Introduction and Episode Overview

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Brad Carmack [00:00:43] Lead

John Dehlin [00:00:43] thou me on the night is dark and I am far from home. Hello and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories Podcast. I'm your host, John Delinquent, and today we have what I think is a very important topic to discuss. Today we are going to be discussing an initiative that hopes to make a pretty important change within kind of the LDS Church and specifically within the BYU community, which includes BYU Provo, but I think it also extends to byu, Idaho, Hawaii, and, you know, any other LDS kind of church affiliated university. The website that we're going to be talking about is freebyu.org you can go to freebyu.org or freebyu.com either one is a website and as it says on the website, their mission is to promote freedom of thought, freedom of religion at byu. And specifically they're asking that the honor code be updated to allow LDS students to change their personal beliefs without being expelled from the university and evicted from their housing. And so that's what Free BYU is about. And unless you've actually heard sort of, you know, across several Internet blogs or Reddit or wherever, you may not have heard, but there are instances where a student at BYU will sort of lose their faith or have a crisis of faith or be seriously struggling. And in those instances, if a church leader happens to find out, you know, one possible scenario is that their ecclesiastical endorsement, which has to be signed every year, can be denied, which can, you know, prevent them from being able to continue at byu. Now that in and of itself is kind of an issue and we'll get into this. But what I've seen is even more troubling. What I've seen on the Internet are instances where a student may have lost their faith but then tried to just simply graduate or transfer to another university. And from what I've seen on the Internet, and I'm going to be looking to these gentlemen to kind of correct me if I'm wrong. But what I've seen on the Internet is some instances where it suggests that transcripts were held so that. So that people's credits from BYU actually couldn't transfer to other universities. Or in at least one or two instances, I've heard rumblings on the Internet of people actually not being allowed to graduate from byu. Now, I'm not sure if that's really how bad it can be, but I guess for the purposes of today, we're going to kind of COVID the whole gamut of hopefully what people have experienced. And I'll just say as a quick disclaimer, the purpose of this isn't to bash byu. The purpose isn't to bash the church. It's actually quite, quite different, at least from my point of view. The purpose of this podcast is just to bring light to some pain and suffering and inconvenience that I think not only affects the students and families involved, but also reflects really poorly on BYU and the LDS Church. And so our hope is simply, I think, to improve the BYU's institutions to the extent that we can and most importantly, to improve the experiences of many of its students. And so to discuss these issues, I've got five gentlemen with me. And I'll say, I lament that we only have males on the podcast today, but that's just, you know, there's a lot of risk in participating in something like this. And so, you know, we're taking what we can get. But I'm just noting that that's, you know, not ideal. But today we have with us five individuals. Three of them are graduates of byu. We have, you know, the founder of Free byu, which is Caleb Chamberlain, right?

Jake [00:05:30] That's correct.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:05:30] Good to be here, John.

John Dehlin [00:05:31] Yeah. Welcome to Mormon Stories, Caleb. We also have Brad Carmack, who's here on Mormon Stories for the first time. Hey, Brad.

Ryan [00:05:39] Hello.

John Dehlin [00:05:41] And we have Ryan. We're not using Ryan's last name just because he has some sensitivities that he wants to attend to. So, Ryan, also, welcome to One Mormon Stories.

Ryan [00:05:53] Hello. Good to be here. Thanks for having me.

John Dehlin [00:05:56] It's a pleasure. And then finally, we have two current BYU students. And these two BYU students obviously would be risking their educations if they use their real names. So we're going to be referring to them with non real names. And so in addition to the three, we have Jeff and Jake. Jeff, welcome to Mormon Stories.

Jake [00:06:25] Hello. It's good to be here.

John Dehlin [00:06:26] And Jake. Jake, welcome to you as well.

Jeff [00:06:29] I would say it's about the same for me.

Guests Introduce Themselves and Free BYU

John Dehlin [00:06:32] All right, so, Caleb, so I gave a little bit of an extemporaneous introduction. Why don't you either amend or add to or correct the introduction that I gave. And just talk to us a bit about. About. Well, why don't we start with your story and your background a little bit and then we can talk about why you started free byu. And then I just kind of want to dig into the stories of Ryan, Brad, Jake and Jeff. And then we'll sort of end by talking about what you guys hope to accomplish with all this. How does that sound?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:07:11] That sounds great. It's okay. Actually, let me start off by saying, just reiterating what you've already said, John, and that is that we are not interested in attacking or submarine BYU in any way. We're alumni and students at byu. We all have a love for the school. And really we're interested in making changes that we think will improve the school, make it better for everybody. And I also wanted to just start out by saying that the LDS faith, the Mormon faith, is positioned, I think, above most other religions in the world as being a faith that's very accepting of other faiths. The doctrines of work for the dead and so on, really, I think, position the church to be able to accept other people and their faiths. So having said that, you see the church and its position about the importance of religious freedom, not for just itself, but for everybody all around the world. It's a fundamental part of the LDS theology that we have the ability to make choices on our own in good conscience. That's the whole part of the reason that we're here on Earth, obviously. So when it comes to free byu, we really think that the changes that we're proposing are really in line with the overall doctrines and the public stance of the church, and that the changes can be made fairly easily with very little negative repercussions. So that's kind of what we're going for. So as far as my personal story, I want to be as brief as possible on that front. But I finished a master's degree at BYU a few years ago. And during that process where I was working on my degree, I had a. I'll call it a crisis of faith. And I ultimately, the semester before I graduated, I confided in my bishop. And through the process, there was a risk that I was not going to be able to graduate. And this was my final semester, my master's thesis was finished and there was a possibility that I would be able to graduate in spite of the fact that I had everything finished.

John Dehlin [00:09:29] Hey, Caleb, are you interested or comfortable at all in sharing just kind of how a crisis of faith Happened to you at byu? Kind of. What, what were the elements that kind of led up to it? Or is that something you'd rather not talk about?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:09:43] I can talk about it. I, you know, when it comes to stories, I think Jeff and Jake probably have more compelling stories than I do. Really. My, my story is not too unique, but I'll, I'll talk briefly about it. Essentially, I started questioning whether my, whether the Mormon epistemology, whether the Mormon way of learning truth was, was reliable, was correct. I'd had experiences where I had very strong first spiritual manifestations outside the context of Mormonism and in places that were actually very contradictory. And either I was misunderstanding what the spirit was or I was feeling the spirit teaching me contradictory things. And it took me a while to wade through that, but ultimately I decided that if the feeling does come from God, then God doesn't actually care whether the beliefs that you follow are true or not. Possibly. Maybe, you know, if they're leading you to do, to do good there, then that's enough. So that's what I concluded. And I felt like it wasn't enough to read the Book of Mormon and feel good about it, that I needed a little more and decided it probably wasn't true. And that was, that was my personal decision. I don't, I don't want to marginalize anybody else's decision, but that's kind of where I was.

Faith Transitions and Losing Ecclesiastical Endorsement

John Dehlin [00:11:05] And at the time, were you feeling scared about your status at BYU as you were struggling in your faith?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:11:13] You know, I wasn't scared at all. And it was because I didn't know. I know everybody reads the honor code, but I don't think, you know, you go, you go through, you know, you read the terms and conditions for anything, right? You go like a lawyer and talk about like an 18 year old kid doing that the first time they signed the honor code to go to byu. And that's been my experience. Nobody knows, very few people know that you can, as an LDS student, you can be expelled or you will be expelled if you change your faith. So yeah, I wasn't scared at all until, until my bishop actually brought that up.

John Dehlin [00:11:51] And so, yeah, what happened in that conversation? And I should note, you only get expelled for changing your faith away from Mormonism. If you convert to Mormonism, that's okay, right?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:12:01] Yeah, yeah, that's correct. You can change, but, or from, or from any other. If you're a Catholic, you could convert to Islam, whatever, but you can't convert from Mormonism to anything else. That's correct.

John Dehlin [00:12:13] And that Just that. That odd. That just seems like a face value sort of contradiction. Right. Inconsistency.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:12:22] Yeah, well. And you know, I, I can honestly see a lot of the motivation for it. I can understand the theological of disconnecting from the body of Christ, from the true church of Christ, especially when you've made commitments and we can talk about answers to those objections, but I don't. I don't want to call anybody hypocrites. Yeah, yeah, there's definitely motivation for the policies that are in place, for sure,

John Dehlin [00:12:46] and I understand it, but they are kind of inconsistent, you know?

