State. Oh. So that's something that I've wanted to write on and to work on.

John Dehlin [02:11:38] Can we do some Mormon stories episodes about that?

Riley Davis [02:11:40] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:11:40] Would you want to Tell us.

Riley Davis [02:11:41] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [02:11:42] The story is Snell.

Riley Davis [02:11:43] Dude. His. His story is incredible. It's. If you want a glimpse into his story, the best thing that's been written thus far is Matt Bowman, out at Claremont University, just not too long ago, released a short. There's a series called Introductions to Mormon Thought, and he did one on Joseph Fielding Smith, and so there's a chapter in there. So Introductions to Mormon Thought. It's printed by the University of Illinois Press, and so you can buy that book, but it's Joseph Fielding Smith. Smith, a Mormon Theologian, I think, is the title of the book. And in one of those chapters, that's the only place that I've seen this controversy that I was just finding in these documents.

Riley Davis [02:12:29] I was just going back. There have been a few articles written about it, too, in dialogue. But Matt Bowman, in his. Joseph Fielding Smith, a Mormon Theologian, has a chapter where it talks about Hebrew snow. But that's the most that I've really heard Snell be brought up. His story is incredible.

John Dehlin [02:12:48] Dang. Well, I. You know, I thought I knew a little bit about that sort of topic, and I don't remember. I'm sure I read. I'm sure I've stumbled on Snell's name.

Riley Davis [02:12:56] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:12:56] Because I read Lowell Benion's biography.

Riley Davis [02:12:58] Totally.

John Dehlin [02:12:59] I read Adventures of the Church Historian, about Leonard Arrington and T. Edgar Lyon and all that. So I'm sure I've seen the Snell name, but I would have never add him to my list of people that I. Oh, so that's.

Riley Davis [02:13:10] Heck, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:13:11] Yeah.

Riley Davis [02:13:11] I would love to talk about. I can talk about Heber Snell all day. He's really awesome.

John Dehlin [02:13:15] So we'll have an episode on that, because that's a story worth telling.

Riley Davis [02:13:18] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:13:18] Anyway, so, yeah, BH Roberts, you know, caused trouble. He was kind of a church educator. And so there's this long history

Riley Davis [02:13:29] of

John Dehlin [02:13:30] church educators running afoul of the lowercase f. Fundamentalists. Just apostles and general authorities.

Riley Davis [02:13:38] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:13:39] Right.

Riley Davis [02:13:39] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:13:40] And that continues into the 70s, 80s, and 90s.

Riley Davis [02:13:43] Oh, totally.

John Dehlin [02:13:44] That then leads. I mean, Michael Quinn was a church educator.

Riley Davis [02:13:47] Right. Lowell Bennion, that. I feel like that was one of the clinchers where he really got ahead of the Brethren was on race and priesthood.

John Dehlin [02:13:54] Yeah.

Riley Davis [02:13:54] And it doesn't matter that you're only five years or ten years ahead of the Brethren. Like, we're gonna. We're gonna rescind that anyway way. But he just gets caught in the crossfire, and they're like, actually, yeah. You founded the University of Utah Institute of Religion. But we're going to cut your course load.

John Dehlin [02:14:13] Yeah.

Riley Davis [02:14:13] And we're going to cut it back. And now actually we want you to write curriculum rather than. And so they just edge them out of as sometimes softly and sometimes they're just kind of. It's rough how they treat their educators sometimes.

John Dehlin [02:14:28] Yeah, yeah. Okay. So all that to say that maybe after 50 to 100 years of the church realizing that the more. The more someone dedicates to studying the gospel, the more they go from milk to meat and the more decades they spend studying the deep doctrines and mysteries. There's two things that happens. One is the higher risk they probably have of losing their testimony, but also the more credibility and social capital they gain. So the combination of the two makes someone who's 20 or 30 years in maybe a real big liability for the church.

Riley Davis [02:15:12] Yeah, it can be problematic. And granted, most of these educators went without a fuss. They didn't want to be a big thing like you look at Lowell Bennion did not want to be a martyr for the cause, you know, and so they're very kind about it, but they just take it in the teeth, you know, these people. Like, I want to say it's Lowell Benion's wife who she couldn't watch when President Packer would get on and talk in conference. She couldn't do it because of what church authorities had done to their family.

John Dehlin [02:15:46] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So now that actually makes a lot of sense, that the church is literally richer than God in 2025, but still cutting costs, still cutting church education. I think it's a combination of the risks and liabilities, but also, especially with the Internet age, I mean, like I said, how many former church educators has Mormon stories alone interviewed, let alone. It's gotta be. The letter to the CES director has been a catastrophic disaster for SEO relative to church education in the Mormon Church. But also just the reputation of CES is now inextricably tied to the CES letter, which is. Which is a nuclear bomb for testimonies in the modern Mormon Church era. Right?

Riley Davis [02:16:39] Yeah, definitely. So I think the new system, if that's the way they're going, like I said, I'm no authority on this. I'm just have been in the meetings and it seems like they're. They're shifting towards a place where it would be feasible to shift to stake called teachers, where they would just have more control over.

John Dehlin [02:17:02] Over the teacher teaching and spend less money.

Riley Davis [02:17:04] Yep. And save. And they're always looking for that.

John Dehlin [02:17:07] Keep more younger people active in their early years as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which means they're gonna have all these buildings on all these high school campuses and junior highs.

Riley Davis [02:17:18] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:17:19] All across Utah.

Riley Davis [02:17:20] I mean, in the ninth graders, it's literally just for the ninth grade year. So you've got this building dedicated to just one grade of students over there. So I don't know know what they'll do or if they'll have state called teachers try to go to those areas and still do it. I have no idea.

John Dehlin [02:17:35] I'm sure they'll sell that property to the high schools and the high schools will turn them into gymnasiums or something, extra classrooms or art buildings or something like that. Yeah, yeah.

Riley Davis [02:17:46] It's just crazy. We'll see what happens.

John Dehlin [02:17:48] Yeah. Okay. Okay. Well, we've totally lost track of your story, so it's all good. But, but this is you, you know, know we're following stuff that's interesting.

Riley Davis [02:17:56] Yeah.

Pay, Training, and the Realities of the Job

John Dehlin [02:17:56] So, okay, so you get hired as a religious educator.

Riley Davis [02:18:02] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:18:03] Not a pension, but a, but a 401k with magic.

Riley Davis [02:18:06] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:18:06] Yeah. And you're thinking you're going to do it for how many years?

Riley Davis [02:18:09] My whole life. Yeah. Okay. I, I was in it for the long haul, you know, I mean, I now have the excuse to study. I mean, I tried to study in depth. Depth all these issues, even tricky stuff like on my own time. And now I can do this as a job. And it was just kind of a dream. And you get. Every teacher has to be interviewed by a general authority. And so I was interviewed by Elder McKay, who's the church historian now. And it was a great experience. I've heard of some seminary teachers that it was not a great experience for them because it's just leadership roulette, you know, it's whoever you get assigned kind.

Riley Davis [02:18:47] And it was, it was great for us. But that time, that was a really hard time period in our life because we, we had just had our first child. It was changing careers, which is a huge move, and then covet hits. And so it was a lot of change in a short amount of time and we had, we had really rushed into having kids too, which a lot of that I attribute to and so glad now that they're here. But we ended up having three kids in four years and so our first ones there just so many. In fact, I remember, I remember I took time off the day after our daughter was born.

Riley Davis [02:19:29] I took time off of my school teaching position, my math teaching position, but there was so much hanging on, on the student teaching. I didn't know if I was Going to get hired or not? I actually went in and taught early morning seminary the day after my wife had her baby.

John Dehlin [02:19:46] Wow.

Riley Davis [02:19:46] So you just to make sure you're not the squeaky wheel, right? You know, you want to just make sure there's no reason they wouldn't hire you. So I literally went in, taught early morning seminary, and then took the rest of the day off to be with my wife. But literally, day after she had our first child, I was still. So like, I gotta be in there. I gotta be seminary teaching because I want to get hired.

John Dehlin [02:20:08] That's crazy. Okay, so really quickly, how was your salary, your starting salary as a church educator? How did it compare to your salary when you were teaching high school?

Riley Davis [02:20:21] So if you're comfortable. Oh, yeah, yeah. I, I took a pay hit to go into seminary, but I was fine with it. But the crazy thing is I took a pay hit to work three more months out of the year because I was only contracted like or two to three months out of the year. I was. I didn't have to do anything on spring break. I didn't have to do anything on my summers as a public educator. But now I'm being asked to come into the office literally all summer, and if I want time off, I have to take it out of my personal vacation time off. So I, I took a pay hit. It wasn't crazy, like five, five or so thousand dollars.

John Dehlin [02:21:05] So less money than a public high school.

Riley Davis [02:21:08] Public teacher starting high school. Public teacher, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:21:11] Again, the church is richer than God, but they're paying their seminary teacher starting pay less than a high school teacher is paid. Yeah. And they have to work summers too.

Riley Davis [02:21:22] Yeah. And the thing is that that has actually shifted a lot in my time in sni, because I even started higher than most seminary teachers because they considered my years teaching as relevant experience. So it could have even been worse for me had I come from a different field. But the church, during my time, in these last five and a half years that I've worked for seminary and institutes, we got a new age group HR director who's really sharp, really awesome. And I think she looked at what we were making was like, wait, really? Because our salaries have gone up dramatically over the last five years. Okay, good. So I, I took a pay hut cut coming into seminary. Now I'm going to take a pay cut leaving seminary too.

John Dehlin [02:22:07] Okay, well, that's good to hear because I want the church to treat its employees well, right?

Riley Davis [02:22:13] Oh, definitely. I mean, it's a hard job. I mean, if I'm talking about the difficulty level as just a high school math teacher. Sometimes people are like, oh, you must need so much patience as a high school math teacher. It's nothing compared to seminary. Seminary was brutal.

Teaching Hard History and Inoculating Students

John Dehlin [02:22:30] Okay, what's so hard about teaching Mormon seminary in Utah in the 2020s? Give us a sense of what it's like.

Riley Davis [02:22:39] First of all, I came in and the co. Covid didn't help, right? You know, so I come in. I only have a few weeks, a few months of normal ish teaching as Covid's starting to spread. And then it gets all online and students don't want to go online. And so that was hard for my confidence in and of itself. But I got in there and I was blown away by the apathy from so many of these students.

Riley Davis [02:23:07] Like, and I, I should know know, right? Like, I'd been an apathetic student. And I know that doesn't mean they're not interested in the gospel, right. I had been the student in seminary who didn't want to hear what the teacher had to say and stuff like that. But I was blown away because so many of these students are literally only in seminary because their parents are making them.

Riley Davis [02:23:29] And you think about what that does to the students. Motivation, right? You know, like, if literally mom and dad are just saying, we want you to be Mormon, and so we're going to make you put this in your class. You're going to give up an elective, you're not going to be able to take art or whatever it is, you're going to take seminary. A lot of these students are just, they, they have some resentment towards their parents for that, and their parents aren't there. So you kind of take it as a seminary teacher. And don't get me wrong, there's probably 2/3 of the class that are.

Riley Davis [02:24:09] Are just really, they're fantastic students and we had awesome gospel topic questions and like conversations and stuff. But there's this subset that always just weighed on me so hard because you just want to make the difference in their life. You know, they hate the church. You know, they don't want to be here. They hate the church a lot. Like, there is a subset in the seminary classroom that are just so done.

John Dehlin [02:24:36] Why do they hate the church?

Riley Davis [02:24:37] Because whether it's they feel controlled by their parents or coerced, and maybe it's them bucking back against parental authority more than the church, normal teenage rebellion, but some of them, it's like legit. They've like gone on tik tok and they know stuff that their Parents won't even touch, and their parents are making them go to seminary anyway. And some of those students eventually have to be removed because they're bringing up those things in classes, and that's not what they want to have happen in seminary class.

John Dehlin [02:25:13] Did you ever have that happen?

Riley Davis [02:25:14] Whereas not in. Not in my classes, specifically, because I feel like I tried to make my. Especially as I started to just become more nuanced and stuff, I tried to make my seminary classroom a place where sincere inquiry was welcome. And so a lot of those students, I feel like some of them who came in kind of jaded, I was able to kind of win over and saying, hey, it's okay to have your questions. It's okay to really grapple with these things. And I could even say, I'm sorry. I'm sorry that your parents are forcing you to be here, here.

Riley Davis [02:25:50] I feel you. Neither of us can do anything about that right now, so let's just make it the best we can. But that subset of students that just were either apathetic or even sometimes antagonistic, it weighed on me so much. I'm not the kind of person who can just set that aside. And on top of that, in seminary, you've got this pressure that, well, if you're not reaching those students, it's because you're not spiritual enough stuff. If you had the spirit with you, you would know the exact right thing to say. We all hear the general conference talks or whatever, where someone's inspired to say that one right thing and it reactivates the person or whatever.

Riley Davis [02:26:32] And so I left every day. If I had students, even if the majority of the class was having a great time, if I left knowing some students hated it and are angry at me and stuff like that, that I'm like, I didn't have the spirit enough to reach them. And so there's just such this culture, and I think they're trying to move away from it. But at least when I got in, even just five years ago, there was such a culture of

John Dehlin [02:27:00] you.

Riley Davis [02:27:01] The way you live affects whether or not you're going to be a seminary, a successful seminary teacher. So if things aren't going well, you need to take a look at your personal life. How are you treating your wife? How are you treating your kids? And basically, it did a number on my scrupulosity because every time I would have a punk kid who was mad at his parents for putting him in seminary, I would go ahead and blame myself and say it's because I'm not spiritual enough. Am I worthy. Am I, Am I actually. Okay. And it just was a lot of pressure.

John Dehlin [02:27:34] Okay. Was there, you know, were you inoculating kids to. Because I have the impression that once the Gospel topics essays came out, the church didn't want adults really reading that stuff because it would basically just infect them with the truth virus or the history virus, but that they realized that while they were going to lose generations of Mormons as adults, if they could inoculate the teens with the problematic church history in a nuanced, contextualized way, then when they got to the BYU or learned about the CES letter or went to college, oh, I already heard about the stones in the hat. It's not a problem. I already heard about polygamy. It's not a problem. So were y' all inoculating Mormon youth or no. On.

