Welcome and Introduction to the Live Broadcast

Part 1 of 2 · Ep. 186

Guest [00:00:02] Mormon Stories Podcast is made possible through the financial contributions of its listeners to keep it alive and available to future generations. Please consider a donation today@mormonstories.org hello and

John Dehlin [00:00:15] welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories and Mormon Expression.

John Larsen [00:00:21] Hey John, how you doing? Brought to you by, we have sponsors

John Dehlin [00:00:27] with your special host.

John Larsen [00:00:30] You know, one John is never enough. You always need two.

John Dehlin [00:00:33] Hello, John Larsen.

John Larsen [00:00:34] Hello, John Dehlin. How you doing?

John Dehlin [00:00:36] Thanks for joining us today on this special edition of Mormon Expression and Mormon Stories podcast.

John Larsen [00:00:44] Yeah, yeah. This isn't the first time we've posted something on both sides, so we've been down this path before.

John Dehlin [00:00:52] In fact, somebody posted a cranky message to your Facebook page saying we've heard enough of him in previous episodes.

John Larsen [00:00:58] Which, which him? Were they talking about, me or you?

John Dehlin [00:01:01] They were talking about me on your podcast.

John Larsen [00:01:03] Oh, okay.

John Dehlin [00:01:05] This is your, this is your first time appearance as a legitimate guest on Mormon Stories.

John Larsen [00:01:10] Oh, really? Wow.

John Dehlin [00:01:12] I know.

John Larsen [00:01:12] And we, you know, the people be listening to this next couple years. We should make it clear we're doing this live.

John Dehlin [00:01:19] Yes. This is the first time that I know of that a live streamed Mormon themed Internet based radio show has been made available with listeners tuned in both through audio and through text. Is that scary?

John Larsen [00:01:36] I feel overwhelmed.

John Dehlin [00:01:38] It looks like we've got at least 30 or 40 people, maybe 50, tuned into the text chat. How about that?

John Larsen [00:01:44] Yeah, but four of them are sock puppets, so I can throw the hard questions at you without having my name.

John Dehlin [00:01:49] No, that's good. That's good. I bet there's some Danites, don't you think? Some modern day Internet Danites.

John Larsen [00:01:54] You know, there's always rumors, but you know, I've been disappointed. I've been watching, you know, I've wanted something exciting like that. Nothing ever happens.

John Dehlin [00:02:02] I always figured if there were Danites, Paul Toscano and Grant Palmer would not still be with us.

John Larsen [00:02:09] Yeah. You know, there's canaries in the land in the. Not in the landmine. There's canaries in the mine. And I don't think I'm it. So I keep my eye on some other folks first.

John Dehlin [00:02:17] Yeah. Who's number one?

John Larsen [00:02:19] You think they're going to firebomb Signature books before they ever go after me?

John Dehlin [00:02:23] They're the number one threat, huh?

John Larsen [00:02:25] I don't know, but there's people who are up higher on the list.

John Dehlin [00:02:30] Well, John, I have one. I'm going to start off with the first question.

John Larsen [00:02:32] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:02:33] Why in the heck would you want to interview me?

John Larsen [00:02:35] Well, you know, that's a good. You're always fun to talk to. But the genesis. We started talking about this a couple weeks ago. There were two things that kind of happened. One, Niall, who appears on my podcast, sort of called you out. In one of. In one of our episodes. We were doing a feedback episode, and he sort of threw down.

John Dehlin [00:02:55] He kicked my cyber ass.

John Larsen [00:02:57] Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, that got me thinking, you know, well, we can talk about this a little bit. And the other was there was kind of a kerfuffle on a Mormon Stories podcast a few weeks ago involving Richard Packham. And I don't. I don't necessarily want to go into the details of that, but I know there's a lot of things that go on behind, you know, both of the podcasts, and there's a lot of decisions that we have to make and editorial, whatever, and we don't always get a chance to, you know, to let the world know what that is. And, you know, there's issues where we bump into each other from time to time that I thought it'd be fun to talk about.

John Dehlin [00:03:38] Well, let's get going.

Why John Larsen Is a Lightning Rod in Mormon Circles

John Larsen [00:03:40] So why all the kerfuffles? No, here's my first question for you. I hardly ever get any negative email. You know, I don't get any, like, hate mail. But you just get inundated with it, and you're the nice guy, right?

John Dehlin [00:03:56] Okay, wait. First of all, if we're talking about email, I've actually received less than probably 10 nasty, negative emails in the five years I've been doing this. So now that's. With the exception of this. This interview that I did with ABC on World News Tonight a week or two ago. I got about five or six more after that. But all in all, I've gotten almost very little hate email, to be honest.

John Larsen [00:04:24] Well, that's still a lot more than I've gotten. But you still seem to cause more. I don't know, you get. People get their panties in a wad more about you than they do about me.

John Dehlin [00:04:34] Why is that for sure?

John Larsen [00:04:37] You know, because we're both still members, right?

John Dehlin [00:04:39] Yep, I am.

Guest [00:04:41] Me, too.

John Dehlin [00:04:42] Yeah.

John Larsen [00:04:44] Why are you such a lightning rod, John?

John Dehlin [00:04:47] Well, I don't know. I mean, I guess. I guess if you stand in the middle of the road, you're likely to get hit from both sides, from both directions. I mean, trying to straddle. Straddle the middle road makes people just not be able to figure it out. That's probably. I don't know. A lot of people say, I just can't figure you out. That's got to be one thing. The second is I've changed my position a lot. I think I really waffled, and I think that makes people think that sometimes my credibility is besmirched and that I'm not stable. That's probably frustrating to some. I think that some people struggle. I don't want to say they struggle with nuance, but I've tried to take a bit more of a nuanced position. And sometimes tempers get so heated on either side that when people are really heated, they're not into nuance. So I know that from the tbm, maybe even apologetic point of view, you're either in or out. You're either with us or against us. So I can see why the apologists and TBMs would definitely hate me and see me as a wolf in sheep's clothing. And I think that the people on the disaffected side can easily see me as an apologist or the biggest attack on me is that I lack credibility or I'm dishonest because I'm trying to walk this middle road, which for many would mean that I would have to be deceptive to my leaders. And while I've tried to be honest with my leaders and with my family and everyone, I've come to a point where I definitely see that there is some dishonesty in trying to walk the middle way.

John Larsen [00:06:40] Dishonesty?

John Dehlin [00:06:41] Yeah.

John Larsen [00:06:42] Maybe you can explain that a little bit.

John's Evolving Relationship with the Church

John Dehlin [00:06:45] Well, I guess I was trying to figure out the right time to talk about this, but I've actually Starting with the Sunstone Symposium In August of 2010, I. I've started telling people that I no longer sort of feel like I'm a public advocate for the Stay LDS position, even though I started the website. I haven't really talked about this on the podcast yet or really written about it, but I've come. First of all, I'll start with what I still feel okay about the Stay LDS position. I still feel like there are people who need to navigate a middle way for to keep the peace in the family or because they really enjoy the church, or they're in some unique circumstance where they can't believe, but they have to figure out how to make it work. And for people like that, I think that I still feel good about the Stale DS position being available as one item on the menu, as one tool in the toolbox. But as I've sort of got on the road and tried to sell the Stale DS position now for a year or two, it's been really amazing to me to see how Many people started out trying to live the stale DS way, but in the end were not able to carry through with it, mostly for reasons of integrity. They basically say, at the end of the day, I felt like I was lying. I felt like I was being deceptive. And I'm not of the opinion that everyone who lives the middle way is being deceptive, but I'm saying that most of the people, probably the majority of the people that I've interacted with, have found that position to be untenable in the medium to long term. Maybe it works in the short to medium term, maybe it works under a certain unique set of circumstances, but in the medium to long term, it just feels dishonest and lacks integrity. I've come to liken the stale DS position to sort of this notion of telling a gay person to marry a straight person and it'll all work out in the end. It sounds good and you want to do it and you don't want to lose your family and friends and community and you can pray and really work hard at being nuanced and sophisticated to try and make it work. But at the end of the day, a gay guy is likely going to want to be with a gay guy and it kind of falls apart. And so you. I guess I would never want to lead. Let's just say I'm playing the psychologist role. I would never want to lead with recommending that a gay person marry a straight person. That would be something I would say only do in a very unique and maybe extreme set of circumstances with much caution. And I guess I've come to feel the same way about the stale DS position now, even though I love Brian Johnston and the guys who run that site and it's going to stay up, but it just. It's going to have a big disclaimer now at the beginning about how I feel about it. But I guess here I go changing again. And I'm just going to add to the people hating me. Thanks, John.