Guest [00:12:50] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:51] Okay. So, Caleb, so you're talking to your bishop, and what happens when you're talking to your bishop?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:12:56] Well, so. And I don't want to be disparaged my bishop at all. He's actually a great guy, my old bishop. And we threatened to withdraw my endorsement. To be clear, he. He told me he would not. He wouldn't sign. He wouldn't. Let's see, what do they call it? Your interview every semester, every year to renew your endorsement. He wouldn't renew my endorsement is what he told me. Fortunately, it was my last semester, so that wouldn't really. It comes down to who your bishop is and how selective he is and how. What, how to the letter he chooses to enforce the honor code as it stands. But like I said, I wasn't in

Caleb Chamberlain [00:13:41] any extreme danger, but. Right, but there was that possibility.

John Dehlin [00:13:46] Right. Okay.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:13:47] Well, when that happened, just in the aftermath of that, I. I effectively just started pretending to my discredit, probably. I, I wasn't willing to risk

Guest [00:14:00] losing my.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:14:00] All my.

Guest [00:14:01] I mean, you can't trust transfer a master's thesis. Right. So if I couldn't graduate, then all that work is just gone. I wasn't willing to risk that. So I, I did all the things you're supposed to do. I put on a lot of appearances just to get through so I could get my degree.

John Dehlin [00:14:17] So you kind of had to misrepresent who you were and how you felt because the consequences were kind of.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:14:24] Yeah, it was a bit of a lie.

John Dehlin [00:14:26] Too high. Yeah.

Brad Carmack [00:14:27] Yeah.

Guest [00:14:27] If I had been more honest, intellectually, spiritually, whatever, I probably would have just done what I felt, felt like I needed to do and accepted the consequences, whatever they were. But it was, it was a bit much to ask considering that I could lose three years of work leading up to my master's degree.

John Dehlin [00:14:48] And how hard or not hard was it to kind of, you know, for you to live inauthentically? Was that a big deal or at the time you were so used to being active that you just kind of, you know, stuck it out and it wasn't too bad. How was it for you?

Guest [00:15:09] Mainly, it was. It was mainly a problem socially, really, but that. That had been a problem before

Brad Carmack [00:15:18] when

Guest [00:15:18] you feel like you're essentially living a lie, when you can't be honest about

Caleb Chamberlain [00:15:22] what you really believe, and when everybody

Guest [00:15:24] around you is saying things, at least at the time, they. The way that people would talk about things kind of grated on me because I decided that that wasn't the right way to look at truth.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:15:38] So,

Guest [00:15:41] yeah, I mean, you still have to go to church, you still have to participate. You got to go to Sunday school. I had a roommate once. Well, before I served a mission, I had a roommate at BYU who lost his endorsement because he was skipping priesthood meetings. So, you know, you have to continue participating socially and religiously and regardless of what you believe.

John Dehlin [00:16:03] Right.

Guest [00:16:04] So that is kind of difficult, and I'm sure that Jeff and Jake can attest to that.

John Dehlin [00:16:12] Okay, well, I'm sure Jeff and Jake, we'll do their stories in just a second. Ryan, why don't you. Why don't you quickly tell us your story, then we'll have Brad, and then we'll kind of dig more into Jeff and Jake. So, Ryan, why don't you go next?

Guest [00:16:28] Okay, sure.

Ryan [00:16:32] A lot of parts of my story are similar to Caleb's. I was also in my last year at byu. I wasn't working on a master's.

Guest [00:16:40] I was just finishing up my bachelor's

Brad Carmack [00:16:43] in accounting

Guest [00:16:47] this time of year, actually.

Ryan [00:16:49] And so there was still a good amount of time left in the school year. And for me, it was entirely intellectual. That's where it started.

Guest [00:17:00] It just started with looking into aspects of church history that I hadn't really

Ryan [00:17:06] allowed myself to look into it before, and spending a lot of time thinking about those things and researching the arguments regarding those issues on both sides, and then eventually just feeling forced to draw conclusions that I never saw myself drawing. And so that really took me by surprise and was quite a jarring experience, as that I'm sure many listeners can relate to.

Brad Carmack [00:17:37] But.

Ryan [00:17:38] So I. It was hard for me to continue participating in the church.

Guest [00:17:46] I tried to, but it was just.

Ryan [00:17:48] It was really hard for me to keep quiet when I, you know, when I disagreed with what was being said or with the way things were being done. And I didn't want to create a bad situation. And so I really just wanted to be able to become as inactive as

Guest [00:18:07] possible for the rest of the school year.

Ryan [00:18:09] And so I found a friend that I could confide in who I suspected had kind of had a similar experience.

Guest [00:18:17] And I was right.

Ryan [00:18:18] She actually had lost belief herself. And it was good that I talked to her because she gave me some great advice.

Guest [00:18:25] And she told me that you've got to be very careful.

Ryan [00:18:28] You can't let anyone know about this

Guest [00:18:31] that you don't really trust.

Ryan [00:18:33] And you're going to have to jump through some hoops and you're going to have to continue playing the role in a lot of ways.

Guest [00:18:43] And she advised me to go get

Ryan [00:18:45] copies of my transcripts in case those got withheld for any reason, so that I could make sure my credits would transfer if I had to. I ended up getting kicked out, and so I did all that. And then I was debating whether I should talk to my bishop, but I decided I needed to because I didn't think I was going to be able to endure putting on this facade of being a full, believing, active member for the rest of the six months I was going to be there, which I know isn't a real long time, but it felt like a really long time at the time. And so I went and I talked to him, understanding, and he was, for the most part, he's a great guy. And I'm still in touch with him and consider him a friend. And so I really don't have any bad things to say about him. But he did question whether I should be at byu, and that led him to wonder whether he should renew my endorsement. Now, luckily, I was in my senior year like Caleb, and so that wasn't so much an issue. I didn't have to find out whether he was going to renew it, luckily. But he did say that in order for me, for him to not go out of his way to take away my endorsement, he expected me to go to church at least 50% of the time and to take on a pretty simple calling, which I agreed to do. So that was the extent of the role that I had to play while I was there. It was more than I wanted to do, but it. But it could have been worse at the same time. So I wasn't incredibly threatened, but. I'm sorry, what's that?

John Dehlin [00:20:30] No, you cut out just right at the very end there. So it sounds like you're required to remain active and to hold a calling, and it wasn't quite what you wanted to do. And what calling was it? I'm just curious.

Ryan [00:20:48] It was just doing indexing for family history.

John Dehlin [00:20:51] Okay, so you didn't. Yeah, okay. All right, now. Oh, go ahead.

Ryan [00:20:59] I was just gonna say, yeah, it wasn't anything real demanding prior to that. I was. I was the clerk, or actually I was kind of a co. Clerk, you could say. And so the bishop kind of let me step down from that and do something that would take a little bit less time, which I appreciated.

John Dehlin [00:21:17] Okay. So, Brad, did you lose your testimony at BYU while you were there?

Brad Carmack [00:21:26] I wouldn't say so, but I did have some of the same epistemological concerns that Caleb described during my last year.

John Dehlin [00:21:33] Okay, so you didn't have an experience at this point of the podcast we could use to relate, which is cool. We can come back to you. Or did you have something to share?

Brad Carmack [00:21:47] Yeah, you can come back to me. But I do have. I was threatened with by my bishop and also the law school being pulled me aside about losing my ecclesiastical endorsement, but it wasn't the testimony loss, although I was kind of going through a faith transition at the time.

John Dehlin [00:22:01] What was that about? Yeah, go ahead and tell that.

Brad Carmack [00:22:04] Okay, so I guess small amount of context. So I went to BYU for eight years. I got what I lovingly referred to as the three degrees of glory. So I did biology first. Then I did a joint degree program with Master of Public Administration and Law. I wrote a book my last year at BYU entitled Homosexuality A Straight BYU Students Perspective. Published it and sold it in the BYU bookstore. As a consequence, my bishop threatened me with the possibility of having a church court lost at the ecclesiastical endorsements. And the law school dean also warned me about the power of the honor code to keep me from graduating.