Riley Davis [02:28:27] Yeah, I think there was definitely a focus on that with President Ballard's religious educators in the 21st century, because I think he might even say inoculate in that talk. And so there definitely was this idea, but at the same time it wasn't built into the curriculum. Usually later on they started building certain things in. Like, for example, in my later years, they've really started with the latest curriculum. They've started putting in more stuff on, like race in the priesthood and like when you get to problematic verses in, in second Nei or what, like it counters with all are alike unto God. And you'll have a lesson that talks about how, how much we disavow racism and stuff like that.

Riley Davis [02:29:15] And so to an extent they've tried to, to build those things in. But usually I would never refer students to, at least in my early seminary years before I was nuanced, I wouldn't send them to the Gospel topics essays unless they were point blanking you on those things.

John Dehlin [02:29:37] Or you wouldn't bring up there wasn't like a lesson on the Book of Abraham or a lesson on the, the Peepstone in the hat or no, a lesson on, on the first vision or a lesson on polygamy in the curriculum. So as of, as of last Friday.

Riley Davis [02:29:50] Well, so there are now. There are now in those early days, so we would have lessons on Book of Abraham, but it's not the historicity of the Book of Abraham. It's like, oh, look at these beautiful things in the Book of Abraham. Look. And you might in passing mention like, oh yeah, the, the story of how Joseph got the papyri. And you might even if you're super nuanced as a seminary teacher, say, and like glaze by and say, and yeah, the, the writings on the papyri that we have don't match up. Maybe a nuanced seminary teacher would do that. But in the curriculum, we talk about these things, but it's always from it.

Riley Davis [02:30:29] It doesn't take accountability for anything. So. And that's one of the reasons I felt like I needed to leave now versus, versus next semester is next semester we're doing second half. We're teaching second half of the Doctrine and Covenants. And I didn't feel like race and priesthood and polygamy. Really, the only time you're going to talk about polygamy is in section 132. Right. And so. And even then, I have huge problems with how the church portrays this stuff. It's not honest in how. In how it portrays it in the curriculum. So. But to answer the are you inoculating Question, there have been swings, I feel like in church leadership, I feel like President Ballard was like, yes, you as teachers, study these things, know them like the back of your hand, be ready to answer all of their questions.

Riley Davis [02:31:16] And then just a few years later, we had Elder Anderson come in the same venue, the same teaching, all ces, and he gave an example. Ballard was saying, gone are the days where you dismiss a sincere question with testimony. Then you have Anderson come and he's like, gives an example about, oh, what do I do if. If I get a question about evolution and Adam and Eve, right? And he says, I would recommend that you bear testimony of what you do know. And so I, as a CES employee, I'm like, wait, which one do I go with? President Ballard saying, don't dismiss with testimony. Right.

Riley Davis [02:31:55] Elder Anderson. Now it seems like there was kind of some backlash after the. The essays and stuff like that. So they retrenched a little bit. And then the latest guidance, we heard from Elder Renlund last year and then Christofferson, and the latest guidance has been, make sure you answer all their questions, but do it in a way that doesn't answer more questions.

John Dehlin [02:32:16] Does it lead to more questions?

Riley Davis [02:32:18] Lead to.

John Dehlin [02:32:18] I've heard that there are many general authorities who believe that the Gospel topics essays were a mistake. And there are many who believe that promoting rough stone rolling Richard Bushman's biography of Joseph Smith was a mistake. And that Richard Turley, former church historian, is now writing yet another Joseph Smith biography. He's being funded by the church. Church because they find rough stone rolling to be not faith affirming. Yeah.

Riley Davis [02:32:48] Unpalatable. Right. And so was that your perception? Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:32:52] Inside.

Riley Davis [02:32:53] Like, my understanding just talking to leadership and employees was that some apostles loved rough stone rolling and others thought it was just the worst thing. And so. But, yeah, so I. I just think you've got this quorum of the 12, and they always act like it's in unison. Right. But they all have their own thoughts. And so depending on who's talking to you, President Ballard might be saying, be super open. And then the next couple of years, it's Elder Anderson saying, actually, don't be as open.

John Dehlin [02:33:25] Yeah. Okay, so. So let's go ahead and shift to when your faith started being challenged. Yeah. But I think your wife's faith started being challenged first.

Riley Davis [02:33:42] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:33:43] So should we go back to talk a bit about. Because you put in your outline that even before you started in ces, Ashley was struggling with some things.

Riley Davis [02:33:56] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:33:56] So how do you want to address that?

Riley Davis [02:33:58] Yeah. And not struggling, as in, like, out of the church or thinking about leaving, but she's always just had a lot more. Taken things a lot harder when it comes to church history and polygamy. And so I. I remember, even when we were dating, I remember her telling me, by the way, if we were to, like, get married, sealed, I die young, and you choose to get resealed to someone else in the next life, I'm leaving heaven. I'm out. She was just so. Just. It was abhorrent, the whole thought of polygamy, whether in this life or eternal polygamy, which continues today. And so she. She just always had a hard time with those things and really grappled.

Riley Davis [02:34:45] And she would get to a point where she's like, okay, I think I understand. Polygamy was an Abrahamic test, and it would be good for a few years. But she always had those questions along more than me, who was just typical, just tbm.

John Dehlin [02:34:59] Okay, so she struggled with polygamy from the time you met her.

Riley Davis [02:35:04] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:35:04] Other experiences with equality, for example.

Riley Davis [02:35:07] Oh, yeah. Well, I. I feel like she didn't really allow herself to care about the gender equality issues in the church until after she started deconstructing. But the thing that really unwrapped, unraveled it for Ashley was retroactive jealousy, ocd. And so we had talked about our past relationships as dating, and, like, she even felt very. Just open, like, it's all good, like, we've repented, like, it's okay. There was no issue. We were really open. And then after we had our. Our first child, which is right. At the same time, I'm getting hired into CES and changing jobs, and all this stuff. Right. As she had her first child, we, she started having these compulsive thoughts, just kind of tearing open my past, my past history, specifically with relationships in sexual history.

Riley Davis [02:36:09] Right. And just the compulsions of knowing, I need to know exactly how far this went. And here I am, I'm, I'm someone who genuinely was trying to live the law of chastity, right. And like was trying and over scrupulously confessing anytime there was anything even close. But she just felt just really torn apart by our doctrines on chastity. It did a number on both of us mentally. And I, I really feel like that was when she started to be able to say, okay, maybe these teachings aren't okay. If this is the fruit of those teachings, maybe this isn't okay.

John Dehlin [02:36:51] Okay. So she's starting to have some of those doubts and you're maybe becoming more righteous. But she's also experiencing scrupulosity and I've heard about that before. Natasha talked a lot about that. Sometimes spouses, especially ones who kept themselves more relatively pure from a lot of chastity standpoint, they kind of can lose their mind about what their partner may have done. Even though Mormons believe in repentance and

Riley Davis [02:37:29] atonement and forgiveness, the atonement leaves no sign scars. Right. You know, once you're healed and the bishop has said you're forgiven. Right. And so the idea, and she understood that and she's like, why am I doing this? I'm, I'm destroying our marriage. Right. I'm, I'm bringing in all these hard things that don't need to be here, cuz Riley's fine, you know, and so, but that really, that's how you know

John Dehlin [02:37:53] it's a mental illness. Because you don't want it.

Riley Davis [02:37:56] No, no.

John Dehlin [02:37:57] And you're not choosing it, but it's happening anyway and it's causing distress.

Riley Davis [02:38:01] Yeah. And these compulsive thoughts, like she had to, if she had a thought about how far something went with a certain past girlfriend, right. She would have to ask it. And so, and it just feeds the compulsion and gets worse. Right. And so when it comes to like therapy and medication, both of which we, we tried, some therapists were much more helpful than others. Some, the Mormon therapists specifically were often not as helpful and not to stereotype because they're fantastic Mormon therapists too. But both she and I at different times had ones that really bought into the purity culture and kind of fed the problem rather than helping it.

Riley Davis [02:38:45] And so, but really between therapy, medication, the thing that really changed everything for Ashley when she started getting. Getting better and losing those compulsive thoughts was when she started letting go of the doctrines and say. Oh. Gave herself permission to say, you know what? Maybe I don't agree about how the church teaches the law of chastity.

John Dehlin [02:39:08] Because you mentioned the object lessons, like, oh, yeah, licked cupcake and the chewed gum.

Riley Davis [02:39:12] Gum. Yeah. And I remember getting. Mine was a licked Oreo. Right. They took the Oreo apart, licked the cream, and then put it back together and said like, hey, well, it looks fine. Right. But would you want it? You know, and so making anal.

John Dehlin [02:39:26] Analogizing that to someone who'd had sex.

Riley Davis [02:39:29] Yes, exactly. Right. So people might not know. You might look like a normal Oreo. Right. But you've actually been licked. You're actually dirty and contaminated, and it's ridiculous. All this goes back to, like, pur. Like purity. Cultural things from literally biblical times and just. Just this fear. But. But, yeah, so, yeah, those. She gave herself permission to say, maybe those things really were harmful. Maybe it's not.

John Dehlin [02:39:59] Okay, it was that before you became a seminary teacher.

Riley Davis [02:40:01] No, this is while I was a seminary teacher because they actually interviewed. Not Elder McKay interviewed not only me, but my wife as well. So the wife has to be in there for the interview.

John Dehlin [02:40:14] You.

Riley Davis [02:40:14] And so she was true blue Mormon enough and devout enough that it didn't cause any issues. And so we started out just very orthodox. And like I said, it was not long, even with young children, before I was in Elders quorum president again and then into my first bishopric. And so we were very orthodox, very faithful at that time. Time. But then while I was a seminary teacher over those years, she started to give herself permission to think differently.

John Dehlin [02:40:46] Okay, well, let's go ahead and jump to how, as a Mormon seminary teacher, just in the past four or five years, your faith starts to decline and hers. Yeah, but how does it start with you?

Riley Davis [02:40:59] So I. I feel like the first thing was seeing how letting go of church teachings helped Ashley, because you're like, whoa, okay, all. We've tried all of these different things, and it's been so hard. And the solution was letting go of a belief.

John Dehlin [02:41:15] Yeah. They say wickedness. You're taught wickedness never was happiness.

Riley Davis [02:41:18] Yeah. And so then here she is, like, decreasing her faithfulness level, like, thinking differently than prophets and stuff, and it's really helping her. So that was a huge thing and just, like, kind of helping me realize, okay, paradigm shifts are fine. You know, we need to be able to think differently. And I think some of the things that started to hit me most. I mentioned the students that didn't want to be in seminary that I always just felt for and just really wished that we didn't have the culture and the pressure to have them be there. But the other thing that I think really shifted, Shifted my nuance and forced me into being more nuanced was my students.

Riley Davis [02:42:03] I would have students in the LGBT community who are just so kind and loving, and they want to make the church work so bad. And just seeing how hostile of an environment it can be for them in the church just really made me want to make my classroom room a safe place.

John Dehlin [02:42:25] How did you learn as a teacher about the plight of gay and lesbian Mormon students in your classes?

Riley Davis [02:42:32] Some of them, it's getting to the point where they'll on the first day say, hey, I'm so. And so while you're introducing yourselves, I had a student introduce himself as, like a transgender male in. On the first day of class. And.

Riley Davis [02:42:48] But another way was sometimes we would do get to know you things in the beginning, and I would have them write me a letter just like, what do you want me to know as a teacher? How can I be the best resource for you? And I just remember I had one student who wrote me this letter and explained that he wasn't out, but that he was gay and how hard it had been to choose to take seminary.

Riley Davis [02:43:17] But he really felt prompted to take seminary, and he was so glad because he came in and I was more open and all this stuff, and he felt so good. But that same student ended up having to drop class at semester just because, I mean, heck, he had cousins in my seminary classes that would say just really homophobic and mean things. And so I would sometimes. And I think that that's where I got into trouble as a seminary teacher is whenever I heard those things, I would put a stop to it and I would just clarify, like, this is the Church of Jesus Christ. Everyone has a place here, and everyone deserves to belong here.

Riley Davis [02:43:55] But then my super orthodox students in the class, that perks their ears up, like, wait, is he. What side is he on? You know? And so. But just seeing that student have to draw, drop because he wanted to be in seminary, he wanted to make it work.

John Dehlin [02:44:12] How do you know that's why he dropped?

Riley Davis [02:44:14] Talking to his family afterwards, you know, it just. I, I. Because I really wanted. I wanted to make sure it wasn't anything on my part as a teacher. And they clarified that. No, it's. It's just a hard dynamic with. Oh, with being A member of that community.

John Dehlin [02:44:32] And so seeing gay kids drop out of your seminary classes made you feel

Riley Davis [02:44:37] what I mean, just, you just feel for them and you just want to become just this advocate and you just are like, you read the data, like, and you see what this minority group in our culture here in Utah goes through and the suicide rates and different things. You just. I, I just wanted to make my class a place. They make have all sorts of seminary teachers or all sorts of bishops or all sorts of whatever. But whether it was in my ward and my leadership callings or whether it was in my classroom, I just eventually wanted to make it a place where people could be safe and where people knew that the Church of Jesus Christ is a church for everyone.

John Dehlin [02:45:21] So what did the church teach you to tell these kids, these gay and lesbian Mormon kids, kids when they come out to you as a seminary teacher? What was the instruction?

Riley Davis [02:45:34] There's like no instruction from what I've, like literally the. They, they teach you to defer to bishops, they teach you to okay your place. I think in the past they've had seminary teachers step into counselor roles that were problematic. Problematic and rightly so. And you get abused.

John Dehlin [02:45:56] Teachers would abuse students.

Riley Davis [02:45:58] And so, so the church is so gun shy about that that right now it's just send them to, that's another site. Send them to their bishop and those kind of resources.

John Dehlin [02:46:11] You know the reason to downsize CES is because you have more legal liability when they're employees.

Riley Davis [02:46:18] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:46:18] And when it's on church property than if they're volunteers.

Riley Davis [02:46:22] We can't control what a volunteer does. They just said they'd teach the class and we didn't know they were going to say that. So yeah, I think that could be a dynamic too. But, but yeah. So I, it was just hard for me to see those things with my students and I feel like I would just divert. I had to say, well, like, hey, thank you so much for sharing that with me. For me, my last three years out of the five years, it was really hard because I was actually in a one man seminary building. I was the only person there. So they would come up.

Riley Davis [02:46:55] There was no other teacher. The area in Bountiful didn't have the demographics to justify two teachers. So anytime I had these conversations with students, I would have to be outside on the way out because I could never be one on one with a student. And I would defer them, say thank you so much for trust in me enough to share that and defer them to their bishops and whatever resources there were on Gospel library, which are pretty meager.