John Larsen [00:09:49] Well, you know, that's interesting because for me, I think there's a lot of people who should stay in the church. I can think of many, many people that I know and love who would not do well outside the church for various reasons. But you were talking about integrity and for me, you know, I tried that whole I'm going to stick around in the church and be a New Order Mormon and I'm just going to. And I tried about every flavor that I could try on and at the end of the day I just couldn't pull it off. Some people can, and it's probably because I didn't dig on church that much at that time. You know, I think some people at the end, they're really conflicted because they love going to church, but they don't believe it anymore. But to me, I was, you know, it was. It was just a pain for me to go. I didn't. I didn't like it. But there was a lot of that integrity thing you're talking about, so I can really understand that.

Guest 2 [00:10:37] Yeah.

John Larsen [00:10:38] So. So, John, you said your positions changed. Were you just coming out of the closet to us?

Guest [00:10:44] Are you.

John Larsen [00:10:44] What's. Where are you with the church now?

John Dehlin [00:10:48] I'm struggling a little bit, frankly. You know, I'm still. My family's all still going and active, and I'm still semi active. I'll miss occasionally and. Yeah, and I haven't. I haven't had a new talk with my leaders yet, but I'm having a hard time, to be honest.

John Larsen [00:11:09] Do your leaders pay attention to you? Do they listen to the podcast?

John Dehlin [00:11:14] I don't think so. There may be one or two people in my whole ward who listen, and I don't think it's more than one or two.

John Larsen [00:11:21] You know, I find it fascinating that all this stuff that's going on and, you know, the podcast, you know, we're a small thing, but sunstone and dialogue and all that. The blogosphere, how much that's just out of the radar of most Mormons, meaning most Mormons just have no idea any of that's going on. And, you know, even trying to explain to a Mormon what it is we're doing, they just. They just don't understand at all. They don't look at their faith that way. I was getting my hair cut. You know, I'm back here in Utah, and I was getting my hair cut a couple days ago, and the guy brought up with us and Zilpha was sitting there with me, and, you know, he started trying to convert us, and he just couldn't understand, even as Zilpha tried to bring up some. Some concern. So I think that most of what's going on here is way outside the realm, which is probably why, you know, you're. You're not likely to get church discipline for this sort of behavior.

John Dehlin [00:12:15] Yeah, I think they. I think they know that I'm doing something on the Internet, you know, especially after I'm on ABC News and stuff.

Guest 3 [00:12:23] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:12:25] And they did a local full featured article on me in the Herald Journal in Logan a couple years ago. But I tried a couple times to talk to my bishop. And I've said this on my podcast and both bishops that I offered to have the conversation with politely declined. You know, I'm like, hey, if you want to get into the stuff that I'm struggling with, they just, I don't think they want to have that conversation.

John Larsen [00:12:49] I've given them the same warning. When people have asked me, I always say I'm happy. I like talking about religion. I'm happy to talk about these things. I love talking about Mormonism. Are you sure that you want to have this conversation? And most everybody will bow out at that point, right?

John Dehlin [00:13:05] Yeah. Yep. And the other thing is I don't, you know. Well, I guess I'll say two more things about that. Why I don't think I've been punished so far. The first is that I don't think the church is really in the excommunication or disfellowship business. If you think about it, yeah, the September 6th got busted. You could argue that that was just trying to make an example out of people and make a large statement. But you have to really do some pretty explicit things to get X these days. You have to like openly deny the Church's truth claims or openly criticize the brethren in really mean spirited ways. And I think I've avoided both of those things. I don't think, you know, even, even if the probability that the Church of Truth Claims are minuscule, you know, I think that one of the beauties of religion is, or one of the ways that religion continues to survive is you can't prove it wrong. So I think it'd be silly to just denounce the Church's truth claims. And to be honest, I haven't got in the business of really criticizing the brethren, so. But then thirdly, I think that it would be bad PR for the Church to start excommunicating people leading up to the Romney campaign and especially after they put out this new PR campaign where they're trying to tout Mormons that are different and unique and individuals. So I think we may have a little bit of shielding from that. What do you think?

John Larsen [00:14:34] Yeah, I think the Church has given up. I mean, every time they've excommunicated somebody well known for heresy, it's backfired on them. I mean, even back to George P. Lee when he was excommunicated for conduct unbecoming a Latter Day Saint, you know, that hit all the papers and it just doesn't. The September 6th blew up on him. Still get bad reverb from that Southerton was excommunicated for living with a girl, wasn't it? So they really don't excommunicate much. The last person I can think of, the last big name, was Grant for his book.

John Dehlin [00:15:15] Yeah, he was just disfellowshipped.

Guest 2 [00:15:18] Right.

John Larsen [00:15:18] He was never excommunicated and even that hit the paper.

John Dehlin [00:15:20] So actually there's Lyndon Lamborn, but he was pretty strident, as I understand it. Someone else asked about Chad Hardy on the board. Hey, Gazelam. Shout out to Gazelam, whoever that is. He asked about Chad Hardy. I guess we don't totally know why Chad Hardy was excommunicated. We only know that he got in trouble for the calendars.

John Larsen [00:15:40] But I don't, I don't think, I don't think Hardy was excommunicated for apostasy. But, you know, you know, local church leaders, I hear about a case every once in a while where they'll excommunicate somebody for apostasy because most excommunications do take place on local level. I'm just talking about big, big name people. So they'll still go after little fish for apostasy, but not somebody who's going to hit the newspapers. So you're safe, John.

John Dehlin [00:16:05] Oh, okay. Good to know. Hopefully that's true after today.

Comparing Mormon Stories and Mormon Expression Podcasts

John Larsen [00:16:10] So, you know, your faith has bounced around and that's been fun to watch for the last couple of years. So what does that mean for the sort of space or position of Mormon stories?

John Dehlin [00:16:23] You mean what's going to happen to the podcast?

John Larsen [00:16:25] Yeah, yeah. I mean, what's your direction?

John Dehlin [00:16:28] We're going to merge. We're going to have a merger. We're going to have a Mormon stories, Mormon expression merger.

John Larsen [00:16:34] You know, some couples are better off apart. There's more sexual energy that way. If they don't get married.

John Dehlin [00:16:44] Oh, no, Actually, I think you probably know, I brought on Natasha Parker, a marriage and family therapist, who's fantastic, the Mormon therapist. She's going to start doing some episodes. I brought on Dan Witherspoon to help out and, you know, and I invite any of my listeners who want to do it, what, what I tried to do a long time ago and what you guys have been doing really successfully, which is to just. If people want to produce their own interviews, they just need to get ahold of me. And I want to keep it going, but my, my number of interviews is. My frequency of interviews is going to have to decrease just because my PhD is starting to really ramp up now. But I still want to keep in the Business. So hopefully I can get more interviews like the Andrew Ainsworth one with Damon Smith, which was a fantastic interview that I had. All I had to do was set that up. I didn't have to do any work except to produce the stuff. So we'll keep going strong.

John Larsen [00:17:38] That's good. Dan Witherspoon and I had lunch at Sunstone. You weren't there. So we've got some things that we're cooking around you.

John Dehlin [00:17:46] Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'm totally, I'm totally open to collaborative efforts between us as well.

John Larsen [00:17:52] Now, what would you say to this? You're the Safer podcast.

John Dehlin [00:17:58] Safer?

John Larsen [00:17:59] Safer?

John Dehlin [00:18:00] I don't. Safer from whose perspective?

John Larsen [00:18:03] From, from. From Mormons. They're going to look at your podcast as safer than.

John Dehlin [00:18:09] You mean as active. Active believing LDS church members?

Guest [00:18:13] Yeah.

John Larsen [00:18:14] The listeners and guests are going to look at your podcast as a safer place to be than Mormon expression for true believers.

John Dehlin [00:18:21] Yeah, yeah, that's probably true. Which is actually safer is a totally different question.

John Larsen [00:18:28] See, you're the wolf in sheep's clothing. I'm the sheep in wolf's clothing.

John Dehlin [00:18:33] You're a sheep, huh?

John Larsen [00:18:35] Absolutely. If everybody else is going over that cliff, I'm sure as hell going to wonder why.

John Dehlin [00:18:44] No, I don't know. It'd be interesting to see if we did a poll for those who have left the church, which podcast has been a factor in more people leaving.

John Larsen [00:18:57] Yeah, you know, I get more letters actually from people who talk about the podcast, helping them just sort of live their lives, not necessarily leaving or not leaving. I think that's probably if there's LDS people out there who think the podcast lead people out of the church. Probably a rarity, but I think it does help people not feel so alone. You know, you can read the boards and there's a lot of great information and great people on the boards, but it's sort of cold when you hear the voices of other people, you know. You know, you have a friend out there, right? So, you know, but like I've said before, Well, I. It's probably a lie. I've said I don't care if people leave the church or not. I obviously don't believe the church is what it purports to be. And I don't believe in anything supernatural. So I mean, that sort of dismisses most of it for me there, but I would consider myself a Mormon, just a non believing Mormon. And I wish, I wish I was welcome at church, but I don't think I am.