John Dehlin [00:22:45] Now, what years were this that you published the book?

Brad Carmack [00:22:49] This is at the very end of 2010 and the beginning of 2011.

John Dehlin [00:22:53] Yeah, I remember this, but I didn't know you were threatened. Did they give a reason why they were threatening you?

Brad Carmack [00:23:01] So my bishop, I was very open about writing the book to my bishop, and the book actually was pretty balanced. I wasn't sure at the time where I stood on the same sex marriage issue, but he said if I was in favor of same sex marriage publicly, that I would be subject to church discipline and the loss of ecclesiastical endorsement.

John Dehlin [00:23:20] Okay.

Brad Carmack [00:23:22] And the law school dean also warned me about the honor code repercussions of my book.

John Dehlin [00:23:26] So you were just warned, but you weren't. No action was taken against you, correct? Yeah, And I just, you know, I'll just. I'm making commentary here and it's not to pile on, but I'll just say, you know, dang. I think of universities as These places where students are allowed to think and explore and even have contrary opinions. It's an important time in people's lives for identity development. And I just kind of feel like universities are the place where people should be able to kind of even hold contrary views, to be able to figure out where they stand. So I guess because I think of universities as the place where open, free discourse and thought should be able to reign, it does just make me feel icky a bit to have someone say, you can't be supporting this or that legislation. Did it feel that? How did it feel for you?

Brad Carmack [00:24:18] Yeah, definitely very icky. There was a change made in early 2011, possibly related, I don't know, to the honor Code, which used to say that advocating for the morality of homosexual behavior was itself a violation of the honor code. Of course, that would apply to any BYU student of any religion. But that clause was stricken, mentioned that soft power, that mechanism of the bishop's ability, for whatever reason, to take your ecclesiastical endorsement away. But at least on the face of the honor code, there was an improvement there.

John Dehlin [00:24:51] Okay, so the improvement. Tell us again, the improvement did what? It made it so that.

Brad Carmack [00:24:56] Yeah, so there used to be in the Honor code a sentence that said it was a violation of the honor code to advocate for the morality of homosexual behavior.

John Dehlin [00:25:05] Okay.

Brad Carmack [00:25:05] And that that cause was removed.

John Dehlin [00:25:08] Okay, so that felt like progress at the time.

Brad Carmack [00:25:12] Yeah, a little bit.

John Dehlin [00:25:13] Okay. But you were able to make it through and you never had your degrees ever threatened?

Brad Carmack [00:25:19] That's right. A lot of my fear was because my brother had been expelled from the university because he converted essentially to atheism during his time at byu, and his bishop refused to sign his ecclesiastical endorsement for the. When the renewal came up. So his progress was halted. And I knew that that happened to him, and it really put a stumbling block in his life and his educational path.

Ryan [00:25:46] Yeah.

Brad Carmack [00:25:46] So because I'd seen that with my own brother, it caused me a lot of fear my last six months of byu.

John Dehlin [00:25:51] So was this an older brother?

Brad Carmack [00:25:53] Yes.

John Dehlin [00:25:54] Okay. All right.

Mental Health, Missions, and Doubts at BYU

Brad Carmack [00:25:56] Well.

John Dehlin [00:25:56] Well, Jeff, why don't we have you tell your story now? You're. You're at BYU now. It's 2014, October. Why don't you tell us your story?

Guest [00:26:07] Yeah, sure.

Brad Carmack [00:26:08] So I served.

Guest [00:26:10] I got back from my mission not too. Not too long ago. I served in a place that was very different from America. There was a really high Muslim population there. And so, you know, with Muslim, with. You know, there was mosques and such. And also along with this, as a missionary, I didn't have any we didn't have permission to preach, so we couldn't do anything. It was, you know, like, really nothing. We really didn't do anything.

John Dehlin [00:26:43] On your mission?

Jake [00:26:44] Yeah, on my mission.

John Dehlin [00:26:45] At all. Like, the whole time.

Jake [00:26:47] Well, there's different areas, actually. So some areas you could. It wasn't like a normal mission, but there are some areas where you had to get. There's like a permission you had to get. And so we ended up getting the permission. But for most of my time there, there was nothing to do at all.

John Dehlin [00:27:05] Okay, so you couldn't proselyte. All right.

Jake [00:27:09] And so one day, my companion takes me to this mosque. This mosque. And so we went there, and it was for the Friday prayer. And so we sat in the middle. We sat, you know, just in the group of people, and everyone's, you know, perform the prayer. And, you know, because we were sitting around everyone, we, you know, us two had to kind of mimic the actions of everybody doing the prayer, which is kind of an involved prayer that involves bowing and prostration. Anyway, so after this incident, I felt. I mean, I swear I felt the closest to God I've ever felt in my life, especially on my mission. And this came as a pretty big shock to me because I would have told you then that I was serving my mission for the right reasons. I was trying to be as obedient as possible. I was doing all these things, reading scriptures. But for some reason, this experience I had with the divine was not. It was like nothing I've ever had in my entire life. And so this, along with a lot of things on my mission, caused me to get sick and. Well, get mentally sick. And so I ended my mission 15 months early. And so I went to. I went back to America.

John Dehlin [00:28:35] And you ended 15 months early?

Jake [00:28:38] Yeah, I was only on a mission for nine months.

John Dehlin [00:28:39] Okay.

Jake [00:28:43] So I got back to America, and I.

John Dehlin [00:28:45] Really. Part of that was because you had this spiritual experience related to another religion.

Jake [00:28:51] Definitely. I mean, I couldn't feel comfortable trying to convert other people. I mean, it just brought me too much. How to say? I mean, I couldn't bring myself to do it. I mean, I didn't feel right doing it.

John Dehlin [00:29:06] Okay.

Jake [00:29:07] I felt like, you know, these guys are. These guys have, you know, a very. Just as valid religion as, you know, my religion. You know, why would I need to. I felt kind of like a salesman, you know, that we were just trying, you know, kind of invasive sort of.

John Dehlin [00:29:24] But you still considered yourself an LDS believer when you left your mission?

Jake [00:29:29] Oh, definitely. Definitely.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:29:30] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:29:31] You just didn't want to proselyte anymore. Okay.

Jake [00:29:35] I felt like, you know, they have, you know, I did feel kind of. Kind of a strong affinity for those people. Anyway, so I got home and I. I had some kind of mental. Like some problems with stress and anxiety that I had to recover. So I was.

Jeff [00:29:50] Me.

Jake [00:29:50] I met with a psychologist for probably the next, I don't know, six. Six months.

Brad Carmack [00:29:56] Ish.

Jake [00:29:56] And at this time, I kind of put this whole incident in the back of my head because I didn't want to worry about it. I mean, I was dealing. I mean, I really was dealing with anxiety problems. I was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder. I was having panic attacks all the time. I mean, not like super frequent, but like, you know, a couple times a month. Like, pretty scary panic attacks. And so, you know, bringing up this issue would be just another, you know, pretty big stressor in my life. So, I mean, I put this whole religion thing on the back of my mind, and I continue to go to church. I continue to do everything. You know, I was, you know, I continued to.

Guest [00:30:33] Yeah.

Jake [00:30:33] Do all of that stuff.

John Dehlin [00:30:35] Okay, so when did things. When did things start becoming different?

Jake [00:30:39] Okay, so I went back to byu There, I continued to the psychologist. And then as soon as I started feeling kind of, like, better, I. Actually, there's one. There's one day where I kind of just. I recalled this experience and, you know, I really questioned myself. You know, you felt, you know, you had this great experience. Don't you think you should kind of do some more research? Like, look into the religion more? And so then this is when I was at byu, and so I started reading the Quran. I read it a lot, actually. I was reading it like, I was reading tons. I was. I was looking things on the Internet. And as I was reading, it was kind of a crazy experience because, I mean, I could feel. I mean, you know, I would feel that questions, you know, I had, you know, were being answered by this. This holy book, which. But by the Quran, which, you know, is something that. Yeah, it was. It was an interesting experience. And so actually, at that. At that time, I kind of made the decision to. To convert. Just, I figured that, I mean, this is the path I wanted to take, but I wasn't entirely sure how to make the decision or, you know, I wasn't sure about the details. Well, first of all, because, you know, at Provo, there's very, like, especially BYU campus, there's a very small Muslim population, probably.