Supporting LGBT Students as a Seminary Teacher

John Dehlin [02:47:21] Okay. Because, I mean, there's some basic ways that the church, in my view, as someone that started out my grad school and Mormon stories years concerned about the church's LGBTQ policies, There are ways that I perceive the church got better. So it used to be. Be that it was a choice to be gay, that being gay was from masturbating, or that being gay was from being abused as a child or having a mom who is distant or a mom who is overbearing and a dad who is distant, Whatever those things were. Sin, basically, or bad parenting. Were you taught anything around those perceptions?

Riley Davis [02:48:00] No. No. I feel like they had come far enough that. That really it was just love them and try to make them feel like they've got a spot here, you know?

John Dehlin [02:48:09] And so then there's the typical, pray it away, pray the gay away, the atonement can help you change. Or conversion therapy. Were you taught anything about whether it was something that could be changed through obedience and faithfulness and repentance?

Riley Davis [02:48:27] I think my generation of missionaries, I remember, remember friends going out on missions

John Dehlin [02:48:33] who

Riley Davis [02:48:37] that definitely tried to get past their inclinations by those means. I feel like by the time I was teaching, we had shifted enough that it was just. I mean, if anything, it was going to come from counseling with their bishop. You know, they just didn't really want us involved with it much. We referred them to church resources. And later, as. As I kind of developed and was more nuanced, I would let those students know that I'm an advocate and that I'm there for them. And I feel like many of them really, really appreciated that. But then you had the orthodox students who didn't appreciate that.

John Dehlin [02:49:15] I guess in my hopeful mind, I'm envisioning this sort of like, okay, your CES teacher. Let's. Let's do the LGBT little talk. It's not a choice. It doesn't go away. Celibacy is not the answer. Mixed orientation marriages aren't the answer. Conversion therapy isn't the answer. Praying it away isn't the answer. I would imagine some sort of education formally for CES instructors around those basics.

Riley Davis [02:49:49] I mean, that I can remember. No, I mean, that's in the past five years. Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:49:54] Okay.

Riley Davis [02:49:54] And the thing is, if. If you had a really progressive and good boss. I remember those topics coming up, but it was all lunchtime conversations. It was, you're talking with your peers. And I had a really progressive and awesome supervisor who. Yeah, I. I think we would talk about those things, but I don't remember being trained in any way specifically for LGBT issues. We were trained a lot, especially recently. Like, even like in the last few months. Recently there's been a huge focus on answering gospel questions or tough questions students come to you with. But that's only been in the last few months. And I think that's probably because we're heading into some of the trickiest waters of content as we go into the second half of Doctrine and Covenants next week year. So.

John Dehlin [02:50:43] So did you ever get in trouble or do you think you were perceived negatively for being too much of an LGBT advocate as a seminary teacher? Is that even a thing or.

Riley Davis [02:50:55] Yeah, yeah. So I, I, this was unbeknownst to me at the time, but one of my students, her dad, he actually used to be a seminary teacher and eventually got hired on as a full time assistant to the quorum of the 70. And so just very devout, very orthodox family.

Riley Davis [02:51:20] And apparently some of my teachings, what they said to my supervisor was that my teachings with regard to LGBT issues could come off as condoning. Right. I was being too supportive or too affirming of those students. It could come off as condoning and also that I made profit seem too fallible.

Riley Davis [02:51:45] My supervisor, like I said, fantastic guy, very forward thinking. He knew I was just where I needed to be and I was trying to be as loving and kind as I could. So he didn't even bring the issue up with me me until the summer. He, he said it kind of in retrospect, like, by the way, this parent had this issue.

Riley Davis [02:52:05] They came and talked to me. I told him there was nothing to see there. Right? You're awesome. Love you, whatever. And so it kind of glazed past and I thought it was over. And I was like, huh, that's weird. I've never had anyone complain about my teaching before, even teaching all these general authorities kids. But, but the real issue happened when that same family had a daughter going into ninth grade a year and a half later.

Riley Davis [02:52:33] So no new. And I think when they said that I made profit seem too fallible. I had a student bring up in the middle of class a TikTok about Brigham Young saying some very racist things. And I just affirmed, yes, those quotes are correct and end profits are not perfect. And this is a perfect illustration of the fallibility of prophets. And so that, and then affirming to my LGBT students was too much for this family. So nothing new had happened. I hadn't taught anything differently or whatever, but this family had a daughter going into ninth grade. The Next year. And they were worried about the progressive seminary teacher.

Riley Davis [02:53:16] And I'm the only man in the building building. So if they're going to send their daughter to seminary, it's going to be with me. So they chose to bring up the same issues, the same complaints with my new supervisor. But like in the church, you play bishop roulette and you don't know who you're going to get. Supervisor roulette is the same, and it can make or break your experience because this new guy had just come in from the curriculum department, super orthodox, super scared of scholarship, and it was dicey with the next supervisor.

John Dehlin [02:53:52] So the extent to which you were sort of LGBT affirming and willing to acknowledge the imperfections of church leaders that counted against you in your evaluations and made families in the local area want to report you to your supervisors.

Riley Davis [02:54:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:54:14] Is that right?

Riley Davis [02:54:14] Yeah. And of course, they never bring it up with you. Right. This could. This could be a conversation, and I could give context. I could let them know that their daughter was in that class with my gay student who was closeted, and that me, being so loving and kind, is trying to let him know, hey, you've got a place here. And it still didn't work being that a friend firming still didn't make it hospitable enough for him. But, yeah, so they went above me to my supervisor. First time, it was no big deal. But the second time, I just barely got this boss. I had never even met him.

Riley Davis [02:54:50] My family went and we directed a scout camp for, like a month. I took time off to go direct a scout camp for a month. And in that time, we switched supervisors. So I. I came home from scout camp, and the very first day, my new boss calls me into his office and sits me down and just says, so I've had these complaints. Parents are coming and telling me that you're too affirming that you make profit seem infallible and all that stuff. And I was devastated. Like, here I am. I'm trying to be the apologist who's, like, making space. I just want to make sure these kids don't hurt themselves and they have a space in the church where they can thrive and know that they have a spot.

Riley Davis [02:55:36] And I. I was devastated because he just laid down the law and said, there can be no question as to where you stand. And if parents are having these concerns and bringing them up to up with me, then there's a question.

John Dehlin [02:55:50] What's complicating about that? We, you know, we talked about this before on Mormon stories. But myself, Travis Stratford, Greg Prince, Hans Matson, got together and did a survey of like over 3,000 people who left the church in like the 2010 time period, put together a report and gave that to church headquarters.

Riley Davis [02:56:12] And Uchtdorf and others left it on his desk. Right?

John Dehlin [02:56:14] Yeah. And the main finding was, was not that it was peep stones or polyandry or masonry or the temple. It was people feeling lied to and sort of like a cousin to that is having had the expectation that general authorities were perfect or church leaders were perfect and then finding out they were flawed. So the idea was again, this inoculation idea, teach them the history and teach them the church leaders are imperfect. And if they have that expectation from high school, then later when a leader makes a mistake or they learn something, they're already antibodies already built up to say that's not a big deal. Whereas if they're encouraging you, discouraging you from talking about the fallibility of the brethren, and instead wanting you to perpetuate prophetic infallibility, then they're setting up their students for more disillusionment later.

Riley Davis [02:57:12] Oh, yeah. And I mean setting me, me up for disillusionment later. Because the thing is, I. I knew the tricky parts of history when it comes to polygamy and all that stuff, but honestly, one of the biggest steps in my faith transition was when I learned the real history of race in the priesthood. When I started listening to Matt Harris. This was before his fantastic book Second Class Saints, but when I started listening to Matt Harris and his interviews on gospel tangents and I started realizing how complicated these histories were, I was good on the, the 19th century stuff. You know, I, I could apologetics that up and down, but they have tried to keep, or even the dismantling of the church history department with Leonard Arrington.

Riley Davis [02:58:02] Greg Prince's book on Leonard Arrington in the writing of Mormon history just re. Just blew my mind because I thought I had gone down all the rabbit holes, but not in recent church history because they keep it so secret and they try to hold it back. But honestly, if. If I would have had a more nuanced picture of prophets from the get go, it might have made a difference for me when it comes to retaining me as well. So. So yeah, it's definitely biting themselves, like they're hurting themselves and trying to cover this up because I was trying to help these students not be upset by Brigham Young later by acknowledging, yeah, yeah, that happened, he said that.

John Dehlin [02:58:46] So I would imagine they might encourage like on the one hand, Rick Bennett, you know, he's been on Mormon stories or I've been on his show Faithful Guy. That's the whole point. He's a faithful guy guy, but he's also doing honest discussion of factual history with scholars. But I would imagine them, the church teaching its educators the same as it teaches its members, which is stay away from anything that isn't pure authoritative doctrine. So I would see them thinking of gospel tangents with Rick Ben as being a slippery slope to Mormon stories or CES letter. So that's a long way of asking what in the heck were you doing as a paid full time Mormon Church seminary teacher in Bountiful of all places? What were you doing listening to unapproved, uncorrelated, unofficial, non prophetic inspired podcasts or YouTube channels?

Riley Davis [02:59:51] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:59:52] What were you doing?

Riley Davis [02:59:52] Well, I would never touch your. Like yours was off limits, like I said. But when Rick is this faithful, faithful guy and he's interviewing a lot of the time faithful scholars as well. Right. You, you have more of a sense of security. And I had always just bought into the whole, hey, we've got the truth. We don't have to be scared of learning things. Right. You know, if, if it's the truth, it can withstand scrutiny. Unfortunately, certainly it can't withstand scrutiny in a lot of cases. And that's why scholars have been this plague to the church for so many years. Right. But I, I think a big part of it was President Ballard's injunction to me in his, in that talk, he said not only to know the gospel topics essays like the back of our hands, but he said to go to, he actually approved of scholarship.

Riley Davis [03:00:48] He said go to the best. And granted he was talking about faithful Mormon scholars, but he even included scholars in there. And so if I have a place where I'm able to learn about these things that my students are going to have questions about, I thought it was my duty, it was incumbent upon me to, to prepare myself to answer their questions.

Riley Davis [03:01:12] So that's really the gist of it is I really felt the need to prepare myself to answer these students sincere questions. And the best way to do that is going to the people who know best. Because honestly, any half glance at our history lets us know the general authorities don't know the history well enough, you know, so go to the scholars who do know the history. That way I'm better equipped. Equipped to answer students questions.

John Dehlin [03:01:38] So this is sounding almost identical to my experience as a seminary teacher in 2000. Yeah, I start studying, I started studying this, the church history in the Fullness of times, you know, seminary and institute manual. Yeah. And that taught me enough. You learn about the Kirtland bank scandal, you learn about, you know, Mountain Meadows Massacre or whatever. You know, you start, you get, you learn about polygamy, it acknowledges it. Then you're like, whoa. All these things that I kind of thought were anti Mormon and false are just true. They're being acknowledged in a faithful way, lightly touched on in the seminary institute manuals. And then I'm like, well, where can I learn more? And that's when I start going to.

Riley Davis [03:02:24] It snowballs.

John Dehlin [03:02:25] It snowballs. So tell us how your snowball happened.

Graduate Studies and Growing Doubts

Riley Davis [03:02:29] Yeah, so I, I feel like it actually started with my, my graduate. So this would have been three years ago.

John Dehlin [03:02:38] Okay.

Riley Davis [03:02:39] I feel like it started before it went into, like, church history and race and priesthood and the lifting of the priesthood ban. I feel like the first thing that really started to unwind and unravel those things for me was my graduate program. So in seminary, the church does help, help fund your master's degree. And so I, I, we own a small business, my wife and I, and so at first I was just going to do an online mba, power through it, get the pay raise, move on, you know, but then I, it was during the summers, and like we said, I'm contracted during the summers and there's not a lot to do.

Riley Davis [03:03:20] You can look lesson prep and in service and trainings as much as you want. But during the summers, I was teaching myself Hebrew and Greek because I wanted to, I wanted to go back to the original, like to these documents and read what it really said, you know? And so I realized, why am I doing a master in MBA when the church will fund my masters in anything? Why not do biblical studies? And at first I wanted to do biblical languages because I always just loved learning different languages so much. And so I wanted to find a school that would teach me biblical Greek and biblical Hebrew.

Riley Davis [03:04:02] And so I started looking for different schools. And I was actually pretty surprised because not a lot of them, first of all, not a lot teach it. Not a lot teach it remotely because I can't pick up and leave without losing my job as a seminary teacher. But not a lot of them will take Mormons because a lot of these schools that do teach those things are the hyper conservative Christian churches that I would get three quarters of the way through the application process or finish the application process and they find out I'm a Mormon and they're like, sorry, we can't have you. So I got turned down from quite A few.

Riley Davis [03:04:39] And I finally found one. Faulkner University in Montgomery, Alabama. Fantastic school. And had a great experience there. And it was even very conservative. It was a very conservative school. But I went in. They're all talking about biblical infallibility and how the Bible's perfect. But I went in as the rogue Mormon who's like, actually, I don't think the Bible's perfect. Perfect. I believe the Bible to be the word of God as long as it's translated correctly. So I was actually a lot more open than all of my peers to higher criticism. When you're going in and trying to be realistic about what these texts are and what they aren't, you know.

Riley Davis [03:05:22] And so as I. I kind of had permission compared to my peers. They all had to stay within the bounds of the Bible's perfect. I didn't have that. So I felt a lot more open to just pursue the best scholarship and critical. Higher. Critical scholarship. Dave Bachavoy's interviews are way more than I could ever do, and they're fantastic in explaining those. Those issues impact Mormon scripture on such a profound level that I. I just had no idea. I. I was blown away when I started realizing that Nephi would have left Jerusalem.

Riley Davis [03:06:05] He would have left before the destruction and therefore would not have had most of Isaiah or the last portion of Isaiah, second and third Deutero and Trito. Isaiah.

John Dehlin [03:06:18] So 600 B.C.

Riley Davis [03:06:20] yeah.

John Dehlin [03:06:21] Was before

Riley Davis [03:06:23] 587 when Jerusalem fell. So Nephi split sometime before that. Any words of Isaiah that he would have had on those plates of brass and taken with him to the New world would not have included the portions of the Book of Isaiah that are most commonly quoted in the Book of Mormon. It's just permeates the entire narrative, not just second Nephi. Right these things. And then add on that the fact that we've got the Sermon on the Mount as written in the King James Version and Jesus just happened to give this version of the Sermon on the Mount.