John Dehlin [00:20:07] Yeah, that's the big difficult thing. Hey, let's do this. Let's ask our listeners who are on the chat board to tell us in the chat which or both of our podcasts led to their disaffection, if they are disaffected, and let's see what they answer. And then we'll. We'll. We'll update the listeners as we get a tally. How's that?

John Larsen [00:20:33] Where the podcast itself led people to the. To the brink of apostasy.

John Dehlin [00:20:39] Yeah. Yeah. Or was it. Or was a significant contributor. Now, so far, I'm winning, unfortunately.

John Larsen [00:20:48] Well, I mean, I think you probably have about six times as many listeners as we do, so. So you should be able to get six times as many apostates.

John Dehlin [00:20:56] And I've been going for five years.

Guest 2 [00:20:57] Yeah.

Guest [00:20:58] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:20:59] So what do you see as the difference between our podcasts? I'm curious. Do you. Do you even. Or do you even contemplate what I. My guess is you don't even consider us in anything you do, But I'm curious if you do and if you see a vision difference or if you see us as complementary or what.

John Larsen [00:21:19] Because the. The. I see us as complimentary. I don't. The only thing, we sometimes compete for our guests and because the world we dwell in is sort of small. And I'm sure you feel the same way. If you get a guest that we were about to get that we'll hold off on getting them back on. It's not like they're forever out of play. But, you know, like, if you interview Richard Packham, I don't want to interview him next week.

John Dehlin [00:21:45] Have I ever interviewed someone you were about to interview?

John Larsen [00:21:49] Yeah, once at once I can think of. It was,

John Dehlin [00:21:57] That's okay if you think about it.

John Larsen [00:21:59] But, you know, sometimes you'll do one, and I think, oh, yeah, that's somebody I was going to call, but I never called them, so it doesn't matter. I'm sure you feel the same way. There's a lot more people you'd like to talk to at any point.

John Dehlin [00:22:11] Man. When you did Mr. Deity, my heart. Because I had been in contact with Mr. DeeDee for a couple years, but shut down the podcast right before I ended up trying to interview him. When you interviewed him, that was such an excellent podcast, my heart sank. There have been three or four times where you've done some things that almost made me want to quit my podcast altogether because they were so good. It made me feel like I should just fold up, because John Larsen is amazing.

John Larsen [00:22:39] See, now, that's one of the chief differences. You're A silver tongue devil.

John Dehlin [00:22:43] No, I swear. I swear on. You know, the middle way

John Larsen [00:22:49] you asked, part of the question was, what do I think the difference between the two is? I think we tend to approach things with a little bit more humor.

John Dehlin [00:22:57] Yeah.

John Larsen [00:22:58] And I don't know if that's intentional or not. You do a little bit more serious interviews, and I say that we just posted a fairly serious one this morning, so. So it was awesome.

John Dehlin [00:23:09] I loved it.

John Larsen [00:23:10] But, yeah, it was a good one. But I think we can approach it with a little bit more. Yeah. A little bit more tongue in cheek, a little bit more than that. A little bit more caustic. But I think, hopefully the humor helps that stuff go down. I hope people get stuff to think about, but I love that, you know, I'll add something.

John Dehlin [00:23:38] I think that the personalities that you brought on and the camaraderie between them is a draw for people. Just regardless of the substance of the content, people like to hear what Niall's saying and the interplay between, you know, some of the guests and the whole mic thing, just the characters, it's almost like reality tv. There's. Forget the substance, just the personalities make it entertaining and interesting.

John Larsen [00:24:05] Yeah. I think for people who listen to it a lot, but for people who listen occasionally, I think that can be sort of this. You know, you get some of those podcasts where we had five guys on. It was a big sausage fest, and you can't keep one voice from the other, and, you know, it gets sort of. It sort of gets caught in a blender.

John Dehlin [00:24:23] Right.

John Larsen [00:24:25] Yeah, but, you know, I try to probably. I try to steer it away. Away from some of that. That might be our strength, but I don't know. You know, it's been.

John Dehlin [00:24:35] Yeah, well, I think it's great. I think you guys are awesome. I love your stuff. I wish you listen to my podcast like I listen to yours. What do I have to do to make you listen? John Larsen?

John Larsen [00:24:44] I listen to the first hour of all your podcasts.

John Dehlin [00:24:48] That was a backhanded. You're missing some good stuff, bro.

John Larsen [00:24:52] I just. I just don't have the attention span that you do.

John Dehlin [00:24:56] I produced. I don't know. Some of that stuff's good, man. Damon Smith, Carolyn Pearson. I stand behind that.

John Larsen [00:25:03] I listen to Damon. I really like that one. I intend to listen to Carolyn. But, of course, we were just moving this last week, so I haven't had a chance to listen to it. Zilpha listen to it, and she said it was great. So at least somebody in my household has listened to It.

John Dehlin [00:25:17] Okay, I feel a little bit better. Zilpha, we love you.

John Larsen [00:25:20] No, John, I really like your stuff, and I think. I think it's all. It's all good. I think, like we said, you know, we did a podcast at the end of last year, and, you know, there's. There's room out there for a lot of. A lot of different voices, a lot different people. And like you were just saying a few minutes ago, you know, I would be happy to help other people get their own stuff on, you know. You know, I get people contact me, just like I'm sure you do, who would love to be on the podcast. And, you know, we'd love to have them if we had an infinite amount of time. So the answer is just record your own damn thing. As long as it doesn't suck too bad, we'll post it.

John Dehlin [00:25:58] Absolutely. Well, that's interesting. All right, so what else you got for me?

Listener Questions Begin: Interviews and Coverage

John Larsen [00:26:05] Are we ready for questions from the. From the unwashed masses out there?

John Dehlin [00:26:10] Are you ready? Are your questions done?

John Larsen [00:26:13] Well, I think I've. I think I've gotten through the main part. I'm sure we can come up with some more as we move along.

John Dehlin [00:26:18] Christian Andersen. Welcome to Mormon Expressions. Mormon Stories. Nice to be here.

John Larsen [00:26:25] Hey, Christian.

John Dehlin [00:26:28] So here's my question for both of you. Who is the one person that you have not been able to interview that if you could, you would get on the podcast on your podcast? That's easy for me.

John Larsen [00:26:38] It's easy for me.

John Dehlin [00:26:39] Why don't you go first, John?

John Larsen [00:26:40] Maybe it's the same guy. Michael Quinn.

John Dehlin [00:26:43] Absolutely. And I've actually had personal conversations with him. He won't do it. I met him for the first time at a Sunstone symposium in Arizona. Hung out with him in a hotel room. It was so cool to spend three or four hours with Michael Quinn. But I hit him up then, and he said, I've said everything I want to say. I've done interviews at Sunstone with people, and I'm just not interested in coming on. Part of me feels like he's more comfortable with the written word than he is the spontaneous spoken word, because he tends to be a very meticulous kind of character. John, what's been your experience?

John Larsen [00:27:28] Yeah, I haven't got as close to him as you have, but same sort of thing, that he's just not real interested in doing it.

John Dehlin [00:27:35] So you've approached him?

John Larsen [00:27:37] I've approached him through some of his contacts. You got to know how to contact him, and I don't have. I don't Know where his hidey hole is.

John Dehlin [00:27:44] Oh, I can help you with that.

John Larsen [00:27:46] Well, yeah, maybe, but I don't think he'll come on my podcast either, so.

John Dehlin [00:27:52] Yeah. All right, Christian, anything else for us? So, on a related note, assuming a GA would come on. Assuming that. Oh, yeah, that's another one for sure. Is there. Is there one GA that you would love to have on? Assuming. Let's just assume for a second that they would say yes.

John Larsen [00:28:10] Oh, yeah, we probably have the same one here, too.

John Dehlin [00:28:12] You're gonna say Boyd K. Packer, right?

John Larsen [00:28:14] No, no.

John Dehlin [00:28:15] Who are you gonna say?

John Larsen [00:28:16] Marlon Jensen.

John Dehlin [00:28:17] Oh, yeah, yeah.

John Larsen [00:28:18] Who are you gonna say?

John Dehlin [00:28:20] You know, I. Holland Jensen. Packer, Monson, probably. Monson would be number one for sure.

John Larsen [00:28:29] I think Monson and Packer are too old. I don't think they've got enough mental capacity.

John Dehlin [00:28:36] Come on, man. Monson is the get.