Guest [00:32:07] Yeah, there's not very many. And so I wasn't quite ready to make the decision. But I sort of already did, if that makes sense. But then I had this opportunity. I had the opportunity of doing a summer. Summer, taking summer class at a different university. So I went to this university, and at this university, I had an entirely

Jake [00:32:28] new kind of life. I didn't know anybody there.

Guest [00:32:32] Just a brand new kind of a blank slate. You know, if I wanted to convert it to a different religion, I could do it at this new. At this other state. And so I went to the mosque and talked with people and I asked questions. I made a lot of friends and I started. I just asked questions, trying to get everything straight in my mind. And that's when I accepted Islam just about a year ago.

John Dehlin [00:32:59] Okay. And like, is there some type of baptism equivalent into Islam when you convert?

Jake [00:33:08] No.

Guest [00:33:09] Well, in a sense, I mean, to convert, all you have to do is just state. It's called the Shahada. It pretty much means I testify that

Jake [00:33:22] there's no God but the God, like the true God, and that Muhammad is his messenger. So you say that and you mean it, then you're Muslim? Pretty much. Okay, so that's pretty much the conversion. That's how.

Guest [00:33:37] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:33:39] Okay. And has. Did that. So did that cause you any subsequent problems at byu?

Jake [00:33:44] Oh, my gosh. It changed my entire outlook at byu. I mean. I mean, I was trying to be so. I mean, from every aspect, pretty much.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:33:54] So.

Jake [00:33:54] For example, socially, I considered myself fairly social before this. This conversion. But after. After getting back at byu, after returning from the summer program, I felt kind of this. I felt extremely kind of. Well, I felt like I could get close to people because I felt like they would figure out, they would know. And, you know, if one person knows, then, you know, ours would spread. And so socially, I kind of withdrew from everything, actually. Like, people would say that in one of my awards. They're kind of giving out awards, and I got the award for least social person of the entire ward or something like that.

John Dehlin [00:34:41] Oh, that's sad.

Jake [00:34:43] Yeah. I forgot what it was exactly. Said it's like the person most likely to get by through the year without anybody knowing or something like that. It was just. Anyways. Yeah, so. And that's actually continued. I moved to a different place and I keep moving. And, you know, that's. That's usually. That's how I feel socially. Not to mention, you know, practicing my religion is hard because, you know, Islam kind of requires, you know, it's kind of demanding in the sense that there's kind of five ritual prayers that you have to perform every day. And these ritual prayers have to be performed between specific times, and they involve prostration and bowing, and they usually take about kind of five, 10 minutes. And so, you know, with roommates and, you know, it kind of causes problems.

John Dehlin [00:35:39] So does anybody at BYU know you're a Muslim?

Jake [00:35:42] Yeah, actually, I kind of have a hard time keeping it. Kind of keeping a secret, kind of. I kind of hard time, like.

Guest [00:35:50] Yeah.

Jake [00:35:51] And so there are probably a handful of students that know maybe like five or six. And there's even a couple of professors that know. I told.

John Dehlin [00:36:03] And the professors kept your confidence?

Jake [00:36:06] Yeah, they did. They did. They actually. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:36:08] That's kind of scary to tell a professor.

Jake [00:36:11] Yeah. I just didn't know what to do, though. I was just like. Like, I didn't know where to turn to because I'm definitely. Because at this time, I really wasn't even sure, you know, like. Like what was said by Caleb. I wasn't sure what would happen to me. I wasn't sure kind of the consequences. You know, I talked to some people, kind of. They didn't know about this policy. I would talk to people and they'd say, you'll be fine. Like, they wouldn't kick you out. But then, you know, other places I read, you know, says, yeah, you'll definitely get kicked out. And so these professors, you know, I didn't want to go directly to the honor code and ask them. What really is the consequence? I didn't want to go to my bishop. And so I just turned to some professors who I felt like would be able to.

John Dehlin [00:36:53] And what did the professors tell you? They didn't. How did that happen? What did they say?

Jake [00:37:00] They said that. Well, they said that they kind of thought it was confusing the fact that other faiths can convert to Mormonism, but Mormons can't convert to other faiths. They did kind of notice that. Kind of. Yeah, this kind of inconsistency or whatever. Inconsistency, yeah. So they didn't notice that. But at the end of the day, Wool said, you know, he thought I shouldn't be here and I should go to a different university, which is hard for me because, I mean, I'm pretty close. I'm very close to graduating, actually. So transferring would actually be a very, you know, it would add, you know, extra. It would, you know, it would cause tons of credits to be lost. I actually did the calculations. I actually contacted university to see if I was to transfer, how much credits would I actually get? And so at BYU, I've completed around 100 credit hours. But the university I would be planning on transferring to. They would only be accepting 60 of these credits, so I'd be losing out on 40 whole credit hours.

John Dehlin [00:38:13] So that's like almost a third of your education.

Jake [00:38:16] Yeah, I mean. Yeah, it's a lot.

John Dehlin [00:38:18] It's more than a third.

Jake [00:38:20] Yeah, exactly. So, I mean, transferring isn't anything convenient at all.

Ryan [00:38:24] I mean.

John Dehlin [00:38:27] Okay, and so these BOE professors, the one you said advised you to transfer but didn't turn you in, Is that right?

Jake [00:38:35] No, he didn't turn me in. He didn't turn me in. We kind of had this conversation on the basis that, you know, I was going to him because, you know, to ask for kind of assistance and ask these questions, and so. No, he didn't. He wouldn't.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:38:51] He didn't.

John Dehlin [00:38:52] Okay, but so now you're just. You're trying to finish up and you're just keeping it secret, and are you doing all right?

Jake [00:39:01] You know, the funny thing is that people are finding out, like, on a regular basis. Like, it's hard.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:39:07] It's.

Jake [00:39:08] It's hard for me to keep a secret. I mean, and it's especially hard, like, you know, with the prayers and. And just even, like, talking about these things. It's hard for me to. And so, you know, people are finding. Now I kind of realized that people really don't want to, you know, if they won't believe it, they won't assume it. If, like, most people, I don't think they would assume it directly unless they saw, like, direct evidence. I mean, most people don't want to. Don't want to, like, think about the fact that someone would convert to Islam from Mormonism. And so, you know, when they see things that might kind of lead them to think that, you know, they kind of maybe push the. Push it aside, I guess.

John Dehlin [00:39:49] Yeah. Okay. And what. What things have you had to do to hedge in case you get found out? You know, any. Anything you've had to do?

Jake [00:39:58] Yeah, yeah. So I. I have my transcripts, and so if something was to happen, I would be kind of ready to transfer to a different university. Just transcripts get frozen. Because, I mean, if I get transcripts get frozen, I mean, I'm going to school based off of government help. And I don't think. I highly doubt, you know, if I was to lose my transcripts, that the government would pay for another four years of university.

John Dehlin [00:40:27] Okay, so is it a fact that BYU will withhold people's transcripts if they lose their faith while a student?

Jake [00:40:37] You know, actually, I wasn't quite sure about this I heard maybe we could ask other people. But, I mean, from what I assumed. I assumed that anyone being. That's what I assume.

John Dehlin [00:40:52] But you're scared enough to. Where you took that precaution of getting all your transcripts because you were certainly scared that that would happen. Is that right?

Jake [00:41:01] Definitely, yeah. Because, I mean, if this was to happen, I mean, the consequences would be enormous for me. I mean, if my transcripts really were frozen, I mean, that's it for my university. I mean, I'd have to find a fine job.

John Dehlin [00:41:15] So, Caleb, can you confirm whether that is in fact, like, just rumor? Is it fact? Is it anecdote? What can you say about that, John?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:41:26] I know it's not BYU's policy to hold transcripts, and I've never heard a confirmed story where that. Where BYU has frozen the transcript and not allowed someone to transfer it. Having said that, if I were back in that position, I would have absolutely got my transcripts just in case.

John Dehlin [00:41:44] Okay, but that's. That's kind of. That's kind of the impression that's being floated around the Internet. And so, you know, it'd be good. It'd be good to know whether that's. Whether that does happen sometimes or whether it's just total hysteria. But there's no, no basis.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:42:00] I don't think that it happens. I know there's a period where they have to. It seems like there's some kind of period where, where they can't transfer the transcripts, but I. I know of no case where that's happened. I don't think it does.