John Dehlin [03:07:00] Well, why wouldn't he give the same talk twice?

Riley Davis [03:07:02] Except that's not what he gave, you know. And so as I'm.

John Dehlin [03:07:05] Wait, what do you mean?

Riley Davis [03:07:06] Diving into critical scholarship and realizing how the Gospels build on each other other how Matthew and Luke draw from Mark as a primary source and different things. As I'm going through those studies and realizing Scripture is not what I thought it was.

Riley Davis [03:07:25] But then you've got prophets teaching things as if it were exactly what they've always told you it was. Right? And so just so many things are problematic. The words of Isaiah wouldn't have been on the plates for, for Nephi. And granted, there are lots of ways that you could kind of say, okay, well, Joseph was inspired around a historical kernel. You can make things work apologetically. You can say, I don't believe the Book of Mormon to be a historical.

Riley Davis [03:07:54] It historically true, but it still has truth. You can do the mental gymnastics and stuff. But as I start reading these things, things, one of the things that really took a blow for me was Joseph Smith's translation just not being what I. Because I don't know about you, but I was always taught. Joseph Smith's translation is a, a revision of the Bible where he is correcting all of these errors. Right. The reason we need Joseph, the reason we need modern prophets is because the biblical text has been so corrupted. Right.

Riley Davis [03:08:29] So as I'm pursuing my master's in biblical studies, I start being exposed to all these just really top of the line scholars and seeing where scripture had developed from. And honestly, that really changed things with the Joseph Smith translation of the Bible for me.

John Dehlin [03:08:47] Yeah. Why was that infected?

Riley Davis [03:08:49] So I love the use infected there or. Yeah, but what happened was I remember studying a book misquoting Jesus by Bart Ehrman. You've had him.

John Dehlin [03:09:02] You're reading that as a seminary teacher.

Riley Davis [03:09:04] Oh, yeah, yeah. I, I was pretty nuanced by this point. Right. But I remember reading that and just realizing, holy cow, there are so many things that just straight up weren't in the original manuscripts and were later editions by scribes. And in theory, that's what Joseph's correcting in his Joseph Smith translation. And so I remember reading and just having my mind blown that when Jesus is talking about his second coming, in Matthew 24, he talks about, so this is the King James Version, right? But of that day, no hour, no the but of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels in heaven, but my Father, O only.

Riley Davis [03:09:48] But if you go to Mark, which is actually the earlier gospel that Matthew was probably drawing from, right. It says, not only does no man, and the angels in heaven don't know when he's coming, it says, neither the son, but the Father. So that phrase, neither the son, I was like, holy cow. In the early Gospel, Jesus is admitting, I don't even know when I'm coming back. But then in the later ones, and it made so much sense that scribes would be uncomfortable with that and take it out, right? And I thought, that's a change by a scribe. Wouldn't that be cool if Joseph caught that in his Joseph Smith translation?

Riley Davis [03:10:26] And fixed it. How faith affirming would that be? So I reach behind my seminary desk and grab the Joseph Smith, his inspired translation of the Bible and I go through and he didn't find the error. And I'm like, okay, well, well, prophets aren't perfect, you know, it's okay. And then I was curious, I wonder what he did with Mark, that original one. That was more accurate, right? It was more accurate. Jesus is acknowledging neither. Not even the Son of Man knows the day or the hour that the second coming will happen. And I go to Mark and he has removed that phrase.

Riley Davis [03:11:02] So basically what Joseph Smith's translation did was not only did he not catch the scribal error, but he took the more accurate earlier gospel because he was probably uncomfortable with it and adjusted it to make it less correct. And so that just kind of rewrote. And at first I remember leaving thinking, okay, well I don't think prophets are perfect. It's fine, you know, but it made me shift my view of what a prophet was, right? He's not catching these things. There's not mystical help. He's, he's just doing the best he can, you know, which explains why you

John Dehlin [03:11:41] start emphasizing to students that prophets aren't perfect, because you're discovering more and more in that process.

Riley Davis [03:11:48] I'm in the thick of it, you know, and so I'm, I'm learning about all these things. And then I, I feel like the, when it comes to church history, the polygamy and blood atonement and all that stuff, I had already delved deep into that. But what I didn't know was the real history on the race, on race in the priesthood. I didn't know that Hugh B. Brown was campaigning to have this ban repealed. I didn't know how close they were. Early 60s, literally, with David O. McKay, like David O. McKay having a black man ready to be ordained and saying, I can't do it for I fear the brethren like this.

Riley Davis [03:12:29] Like, I had no idea about that history. I dove deep in our early history, but I, I was blindsided by that. And it wasn't like faith shattering for me, but it just re. Negotiated what prophets were. All of a sudden I'm like, okay, well Hubie Brown was right, you know, and wanting to repeal the ban, he was outvoted. Yes. Oh yeah. And it blew my mind when I realized Markey Peterson had to get sent to South America for them to you be able to unanimously. And they had to wait till Delber Delbert L. Stapley was in the hospital and to Be able to unanimously repeal the ban, you know.

John Dehlin [03:13:10] 78.

Riley Davis [03:13:11] Yeah, yeah, in 78. And so I, I remember, remember just learning that stuff. And so I'm like, all my students need to know this stuff. So I just started teaching very openly. Like, I wouldn't go out of my way. I didn't feel like it was on me to like, force all this on them and stuff. But if something came up, if a student had a question, then I would just try to handle it. And I know everyone has their own spin, their own bias, but I would try to just be. Be as unapologetic and just, hey, you deserve to know the truth and to have informed consent.

Riley Davis [03:13:46] And so I would address those issues very directly. And so that also made my new supervisor very un. Uncomfortable. Like there. It was just such a weird dynamic with him because it. From the first day I met him, just. There can be no question where you stand. You're with the brethren or you're not. And making me feel like my job's on the line for trying to be empathetic and loving to these youth and historically accurate. Yeah, yeah. And so.

John Dehlin [03:14:22] And honest. Yeah.

Riley Davis [03:14:23] But he would often just say things like, let's make sure we're careful about which wells we get our water from.

John Dehlin [03:14:31] You know, because he would monitor. Because they used to come in and watch my, my lessons, take notes and then give me feedback. Oh, yeah. So I guess it could be students telling on you or their, Their observations.

Riley Davis [03:14:44] And the thing is, I feel like the vast majority of my lessons, there was never an issue I really tried to teach. I knew I was expansive in my thoughts, so I tried to teach the parts of the material, the parts of the manual that I felt like were true and teach it honestly. You know, I was very careful about my testimony and saying what I believe versus things that in the past, maybe I would have said, I know, but he ramped up the observations like crazy. Whereas my past supervisor, who is super forward thinking, super awesome, he saw me maybe once a term.

John Dehlin [03:15:22] Term.

Riley Davis [03:15:23] So like four times in the year. I was observed like 15 different times this last year.

John Dehlin [03:15:31] So you started getting. You started getting observed with the greater frequency.

Riley Davis [03:15:35] Oh, yeah.

John Dehlin [03:15:36] You were flagged as a concern.

Riley Davis [03:15:38] And it might have also just been my, My boss. I. I feel like he dealt with scrupulosity as well. And he might have just felt like he had to be open over the top. And maybe he was observing everyone a million times, you know, but every.

Riley Davis [03:15:55] Just so many of our interactions were like, hey, let's just be careful what, what sources we're going to. And make sure they're faithful and just trying to reign me in constantly. Let me know. I. I remember one time we were on a hike for a faculty, like, bonding thing and the summer, and I was like, we were talking about some of the breakoffs of the church. I was like, yeah, it's crazy. I had no idea. There are, like, more than 400 different offshoots from the time. He's like, where'd you hear that data? I'm like, from one of the leading scholars. He's in the community of Christ.

Riley Davis [03:16:33] Right. But it's. The book is called, like. Like, Schisms and Mormonism. Like, I. I'm. I'm reading these things, and he's like, that's not true. And I'm like, actually, it is. You know? And so later, I would show him the book, and then he would respond with, be careful with John Hamer. That's who it is, John Hamer. But. But, yeah, so he was just very uncomfortable with how open I was throughout the whole year. And I.

CES Leadership, Institutional Pressure, and Whistleblowing

John Dehlin [03:17:02] You would think that a supervisor in the CES system would know more than you about all this stuff because they had been there longer and had heard it all and had kind of made their way up the ranks. But you're saying the bubble persists even with CES leadership?

Riley Davis [03:17:21] Yes, but also, I feel like sometimes the more, you know, the more defensive and aggressive you have to be. Think about it. This girl who. Her parents. Parents complained about me twice. The only complaint I ever had about my teaching ever was from the same family twice. And it's from someone who used to be a seminary teacher, and before that he was in the church history department. The guy knows how problematic this stuff is, which is, I think, why they feel a heightened need to be defensive if they ever see someone going out of those orthodox lines. And my supervisor was coming fresh. This was his first time being a principal in seminary, but he was coming fresh out of the curriculum department.

Riley Davis [03:18:04] I. I know he knows this stuff, but I think he also knows this stuff and knows how potentially dangerous it could be. And that's why he's like, no, we'll have none of it in the classroom.

John Dehlin [03:18:15] But he's saying that's not true. When you tell him there are 400 schisms, and he's saying that's not true.

Riley Davis [03:18:19] And, yeah, I guess the bubble to that point.

John Dehlin [03:18:21] Okay.

Riley Davis [03:18:22] Yeah. Is things is real.

John Dehlin [03:18:23] So he knows some of the things, not other things. Okay, okay.

Riley Davis [03:18:27] But, yeah, so things just kept getting kind of dicier and dicier with that supervisor. And I just eventually started kicking back. Well, it was hard because at this point, like, I'm in the heart of my master's degree. We have three little kids, I'm serving in my second bishopric, and Ashley's starting to have questions and thoughts about the church. She even stops attending, you know, and so.

John Dehlin [03:18:55] And that can get you fired.

Riley Davis [03:18:57] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:18:58] Talk about that.

Riley Davis [03:18:59] Well, if I stopped attending, it could get me fired. I don't.

John Dehlin [03:19:03] I have had conversations with CES employees. Oh. What happened was their spouse lost their faith, which then led to them potentially being divorced.

Riley Davis [03:19:14] Oh, divorce definitely will get you fired. Yeah, that's still. I had a friend just a few years ago who got fired because of his. His wife chose to get a divorce. And so, yeah, there's just all sorts of pressure with this career. I mean, if you lose your testimony, you're out, right? If you get divorced, you're out. If, if you even get too nuanced, you can be out it. If you can even be fine. Like for example, in my latest bishop brick, which this is like recent, like, I, I was literally released from this bishop brick on Mother's Day of this year. So just a few months ago, I was still serving in the bishop brick despite being agnostic about a lot of things.

Riley Davis [03:19:57] Right. But I have a super forward thinking bishop right now and he's super awesome. And I think he saw. Saw my inquiry and all that stuff as, as a game, as a plus. And I think he wanted the youth to have people who have questions and stuff, but are grappling with that in a faithful way. So. But if you get the wrong bishop and bishop roulette or the wrong supervisor, your career can be over.

John Dehlin [03:20:25] That's stressful.

Riley Davis [03:20:26] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:20:27] Yeah, that's what happened to me. Like, it took me out of the church. I think. I think, yes, seminary and institute takes a lot of people out of the church. I've heard a lot of people say their faith crisis starts when they're teaching seminary. What about Joseph Smith stuff? So polygamy, Book of Mormon, DNA, peep stones in a hat, Treasure digging you haven't really talked about. You've only focused on kind of biblical

Riley Davis [03:20:53] criticism, higher criticism, because that's what took me. Took my testimony and kind of of shifted it because I already knew the other stuff, even the polyandry and the like. I mean, I'd read rough Stone Rolling and I'd read articles and like, like when it comes even the treasure digging stuff to just really weird stuff, I was like, okay, God used that as a way of that was Joseph Smith's cultural milieu. And he was using that to bring the truth. I think in the end, if Joseph really did see our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ in that grove, my testimony from my mission on was very much, if that happened, it's going to be Hinckley's dichotomy, right.

Riley Davis [03:21:40] Of either that happened and it's the greatest cause in the world, or it didn't happen and it's a sham. And I was like, no matter how much negative stuff would come up, I'm like, okay, I don't understand his personality polygamy, I don't understand the polyandry especially. I don't understand all of this stuff, but I really believe he was a prophet.

John Dehlin [03:22:01] Okay, so let me just try and think through your mindset. So you're thinking if God restored his one true church to Joseph through the first vision and the priesthood, restoration and the establishment of the church, then it doesn't matter if Joseph was a treasure digger, it doesn't matter if we've got dates wrong, if Brigham Young was a racist. It doesn't matter if Joseph married 14 year olds because the church, the true church, was restored. Yeah, that made you invincible to a lot. Invincible to a lot of the things that take people out.

Riley Davis [03:22:36] And even if Joseph was wrong in marrying Helen Mark Kimball, and even if he was wrong in some of these things, as long as he was still a prophet, as long as he was still a prophet who either made mistakes or God commanded him to do wacky things that I don't understand. Right. I could still hold on. But it's once I started redefining my definition of prophets that I got in trouble. And that comes from both the biblical text, right. Whether we're talking about Isaiah and me realizing, oh, so, so much of what Nephi says is Isaiah, Nephi could not have possibly had on the plates when he left Jerusalem.

Riley Davis [03:23:16] Whether it's redefining how Scripture was written or redefining prophets, as in Joseph and all of his successors used the Bible at face value despite all of the problems within it, you know, So I, I guess I just thought if this really is, if it's a dichotomy and, and it's the church of God or it's the church of the devil or whatever, all the different things they've said in my mission scriptures. I had a quote from Tad Callister that basically said, that's the genius of the Book of Mormon. There is no middle ground. It is either the word of God as it claims to Be or it is a sophisticated but diabolic hoax.

Riley Davis [03:23:55] And so I knew it wasn't a sophisticated and diabolic hoax. Therefore it's true. So I feel like, like, no matter how many problems got thrown out, I was just able to say, okay, prophets aren't perfect. Hey, there's really awful things in our history. Let's own them. And I did. One of the things that was hardest for me was when I looked back and I saw the church. The church had a history of not owning those things. So whether it's the priesthood ban and I'm learning, holy cow. There were people who were advocating to have this repeated, appealed, and there were educators, the Bennion report. Right.