Guest 2 [00:28:38] Don't.

John Dehlin [00:28:38] Don't kid me, Watson.

John Larsen [00:28:45] I've heard enough rumors about Monson over the years. You're not going to get him without handlers. I don't. You know, I don't think he'd be that great of an interview. There's a reason they're not rolling him out like they did Hinckley.

John Dehlin [00:28:55] Yeah, he's not. He's not feeling very well these days either.

John Larsen [00:29:00] Yeah. And, you know, we've heard all the widow stories, so there's not much more there. How many widows were in his ward, by the way? I think I started counting one time, and I quit at 3,000, 742.

John Dehlin [00:29:13] Oh, don't be mean, John.

John Larsen [00:29:17] So, Packer. I mean, what would you ask Packer?

John Dehlin [00:29:20] Oh, I would. Oh, I would ask him all the same questions that asked Monson. It'd just be fun. I'd ask him if he. If he ever regretted. It'd be hard to interview any of these guys, really, because, really, what would any of them say publicly? They wouldn't say anything. It would be like Meet the Press. It would be like a politician. I'm not saying they're politicians, but I'm saying that there are all sorts of things that I'm guessing these gentlemen would be willing to say privately, but there's no way in h. That they would ever say publicly. Oh, absolutely. So what you'd get, I guess, would be very carefully crafted statements that really didn't say a whole lot.

John Larsen [00:29:53] Yeah, you know, I'd rather than talk to any of the 12 because of that reason. I'd rather talk to people like Turley. You know, some of the. Some of the people who are More removed from the inner circle. I just don't think they'd be an interesting interview. Now there, there are the. What is the church's podcast called? Conversations or something like that.

Guest 3 [00:30:12] Yep.

John Larsen [00:30:13] Where they have a faithful person interview them. That's an interesting podcast. People should get ahold of that.

John Dehlin [00:30:17] Have you been listening to it?

John Larsen [00:30:18] Yeah, yeah, I love that one.

John Dehlin [00:30:20] Any good interviews?

John Larsen [00:30:21] I really like the Dallin Oaks one. I recommend that one to everybody because he actually, I think he's interviewed by Sherry Dew in that one. He's got his wife Kristen with him and he kind of goes off script a little bit. You can see the man come through a little bit more, which is, you know, what's missing from conference.

John Dehlin [00:30:37] That's cool. I'll check that out. I can't freaking believe you listen to that and you don't listen to my stuff.

John Larsen [00:30:42] I told you I was the first hour.

John Dehlin [00:30:45] You're killing me. All right, Christian, thanks for calling in. Thanks a lot. All right. Okay, well, let's open up the calls to another caller. There's. We meet. Yeah, how are you?

Guest [00:31:01] Good.

John Dehlin [00:31:02] Thanks for calling in.

Guest [00:31:04] Oh, thanks.

John Dehlin [00:31:05] I've got John Larsen with me here.

Guest [00:31:07] Hey, yeah, I know John. I'll be talking with John next week.

John Larsen [00:31:13] Oh, yeah, that's right. That's right. We are at the 8th to 8 o'. Clock.

John Dehlin [00:31:18] You know that when Leno and Letterman were in their heyday, if you did an interview with one, the other wouldn't let you come on. So Tierza, just know that you're besmirching your ability to come on my show once you.

Guest [00:31:31] I know, it's sad.

John Dehlin [00:31:35] I'm just kidding.

Guest [00:31:38] So I think you guys need more female voices. Well, John Dehlin, you do pretty good, but Mormon expressions, you guys need more guys. I mean girls.

John Dehlin [00:31:49] No kidding.

John Larsen [00:31:50] We keep getting turned down.

John Dehlin [00:31:53] I've been telling you guys that since the beginning.

John Larsen [00:31:56] Well, we've got Zilpha comes on and

John Dehlin [00:31:58] Bridget and should never not be on.

Guest [00:32:02] I agree. I think Zilfa's great.

John Larsen [00:32:05] Zilpa does what Zilpa wants. Zilpha comes on when Zilpa wants to come on. It is completely a function of Zilpha.

John Dehlin [00:32:13] Zilpha, step it up, sister.

John Larsen [00:32:17] She's sitting here listening next to me. But yeah, she runs her own show when she wants to. No, Zilpa's great. Yeah, more females. I agree.

Guest [00:32:31] That's actually my only complaint about any of your stuff. I think it's great.

Women's Voices and Representation in Mormon Media

John Larsen [00:32:36] So here's my question for you. And I think we brought this up on one of the podcasts. So I opened up the essay contest. We had 11 essays submitted. One of them was from a woman. 10 of them were from men. Why is that? So I'm saying it's not my fault.

Guest [00:32:52] Well, you know, for the essay competition, I came into your podcast. Just. I missed it or I would have entered.

John Larsen [00:33:01] Oh, so now the female count is up. It was before you came along. All right.

Guest [00:33:07] That's right. I'll bring them in. I'll bring in the Relief Society, you

John Larsen [00:33:10] know, and I'll have to say that I think some of the women. And I don't know if you can comment on this, John. Struggle a little bit more. Not that what they do. They say really great things, but I get more second thoughts from them after they record. I don't know why. They second guess themselves a little bit more. So maybe that's it. Maybe there's a little bit of a fear, and it's probably cultural. I don't know.

Guest [00:33:39] I suspect that's true. That it's cultural or just even a female thing. You know, it's. You feel lots of guilt.

John Larsen [00:33:49] That's probably true. No, I. More women.

John Dehlin [00:33:53] More women. We do need more women.

Guest [00:33:55] Yes.

John Larsen [00:33:56] Mormon expression wants more women.

John Dehlin [00:33:59] I actually once sent an email out to every Mormon feminist I knew saying, I want to sponsor a feminist Mormon podcast. And I offered to produce it and teach them and do everything. And I don't think one person, maybe two people responded to the email and they were like, maybe, but I'm really busy, so I've tried. Okay, I'll keep doing it. I brought on a couple people. I'm releasing a podcast in a little bit by a. Where the interview is done by a fabulous woman. So let's keep. Let's keep working on that, John.

Guest [00:34:35] Yeah, excellent.

John Larsen [00:34:37] I also think that women tend to be busier. You know, guys have more time to sit around and talk at their computer screens. Yeah, Zilpha just said, because women are doing all the work. That's probably.

John Dehlin [00:34:49] That's right. Oh, now I'm really embarrassed. Now the feminists are gonna hate me. Well, Terza, thanks so much for calling.

Guest [00:34:57] Well, thank you, guys.

John Dehlin [00:34:59] All right, talk again soon.

Guest [00:35:02] Sure.

John Dehlin [00:35:03] Okay. John, do you want to read something from our grab bag?

John Larsen [00:35:07] Sure. Before we. Let's see. Here's one to Dear John and John. My father says that the bigger the church gets, the more it is likely to experience epic downfalls. More and more like the Catholic Church regarding worldly scrutiny. Do you agree? The larger the church gets, the harder it will be to manage it in A positive global light. That's from C, boy.

John Dehlin [00:35:27] Well, why don't you go first on that one?

John Larsen [00:35:29] I think it's true to some extent. It's also true that the larger the church gets, the more smaller things won't impact it. Like a bishop diddling a kid. That becomes pretty common. But I think the biggest impact is the church is so obsessed with its image, it's like the network television. Network television has to appeal to get the most people watching their shows. They water them down as much as they possibly can. So the church's biggest problem is not that it's going to topple and fall from some weird doctrine. It's just going to water itself down so much to appeal to the greatest number of people that it'll just become meaningless.

John Dehlin [00:36:08] Yeah. I'll add that I think financially, the more we expand in the Third World and the more we shrink in the Western world, the tougher it is to be profitable.

John Larsen [00:36:23] Yeah, that's true.

John Dehlin [00:36:25] Except I hear they're doing some innovative things in Third World countries to try and not have them be a drain on the church's financial resources.

John Larsen [00:36:36] Well, I mean, that's been obvious where, you know, there's been people who brought up where there's kids going to primary right now who aren't food secure, who don't have clean water, and there's other places in the world where the church spends money on these treks, you know, so. So. So it's a huge problem because the church gets most of its money from, you know, the Wasatch Front and then from the United States. And I know in my lifetime, I've seen the amount of money that the church spends on things that would be, like, more social, you know, like roadshows and bazaars and campouts and all that gets decreased. But the fear is there's all this Third World poverty still sucking all the juice out of it. I don't know how to manage that. I don't pretend to be able to tell them what to do in this case.