John Dehlin [00:42:14] But you've heard that, right?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:42:17] I've heard people suggest that, but I've never seen it rooted in any verifiable story. So. And I've looked into it a little bit. I don't think it happens.

Brad Carmack [00:42:25] Okay, so I agree with Caleb on that one.

John Dehlin [00:42:28] Okay. All right.

Ryan [00:42:30] They. What they will do is put a hold on your record that will prevent you from being considered for admission to any other church school. So that might be where this idea comes from. In fact, if you lose your ecclesiastical enforcement, you'll get a letter and part of what's in that letter will let you know that that hold is on your record. So the idea that this hold would prevent you from transferring anywhere else could be just a misconstruction of that fact.

John Dehlin [00:43:01] Okay. Okay, well, that's good to. That's really good to confirm. So your, Your guys concern isn't so much that. That transcripts are held so that people can't transfer. It's More that by being forced to transfer, you can lose up to one to two years of your education. Is that right?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:43:20] That's right.

John Dehlin [00:43:20] Is that the bigger.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:43:22] It's especially. Yes. And so Jeff talked about how he would lose a lot of his credits by transferring to. And the problem is even worse for graduate students because often graduate student graduate credits don't transfer. And then absolutely, you cannot, except for maybe in rare circumstances, transfer the work you're doing for your PhD dissertation or your master's thesis. I mean, that just can't happen.

John Dehlin [00:43:51] He's kind of to start over.

Brad Carmack [00:43:53] I agree with Caleb. The burden on graduate students is especially heavy. I looked into the ability to transfer my Master of Public Administration credits, and even though I was one semester from graduating, the best I could find was somebody, a school that was willing to accept six of my MPA credits. And for law school, you have to spend your last two years at the law school that you graduated from. So I would have been set back two years of my legal education if I had had to try to transfer to another law school.

John Dehlin [00:44:20] Okay, yeah. All right. And yeah, that makes sense. Okay, well, Jake, why don't we have you tell your story really quick?

The CES Letter and the Honor Code

Jake [00:44:30] Okay.

Jeff [00:44:33] So my story kind of begins my senior year of high school. I had a physics teacher who was an atheist. And so he and I would debate religion a lot. And just from that experience, I kind of had some questions about God, about religion. He had been a member of the church, had served a mission, come back and become an atheist. And so I thought that that was interesting because I hadn't met someone who had done that before, so it was kind of off putting. But I kind of just put my doubts on a shelf. You know, I put them on the proverbial shelf. So fast forward to my freshman year at byu, and I start hearing rumors on the Internet about things that might be problems with the historicity of the Book of Mormon or the Book of Abraham. I'm like, okay. So I look into them and I find the. The apologetic answer.

John Dehlin [00:45:21] Wait, this is on your mission?

Jeff [00:45:23] I just heard little bits and pieces on the Internet. Some would make, like, some comments about, like, blacks in the priesthood.

John Dehlin [00:45:31] Okay.

Jeff [00:45:32] Or the book Historic Historicity of the Book of Mormon.

John Dehlin [00:45:35] Again, on your. On your mission or not on your mission?

Jeff [00:45:38] Not on my mission. So I actually didn't serve a mission.

John Dehlin [00:45:40] Okay, okay. All right. So this is just on the Internet,

Jake [00:45:44] you know, I would say just hearing,

Jeff [00:45:46] like, nothing like very substantial, but like kind of rumors of there being problems.

John Dehlin [00:45:51] Okay, got it.

Jeff [00:45:54] And so I started to Have a lot of doubts just about the church, about religion, but I didn't think, like, I would still call myself a member for that period of time. I was going to church regularly. I was holding a calling, I was fulfilling my calling. I was doing everything I could, but I didn't end up going on a mission. I kind of fought against the tide at byu. And there's a lot of social pressure to go on a mission. And if you don't, it's one of the fastest conversation killers I've ever experienced. Because you try and talk to someone and be like, oh, where did you serve your mission? I'd be like, oh, I haven't served. And they just. The interest would drop substantially. So I just kept on putting little things on my shelf, just so you know, I kept on putting them on, you know, in the back burner so I wouldn't have to think about them. Okay, fast forward to this year in May, I found the CES letter.

John Dehlin [00:46:53] So this is cesletter.org Jeremy Runnels, letter to CES directory director.

Ryan [00:46:59] Correct.

Guest [00:47:00] Okay, so I found that letter and it just kind of confirmed a lot

Jeff [00:47:06] of the things I had heard.

John Dehlin [00:47:07] Now, are these websites blocked at byu? Do you know?

Guest [00:47:12] I actually haven't tried.

John Dehlin [00:47:13] Okay.

Guest [00:47:14] I was too scared to try.

John Dehlin [00:47:15] Not at byu.

Guest [00:47:17] Yeah, this is just in my apartment.

John Dehlin [00:47:18] Okay.

Jeff [00:47:21] But I found that and I read through the whole thing in like, 45 minutes. I just sat down and read the whole thing. Just devoured it. And my world was just rocked. Like, it felt like the world had, like, shifted beneath me, that I didn't know which way was up, which way was down.

John Dehlin [00:47:39] So that was a testimony slayer for you.

Jeff [00:47:42] It was a crisis of faith for me. That's when I guess I would say that I really began to doubt the church. Up until that point, I kind of had, like, little, like, side doubts, but I hadn't thought that, you know, okay, maybe the church isn't true, or maybe I would want to try something else. That was kind of the moment where I was like, oh, maybe it isn't true. Maybe there is something else out there.

John Dehlin [00:48:04] And this is how many months ago?

Jeff [00:48:06] Sorry, it was about five months ago.

John Dehlin [00:48:08] Okay, so that's pretty recent.

Jeff [00:48:10] Yeah. And I'm in a similar situation to most of the other guys in that I've got one semester left at byu, obviously. I just didn't know who to talk to or who to ask, because at BYU you just assume that everyone's Mormon and if you ask the wrong person, they're going to get up in your face and say, why don't you believe? Or they're like, if you express doubt to someone, that they'll kind of, like,

Guest [00:48:34] push back and, like, push down harder.

Jeff [00:48:36] Be like, well, you need to be doing this.

Guest [00:48:37] You haven't done your scripture study well enough.

Jeff [00:48:40] You haven't done.

Brad Carmack [00:48:40] You haven't prayed enough.

Guest [00:48:43] And so I was scared to tell

Jeff [00:48:44] anyone what had happened.

Guest [00:48:49] It's a huge mental strain when you go into conversations or into class and know that you can't be totally honest about what you think. Because if you say something that sounds critical of the church, your professor might bring it down on you, the other

Jeff [00:49:05] students might attack you, your bishop might get contacted. It's really kind of just scary because you don't know who you could talk to about what and how far. Like, if you go too far, will they report you? Will they not? I talked with my bishop. At this point, I'm basically inactive because I can't officially say that I'm going out of the church because that would kick me out of byu. But my bishop knows I'm having doubts, and my roommates know as well.

John Dehlin [00:49:40] It sounds like it's kind of tough for you right now, just kind of living in fear and feeling like he can't live authentically.

Jeff [00:49:48] Yeah, no, that's definitely a big part of it. Because I don't want to say something that be like, oh, why do you think that? And have someone, you know start questioning me, like, oh, do you not believe the church is true? Like, it's an everyday conversation. Like, you just have to kind of, like, put up this facade of being the good Mormon boy.

John Dehlin [00:50:07] Right, right. All right, well. Well, I want to thank you all, all five of you, for kind of telling your stories. And now maybe let's jump to. To some questions. The first question that came to my mind is, and Caleb, I'm going to have you answer the questions first, but you're also free to pass them to whoever you want. So there's some kind of order to the question and answer. Is that okay?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:50:33] That's fine. Yes.