Riley Davis [03:24:34] And all of these different things. People wanted to make this happen. And anyone who kind of was ahead of the brethren kind of just got sacrificed along the way until the church was finally willing in 1978 to repeal the banner. Right. And so learning that history made a big difference, difference in my life because I was like, okay, I can disagree with prophets. They disagree with each other. Some of them held on to racist views, and that's why the race ban was perpetuated for so long. So I gave myself permission to say, okay, if their views are racist, or in our modern day, if their views are homophobic, I give myself permission to disagree with them.

Riley Davis [03:25:18] And so that's when it really started breaking down for me, me, is me saying, okay, they're not always right. I could have disagreed with them on the race ban had I been in that era. I'm going to choose to disagree with them on this.

John Dehlin [03:25:35] Okay. So you started to feel like you could disagree with the brethren. But what I'm hearing is kind of the fatal blow was when you started realizing the scriptures were. Were problematic, contradictory, false, or corrupt.

Riley Davis [03:25:53] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:25:53] That wasn't something you were able to nuance.

Riley Davis [03:25:56] Yeah, because if you look at how Joseph or any other prophet used the scriptures, they used them with a complete, like, misunderstanding of what the scriptures are. They would cite things that are later interpolations. They would use these really sexist verses and cherry pick them. I started to realize the way our prophets use scriptures. Scripture is to say whatever the heck they want. Right. They. You can make scripture if you're cherry picking and using a verse here, a verse there, you can make it say whatever you want.

John Dehlin [03:26:28] I think that's called proof text.

Riley Davis [03:26:29] Yeah, exactly Right. But yeah, they. It was just one constant. And we see that in the. I had a hard time teaching the they. It's not do. It's not scripture mastery anymore. You probably had to memorize. I had to memorize scripture mastery verse verses.

John Dehlin [03:26:47] Yes.

Riley Davis [03:26:47] When I was in seminary. Now they're doctrinal mastery verses, and the focus is not on memorization, but it's basically key points of doctrine that they want to hammer home. But it's just all proof texts, like, literally 12 lessons a semester. I would have to dedicate the whole time to saying, like, for example, the stick of Judah and the stick of Joseph is a doctrinal mastery. And I would have to dedicate a whole class to, too. See, look, isn't this a cool proof of the Book of Mormon? Joseph knew that this is the stick of Joseph that would be united with the stick of Judah, despite the fact that the Hebrew word for stick means it's wood.

Riley Davis [03:27:24] Right. It's. It's not a roll. It's not a scroll, like I was told, you know, it's not books coming together. And there's a reason scholars who actually know what they're saying, like Heber Snell, go to Joseph Fielding Smith and say, I'm not teaching that because it's not true. You know? And so, yeah, I start disagreeing with a lot of. A lot of those things, rewriting what prophets are. And then the other big blow to me was I knew the complicated past history. I did not know our history with abuse reporting in the church.

John Dehlin [03:27:58] How'd you start learning about that?

Riley Davis [03:28:00] Well, part of it was firsthand in my experiences with Curtin McConkey, and then.

John Dehlin [03:28:07] Do you want to talk about that?

Riley Davis [03:28:08] Yeah, absolutely. So I had an incident in my class where it seems like sometimes the management or supervisors make it seem like the most effective seminary teachers are the ones that can make students open up and be most vulnerable in class. Class, which can be really problematic. You end up discussing a lot of things in a seminary class. And I remember, I don't know what it was, but we were sharing hard things that Christ has helped us overcome.

Mandatory Reporting, the Abuse Hotline, and Institutional Failures

Riley Davis [03:28:44] And a girl raised her hand and started sharing a situation with her parents that sent up all the red flags, like, not okay, something like this needs to be reported. And so. So, like usual, as everyone's leaving the classroom, I'm outside, I pull her aside outside, and I'm like, hey, question. Thank you for sharing that. Right.

Riley Davis [03:29:08] Have you told anyone else about this? And she said, well, I told my aunt, because what it sounded like was really intense neglect and abuse. Right? And so I. I just let her know, hey, hey, I care about you. Thank you for sharing that. I'm glad your aunt knows I am required by law, to report anything like this. And the girl actually seemed pretty supportive. She was like, I get it. You. You can report this.

John Dehlin [03:29:38] Wait, are LDS seminary teachers in Utah, do they conceptualize themselves as being mandatory reporters? That was. Surprised me.

Riley Davis [03:29:50] No, I don't think they do on large scale. I did, because that's what I. I was a public educator before, and they are school teachers. Absolutely. And actually adults in Utah, adults, period, are mandatory reporters.

John Dehlin [03:30:04] Okay.

Riley Davis [03:30:05] And so it's not the Mormon Church.

John Dehlin [03:30:06] No. Seminary.

Riley Davis [03:30:08] No, that was not.

John Dehlin [03:30:08] You were a mandatory reporter.

Riley Davis [03:30:10] No, in fact. In fact, I later went into my office and did what I was trained to do, which is to call the church helpline. So she, she actually seems pretty supportive. So I just kicked into my educator role. Hey, I've got to report this. Thank you so much. And we're here for you, whatever. And she seemed pretty supportive, like, yeah, yeah, you're fine. Thank you for caring about me and calling it in. And so the thing is, instead of calling dcfs, as all church leaders and employees are programmed to do, I immediately open my phone and it's my first time having to call the abuse holiday hotline.

Riley Davis [03:30:45] Because we're taught immediately, if anyone says anything like that, to call Curtain McConkey. Right? We're not told that it's Curtain McConkey. It's just the abuse helpline. Right. But I call them and I report it. And the lawyer on the other side of the line is like, well, thank you so much for calling. Doesn't seem like we'll have, like, I don't think DCFS would have a good enough case, like, to actually open an investigation on this, so don't call it in.

Riley Davis [03:31:17] And I kind of paused. I was like, so wait, like, I don't have to call it in. He's like, oh, no, don't call it in. And so I, I'm like, okay. And I hang up and I'm just like, dumbfounded. I'm like, what do I do? Because literally from the get go, from the time she raised her hand, I knew that I had to call this. Like, the education cater pre seminary teacher in me is like, I've got to call this, and it's my responsibility.

Riley Davis [03:31:44] And then I, I get told by the helpline, don't. So then I'm frantically searching online, okay, who's a mandatory reporter in Utah? And I find out, yes, I absolutely am anything the church wants with priest penitent privilege. This is not some penitent person confessing to me. This is a victim confession coming to me. And so any argument for, oh, you don't have to, doesn't apply here. And I'm like, I'm a flipping mandatory reporter, and they're telling me not to report. And so I'm just kind of racked with guilt because at this point, this was three years ago, I. I'm still very in the boat. Like, I feel very bad going against church authority.

Riley Davis [03:32:26] So I pull open our emergency response guide for seminaries and institutes. And I'm like, well, I'll go through and see if there's some sort of, like, leeway for me to report this. But what I find in our. Our under the topic abuse, in our emergency response guide, it says, to protect confidentiality. Never highlighted in red. I didn't highlight that in red. Never discuss specific instances or allegations of abuse except as directed by the helpline or legal area count counsel. So I'm like, I literally can never. Like, this is supposed to die with me right here. This girl said she's in this situation that I don't want her to have to keep enduring.

Riley Davis [03:33:11] And then it goes on to say, and it even seems like our policy used to kind of teach teachers to prevent reporting if possible. It says when it appears that a student might talk to a teacher about a personal or family involvement with a abuse, the teacher should first explain that he or she is required to aboard report allegations of all types. I explained that after she had confessed to me. Right. I explained, hey, I'm gonna have to report this. But this almost seems like preemptively try to get them not to report before. If it even seems like they're going to report to you, you need to hop on and say, hey, whoa, whoa.

Riley Davis [03:33:51] I'm required to report this and see if that'll stop it. But then it says teachers should never try to assume the role of bishop or branch president. He did ask me to reach out to her bishop and stuff. But a bishop is not a counselor, is not a social worker, is not qualified or trained to handle something like that. It says, do.

Riley Davis [03:34:14] Do not discuss or report the matter with anyone unless directed to do so by the helpline or legal counsel. Counsel. Then at the bottom it says about how we're not supposed to fill out an incident report or take notes or write anything down about this. So I'm looking at this policy and I'm like, hey, I can't write anything. I can't talk to my supervisor. I can't talk to the counselors down the street. I can't. I. This is supposed to stay with me. According to what Curtin McConkey just told me, I eventually couldn't handle that, just my conscience. And so I went down the hill and told the school counselor thinking, well, maybe the counselor could report it or whatever. But she.

John Dehlin [03:34:57] Let me ask you a question. So I'm trying to remember when the Michael Resendez AP article came out that where we're on Mormon stories, we did the episodes on the Hotline.

Riley Davis [03:35:09] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:35:09] And the child abuse cover ups. I'm pretty sure the. That was summer of 22, so three years ago. Do you remember whether this stuff you're experiencing was before the huge hotline AP hubbub or during or after?

Riley Davis [03:35:24] I don't know, because when I heard of the AP thing, like we said with the bubble, a lot of these things I would hear about and keep them on the periphery. Right. And so like, oh, man, there was an abuse scandal in Arizona. Right. But I, I didn't necessarily go down that rabbit hole because it's recent stuff, you know, and so. But yeah, I. I'm sure.

John Dehlin [03:35:50] So you weren't influenced by.

Riley Davis [03:35:51] No, no, I don't think so.

John Dehlin [03:35:53] This is just you.

Riley Davis [03:35:54] Yeah. And so I'm just on there and I know my situation. Obviously, when I did report it, I don't think a case was filed. And so it's not like it this drastic. In my case, this huge overarching abuse that was covered up, but just the fact that the policy was, oh, we don't have enough, just don't report it. And so I eventually go and talk to the school counselor and say, this is what she said to me and everything. And the school counselor just looks at me and says, you're going to report this. Right. I'm like, well, I don't know if I technically can't. And she's like, you need to report this. She said it to you.

John Dehlin [03:36:30] You.

Riley Davis [03:36:31] And so that empowered me. So I was like, okay, I'm going to report it.

John Dehlin [03:36:35] Had you been taught anything about, as a Mormon church educator in high schools, how you should or shouldn't interact with the high school, you know, child psychologists or, you know, counselors to mental health counselors to students.

Riley Davis [03:36:52] Yeah. Really, the only training or the only thing that I knew to do is like, if, if there was ever a mention of suicidal ideation, I was to basically put class on hold, have someone come cover my class and walk the student to the counselors across the street. But really, when it comes to that, I had really good relationships with the counselors at the junior high. I was the only teacher. And so I worked really closely on, hey, I've got this student who's struggling on what, like how, how can I best help them, you know, so. But I wasn't trained formally on really much other than if it's serious mental health, like self injury stuff, to, to use them as a resource by walking them over.

John Dehlin [03:37:37] So this counselor is telling you you got a report because it's the law.

Riley Davis [03:37:41] Yeah. And I already knew it was. And so I, I was like, you're right, I'm a mandatory reporter. I'm going to report this. And so I walked in up and up to the building and called DCFS and filed the investig. The, filed my report and they said thanks. And I felt so much better. I felt so relieved. But at the same time I'm still super orthodox and feel bad going outside of church authority.

John Dehlin [03:38:06] You defied church direction.

Riley Davis [03:38:10] So I called the hotline back and let him know what I did.

John Dehlin [03:38:13] Who?

Riley Davis [03:38:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:38:14] What were you thinking?

Riley Davis [03:38:15] I was thinking, well, I was thinking I don't want them to find out I reported it and not tell them. So basically I made it sound like with the helpline, I made it sound like, yeah, the school counselors were involved too, ignoring the fact that I involved the school counselors, but I basically said school counselors were involved too. So we thought it was best to report it. And so the lawyer didn't think much of it. He was like, okay, thanks for letting me know. But by right. But what I didn't realize is that later on I would find he went back and altered that file.

Riley Davis [03:38:51] And we can get to that in a second. But fast forward two years, a year and a half. But this was actually just this last year. And the nice thing was I kind of knew, I knew I was probably on my way out of seminary and institute when this happened, but.

Riley Davis [03:39:15] I had another incident come up in my, in my class. It was totally separate. There was something that happened in the bathroom where I'm, I'm a one man building, which is a security issue in and of itself. Right. Like if I'm in the classroom and students are in the bathroom. Right. Like I, I didn't need even know that another student had come in late at that point. And so there's a lot of, kind of risks with just being out there on your own too. But I called and reported something and at the end, this time to their credit, this time to their credit, and it might be because they were getting a lot of heat like you said, but they recommended I report.

Riley Davis [03:39:57] Granted, the police were already involved in this case and in between these two, two instances, I had listened to Heaven's Helpline, the podcast from New Zealand that really just opened that wide up, wide open for me, you know? And I realized, and it just resonated so much. I was like, case is way worse, way, so infinitely worse than what I was asked not to report, have been asked not to report. And it was so unsettling. That was probably one of the big things in kind of unraveling my, my view of the church. Because even when it's like, okay, the truth claims might not be there, it's like, hey, well, it's a good institution. It does good things, right? I can still be a part of this. It's my culture.

John Dehlin [03:40:44] May not be true, but it's good.

Riley Davis [03:40:46] Exactly. And so, but then when you hear, though, like them offering to pay out victims not to talk about their story, and when you hear about these cover ups, you're like, maybe it's not that good, you know? And so I, at the end of this call with Curtin McConkey, they said, okay, you'll report it. Thanks. Do you have any other questions? And I asked this lawyer, and it's a different lawyer than the first time I asked him. Yeah, I have a question. Why was I told not to report when I called in two, three years ago and he just sounded frazzled and was like, well, we always, we always tell you to report.

Riley Davis [03:41:25] And I've just listened to Heaven's Helpline. I'm like, no, you don't, you don't always tell people to report. That's a huge issue. And so he's like, well, I would have to go and review the file, but I can give you a call back. And I was like, please do, because honestly, it's something that I've dealt with for years. I'm glad I did the right thing and called it in. But I have felt burdened by this policy, this policy that if anyone says something in the helpline, tells you not to tell anyone, that you're like, bound to secrecy according to your policy. I have felt like, so heavy with this over the last few years.

Riley Davis [03:42:02] So the lawyer eventually calls me back and he's like, well, I reviewed your files and I'm sorry, you, you must be mistaken because it says that we told you to report.

John Dehlin [03:42:15] Oh,

Riley Davis [03:42:17] yeah. And so he's like, I'm looking at the. After every call we can keep, the person on the other end keeps notes. And it says simply that this girl mentions something problematic in class and that you called the hotline and we told you to report.