John Dehlin [00:37:23] Yeah, it does feel like a different church. I know that I grew up in a church that's very different from the one my parents grew up in. And it seems like the young generation now is also getting something very different. So it does feel like the vitality is being correlated out of the church a little bit. A lot of the creativity and a lot of the fun. I don't mean to be negative about it, but it's just. It's hard not to see it that way.

John Larsen [00:37:53] Oh, yeah. A lot of what Made it a community. Yeah, definitely. You know, John, do you think that the non English speaking world of the church is ever going to revolt? Meaning? There's so much money. I mean, look at all the money that's pushed in a Deseret book. I mean, that's all church funded, right? That's run by the church. All the books they have, all the. And then if you were in some other language, especially other than, say, Spanish, you only get correlated material. There is no other material. And all the brethren are white and from the Wasatch, from the Mormon corridor, and it's still a very Western church. As more and more of the population is south of the border in the rest of the world, do you think they're ever going to say, enough already?

John Dehlin [00:38:41] Right. Yeah, it's crazy.

John Larsen [00:38:47] All right, should we go to another question?

John Dehlin [00:38:52] Yeah, let's open it back up. All right, listeners ready for a call.

John Larsen [00:38:58] All right, here's another one while we're waiting. From Chris, what is the hardest aspect about lining up an interview? Is it just availability or is there a fee involved for really established people?

John Dehlin [00:39:11] I've never really paid a fee.

John Larsen [00:39:13] I've never paid a fee.

John Dehlin [00:39:16] That'd be sweet.

John Larsen [00:39:18] The hardest part. What Zilpha. Is scheduling. That's probably true.

John Dehlin [00:39:27] It's really hard to schedule people.

John Larsen [00:39:30] Yeah. Sometimes it's hard to find people's contact information. Sometimes they brush you off. But more often than not, it's just. I've probably got. You're probably the same way. There's probably about 20 out there that I'm working to one extent or the other, but they just haven't happened for this reason or that reason or the other. And you only. You only have so much time. I mean, I could easily. You could easily turn a podcast, like what we do, into a daily affair like Radio West.

John Dehlin [00:39:57] Yeah, totally. Do you ever feel like you're running out of material or do you feel like you've got five years worth? Oh, I.

John Larsen [00:40:02] There's an infinite supply. Do you feel like you run out of ideas?

John Dehlin [00:40:05] Well, I want to keep it fresh and interesting. I don't want to be. I don't want to go on too long. You know what I mean?

John Larsen [00:40:10] Right.

John Dehlin [00:40:11] And I've been encouraged because some of my most recent ones have been some of my best. And to be honest, you guys have really helped that because when you guys do a really good thing, it makes me want to up my game. But, yeah, sometimes I feel like maybe people are getting sick of it.

John Larsen [00:40:25] But I try. I try to keep the podcast out Of a rut. So, for example, let's say we've done a couple on issues of homosexuality. They're very interesting. They're very touching. I just want to move on to something else. So. So I. You know, so if. If I haven't talked to an author for a while, try to get an author. If we haven't talked to. You know, that's one thing. There's a lot of people who have very interesting stories, but I try to avoid getting into that where we're just telling people stories. I know that sounds kind of funny because you're the Mormon stories guy, but it can be overwhelming to hear the same thing over and over and over again.

John Dehlin [00:41:00] Yeah, right.

Guest 2 [00:41:03] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:41:03] I struggle with that. But then sometimes I want to cover a theme. Sometimes I want to really explore something in depth. So I've kind of been on a bit of a homosexual or a gay theme. There's a couple more I have to release still, but sometimes I really like to cover stuff in blocks.

John Larsen [00:41:19] Yeah, yeah, there's. We tend to hit a topic, then move on. I think oftentimes we probably don't do it well enough, but at least that might keep it fresh. I don't know. I don't mean that as a backhanded slide. I mean, it's sometimes hard to know how far to go and when to quit.

John Dehlin [00:41:38] Sure, sure. Totally. Yeah. What else have we got on the question board? Looks like people aren't calling in. They've lost their mojo. Let's see what else we got here.

John Larsen [00:41:49] Here. Here's one from Dan in Virginia. This addressed me. I describe your podcast in an attempt to have all sides represented. But do you think it's fairly balanced? Is Mike the best you can do for the other end of the spot?

John Dehlin [00:42:03] I totally agree. I. Mike's a great guy, I'm sure, but he's almost like a straw man. Mike is like one huge straw man. Need a better. You need a better defender of the faith than Mike because it's not as credible. Does that mean what's. I mean, did I go over the top there?

John Larsen [00:42:22] No. I mean, you can be mean to Mike because Mike's mean to everybody else.

John Dehlin [00:42:26] He's mean to me, that's for sure.

John Larsen [00:42:29] Well, okay. I don't particularly try to be balanced.

John Dehlin [00:42:35] You're an entertainer. You're like Glenn Beck.

John Larsen [00:42:36] Well, here's the problem with balance. It's a fallacy. And I'm not going into the whole everybody's biased thing. I'm just saying, you know, you watch the news shows and they Say, okay, we're balanced because we have a Republican and a Democrat on. As if those are the only two viewpoints out there. Right. And so they do the same thing. They say, oh, you're balanced. You have an apostate and a faithful Mormon, you know, and a lot of the questions we're dealing with are questions of history, they're questions of fact, they're questions of theology, they're questions, epistemology, all sorts of things. It's not like there is this balance that can be achieved. So I want to get at the. I want to cut through the. The vestiture, probably people who are vested in an answer, and you get a lot of ex Mormons who are vested in it being false and a lot of Mormons vested in it being true. I want to get at the heart of the matter because I think the questions are interesting of them, of themselves. I don't think I particularly try to be balanced. I agree that I would like a more. I mean, I'm not saying I want to replace Mike, but I would like other faithful voices. But most faithful voices cannot operate in the world. I'm sorry, this is an insult to the Mormon world. Most Mormons just cannot operate in any sort of. They can't deal with their faith on that level. They can't deal with it academically, they can't deal with it rationally.

John Dehlin [00:43:52] You should try Blake Ostler.

Guest [00:43:54] He was.

John Dehlin [00:43:54] He was a great guest, and he's. He's conservative and thoughtful, and there are.

John Larsen [00:44:01] There are a lot of faithful people who will come on the podcast, don't get me wrong. But that sort of reoccurring, mixing it up on that, you know, it's. You have to admire what Mike does because he can be sitting there in a room. I mean, we're across the country, but he can have four people slinging bullets at him. And he's unflappable. You know, how many people like that are there out there?

John Dehlin [00:44:23] Kudos to Mike, for sure. And it's very hard. It's very hard to find TVMs that will come on. Hey, I gotta hear. I've tried 15 times to get Daniel Peterson or Louis Midgley to come on, and they've. They've turned me down flat. You once indicated that you almost got Dan Peterson on what happened.

John Larsen [00:44:48] Dan said he would come on, and then he stopped returning my calls. So I don't believe. I don't know. I don't know what happened there. One time I'm just gonna show up like, you know, like a documentary crew at his office with a boom mic with a fuzzy thing on it. See if I can. You know, man, you know what happened to me?

John Dehlin [00:45:08] This was funny. I just have to tell you this. So before I ever interviewed Grant Palmer, I did my best to line up somebody who could defend Joseph Smith. So I went up on the FAIR boards and I called and I emailed Dan Peterson and Louis Midgley and all these people couldn't get a fair person or a Farms person for my life to come on the show that I thought would be credible or interesting. So, of course, then I interviewed Grant Palmer, and all the Fair and Farms guys say that I'm imbalanced. And, you know, it was crazy. But I actually had an email exchange with Daniel Pearson where I invited him on the show and he said, no, I'm not going to come on your show. And I'm like, whatever. And then like a year ago, I'm trying to get someone from FAIR to come on the show again. And I'm being mocked for the imbalance of Mormon stories and how I don't have enough faithful listeners on. And I make this statement that, you know, well, I've tried. I've even tried Daniel Peterson a number of times, and he won't do it. He comes on the fair board and he's like, oh, you've never invited me to come on your podcast. Like, I'd be scared of you, you know. And then I pasted in the email conversation where he declined to come on the show. And he didn't respond in any. Oh, he did respond. He said, well, okay, maybe I'll come on. I've been really busy. Check back with me at the beginning of the year. And it just never materialized somehow. It's kind of funny.

Mormon Apologetics and Online Debates

John Larsen [00:46:42] Here's my thoughts on the apologist now. For years and years, I have been for fun, I play on the apologist websites, the. The MAD boards, the Mormon apologetic discussion. That's where all the big apologists gather around. I think there's really two issues going on with those guys. For years, they have been tooled up to deal with evangelical Christianity and poor evangelical Christianity at that. The sort of Ed Decker, you know, Mormons really worship the devil stuff. And that's. That's where their. Their writing has been. And they're also really used now. I love a lot of these guys. I would count virtually all of them as my friends if they would go out with me. But. But they're used to playing on their field and where, you know, my, my. My podcast is very secular. Yours is pretty Much. So that's, I don't think that's a field that they're comfortable operating in for the most part.