John Dehlin [00:50:34] Okay, so first question is, like, what if someone were to say, hey, you signed the honor code, you knew what you were getting into, and you know BYU is a private school. It has the right to decide who it is and who is and isn't a member, a student. And if you violate the honor code, you deserve to face the consequences. What's your response to that?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:50:59] Well, so there's a few different arguments in that statement. First of all, the idea that signing the honor Code basically removes any culpability on the part of BYU for, for a policy that could be considered unethical. I don't really agree with that idea. I alluded to this before, but we have, here we have students, kids, you know, 18 year old, 19 year old kids who are leaving home for the first time in their lives having never been exposed seriously to any other religious ideology ever. And they're going, and they're signing this document which maybe they've read, gone over with a fine tooth combination and maybe they haven't, and assign this document that says, okay, you as an 18, 19 year old are agreeing that you won't change your faith between now and the time that you graduate. And if you do, you'll be expelled and you'll be evicted from your housing and if you have an on campus job, you'll lose your job. So let's say for example that a student signs this and goes into it. Can we really, is it really reasonable to put that kind of burden on someone who's expected to perhaps for the first time in their life, actually identify, find their testimony for their first time? President Uchtdorf recently said that we are a question asking people what kind of questions? How can you seriously ask questions if you know that if you come up with the wrong answer that your life will be turned upside down, that you'll be expelled from school? I mean, all social and familial concerns aside, that alone is a huge burden. And it's hard to imagine somebody, in spite of the fact that they signed this contract, it's hard to imagine someone being able to reasonably evaluate with that kind of fear and burden hanging over them. So you know, maybe there's some credit to the argument that, you know, you signed this document so you deserve it if you change your faith. But in spite of that, I still don't think it's very ethical and I definitely do not think it's in line with BYU's very public stance on the importance of religious freedom. Another question that you raised was about

Jeff [00:53:19] the,

Caleb Chamberlain [00:53:21] about BYU being a private institution. I'm wondering, Brad, do you want to tackle that one?

Brad Carmack [00:53:25] Yeah, sure, I'd be happy to. I think that it's definitely a very, I guess, common response in these types of discussions to it's essentially it's an is ought fallacy. I think that because an institution has the right or the ability to perform an action that it's the right thing to do. I think once we step back from that, most people that I've had reasonable dialogue on this Topic will agree that even, even if BYU did have that right, of that ability, which is, by the way, not a solid assertion, there are a number of restrictions, both in terms of accreditation and in terms of legal barriers, including the Fair Housing Act. Again, this little side note here. If there are any people that are BYU students that get evicted or get a letter from your landlord to leave on account of your change of faith, let me know. I've written extensively on our website and also on my blog about how to contest that type of eviction, which is a violation of the Fair Housing Act. So there are some legal as well as accreditation boundaries on BYU's activity. But I think more importantly, we should be asking the question of should they be executing this policy in this way? And like you, Caleb, with respect to that contract question, I would say no. And also from a contract perspective, having gone through uou law school, there isn't a binding contract for a teenager who doesn't understand the terms that are in the contract. I think that when you talk to most people about the subject, most of them aren't aware, and in fact, most of them being BYU alumni and most of the BYU graduate students that I spoke to aren't aware of the reality of this policy. So it's not a realistic expectation that the teenagers that are signing it for the first time have this level of understanding. If there's no meeting of the minds, there's no contract.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:55:15] Okay, so to your point, Brad, that BYU is bound by more rules? It's true BYU is a private institution, but it's an accredited institution whose primary purpose must be, according to the accreditation, to dispense secular degrees. And in fact, the nwccu, which sets those accreditation standards, specifically addresses what a university can and cannot do in terms of religious and intellectual activity.

Brad Carmack [00:55:51] That's right.

Caleb Chamberlain [00:55:53] Yeah.

Brad Carmack [00:55:53] So it's very interesting. The national association of Law Schools, as well as the American Bar association, has a substantial amount of content language around the academic freedoms that are required in order to be a member of good standing for the national association of Law Schools and to be on the green list for the American Bar association, which BYU Law School is both. And there's, interestingly, an entire section dedicated to wrangling with this issue of, well, at BYU Law School, they could be evicted and lose their ability to graduate from BYU Law if they express a change in religion or even if they express contrary views because of that mechanism to the bishop. How can that school maintain its membership in the ABA and the national association of Law School? These are law students kind of Considered these are doctorate students that should have this academic freedom, most of us think. And so it is very interesting when you look at the accreditation and the membership accreditation that you mentioned, Caleb, or whether it's the Law Schools association of Law Schools or the ABA to see how this plays out.

John Dehlin [00:57:00] Okay, so definitely according to some of these accreditation bodies, the church is on maybe some shaky ground. Potentially, yes. Okay.

Ryan [00:57:13] Another thing factoid related to the ADA is that there's a lot of language in their accreditation standards regarding discrimination of any kind, including religious discrimination. And so because of this, BYU's law school has an entire page devoted to stating that they follow this non discrimination policy. But interestingly on that same page it also says that students are required to adhere to the honor code. And so that's just kind of an interesting contradiction since you could argue that the honor code is a discriminatory document since former LDS members are, you know, treated differently according to that.

John Dehlin [00:57:56] So has anybody, I mean, has anybody been treated unfairly to the point where they've attempted to try and notify these licensure bodies to try and raise the issue? Are we aware?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:58:10] I'm not aware of any personally and I doubt that it has been done.

Guest [00:58:16] But

Caleb Chamberlain [00:58:18] again, we don't want to go to these organizations and file a complaint and force BYU to change. I don't think that needs to happen. I think BYU can in good faith make a very simple change here that can fix the problem and we want to give them the opportunity to do that.

Proposed Reforms and Protecting Student Rights

John Dehlin [00:58:39] All right, so Caleb, what change are you requesting or recommending?

Caleb Chamberlain [00:58:42] Well, there's the specific sections in the Honor code that say former LDS students are not eligible to receive an ecclesiastical endorsement. This is true regardless of where they get that endorsement. The language there means that any student, whether any former LDS person, whether they're applying as a non member or whether they, or whether they're currently at the school, they're not eligible to be, they can't attend the school, they're not eligible to get an endorsement and they need one. And what we're proposing is that that rule has simply changed. Right now if a Catholic student converts to Mormonism, then they're able to go through a process, a fairly quick and easy process that changes the tuition that they have to pay from non member tuition to member tuition. The transition is very easy and very seamless. And there's no reason that it can't be the same way for an LDS student who changes to, for example, Islam. They should be able to go and start paying the non member tuition and then Start getting their endorsement from their new religious leader, whoever that happens to be.

John Dehlin [00:59:55] You know, all these athletes, football and basketball players, all these athletes that are not members, do they all have to go to religious leaders to get their ecclesiastical endorsements signed? Or. Or can an atheist or an agnostic get some civil leader or something? Do we know? Yes, go ahead.

Brad Carmack [01:00:19] We do.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:00:19] Go ahead, Brad.

Brad Carmack [01:00:20] I grabbed this one. So there's a BYU chaplain. He sits very close to the Dean of student life on the third floor of the Wilk, and he's the one that's charged with providing these ecclesiastical endorsements or unaffiliated students.

John Dehlin [01:00:35] Okay, so you. You don't have to be a member of a religion necessarily to be able to attend byu?

Caleb Chamberlain [01:00:41] That's correct.

John Dehlin [01:00:42] Okay. All right. Okay. So you want to make it so that a believing member can deconvert from Mormonism and change, you know, pay the increased tuition fee and remain a member. That's your request, Is that right?

Caleb Chamberlain [01:00:58] Remain a student, remain at the school? Yeah, that's correct.

John Dehlin [01:01:01] Okay. Any other requests, Any other suggested policy changes?

Caleb Chamberlain [01:01:07] That about sums it up.

John Dehlin [01:01:09] Okay, that seems. That seems pretty simple.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:01:13] That's right. I think what they might be concerned. Yeah, I think what they might be concerned. I can imagine a student who is in, who's violated the honor code in some way, not because of a change of faith and is facing disciplinary action, could conceivably say, leave the church and get an endorsement from another leader and there and kind of circumvent the honor code. But honestly, that situation I don't see as being. It would be a rare exception if it ever occurred. And I think there could be ways that that particular situation could be dealt with reasonably.

John Dehlin [01:01:50] Okay, so you're not. You're not asking that people not live up to the honor code overall. So, you know, you're still okay with people, for example, obeying the word of wisdom and the law of chastity and that kind of stuff. Right.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:02:03] To define a moral standard of some sort. And the honor code fits into that rule. But when that moral standard becomes thou shalt not change your faith, I think that's when it becomes a problem.