John Dehlin [03:42:34] And that was, see, prior to Resendez, the policy was they destroyed any record.

Riley Davis [03:42:43] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:42:44] Of those conversations at the end of the day of that conversation, which is

Riley Davis [03:42:48] a lot lie, by the way. It's an absolute lie. Yeah. So the thing is, I even found there was something because I looked up the testimony where you've got a church lawyer in Arizona testifying, testifying and saying, hey, we destroy all the documents at the end of the day. We destroy all the records of the calls at the end of the day. And I'm, and this is so oath, two, three years have passed since the initial call. Right. So I can at least see that they are maintaining records after that. So after that person under oath literally says, we destroy the records at the end of the day, I have seen some of the records that they keep.

Riley Davis [03:43:32] And so I, I tell him, I'm like, okay, then why would I have felt burdened for years over this? Why would I have felt if, if, if you guys just told me to report like I wanted to in the first place? Why did I feel like I had to go confess to the school counselor? Why did I feel like I had to go down and breach trust with you in order to do what I knew what was morally right? And they're like, well, all we can go off is what we've got in the notes. And the notes say that he told you to report. And so I said, well, because I had read up on some of our rights, I'm like, if you're the attorney representing me, I should have access to any files you have on me.

Riley Davis [03:44:13] And so I said, would you, would you send me the file? I want to see that it says that. And he was really hesitant. He was like, no, well, I, I don't know. No one's ever asked that before and all that stuff. And he's like, I'll ask my supervisors about it and get back to you. So eventually what happened was he ended up sky, like doing a zoom call with me. Right. And he did a zoom call with me and he went through the file and showed me the original email. Right. Showed me the original email.

Riley Davis [03:44:50] Utah's a one party consent state when it comes to recording conversations. So I did record the, the zoom call and the conversation, was able to see some of the correspondence that they've kept on me. And it was really kind of enlightening because whereas he was always very like, oh, no, we always tell you to report. And like, I have no idea, like, why this would be a concern. And like, super nice and fluffy in his emails, it was a lot more just like, this guy's going to be an issue for us. How do we figure this out? And yeah, and so they were worried about it. Probably worried about something like that, this.

John Dehlin [03:45:29] But talking to you like, oh, you're great.

Riley Davis [03:45:31] Yeah. And it's all just so, yeah, we always told you to report. It's no big deal. And I just felt so gaslit. Just so, like, I would not have responded in any of these ways. And this has become like a formative, like I am like.

Riley Davis [03:45:45] So it got so bad that before I recorded the conversation and saw the email, what happened was I, I had to sit through a training at work. Work where we went over the abuse response guide. You're supposed to, in your end services every year, go through every part of the emergency response guide. And so this was all fresh on my mind because I had just been told, actually, we always told you to report. There's no issue here. And I was so upset. And we have this emergency response guide and it, you have to read through the fine print that says don't tell anyone, don't write anything down, don't file, file a report, all this stuff.

Riley Davis [03:46:25] So I brought it up with my faculty and I was like, why the heck is this our policy? This is not okay. And my faculty actually agreed with me and they're like, yeah, you should take it up with HR. So I did. While Curt McConkey was working on all this and they, they were pending approval for me to see the file myself, I called, like I said, we have a really sharp HR director right now in seminaries and institutes. And I called her. And when I called her, she was like, well, I can't imagine that this is coincidence, but a few weeks ago, Curtin McConkey called me about potentially changing the policy on abuse in our emergency response guide.

Riley Davis [03:47:09] So she's like, before I tell you we're going to change anything, let's see what the lawyers come back with. And wouldn't, you know, know two weeks later, just in an email, like, no big deal here, but in an email, it says, updates to emergency response guide on the topics of abuse. And like, two other things. Right. And kudos to them. They took what I said and they made a policy change. A lot of those problematic things that I read to you from the old emergency response guide have been shifted now, which is great. Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:47:45] But what that means is that for decades and decades and decades, with literally hundreds of thousands, if not millions of students over the years, whenever seminary and institute teachers did find out about abuse happening. When they were mandated reporters in states like Utah, Curt McConkey time and time again told them not to report, which kept children in harm's way at the express direction of Curt McConkie, the Church's law firm, and in effect, the Mormon church. Am I wrong?

Riley Davis [03:48:24] Oh, no, no, that's exactly it. And so I felt very grateful because at that point, since I knew I was kind of on my way out of seminary and institutes, I felt liberated to actually say what I think, because it's just like in church leadership, you always just agree with the people above you, right? That's how you get promoted. That's how you move forward in the church, is just always being in sync with the leaders above you. But at this point, I didn't care. I didn't care. And so I. I felt very open in raising my concerns with my faculty. And they're like, call hr.

Riley Davis [03:49:02] So I did. And I'm very grateful that me feeling liberated led to this, because I did confirm as he. So he was kind of frantic in his email because I was recording the call and he opened it up to the top of the file and then had to scroll down to the very first email, which is how I kind of got a view into the entire email stream about.

John Dehlin [03:49:26] Weird that he was letting you see his screen.

Riley Davis [03:49:28] I. So I. I think they're just not used to this. They're not used to.

John Dehlin [03:49:32] They're not used to any scrutiny? No, no. Or pushback?

Riley Davis [03:49:35] No, absolutely not. And so this is the first time I've ever dealt with this. What do I do? And I think they only agreed to let me see him because technically they have the legal responsibility to. And like, I. I was probing, I was asking. And so this was the first time. But he literally opened up the files. You can see the basically giant Excel spreadsheet of it. Like this case with this student. And the very bottom email was the first report, and he scrolled down and sure enough, it says, we asked him to report. That doesn't do a lot for me because I literally called the guy back and told him that I reported.

Riley Davis [03:50:13] But it does suck that they would come back and be like, no, we told you to do the right thing the whole time. Time. You know, But I. The cool thing about seeing those emails, that text stream was that I was able to confirm that it was my advocacy that helped make the policy. It was the lawyer that I was working with on this case was the one who emailed. You can see it in those screenshots that he suggested. A policy change. And so I'm grateful that it helped impact a policy change and I think feel like when people actually do speak up and when people actually do say what they feel, when they feel liberated to do that in the church, things change in the church.

Riley Davis [03:50:55] And I'm glad that I was able to do that. And initially I had thought I was going to be able to do that for a career but eventually I, I just got to the point where I was like, I, I don't think 30 years here is feasible.

Riley Davis [03:51:11] I could have really great, I could have really great supervisors who are super forward thinking like I've had in the past. But one wrong supervisor and I've got them breathing down my neck and saying my job's on the line because I'm not orthodox enough. And I think another big thing is I, I had always wanted to pursue the PhD and be in higher education in the church. I had always had church schools like BYU and stuff, stuff in kind of on my mind at least as a potential goal because the church right now we're, we're in a phase where they're not hiring the best scholars.

Riley Davis [03:51:54] They're going more towards conservative. They want and literally as a 9th grade seminary teacher, I'm getting emails from BYU sent to every seminary teacher, release time seminary teacher saying if you have a PhD in education, come apply for BYU and they, these are PhDs in education because they don't want people qualified in ancient scripture or, or in church history like literally for the church history department position. They're saying we would prefer a PhD in education because then they can have the credentials and be scholars and have no idea what the heck they're talking about. But so I had always had that kind of on my mind.

Riley Davis [03:52:34] I had all always envisioned myself after my Masters in Biblical studies trying to go coordinate, be one of those seminary and institute employees that is teaching institute, but mostly taking care of all the stake called teachers in the area. I wanted to go coordinate adjacent to a big university and get a legit PhD because if you're from seminary and institutes but have the credentials, that's kind of the golden area for byu. You, because then they can say look, we've got scholars, but they're also conservative, right? And so I had really wanted that and I really felt like being the progressive bishopric member or the progressive leader, progressive institute teacher, professor.

Riley Davis [03:53:23] I, I thought that was feasible for me. But I, I remember reaching out to a scholar at BYU who I really, really respect and admire and kind of asking him, calling him and asking if you could do this again and take a different path.

Riley Davis [03:53:41] Would you? And the answer was absolutely the church education path. And being just constantly feared and set aside, moved out of the Religious Education Department, all these different things. Like, I, It. I just realized this. I can keep trying to fight this my whole life and eventually get kicked out when I cross the line too far, or I can choose to step out now on my own terms.

John Dehlin [03:54:14] The BUE professor said, don't do it. He wouldn't do it.

Riley Davis [03:54:18] Yeah. Just speaking to his younger son himself, he would have taken another route.

John Dehlin [03:54:23] Yeah.

Riley Davis [03:54:23] Because he didn't realize how. How hard it would be on his family.

John Dehlin [03:54:29] Yeah. And was the hardest part maybe, of all this, seeing how disinterested or even opposed the church is to protecting children who are experiencing abuse?

Riley Davis [03:54:45] Yeah. I think that's. Did that for me, was just kind of the linchpin of like, okay, I, I can say, oh, yeah, this is my culture, and this is good. I'm contributing to something good all I want. But in the end, if they're not putting children first, I mean, the, the historical Jesus, I feel like would have a lot to say about church leadership today. If you look at it he. The. And first of all, historical Jesus, we only know what we can like, hopefully get from the biblical texts. But it. He consistently, I feel like our prophets today are less biblical prophets, but more priests. And the. That kind of dogmatic letter of the law was all. Those were always the people who received the most scathing rebukes from the Savior or from Jesus.

John Dehlin [03:55:48] Yeah. A couple questions just about being a CES teacher in 2025 in the Mormon Church. So first we hear reports that the church is hemorrhaging its teenagers and it's Gen Z and millennial cohorts. Are you seeing that? Have you seen that over the past five years of the church hemorrhaging its high schoolers and young adults or not? And did you hear talk in the church where the church tells its educators that it's hemorrhaging its youth or not? Not.

Youth Retention, Informed Consent, and Leaving the Church

Riley Davis [03:56:31] No. The church tries to always frame it really positively. I mean, even.

John Dehlin [03:56:35] Even internally.

Riley Davis [03:56:37] Yes. The thing is, they've doubled down. I think they knew there was an issue. There was a huge campaign to innovate, institute and. Right. And try to retain those older, the young adults that they were losing, which I think they really were. You know, but I feel like they've doubled down so much on seminary and institute in other parts of the world that they can always say, look, we're growing. You know, like, if you look at the line, actually, seminary and institute enrollment has increased slightly. And I was able to look, breaking down the individual countries and stuff, a lot of that growth is happening.

Riley Davis [03:57:21] Like, you can actually highlight red. Red. Different areas that were actually having less enrollment, 10 or less enrollment from the year before. Right. So you could highlight in red those areas of the world, and you could see England and different places, like, where it is plummeting. But the growth in Africa has been so expansive that it's compensating in numbers. And so they're able to say, look, look, we have more students than we ever have been. Right. And so that's been the big push right now is they're, like, congratulating us. Your efforts on enrolling people are doing so much good. But a lot of these seminary and institute students are, like, in developing nations.

John Dehlin [03:58:10] I've also been told, I think, that this Pathways.

Riley Davis [03:58:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:58:15] You know, it's basically super cheap online education that can help you get an associate's or a bachelor's degree in, you know, from the United States. That's being shared everywhere as a missionary tool. And they're requiring everyone who enrolls in Pathways to enroll in seminary and institute.

Riley Davis [03:58:37] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:58:38] And so in that way, they're kind of padding the numbers totally so that as high schoolers and college students are declining to enroll in seminary and institute, those numbers get offset by all the people who are falling into the Pathways funnel. That's my understanding. What's your understanding?

Riley Davis [03:58:57] No, I could see that, but they would definitely bring just these stories of chapels just overflowing in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Right. And that just all of these people desperate for education and the church is using education in order to help funnel people not only into seminary and institutes, but also into the church. Right. Through baptism and stuff like that. But, yeah, so I. I just feel like the hemorrhage and stuff, they always phrase it. I mean, heck, you. You have apostles say we're growing at rates never before, even when the numbers definitely don't seem like that. And I feel like seminary and institutes is the same way. They always have to keep the positive spin. If there are negative numbers, they don't really talk about them until we've skewed them slightly positive. And then we say, hey, look, there was a dip, but now we're higher than ever.

John Dehlin [03:59:53] So you think they're cooking the books?

Riley Davis [03:59:54] Yeah, for sure.

John Dehlin [03:59:55] Well, for the. For the CES seminary and institute enrollment, and also for growth of the missionary program.

Riley Davis [04:00:03] Yeah, I think they definitely have an image that they want to uphold. And they work hard to make the data agree with that.

John Dehlin [04:00:15] So do you have an opinion on how they could claim in the trailing 12 months, the best global growth and missionary program that they've ever had, not just in Africa, but in all regions, everywhere?

Riley Davis [04:00:28] I have no idea. It's some of the claims that I hear. It's just really, you're not. No. 0%. And the thing is, like, how many of these students are. Are we talking enrolled versus completion? Because if you're enrolled, you look at some of these countries and their completion rate, whoever is actually getting the credential, right. The seminary certificate kit for doing four years, like, so low on. On in some of these countries, like. And maybe they're getting it more because of Pathways, Right. If it's required for them, they'll get it, you know? But, yeah, I feel like there's just a lot of manipulation when it comes to that information.

John Dehlin [04:01:16] Now that I'm thinking about it, it's almost like Pathways is the new baseball baptisms or soccer baptisms program. Because instead of saying you gotta get baptized to join a baseball league in the UK or Japan, or you gotta get baptized to play or come get baptized after you play soccer in Latin America, it's. You gotta, you know, join seminary and institute and. Or it helps to become a member to do pathways.

Riley Davis [04:01:45] Yeah, no, for sure. And the thing is, like, it. It's working like there's growth there, at least when it comes to numbers. And I feel like that keeps the average member here looking at, like, look, we're growing. It's progress. The Lord's work is the stone cut out of the H Mountain without hands is rolling forth. Which also is not what that biblical text means, but.

John Dehlin [04:02:06] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, so back to the question of are you seeing. Seeing a lot of Mormon youth in high schools right now, at least in bountiful, leaving the church or not? Or is Bountiful a place where a Mormon kid really can't leave?

Riley Davis [04:02:25] I don't know. There's so much pressure. You look at those missionary walls on the inside of the seminaries, they've just got the map of the world. And every year you've got the seniors and they put their picture next to where they're going. Right. I didn't have that. I don't remember that in Clearfield, at Clearfield High or in Syracuse.