John Dehlin [00:47:37] Yeah, My opinion is they want to control the conversation.

John Larsen [00:47:43] Right.

John Dehlin [00:47:43] They're not comfortable. Just like the Brethren aren't comfortable with any question from anybody because I don't think they have good answers.

John Larsen [00:47:53] Yeah, it's the midgley defense. They want to control both the question and the answer. And where they can't control that, I don't think they're comfortable. They're not going to put themselves out there.

John Dehlin [00:48:04] And then what they do. And I had a conversation with someone from FAIR just a couple months ago. They go back and blame it on us. They say, oh, well, you're too negative, or oh, the threads on your blog are too negative, and they throw it back on us. But I don't see them coming out with their own podcast with interesting discussions.

John Larsen [00:48:23] And, you know, I also don't want to paint with too broad a brush. We've had some great apologists. Come on. I think you have to, you know, Kevin, Barney, Consig. We've had, we've had Jeff Lindsey.

John Dehlin [00:48:34] I talked to some FAIR guys about that and they said that that interview has made them not want to do any more podcasts. Probably they blamed it on the comments on your blog page.

John Larsen [00:48:45] Ah, they're pussies.

John Dehlin [00:48:48] Whoa, somebody's got to beat that out.

John Larsen [00:48:53] I mean, okay, so you're an apologist. Step up. You know, you know, you got, you got to step out of the Maxwell Institute. And you know, I've seen a few, I've seen a few threads all the time where they'll acknowledge when they're sober that their greatest threat that they have is from secularism, that they're just not equipped to deal with that. And that's, that's not what they're. You know, if you were running an evangelical podcast, I think, I think Dr. Peterson would come on in a heartbeat. But he just doesn't want to deal with the sort of issues because if you come with, like if you talk to me and I'm gonna throw those guys softball questions, obviously, but, you know, they have to first convince me that the supernatural exists. And they're never gonna be able to do that.

John Dehlin [00:49:35] Right? Yeah, I mean, it's a totally different playing field.

John Larsen [00:49:39] Here's another one from Dan in Virginia. Would you like to interview any well known Mormon businessmen? Bill Marriott, Noel Archibald, Nolan Archibald. I've always wondered how people so smart and successful could be convinced of the truth of the church. Don't they have advisors. I'll take the second part first. If you accept a few premises, the church makes sense. There's just a few certain propositions you have to accept. And so as long as you do that, it's kind of like non Euclidean geometry or whatever it is. If you forget that parallel lines can never cross, you can come up with a whole other geometry. And that's just the way Mormonism is. If you accept certain things are true, Mormonism makes beautiful sense. And I often wonder about a lot of the apostates who can't remember that it all used to make sense back in the day. You know, there were some things we all put on our shelf or whatever, but for the most part it made sense. So I can see how somebody like Bill Marriott or any of those other guys, you know, they're rolling in the dough, they're recognized in the business world, they're recognized in the church world. And Mormonism is a theology I can't remember the actual term for. There's a term out there where theology that says you'll be rewarded financially and socially and successfully by obeying the gospel. And Mormonism is very much like that. So, hey, it's working. But as to what questions would you ask them? I don't know. I don't think they're theologians. I don't know that they would be able to express that sort of stuff. What's your thoughts, John?

John Dehlin [00:51:15] Yeah, you know, I would want to interview Nolan Archibald just to ask him about his dealings with Buckley Jepsen. Did you ever hear that podcast with Buckley Jepsen?

John Larsen [00:51:26] Was that a long time ago? Yeah, you got to refresh my memory.

John Dehlin [00:51:30] Basically, Buckley is this wonderful man who served in the bishopric in his ward in D.C. and basically he had gone inactive because he came out of the closet as gay. He and his wife amicably divorced. He stayed active, but ended up finding a boyfriend, falling in love, and he ended up getting married to this beautiful man named Michael Kessler. They got married and then he just, you know, would quietly attend his ward alone as a married man, as a gay married man. But, you know, he wouldn't bring his. Wouldn't bring Michael. You know, they wouldn't, you know, hold hands or kiss or anything, but. And he wouldn't ask for a calling. He wasn't asking for a temple recommend, but he would try and serve in ways that he could. Like he said on his podcast that he would buy hymnals and scriptures for new converts. You know, really sweet stuff, you know what I mean?

Guest 3 [00:52:31] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:52:32] And then his Stake president was Nolan Archibald, apparently in D.C. and his bishop was some guy. And for some reason the bishop started coming after him and wanting to excommunicate him. It was kind of crazy. And, and so they come after him and he. It looks like he's going to be threatened to excommunication. Then he does an article with the press, and it lets the press know. And Peggy Fletcher Stack, I believe, or Jennifer Dobner, I forget which one, runs an article on the fact that this. This man's being threatened with excommunication. Guess what happens within, you know, a month or two. His bishop gets called on a mission.

John Larsen [00:53:21] Yeah, now I remember the story. Yeah, it hit the press. Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:53:24] Yeah. Now I, you know, I've talked to some people and they've told me that I'm crazy, that they would reassign a bishop in that way. And, you know, they may be right.

John Larsen [00:53:35] I've heard of that sort of stuff happening more than once. It famously happened to Ezra Taft Benson.

John Dehlin [00:53:41] Right, right, right. When he went to Europe after all this John Bircher stuff.

Guest [00:53:45] Right?

John Larsen [00:53:45] Yeah, yeah. So not. That's probably. It's probably a true story.

John Dehlin [00:53:50] Who's this?

Guest 2 [00:53:51] This is Trevor in San Antonio, Texas.

Caller Discussion on Mormon Community and Identity

John Dehlin [00:53:55] Trevor Hunt, thanks for calling in to Mormon Expressions, Mormonstories.

John Larsen [00:53:59] Hey, Trevor.

Guest 2 [00:54:00] Well, thanks for having me. My, My question is, you know, I. My wife and I, we've been going through this cognitive dissonance disaffection thing for the past year. And, you know, we love the church culture and we, you know, we haven't been going to church lately because it

Guest 3 [00:54:24] just wasn't working for us.

Guest 2 [00:54:27] And we've actually tried out the Community

Guest 3 [00:54:30] of Christ a couple times.

Guest 2 [00:54:33] And doctrinally, you know, that they seem to be pretty. Pretty okay with saying that we don't know everything. And, you know, we recognize that Joseph

Guest 3 [00:54:46] Smith was very flawed.

Guest 2 [00:54:48] My question is, why isn't it more. Why aren't there more ex Mormons Nams, you know, you know, people like me checking out the Prairie Mormons.

John Dehlin [00:55:07] What do you mean, the Prairie Mormons?

Guest 2 [00:55:09] Oh, the, the rlds. The Community of Christ.

John Dehlin [00:55:13] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I've got a lot. John, why don't you start? But I've got a lot to say about that, too.

John Larsen [00:55:18] My thoughts are. Because they. They need to get their stuff together. I mean, for the past 20 years or so, they're just sort of. I don't know. I. They.

John Dehlin [00:55:31] So John Hamer hasn't converted you yet, huh?

John Larsen [00:55:33] No, no, no. I mean, but he makes it. He almost converts me. No, and, and from what I understand there, there's a lot of, I still don't think they know who they are. That's probably it.

John Dehlin [00:55:49] You know, I've got a little bit of history here. So when I was navigating, when I was contemplating leaving the church the first time around a couple years ago, before I went inactive, I kind of went inactive for about a year. And that's when I discovered the community of Christ. I listened to their backstory, found them to be an institution with a high degree of integrity. The fact that they discovered all this historical stuff, they owned up to it and they decided to take a really constructive approach and lead the church in the right direction. They, you know, they focused on love, they, you know, let women come on have the priesthood. Like that all just really resonated with me, me. So I was really interested and I still think the people that I've met at the top, leadership like Bill Russell and Susan Score and you know, it's an amazing organization. I want them to succeed. But I think that it's tough because the people that I've, you know, I want to be careful about this because I want to encourage them to be successful. But I've talked to some people who have tried to attend their meetings and I think it's been a little bit hit and miss. Maybe some people haven't felt, you know, as inspired. Maybe it's because of their own conditioning of what they're used to in the LDS Church. Trevor, did you attend any of their, you said you did attend some of their sessions.

Guest 2 [00:57:26] Yeah, you know, you know, we've gone three times and every time we've gone

Guest 3 [00:57:32] to the equivalent of their sacrament meeting and we didn't do the Sunday school stuff.