John Dehlin [01:02:15] Yeah. Because. Because I don't think people necessarily choose to deconvert. You know, Jeff and Jake, would you guys say you. I mean, would you say that it was like one day you're a believer and then all of a sudden you say, I think I'm going to leave? Or do you feel like it was more something that happened to you? I mean, obviously. Obviously there are choices involved, ultimately, but in, but I don't think anybody would choose to lose their testimony. Jeff, what would you say?

Jake [01:02:45] Oh, by no means. I mean, you know, if these things hadn't happened to me, I definitely wouldn't have changed my faith one bit. I mean, I had no concerns with the church. I thought, you know, I could see, you know, the good influence it had on my life. I mean, if it wasn't for these spiritual experiences that I had, I mean, I wouldn't have converted to. I mean, I probably would. Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:03:11] So how about you, Jake?

Jeff [01:03:15] Leaving, like, having my testimony, like, it felt like it was ripped from me. It was a very traumatic experience. It wasn't something that I chose to engage in. It was something that happened to me, and I kind of, like, watched as it just slowly drained away. And it was. It was a painful thing. It wasn't something I chose, like, just decided, hey, I'm gonna leave the church today.

Ryan [01:03:36] Right.

John Dehlin [01:03:37] So, Caleb or others. What, suggestions? So let's say there's a BYU student right now who has lost their faith. What. What, do you guys have suggestions for them for what they should or shouldn't do to remain safe?

Caleb Chamberlain [01:03:52] We talked earlier about the honor code being a contract.

Brad Carmack [01:03:55] And.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:03:56] And it is. I don't think any kind of contract should prevent you from. For pursuing your faith in good conscience. Having said that, I also don't think that you should sacrifice your education if you can avoid it. If you require. The honor code requires you to go to church, you should continue going to church. It requires you to abstain from alcohol and other things. You should be following the honor code. Don't use your change of faith as a reason to break the honor code in other ways. It's still important, and it's still on you ethically and morally to maintain your word. I think where that breaks down is when the honor code asks you to do something unreasonable, and that is to not follow your own conscience.

John Dehlin [01:04:44] Okay, so keep living the honor code. But as far as following your conscience, go, is the advice just to kind of lay low and. And don't be careful who you talk to and just hang on until you graduate. Is that. And I guess I've seen people on Reddit or other places basically say, get copies of your transcripts each semester because there's still a lot of fear that their transcripts will be frozen for some reason.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:05:12] Yeah, well, that's probably not a problem, but it can't hurt. I mean, it doesn't cost anything if. Well, if it costs anything, it doesn't cost much to do that.

Brad Carmack [01:05:21] But a few bucks. I did it. Yeah.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:05:23] Let's talk about what the honor code actually requires. So, first of all, it talks about disaffiliation, it talks about former LDS students, but it does not say anything about students who are struggling with faith. You can have a faith crisis while at byu. Now, having said that, it's entirely up to the bishop. If your bishop wants to remove your endorsement because of your trial of faith, then he can.

Jake [01:05:51] But it.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:05:52] You aren't being dishonest or unethical to continue going to church not believing you can. You can continue doing all the things that the honor code requires you of you, and you won't be being dishonest in that way. Does that make sense?

John Dehlin [01:06:07] Yeah. So, okay, so keep going to church.

Ryan [01:06:11] My. I would personally advise. Only be open with your bishop about it if you really trust him and really think that he won't come down on you for having doubts. Because it's hard to know whether your bishop will really be understanding and supportive or whether he will decide that you just shouldn't be at BYU anymore. And besides that, there's not a whole lot you can do. I mean, you can appeal his decision to your stake president, and then you might even be able to appeal it from there to the honor code office. But my guess is you would have a hard time doing that. So err on the side of caution would be my advice, personally.

John Dehlin [01:06:50] Now, we're assuming, does the renewal of your ecclesiastical endorsement. Do they ask questions about your beliefs?

Brad Carmack [01:06:59] Yes, they do. I had that experience. I went there eight years. Yes. They sit you down, there's a little interview. It's almost temple recommendation. They go through and ask you for those standards. And of course, your testimony is part of that.

John Dehlin [01:07:12] Okay, so if so. So we're assuming. So something we're talking about is if you're a senior, you lay low, but if you're a freshman, sophomore, junior, or a graduate student that needs renewal, then you're put in the position of potentially having to lie about your beliefs if you want to. If you don't want to, you know, get kicked out. Is that right?

Brad Carmack [01:07:36] That's how I would describe it, yes.

John Dehlin [01:07:38] What do you think, Caleb?

Caleb Chamberlain [01:07:41] You know, I'm not confident. I don't recall verbatim what the questions are on the honor code, so I wouldn't be able to comment on that.

John Dehlin [01:07:48] Jeff and Jake, do you guys remember at all. You guys would have done it recently?

Jake [01:07:53] Yeah, actually, I had my. I had my ecclesiastical endorsement renewed as a Muslim. And actually, it was kind of. I mean, I think it varies from bishop to bishop, but the bishop that I had, I mean, it only lasted literally, like two minutes, like a minute and a half. It was a very short thing. I can't remember exactly if he asked anything about my testimony.

Brad Carmack [01:08:24] That's a general question. If you're living the honor code.

Jake [01:08:27] Yeah, that's true.

Brad Carmack [01:08:30] How can you. You know that you kind of. There's. You're fudging the line there on your integrity. If you're answering that question and you're convicted in your heart of another faith, because on the face of the honor code, that would be a violation. Yeah, I guess I'd say yes. If you're in your younger years and you're in your education and you have to get a renewal, then, yes, you'd have to lie in order to stay.

Ryan [01:08:50] Although the honor code doesn't require belief. But.

John Dehlin [01:08:56] Okay, so. So for you, Ryan. Is that Ryan?

Ryan [01:09:01] Yeah, this is Ryan.

John Dehlin [01:09:02] Okay, so for you, Ryan, the honor code doesn't require belief. That's your impression, right?

Ryan [01:09:09] I don't personally see anything in the honor code that would cause you to be in violation of it if you didn't believe, if you leave, if you disaffiliate from the church. That's completely.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:09:22] Now, if I can jump in, there's one term. There's one term in the honor code that I think gives bishops a lot of leeway, and it's probably on purpose, and that is the students are required to fulfill their responsibilities as members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. So if fulfilling responsibilities is broad enough to include not believing it anymore, I mean, if that is not believing is a violation in terms of that, then absolutely, it's under the bishop's discretion to decide what.

John Dehlin [01:09:50] We could argue. We could argue that they intentionally left off belief questions to. To allow non believers to stay at the university. Right.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:10:00] They may have thought that. I don't know. It's hard to. It's hard to infer what their motives may have been when it was drafted, however long ago it was drafted.

John Dehlin [01:10:11] Yeah.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:10:11] One thing we do know for sure is that they do not want people who have left the church to be around.

John Dehlin [01:10:17] Right.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:10:17] If you've really left.

John Dehlin [01:10:19] Yeah. Okay. So, Jeff, you don't feel like you had to lie when you got your endorsement renewed, is that right?

Jake [01:10:27] Well, yeah, I guess so. I mean, they asked me, you know, do you follow the honor code? And I guess by not, I mean, I kind of said in, you know, with the idea that, well, you know, I'm having a Crisis of faith. According to. According to them, like. Because, I mean, I talked with the professor I talked with. He's. You said that a lot of students have crises of faith and that it's

Guest [01:10:51] a common thing at byu.

Jake [01:10:52] So, I mean, I really don't.

Guest [01:10:56] Like, that's one reason why even my senior year, Even losing these 40 credit hours, the idea of transferring still is appealing to me, and I actually am considering it.

John Dehlin [01:11:11] Sure. But. But you're. But you're saying you felt like you could have a crisis of faith, but and still renew your ecclesiastical endorsement without necessarily lying? It seems.

Jake [01:11:22] I mean, I mean, at the end of the day. Yeah.

Guest [01:11:24] I mean, my conscience was kind of, you know.

Jeff [01:11:28] Yeah.

Jake [01:11:29] You know, I kind of felt with. I kind of felt I had no other option. I mean, at the end of the day, I didn't feel like.