John Dehlin [04:02:45] I didn't have that.

Riley Davis [04:02:46] No. But literally, if you go to. There's one at Davis High, there's one at Leighton High right now. There's one at. At Bountiful but just these walls of all the missionaries and where they're going, and it's just such this celebration of like, it's an insane number of missionaries. You look in and you're like, holy crap.

John Dehlin [04:03:06] Crap.

Riley Davis [04:03:06] We just, from this high school, we're sending 300 missionaries in like one year. Like, it's crazy. And so I feel like there's just so much pressure. It probably is harder. I definitely had lots of students stop attending, like between 9th grade to 10th grade year is where in seminary we see the biggest drop. And so I did have lots of students who, their parents forced them to take it in ninth grade and they took it and it was all right. And a lot of the time they're like, no offense, Brother Davis, but I'm just not interested. And I was like, cool. But yeah, so there were definitely a lot of drop offs, but I think there's also a lot of cultural pressure to stay.

John Dehlin [04:03:51] Okay, so you're not necessarily seeing a lot of high schoolers leaving the church, or what about losing their faith? Coming to you privately about. About coming to you privately as a seminary teacher saying, I don't believe anymore, or bringing up controversial things in class.

Riley Davis [04:04:07] Oh, controversial things all the time.

John Dehlin [04:04:09] Oh, really?

Riley Davis [04:04:10] Tick tock. Yeah. Like, I had like students asking about signs and tokens in the temple, like in the middle of seminary. And I'm trying to field that well, you know, and so, but. Or, oh, did Brigham Young really say that he would rather other asses vote than Negroes? And like, they're just showing you the quote, like on their phone from Brigham Young. And granted, I might have got more of that than the typical teacher because they knew I was willing to engage and not just brush it aside, you know, but yeah, I would have. Students would bring up stuff a lot and I always would have to walk that tightrope of, okay, how do I answer this?

Riley Davis [04:04:51] This just clearly and apologetically, because I was really passionate about that. Trying to handle things straightforward and not sugarcoat. But at the same time, when someone's like, asks about the priesthood ban and you've got three kids in the class saying, wait, there was a priesthood ban, you know, it just trying to balance, what are parents going to think? You know, what's my supervisor going to think? And eventually, just all that juggling, I was just like, when it comes to retiring, I just need to go back to public education.

John Dehlin [04:05:22] Would you say that the church is providing informed consent to its teenagers such that they're learning factual based church history to an adequate level, such that they can make an informed decision about whether they want to serve a mission or get married in the temple. How. How's the informed consent being provided by the church education system in 2025?

Riley Davis [04:05:48] I don't think the church provides informed consent for its seminary teachers teaching, let alone the. The youth. Right. Absolutely not. And I remember that was one thing as a bishopric member. I was just fuming at Kevin Pearson when he said I was at. I was at young men's and four young men's. We were watching that broadcast, and he looked at all of my young men in my ward and said, don't ask if you should serve a mission. The choice has already been made. Right. That's a stupid question. And I was livid. I was livid because they phrase it as. No, you. Of course there's no question. Right. You shouldn't grapple with these things. You shouldn't try to learn these things. Things. And yeah, I. I definitely do not believe the church has met criterion for informed consent.

John Dehlin [04:06:43] Didn't Pearson say that up in northern, like. Like Davis county area, wasn't that cool?

Riley Davis [04:06:48] Well, that. That one, from my understanding, it was like a Utah area broadcast.

John Dehlin [04:06:53] Okay. Yeah, that.

Riley Davis [04:06:54] Because it was being broadcast. It was him and other church leaders. And all I remember from the whole thing was him saying that because I was texting my wife, just fuming. Just like, did he really just tell these youth not to even ask if they should serve a mission? It was just so asinine to me that I just was blown away.

John Dehlin [04:07:12] He's telling people that they made that promise when they got baptized. So the decisions.

Riley Davis [04:07:16] So don't question, don't. Don't think about it. Just do it. And granted, my mission was a really positive experience for me, you know, and. And I learned a language and I learned different, like, to love other cultures and stuff. But so many. I mean, there were missionaries who didn't fit the norm in my mission. Right. Who I feel like the president was really harsh on and it was not a good thing for their mental health. And it did take a toll.

John Dehlin [04:07:46] Yeah. Okay. So not just the students, but the teachers are not taught. Being taught.

Riley Davis [04:07:55] And like, there's no curriculum, like, other than saying, go study the gospel topics, essays, other.

John Dehlin [04:08:02] And are they encouraging in 2025?

Riley Davis [04:08:05] I mean, yes. Yes. Most recently, Elder Renlund did bring them up again, and it was kind of the be ready to answer questions, but don't cause any more questions.

John Dehlin [04:08:15] But it's often, it seems like it's hot, cold, hot, cold, total.

Riley Davis [04:08:19] I, for most of my time in Seminary and institutes. I didn't feel like they were encouraging us to study the gospel topics essays very much at all.

John Dehlin [04:08:27] So even though Ballard said that, it seems like it got backed off on by the administrators.

Riley Davis [04:08:34] Yeah, I felt like Elder Anderson made it pretty clear in his. A few years later, whoa. We can ease back on the whole, yeah, know your stuff and answer their questions.

John Dehlin [04:08:44] I can see two reasons why we. One would be we're geeking out. We're nerding out here. I can see why. Two reasons. One is you want to have a leader on record saying that because it kind of then can be always queer.

Riley Davis [04:08:56] We said it right.

John Dehlin [04:08:56] We said it right.

Riley Davis [04:08:58] But go to the best scholars. Elder Ballard said, trust the best scholars.

John Dehlin [04:09:02] So I could see that you would want a leader to say that at some point. But then I could also see teachers start to read the gospel topic topics, essays, and not only talk about them with students, but also start to have doubts. And then I can see them go, whoa, whoa, whoa. Chill out on these gospel topics essays. Maybe we didn't totally mean it.

Riley Davis [04:09:20] You know, that's kind of what I felt in leadership, that it swung back and forth and now it's swinging back towards. You got to be able to answer their questions because they're going to have a lot of them when we teach polygamy and race and priesthood next year.

John Dehlin [04:09:34] That's coming out. What do you mean?

Riley Davis [04:09:36] Wool is so official declaration two, we teach it at the end of doctrine and covenants. DNC 132 is where we officially address polygamy. And so I think they're really concerned about how seminary teachers will field those questions as they come up.

John Dehlin [04:09:52] Yeah.

Riley Davis [04:09:53] So, yeah, there's been a lot of emphasis on answering questions, but do it in the right way.

John Dehlin [04:09:57] Yeah. Okay, last question. Did you get a sense for how much other CES teachers are struggling, doubting versus not. Or is everyone afraid to talk to everyone else?

Riley Davis [04:10:11] No, not necessarily afraid. There are some fantastic, awesome, progressive seminary teachers out there, like super great. Like really trying to make a loving environment for your student when they go to seminary. You know, just great people. But I feel like most people, people who have these thoughts or feelings, filter themselves out. They. They end up removing themselves from the system. They take jobs elsewhere, and they kind of filter themselves out. So I feel like it is rare the. The person who ends up going all the way through and, and like getting kicked out these days because people, once they start having a faith crisis or once they start thinking differently, once they don't feel like they can Bear their testimony like they used to to the students. They usually kind of just take the back door, you know.

John Dehlin [04:11:10] What are your thoughts on the church's Mormon church's current top apologists? So Terrell Givens, Richard Bushman, Patrick Mason, Some would say that he is. Some would say he isn't. Is it Keith Erickson, Brad Wilcox, like, do you have opinions on who are they and what are your thoughts on them?

Riley Davis [04:11:35] Yeah, I feel like Keith Erickson, he came and did a series of talks to all of the seminary and institute teachers a couple of years ago, kind of after he came out with his book. I can't even remember the name of it, but basically Real. Real or Rumor Unshaken. Was that Patrick Mason?

John Dehlin [04:11:57] Okay.

Riley Davis [04:11:58] Or. No, but Keith Erickson, I feel like he's going on these tours all over the world saying, hey, there's. There's nothing to see here. Yeah, yeah, we'll talk about it. But it's all just culture. It's all just people. People who did the wrong thing. Like. Like Mountain Meadows Massacre. Yeah, we had. We had. There are bad people who will do bad things inside of Mormonism and outside of Mormonism. And he kind of brushes it off as if there's nothing to see here and does not in any way own up to the level of culpability that is there from the church and church leaders. And so I've been pretty frustrated as I've seen clips of him going around the world to New Zealand and England and all these places, basically saying, I'll give you enough so you think you know what you're talking about, and then I'll glaze over it and make it seem ludicrous to have an issue with this, you know, so Keith Erickson, that's there.

Riley Davis [04:12:55] Terrell Givens, I have so much respect for. I really think that Faith Matters crowd for so long, Ashley and I, that was. Was our crowd. Right.

John Dehlin [04:13:06] So you went to Restore.

Riley Davis [04:13:07] Oh, yeah, I've been to. Yeah, it was a fantastic. I'm trying to think. I. I went the year that Pete Ends was the keynote speaker because he's also one of my heroes in biblical scholarship, and I love nerding out on that stuff. So, yeah, so I went to Restore, and we love that group. It was interesting. Like, I even reached out to Faith Matters recently once they had Kerry Muhlstein on again. I was like, guys, like, just so you know, I love this. I love what you're trying to do. Just know that by having these kind of pseudo scholars on and pretending like there's validity to what they're saying, you lose part of your demographic. And they actually responded very, like, courteously to. To me, they seem like fantastic people, you know, but more and more, I feel the hosts. Yeah, yeah. Aubry and Tim Chavez. They're awesome.

John Dehlin [04:14:09] They got back with you.

Riley Davis [04:14:10] Yeah. So they said thank you for the feedback, and we love hearing it, but they've just kept getting more and more hyper conservative people on there. And so it's.

John Dehlin [04:14:20] They are. They're trending conservative.

Riley Davis [04:14:22] It feels like that. That to me, Julie Hanks is on the outs. Yes. You know, and I remember a little while ago, them, like, clarifying what kind of church funds they receive and that they're part of this coalition for, like, basically positive church podcasting. And they seem a little on the fringes for positive church podcasting, you know, but.

Riley Davis [04:14:45] But the fact that they're taking money, I'm sure. I'm sure they have to have. Of super conservative people. But for a long time, the Terrell Givens crowd was where we were at and just trying to think outside the box of traditional Mormonism. So I love that. Patrick Mason. I Honestly, his interview with you was one of the few that I let myself watch as a seminary teacher, you know, because I. I wanted to hear him engage with you, and so that was really awesome.

Riley Davis [04:15:19] So I've. I've read all their stuff. Honestly. Terrell Givens is not problematic for me. The people who are problematic for me are some of the BYU scholars and apologists right now, like Josh Sears. I. I had no idea that I. I only recently listened to your David Bakavoy episodes and felt so much resonation with me because of my background in biblical scholarship and stuff like that. But you actually played on that episode with Dave Bachavoy a clip from Josh Sears, basically giving different ways that you can say there's no issue here with the Isaiah problem. And I had found that on my own before, and when I found it, I was just disgusted by it.

Riley Davis [04:16:04] It was just so dismissive in so many ways that I was like, this is not real scholarship. And so I have a lot harder time with. With those kind of apologists than I do with the givenses who I feel like are trying to create a bigger box for Mormonism. If you're trying to expand it, great. If you're trying to use bull scholarship to prop up churches, the church's truth claims, I hate it.

John Dehlin [04:16:33] Jared Halverson.

Riley Davis [04:16:35] Halverson is kind of in the middle for me. He spoke at RESTORE when I was there. He's Kind of in the middle for me because I. I see him as one of the good guys, you know, because he's so loving. Right. He really goes out of his way to listen to people. And when he got in trouble, like, he apologized, right? When he said something problematic, he apologized. So I feel like if we had more like him, it would be. Make a big difference and be awesome. And honestly, that was kind of more nuanced thinking. BYU professor was what I had wanted to be someday, you know, but with him, sometimes I struggle with his reasoning that he uses. But.

John Dehlin [04:17:15] Okay, so just back to the. You. You don't see. You weren't able to see other CES teachers in faith crisis or anything like that?

Riley Davis [04:17:23] Not necessarily. Really. I had a friend who. It was hard because the divorce took him out, and so that's difficult. And I have friends who are very progressive seminary teachers, but they're still in.

Faith Crisis, Resignation, and Moving Forward

John Dehlin [04:17:43] Okay, all right, so really quickly, why, I guess shifting a tiny bit. Why hasn't the restore approach stayed effective for you and your wife? What? Oh. Or maybe it has. Are y' all progressive, liberal, nuanced? So restore Mormons now? Are you Faith Matters Mormons now?

Riley Davis [04:18:04] No, no, We've. We've started. So I feel like I really. I know everyone has their bias and everyone. You cannot get outside of your paradigm. Right. But I feel like I've really tried to take the data and kind of follow them where they lead, and I feel like it was just too much for me. I could try to be a Mormon who doesn't believe in the historical Book of Mormon and try to make that work and try to find truth in it and testify of it, but it really just piles piled up so much that, that it. I didn't feel like I could do it anymore.

Riley Davis [04:18:51] And Ashley had already stopped attending. I was in the bishopric and fulfilling my calling mostly because I just loved our bishop and he's so. He's progressive and more and forward thinking. And so I was like, you have so much on your plate, man. I just want to take some of that off your plate. So I was still serving in the bishopric, but Ash had stopped attending and just felt like it didn't. She had also started writing a sub stack called Staying and Straying, where she kind of goes through her faith journey in different tough topics. And I can neither confirm nor deny whether or not I do the footnotes for her, because I was doing it while still employed, but.

Riley Davis [04:19:36] But yeah, so she was just on this transition out. And I just felt like the data point towards a non historical Book of Mormon. And I felt like that was a really big deal for me. And the data point towards just really fallible leaders who make some pretty atrocious mistakes. And I can even, even forgive those mistakes and we can move past them, but they refuse to do that. They refuse to acknowledge hurt. They refuse to make changes on things that are still currently affecting the students that were in my classes. I didn't know how I could be this progressive Mormon who wants to make a space for LGBT youth when the doctrine still isn't.

Riley Davis [04:20:27] And it'll change someday day. It always does eventually, when there's enough pressure and enough time. But I didn't feel like I was. I didn't feel like I could wait around for that.