Guest 2 [00:57:39] It's a bit of an argument with my wife and I because she kind

Guest 3 [00:57:43] of still wants to go to the

Guest 2 [00:57:44] ward and I want to check them out. It felt like just a very Christian meeting. I mean, actually every time we've gone there's been no mention of the Book of Mormon or Joseph Smith. It was just all very Christ based teaching. The thing that was a little bummer for us is, you know, we're very much used to the Mormon experience of the big church house with lots of families our age with kids that are the same age as our kids. And everyone there was old, you know, just a lot of older couples. There was a couple of middle aged couples. Yeah, you know, I'd say in their 40s, but, but in the place felt a little run down. But you know, just, it just kind of boggles my mind because I see so much potential. There's, you know, people like me that

Guest 3 [00:58:36] would love to,

Guest 2 [00:58:39] you know, have a church that. Where I don't. Why I feel like I don't have to abandon my culture, but yet I can, you know, feel comfortable that there's

Guest 3 [00:58:50] not all this dogma.

Guest 2 [00:58:55] I just wish that, like you guys

Guest 3 [00:58:57] said, they could get their act together.

John Dehlin [00:59:00] Yeah. I mean, I'll add something, Trevor, and that's that I don't think, you know, if you. And this is something John Hamer would argue with me about. And I would love to have John come back on Mormon Stories to talk about this. We've talked about it a bit, but we had planned a very long episode where John and I really talk, and somehow that fell through. But I just don't think religions succeed by claiming to be one of many good churches. I think that a church succeeds when it makes a really bold claim, when it sticks a stake in the ground and says we're true and everyone else is false. And they give members a real reason to believe they're really onto something. If your church just says, yeah, we're good, but they're good, you can join them or us, or take baptism from them and bring it to us, and that's okay. I just don't think that that, you know, isn't there some quote that like, a religion that doesn't require everything of its members isn't worth its weight in salt? And I think there's some truth from that in that, from just a success and a growth perspective. If you look at Lutherans and Methodists and Presbyterians and Episcopalians, you know, how are they doing? They're all totally going downhill, it seems like. And the church is like Jehovah's Witness and who else? Scientologists and others. The ones that make the exclusive bold claims are the ones who seem to be still growing. John, would you disagree with that?

John Larsen [01:00:31] No, I think that's true. Yeah. The church has to require you to do something. Otherwise, what are you doing there? Now, the one that's sort of interesting that Zilph and I actually, we've talked about this on the podcast, but Zilph and I started attending the Unitarian Church before we quit going to the Mormon Church. And I think I pretty much quit the Unitarians. I'm now inactive in two religions, so I think I quit them this year. But they're kind of strange because they almost cross the line around the other side and become bold in the fact that they proclaim they believe nothing or in other words, there's no dogma at all. There's nothing you have to believe. But they're just trying to grasp that community, that thing that we. I mean, most people don't go to church because they, you know, feel really strongly about the, you know, the Nicene Creed or anything like that. I mean, those are rare people who really get all tangled up in that stuff. Most people go because it's their community, it's who they are, it's their identity. And so when you're changing religions, it's hard to, it's, it's hard to cross that and join that new identity. You have to do it for years and years before you start feeling that they're doing it the right way. I mean, if you leave the Mormon Church and go to another church, the first thing that's going to be going through your head all the time is they're doing this wrong. You know, you can't do it that way. You can't, you know, even things that you might say, man, I really wish that women had the priesthood. I guarantee you the first time you leave a Mormon church and go to a church where there's a woman preaching, you're going to feel that something's wrong or something else like that.

John Dehlin [01:02:03] You know what, though? You know what, though? When Susan Scorer, who's an apostle at the community of Christ, came and spoke at Sunstone, there wasn't a dry eye in the house. It was so inspirational to see a woman be an apostle. It was moving. So in that one instance, and I've heard about women, people being present when women did the laying on of hands to ordain people to the priesthood in the community of Christ. And again, there wasn't a dry eye in the whole room. There's something beautiful about seeing women partake in the priesthood.

John Larsen [01:02:38] Oh, I agree. And you know, after I got used to that, you know, academically, it didn't bother me. It was just something that at the bottom he said, well, and just this isn't right. And especially when they would do things like, you know, they'd put stone. You know, Unitarians do a bunch of weird crap like put stones in the river and what, you know, it just never feel to me. But I'm not a real sort of ordinance, whatever it is, these guys. So. But you know, John, maybe, you know, I've been looking at, I've been casually looking for this story. After September 6th, there were a bunch of Sunstone sort of apostates and liberals who actually started a ward in Salt Lake City. That was to do that, to capture the culture and the elements of the. Of the religion that they liked without having the patriarchy or the dogma. And it failed. It didn't last. I think Lavina was involved. I probably should just call her and ask her about it. I've been looking to find those people and bring them on, because I've thought about that before. I feel comfortable with Mormon things, but I don't want all the garbage that goes with it.

John Dehlin [01:03:48] Yeah. I'll be honest. I've been thinking about this idea for a couple years now, and I've talked about it a little bit too much on my podcast. Judaism has Reformed Judaism, and Reform Judaism at one time was heretical to the Orthodox and the Hasidic and even the conservative. Now Reform Judaism is the largest branch of Judaism in the United States. And you don't have to believe anything in Reform Judaism. Rabbis can be atheists. You don't have to believe that Moses even existed.

John Larsen [01:04:19] But they've got 4,000 years of culture. Here's the real problem. You strip away the truth claims of Mormonism and what do you have left? Yeah, Mormonism is. Mormonism is like a half culture. If you compare it to other cultures that have been fully developed, Mormonism is sort of halfway there. They're halfway just mainstream American and halfway their own unique thing. And it's like going to other places in the United States. If you go up to Maine, there's culture elements. If you go up to Minnesota, there's cultural elements. The same thing. Sort of like. Like Utah is. So I don't know if Mormon culture can survive without Mormonism, like Judaism,

John Dehlin [01:05:06] you

John Larsen [01:05:07] know, the Jewish culture can survive without Judaism.

Guest [01:05:09] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:05:10] And I'll just add, John, one more thing. Liberals are incredibly hard to organize and to get to pay tithing. You know what I'm saying?

John Larsen [01:05:20] Oh, they're hard. As you know, Zilph and I have spent time trying to get ex Mormons and Mormons on the fringe together so they can meet each other and have that sort of sociality. And yeah, something coming out of Mormonism makes people very reluctant to commit trust anyone. Maybe it's trust. Maybe it's just that Mormonism takes so much commitment and so much of yourself that people just want to revolt from that. They don't want to be tied down to any sort of calling.

John Dehlin [01:05:49] Right, right. All right, Trevor, well, thanks so much for coming on.

Guest 2 [01:05:54] All right, thanks, guys.

John Dehlin [01:05:55] All right, good to talk to you.

Guest 3 [01:05:57] All right, you too.

John Dehlin [01:05:58] All right, John, we're going to call George and I'm wondering if this is your George or a different George.

John Larsen [01:06:02] I don't know, we'll see.

Guest 3 [01:06:04] This is George in Orange County, Yorba Linda.

John Dehlin [01:06:07] Different George.

Guest 3 [01:06:08] I really enjoyed this conversation about the community of Christ. I'm one of those, the lds and I came in as a convert when I was 18, realized by the time I was 20 and going on a full time mission that there were other Book of Mormon believing churches. And so I got interested not just in the community of Christ. By the time I was on my full time mission, I had maybe six or seven newsletters coming to me from all the various branches of Book of Mormon leading churches. And so I got to know apostles in, you know, the Temple Lot Church, the Strangite church, the Kalmurite church, several apostate, several polygamous groups. I just wonder how rare a person I am or if other people in their Mormon experience began to start looking for a prophet that really prophesied, a revelator that really revelated, a translator that really translated because that's where my real interest was. I started looking in these other churches when I realized that our leadership, they were just old men.

John Larsen [01:07:25] So is there anybody you follow as a prophet today?

Guest 3 [01:07:30] Well, I still have, you know, I still have membership in the Utah Church, but I would call Monson the president of the church, not a prophet. The church. No, because I've lost my belief in Joseph Smith eventually. It was easy for me to see that, you know, that all of these churches were basically being led by charismatic male leaders.

John Larsen [01:07:57] You know, what's interesting is you started your statement, which is really true, talking about the Book of Mormon and then we've kind of gone into the charismatic sort of prophet thing. And you know, if you, if you, if you're in Utah about every five years or so there's a significant, by significant, I mean, couple hundred followers break off of the church about every five years. That happens, right? And you know, so it, it's, it's something that keeps coming up over and over and over again and that they'll move off to some corner of Utah or whatever and eventually they'll usually fall apart. But the two, what the point I want to make is the two things really are unconnected. The Book of Mormon surprisingly informs very, very little about Mormonism. You can accept the Book of Mormon and pretty much believe anything you want with mainstream Christianity. So it's interesting that those two things have gone together. And that's more from like you hinted at from Joseph Smith that they trace themselves back to Joseph Smith.