John Dehlin [01:11:36] Yeah, yeah, you're between a rock and a hard place.

Jake [01:11:39] Like, I was 100%.

John Dehlin [01:11:40] How about you, Jake? Did you feel guilty? I mean, you would have done it within the past year. Do you remember feeling guilty, or did your crisis of faith happen after you had renewed your endorsement?

Jeff [01:11:55] So the major one happened after I renewed it. It was only by a couple weeks that I missed it. I had my endorsement interview, then I had my crisis of faith a couple weeks later.

John Dehlin [01:12:05] Okay, so you didn't have to do that interview after a major crisis of faith.

Jeff [01:12:10] No, I say, but I would be

Guest [01:12:12] afraid of that interview today in terms of being honest about my belief or lack of belief and how that might affect my ecclesiastical endorsement.

John Dehlin [01:12:25] Right. Okay. All right, Caleb. Well, this has been a great conversation so far. Are there any final points, you know, you want to make or anybody else wants to make before we wrap this up?

Closing Thoughts on Religious Freedom at BYU

Guest [01:12:38] Well, I'll jump in first. You know, it occurs to me that,

Caleb Chamberlain [01:12:43] like Jake said, or might have been, Jeff, that a lot of people have cracks of faith, and most bishops, and the vast majority of bishops are going to be understanding of that. And, and my experience has been that no bishop is out to get the students that he. That he serves. So the message almost is that you can. You can have a faith crisis, you can question your beliefs while you're at byu, but you can't change. I mean, you have to come to the same conclusion. You have to come to the conclusion we think you should come to, or we're going to turn your life upside

John Dehlin [01:13:17] down or stay quiet and. Or lie about it, basically.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:13:22] Right?

John Dehlin [01:13:22] Yeah.

Guest [01:13:23] Right.

John Dehlin [01:13:24] Okay.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:13:25] And that wouldn't be without precedent, I think, for. For religious leaders to suggest that people believe what they Want.

Jake [01:13:33] But.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:13:33] But remain quiet about it.

John Dehlin [01:13:35] Right.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:13:38] But again, I, you know, I pointed out at the beginning of this that we don't want to submarine the school and that we. That we're really interested in improving things. That. And that really is the truth. This is something that I think could come back to buy byu, potentially. BYU Law School hosts a symposium yearly where they invite leaders from across the world to talk about the importance of religious freedom at byu. Yet at byu, a student couldn't convert to Islam without being kicked out of the school. Is BYU really setting the example that they would want to set as they're trying to push forward and lead the

Ryan [01:14:17] way

Caleb Chamberlain [01:14:20] and trying to guarantee religious freedom around the globe? And the same goes for the LDS Church. They talk about it so frequently, and it's so important. You know, my hunch is that this just isn't on their radar. I don't think anybody really realizes that this is a problem. And so what we want to do is just bring it to their attention. And I have every confidence that they'll take steps to fix it once they know about it.

John Dehlin [01:14:46] Yeah, I mean, all that would need to happen would be for some BYU kid to convert to, like, to being evangelical or Christian or Baptist or Catholic. And then they just need to inform some top leader in that church that they got kicked out for converting, and that would cause a real storm. You know what I mean?

Guest [01:15:05] Right.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:15:06] I mean, imagine the potential for bad press it would be if Jeff were kicked out of school because he converted to Islam. I mean, can you imagine a more damaging headline? Just let me be clear. That's not a threat. That's not even a suggest. We're not pursuing that. We don't want that to happen. But I'm just saying I care about byu. I love the school. And this policy is at odds enough with its public stance that it has, I think, some potential for embarrassment.

John Dehlin [01:15:36] All right, Ryan, any final thoughts you want to share?

Ryan [01:15:40] I'll just say one thing to add to what Caleb mentioned about the irony of the policy. He mentioned the Freedom of Religion symposium. And of course, we're all familiar with the 11th Article of Faith. We claim the privilege of worshipping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience and allow all men the same privilege. And I think one of the keys there is all men. And it's similar to many other statements that the church has published. For example, a year ago, they released a page on their website all about religious freedom and the importance of protecting religious freedom for everybody. I'll just read you one sentence from this page. So this is on the church's website. It says freedom of religion is a fundamental human right that protects the conscience of all people. And so it's hard to understand why they would be limiting the religious freedom of so many people, 99% of students at BYU, when they're saying at the same time that religious freedom is important for all people. And so I think this is one of the things that like Caleb was alluding to will make this or should hopefully make this a no brainer for BYU and the church once the issue is really brought out into the open.

John Dehlin [01:17:06] Got it. Okay.

Ryan [01:17:07] Brad.

Brad Carmack [01:17:08] Yeah. So I've spoken about this issue with several vice presidents at BYU and pursued it to some length. And I think I'd like to continue sort of in the same vein that Caleb and Ryan started in appealing to the 11th article, Faith what would be more consistent for BYU and the Church to have a policy that allows LDS students to convert away from the LDS faith? Because we have a very particular view of religious freedom. Now that term to the average person it kind of means your freedom to be able to exercise your religion and profess it, but it has a very particular meaning from a legal perspective. And usually, usually it's a group or institutional religious freedom that's defended. So say your employer like I work for, for Yahoo. Right. So there wouldn't be allowed to, you know, terminate someone because they changed their faith. But if I'm working for the corporation, for the Presiding Bishop, they would. So their privilege really of religious freedom is a privilege to discriminate where somebody wouldn't be able, wouldn't be allowed to. But LDS people in our, in our lexcon and from that article of faith, what we really care about is individual religious, not the religious freedom of institutions. So when there's a wrestling match between those two, we come out inside, as Joseph Smith did, on the side of individuals, God's children that are expressing and practicing their faith, that are following the dictates of their conscience. From that perspective, it makes it very clear from a religious freedom analysis what policy is better in this case. One protects the group religious freedom, the other one protects the individual religious freedom. And it would be more consistent with our own statements and our own perspective on religious freedom to allow LDS BYU students to convert away from the lds.

John Dehlin [01:18:55] Right. Okay, Jeff, what would you like to add as we close?

Jake [01:19:01] I'd just like to mention a conversation I had with a international student from Iran and I just, I was telling you about my problems and I stated how that if I was, you know, people that convert get kicked out. And she compared, actually BYU with Iran. She said it'd be just like Iran.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:19:23] How.

Jake [01:19:23] You know, this whole kicking people out because of their religion, I just thought it was kind of interesting.

John Dehlin [01:19:29] Okay, okay. So it's something that, again, could hurt the church's public image if it were kind of. If a bigger stink was made about this.

Jake [01:19:41] Yeah, yeah. I mean, we all. We all are against, you know, Iran and their. Their persecution of religious freedom. But, you know, there's this whole idea of really, you know, that same. That religious, you know, that persecution is kind of here, too, anyways.

John Dehlin [01:19:55] Yeah. All right, Jake, you get the last word.

Jeff [01:19:58] I think the biggest thing for me is that I don't even have the option of paying non LDS tuition. It's not even a choice. It's either stay LDS or get kicked out. It's not like I can just go and fill out the form and change religion super easily. There isn't even that option. So for me, just letting people have that option to pay the non LDS tuition to become, you know, allowed to change them, to change religions would be fantastic. It'd be wonderful. It would allow people to be honest with each other.

John Dehlin [01:20:33] Yeah. And that's certainly a value of the church, is to be honest. All right. All right, brethren. Well, I just want to thank you all for what you're doing. I think it is an important issue, and I think it's a great opportunity to help make BYU better. So the website is freebyu.org profiles are offered there. If people want to put their stories up. You can put your stories up there. If you guys want to get in touch with Caleb or the other guys, there's a contact us button there. You know, Caleb, Ryan, Brad, Jeff, and Jake. I just want to thank you guys for coming on Mormon Stories and giving awareness to a very important issue. Thanks so much.

Caleb Chamberlain [01:21:17] Thanks, John. Been a pleasure.

John Dehlin [01:21:19] Good luck, guys. Thanks for joining us today on Mormon Stories. If you enjoyed this episode, please help us make more like it by becoming a monthly subscriber@mormonstories.org music for this episode was provided by the Lower Lights and other sources.

Jake [01:21:37] Cease to make me whole when with a wounded heart A anger or malice I draw myself apart Searching my soul.

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