John Dehlin [04:20:40] So it wears you out to try and be a nuanced, progressive Mormon. That's. I found that too.

Riley Davis [04:20:45] Yeah, it's exhausting.

John Dehlin [04:20:47] And then also, I guess the discoveries about the Curt McConkie and the church's helpline and the church covering up childhood abuse, that often turns people who feel like, okay, it may not be true, but it's good. When the church is protecting child abusers at the expense of child victims, then you start wondering if the church is good. Is that right?

Riley Davis [04:21:10] Yeah, you just draw a line and you're like, okay, that's not okay. And how good do I feel contributing to this cycle in the system, you know? And so eventually Ash had stepped into. Stopped. Had stopped attending. And for another reason, the other counselor in my bishopric was going to be released due to personal circumstances, just family health stuff. And so my bishop was kind enough to come to me and say, hey, would love to keep working with you. You're super awesome. If you feel like this is a good time to transition out, out, just know I support you in that. And I felt like it was the right thing, so I asked to be released.

Riley Davis [04:21:54] And so like I said, that's just this last Mother's Day. And since then I've. I've attended. I. I still attend once in a while and when I can or when I feel like doing it. But the other big thing is, as parents, we've just decided, like, if our kids really. They always hated going to church, and so we're not going to force them, you know, and when we do bring them, we're a little worried about what they're getting in primary anyway, so there's not a lot of incentive to bend over backwards to try to be this.

Riley Davis [04:22:30] Be this progressive Mormon. And I think that's probably because the church's truth claims, when it comes to, this is the one true church. And the priesthood was literally restored word. And the church kind of holds that, holds that over your head and says, hey, if you quit, you lose your eternal family.

John Dehlin [04:22:50] Only we have the keys, you know.

Riley Davis [04:22:52] Exactly. And then you find out the people restoring these keys are Elias and Elijah, who are the same person. And Joseph just didn't know what he was talking about like so many other prophets. And so the thing is, like, I, I think once I had let go of, okay, this is the true church, I had been very expansive, like, of course God's going to save so many people outside of this church. Right. But once I let go of, yeah, priesthood probably wasn't restored like they say it was. And the historical record supports that. The, this was made up after the fact. Right. The whole idea

Riley Davis [04:23:33] of, oh, John the Baptist came and laid his hands on us and Peter, James and John came and ordained us and all this stuff was brought up way after the fact once Joseph started experiencing real pushback to his authority. And, and so I think once I let go of those things, it's like, why are we fighting so hard to make this work?

John Dehlin [04:23:56] Did you mention in this interview that you're basically told by your leader in church education that you had no future? Did you get to that part or

Riley Davis [04:24:07] so I, I don't know if they said that, like my supervisor.

John Dehlin [04:24:13] Yeah. Was that because you were whistleblowing around child abuse?

Riley Davis [04:24:17] No, no. And I, I don't think it's. That I had no future. I think they would have let me stay as long as I, as long as I didn't tell them what I actually thought. Right on. Honestly, I can make a temple recommend and review work with all my nuance. And if I have the right leaders, they'll keep endorsing me and I'll keep my job. But if they knew what I actually believed about the Book Mormon, if they knew that I believe it's basically Bible fanfiction, right. 19th century Bible fanfiction from the world of Joseph Smith. And anyone who says, oh, it's so crazy that he could do this. It's. No, it's, it's exactly what Joseph would have written, you know, so if, if they would have known what I would have, what I believed, I wouldn't have had a future. But I think if I kept it to myself, I could have kept going.

John Dehlin [04:25:10] But that's kind of toxic to just, oh, yeah, keep that to yourself. Oh, yeah, but you don't believe, but you're teaching it anyway.

Riley Davis [04:25:16] And, and I never once I got into these nuanced eras. I never taught anything I didn't believe. I was just very careful in. I would take out of the whole chapter. I will. And even sometimes I had a lesson in the New Testament where I would have students focus on some verses that were super uplifting and beautiful and all that stuff. And then I would skip down there in the Pauline epistles, and I would have them read something super sexist in the second same letter in the same. And I would kind of help them deduce, okay, what do we learn from this Scripture? You can find beauty and you can find meaning and all this good stuff.

Riley Davis [04:25:54] You can also find terribly sexist and hurtful things. So I tried to help them differentiate. Everyone chooses what they take out of scripture, you know, But I also don't think that's what the church would have wanted me to be teaching, because to them, they say, no, scripture is the word of God. And then they proof text it enough to say, look, we're right.

John Dehlin [04:26:14] You know, it's almost inevitable when we bring a former CES teacher on Mormon stories, that their former students come in the comment section and say, hey, that's Brother. That's Brother Davis. Hey, Brother Davis. I was in your 2023 graduating class. Well, it's probably going to happen.

Riley Davis [04:26:36] Well, if there are any out there, just know you're awesome. And I've always just tried to teach the best I can, and I think you're great and I hope you're doing well.

John Dehlin [04:26:47] So what's your future?

Riley Davis [04:26:49] So, yeah, I. Once I realized a career here is just not feasible, we started kind of stepping away from church and church callings and leadership and stuff. I just started putting out feelers when it comes to school district positions. And I mean, granted, I want to say that the leadership, my direct leadership above me in seminary and institutes has been very kind to me on my way out. They've been very. In fact, when I brought up all my concerns with this supervisor who was so rough on me mentally and emotionally and super, super depressed in that phase where you feel like they're casting you as an enemy and like, yeah, yeah, so.

Riley Davis [04:27:35] But they listened to that and they moved me to the seminary at the high school, adjacent to the high school, right by my house. And so at first I was like, dang, I'm gonna have to take a pay cut and commute further. I've been commuting to bountiful these five years, but I got this seminary teaching job right next to my house. But then a math teaching position opened up at the high school right next to my house. And so I'll be teaching just 10th grade math next year and just excited to go back and to teach something that is true.

John Dehlin [04:28:15] Wait, math is true?

Riley Davis [04:28:16] Yeah. Well, I always, I always, always c, like phrased it with my students. I felt like math was the pursuit of truth. Right. When you've got an equation right, you're trying to figure out what you can put in on this side to make these two this statement true, that this equals that. And so I'll go teach that kind of truth rather than dogma.

John Dehlin [04:28:39] And what do you hope happens with this story?

Riley Davis [04:28:42] I, I don't know, because honestly, we're just so fresh in to this phase of life that it's hard to know what will happen. Like, I really appreciate all the people who've come on Mormon stories and even the ones who've come over multiple years, like you had them in the past and then they come back and you kind of get, as someone who never listened to Mormon stories the first time around, I get to hear the, this person in 2018 and then that person in 2024. Right. And kind of see where their life path has taken them. Because honestly, at this point, I, I, I wish I could say, oh yeah, I've deconstructed and life is so beautiful on the other side and it's relieving. I've been able to get off antidepressants, you know, and I've been feeling better in that sense.

John Dehlin [04:29:36] Wait, so leaving the church and deciding to quit this job has helped become less depressed?

Riley Davis [04:29:42] Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Like I said, I had that really depressed phase in like ninth grade, like early teens. But then I didn't feel that kind of depression until I became a seminary teacher again. And there are a lot of seminary teachers that it's just, it's just hard and it wears on you and it's heavy. And so, yeah, I've felt like, I've felt positive effects. I've felt like I've been able to move forward and really feel just a lot better about myself and less shame and all that stuff. But I, I don't know what the future looks like for us. All I'm all I'm glad about is that Ash and I broke this down at the same time because I see so many friends or colleagues.

Riley Davis [04:30:39] I even had one seminary teacher come up to me after a recent training just like a couple weeks ago, and he heard me sharing my story that of course I was still teaching seminary at the time. So I couched it as, yeah, my wife is leaving the church.

Riley Davis [04:30:56] And he heard that and he was like, Came ran after me after the meeting, was like, hey, thanks for sharing that. My wife left too. And so I see so many people that it's so hard when one spouse leaves, one partner leaves and the other doesn't. And I'm just glad because I feel like Ash was on kind of a collision course with her struggles with polygamy, just that. That innate feminism in her and so many different things. And so she was going to deconstruct regardless. And I'm just so grateful that I changed my masters to Biblical Studies because I honestly feel like it just broke down.

Riley Davis [04:31:37] All of the proof text that I had used to be harsh. All of the things that I'd used to say. Well, scripture says therefore. I just feel like it made me a kinder person, you could say more Christlike person, you know, and not. But I'm just so glad that our deconstruction was in sync with each other. And I think I'm so academically inclined that I don't know that I would have been able to deconstruct us alongside Ashley had it not been from. For all this intellectual kind of help helping me realize the church's truth claims aren't what they said they were.

John Dehlin [04:32:18] So. Do you regret working in the ces?

Riley Davis [04:32:22] No, not at all. I mean, like I said, it's, it's a pay cut now, going back to public ed. But the school district has been very kind to me as well. And I, I mean, I'm coming in at the master's degree level. I don't know they'll do. Do with a, a math teacher with a master's in Biblical Studies, but there you go.

Riley Davis [04:32:43] And I, I do, I, I'm not sure what I want to do with my degree from here on out. I've thought of. I've got several writing projects that I've started and I'm just trying to gauge how much of my life in this next era is even going to be able to be dedicated to Mormon studies, because I have so many people in that field. Field, Matt Harris, like these great scholars who I just look up to so much.

Riley Davis [04:33:10] And I would love to publish in that field, specifically where there's overlap between Mormon scripture and the study of the Bible, which, like I said, it's Bible fanfic, so there's tons there. But I just, I don't know how much in this next phase I'll dedicate to writing and stuff like that.

John Dehlin [04:33:29] I, I guess you might Be grateful that working in CES helped you realize the church wasn't what it claimed.

Riley Davis [04:33:41] Oh, yeah, absolutely.

John Dehlin [04:33:42] Like, if you value basing your life on truth.

Riley Davis [04:33:46] Oh, yes. Yeah. I feel like I took this detour. I learned some Greek and Hebrew and Aramaic, and it was super cool. And I love geeking out on scripture stuff and all that, but I. I feel like it was a really good detour, mostly because it helped me and my wife when she started breaking things down. I was able to be there.

John Dehlin [04:34:08] Yeah.

Riley Davis [04:34:08] I was able to be where she was at because mine wasn't so much about polygamy and the sexism because it disproportionately affects women.

John Dehlin [04:34:18] Yeah.

Riley Davis [04:34:18] Like, all of these issues, it's. The church is made for me. I'm literally. I'm in the leadership positions, I'm getting talk, giving talks. I'm needed, I'm on the committees. I'm doing all that stuff. The church is made for me as. As a white, middle class man. Like, I thrive here. And so I feel like the breakdown has been perfect because it put me in sync with Ashley.

John Dehlin [04:34:45] Beautiful. Well, thanks, cef.

Riley Davis [04:34:48] Yeah, no, thank you very much. And it's been a great detour.

John Dehlin [04:34:52] Thanks. Church education system. Yep. Yeah. All right. Well, Riley Davis, it's been so great. I mean, literally your last day was Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and then Monday, you're here on Mormon Stories, so we can't. That's almost unheard of. Just about a month ago, I had a guy who worked 30 years as a church employee, and then, like, the next day he came on Mormon Stories and we recorded the whole thing. Yeah. And then he said, I'm. I'm afraid I don't want to.

Riley Davis [04:35:25] Oh, really?

John Dehlin [04:35:25] I want to release it. So we didn't release it. So, anyway, hopefully you'll let us. Hopefully you'll let us release.

Riley Davis [04:35:30] No, you're. You're good. And. Yeah, I just. I feel like so many of these things. I had already broken down so much of this previously.

John Dehlin [04:35:40] Yeah.

Riley Davis [04:35:40] That I. I was gratefully able to transition out of CES on my own terms.

John Dehlin [04:35:45] Yeah.

Riley Davis [04:35:46] And I feel like the more transparency and the more discussion we have on all of these topics, the better. And as much as it might hurt, growing hurts. And, like, hey, I feel like it's a net gain for the church to have more conversation about these issues because they really are, in some way, ways making progress, you know, in some ways. And so it's not enough for me to be able to stay and be like, oh, yeah, I endorse this, but I Hope more people will keep talking and keep raising issues because like I saw with hr, literally one rogue complaint ended up in a global policy change. And so if more people do that, just the better. And so, yeah, excellent.

Closing Thoughts and Farewell

John Dehlin [04:36:34] Well, before we end, just want to remind everyone, thank you so much. If you are a donor, you make all this possible. If you value this type of content and you're not yet a donor, just know that we don't do product endorsements. We minimize our ads on YouTube and Spotify and Apple. And all we ask is that you just become a monthly donor. 10 bucks a month, 20 bucks a month, 100 bucks a month, whatever you can afford. Forward. We're tax deductible in the US we're transparent in our finances, and we do our best to spend our money providing you with good content. So go to MormonStories.org, click on the donate button.

John Dehlin [04:37:10] Become a monthly donor if you can. Thanks. If you're already a donor, you can also help us by subscribing on Spotify, on Apple podcasts or on YouTube, giving us positive reviews on Spotify and on Facebook. Facebook and on Apple Podcast.

John Dehlin [04:37:25] Liking, sharing, commenting. We love to hear from you. Please email us@moremorestoriesmail.com Please comment on these episodes. We'll read the comments and respond. If people want to get a hold of you, how do they do that? Or do you want them to get a hold of you?

Riley Davis [04:37:39] I mean, I'm fine. If anyone, my email's all out there because I'm working at Leighton High next year and so Riley did davis@leightonhigh. My email is on there. And so if you want to reach out, you're welcome to. And your wife's substack is staying and straying. And so, yeah, I help with the footnotes mostly on some of that stuff. She's got. Got some good stuff on there.

John Dehlin [04:38:03] All right. All right. Well, thanks again, Riley Davis, for coming on Mormon Stories. Thanks to all you for joining us. Thanks to Brooklyn and Julia and Margi who really help keep the Open Stories foundation going as as well as the board. But please take care of yourself and we hope to bring you back to talk about that one.

Riley Davis [04:38:22] Hebrew Snow. Yeah, Snell, I'd be happy to. That'd be awesome.

John Dehlin [04:38:26] Let's do that episode.

Riley Davis [04:38:27] Let's do it.

John Dehlin [04:38:27] All right. Thanks, Riley Davis. Thanks, everyone for joining us today. 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.

Transcript © 2026 John P. Dehlin. All rights reserved. Brief quotations are welcome with attribution and a link to mormonstories.org; all other use requires written permission.