Guest 3 [01:08:56] Yeah, absolutely. And what happened with me was I, you know, I became converted to the Book of Mormon. And of course, then along with that came the teachings of the LES Church. And then I began to realize that, hey, these prophets aren't. They're really not prophets, you know, where are the Revelations? And so I started looking in what I call Book of Mormon believing churches, thinking that maybe there was another branch of the church where the real priesthood had stayed and where there were actually prophets. And of course, I was disappointed in that. I guess the community of Christ was the closest that I came to at one time by looking carefully at the teachings of the son of Joseph Smith, Joseph Smith iii. Certainly Strang published Revelations. James J. Strang. I got to know some people there, but they, of course, claim that there is no prophet on earth today. So that's the reason that I more or less tied them together. What's interesting is that as I got these newsletters and kind of kept up on my research for decades, and one thing that I would see in the various groups is that when somebody would get mad at the leadership in their particular group, pretty soon their name would appear in one of the other small minority churches. They would move from church to church. And I thought that was so interesting and that they. They never really came back to the mainstream, you know, to the Utah Body, or very few of them did. They would if they were. If they were reorganized and they got mad at the reorganized church, they go across the street to Temple lot church and eventually temple lot. You know, that. My goodness, that. That grew into a dozen different Elijah message churches. So it was interesting to me to see how leadership moves around and even sometimes followers would. Not only would a leader, let's say a member of one of their 12 apostles, would get mad at the group and move across to another group, but then people who, at least his own family and sometimes extended group would move across with him.

John Dehlin [01:11:19] Yeah, that's the problem with schisms. They, you know, they just keep schisming.

John Larsen [01:11:23] Yeah, exactly. We've wanted to do a podcast on the history of the schisms among the Cohabs in Utah. You know, the Allreds and the Singers and all those guys. It's so complicated. I mean, Big Love is not an exaggeration. It's actually quite a simplification. It's so complicated, those schisms and rejoinings and. And murders and kidnappings, and it just gets crazy.

Guest 3 [01:11:46] Oh, yeah, yeah.

John Larsen [01:11:47] And that's how.

Guest 3 [01:11:47] Yeah, I have a. I have a twin brother who's not lds. And, and they, they really love him. His family, his wife, they really love. Big love. And he would call me every week after the, after the episode was on TV and say, okay, now tell me which group. They're really, you know, which group is being brought to the forefront in this particular story. And I could actually tell him pretty much, you know, what particular polygamous group that they were bringing in to add a little, you know, flavor, color to their story. Yeah, it's an amazing schism. Yeah.

Hopes for a More Liberal Mormon Movement

John Dehlin [01:12:31] Well, I just want to go. I just want to go on record that I would love nothing more than for there to emerge a vibrant new strain or revitalized strain of Mormonism that let liberals and progressives and disaffected engage in all the benefits of religion and church without some of the marginal costs. I just want to go on the record and tell John Hamer and Susan Score and Bill Russell and all those people at the Community of Christ that I hope they are wildly successful in their ambitions. And I wish I, you know, I, I've talked about this a little bit as well when I was reading Carolyn Pearson's book about her husband Gerald being gay and then sort of being thrown into the, quote, gay lifestyle, unquote, in San Francisco in the 70s. And you see how it was just such an unhealthy environment for him at the time. But then you realize that it's not his fault. Like if you were marginalized and ostracized, kicked out of your home, living homeless, you know, you probably wouldn't always live the healthiest lifestyle as well. I think it's just not totally cool that if you leave the LDS church, you're ostracized, alienated, sometimes divorced, thrown out into the street without any religious or social community at all. And you have to fend for yourself. Now. I'm one who now believes that you can totally transition fine and become a happy, healthy, contributing person, maybe even more so than you ever could have as a member. But I would love to see religion exists for a reason. I think it exists because it provides some benefit to people. I would love to see some type of Mormon themed church or religion emerge that gave many of the disaffected people I work with a spiritual and a community home without a lot of the baggage. And I just want to applaud Community of Christ for trying to make that happen. And I want to encourage all my listeners to start their own massive alternative church. I nominate John Larsen to be the first prophet.

John Larsen [01:14:39] What would be life if you actually.

John Dehlin [01:14:42] No, Zilpha. I nominate Zilpha to be the first prophet.

John Larsen [01:14:47] That's a much better choice. She's been talking about starting her own church, actually.

John Dehlin [01:14:50] Will you talk to her? Tell her I nominate her.

John Larsen [01:14:53] So if you strip away all the weird stuff, don't you strip away everything from the restoration? I mean, what makes it. What. What would be left that's Mormon?

John Dehlin [01:15:03] You know, I don't know how to do it, man. I don't know how to do it.

Guest 3 [01:15:07] There's still the culture there, though. I, you know, I still am a cultural Mormon. And even though I stripped away all of the beliefs, you know, other than I. Well, actually, I kept my. I've kept a hope in my faith in the grace of Jesus Christ. I kind of stayed with that message.

John Larsen [01:15:27] There's a hundred churches out there for you then, aren't there?

Guest 3 [01:15:29] Oh, yeah. And the restoration really has gone away. Except that I love the culture. I love getting together with other liberal Mormons. One thing, in California, we do have some wards out here. Occasionally you fall into a ward where you've got, you know, a lot of people, a lot of members, families, especially some of the singles wards. You've got a lot of people who are very, very liberal in the way that they interpret momentism. And I love it. And I mean, I have several children of my own and I see. I guess I would call them TBMs. They're pretty, you know, they're. Gee, three of them are at the temple tonight for a granddaughter who's getting married. But the truth is that they think in a very, very liberal way about. About the church. They embrace the good things, you know, and just try to have something interesting to read on those occasional toxic open church that nobody wants to listen to. Right.

John Larsen [01:16:38] All right, well, we'll do all.

John Dehlin [01:16:39] George, thanks for calling in, man.

Guest 3 [01:16:41] Hey, good talking to you, man.

John Dehlin [01:16:42] Thank you.

Guest 3 [01:16:44] Keep it up. This is an interesting concept. I love this.

John Dehlin [01:16:47] Thanks, guys. Thanks, George.

Guest 3 [01:16:48] Sure. Bye. Bye.

Guest [01:16:50] Thank you for joining us today on Mormon Stories. To comment on this episode or to discuss it with others, please check us out online@mormonstories.org if you want to find other friends, family members, former missionary companions, or ward members who approach Mormonism like you, consider adding me, John Dehlin, as your Facebook friend. This may seem like a strange idea, but many of my closest friends have discovered that they are not alone in their thoughts or feelings or family or even award situation through discovering mutual Facebook friends. Finally, to keep Mormon stories alive, please consider a donation@mormonstories.org music on the side episode was provided by Clayton and sky, Pixton.

John Dehlin [01:17:53] Nearer my go nearer to thee.

Part Two Begins: Truth, Belief, and Leaving the Church

Part 2 of 2 · Ep. 187

John Dehlin [00:00:02] Mormon Stories podcast is made possible through the financial contributions of its listeners to keep it alive and available to future generations. Please consider a donation today@mormonstories.org hey, thanks

John Dehlin [00:00:15] for listening to us. You've stayed on almost two hours.

Guest [00:00:19] Yeah, it's flown by. And John Larsen, it's good to finally sort of meet you.

John Larsen [00:00:26] Hey, Randy,

Guest [00:00:29] I gotta say, I'm exactly. Everything you say pretty much is right on. And I want to, I want to

John Larsen [00:00:34] say everything who says.

Guest [00:00:36] I'm talking to Larsen.

John Larsen [00:00:37] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:00:38] Everything John says, oh, no,

Guest [00:00:41] no, no. Yeah, anyways, intellectually and yeah, he's my hero, he's right where I am. But anyways, I just want to give Larsen kudos for that. Joseph Smith being the goof off in the back of calculus class. That isn't really calculus class analogy. Seriously, that was an old timer.

John Larsen [00:01:03] Well, you know my first question.

Guest [00:01:05] I'll go ahead.

John Larsen [00:01:07] No, you know, once you, once you get out of the circular reasoning that he's a prophet and you start, you know, you have to really ask yourself, well, why? Why do you believe this guy? And it's a hard question to answer.

Guest [00:01:21] Well, I guess I had a three hour conversation with my best man at my wedding, letting him know he's a true believer, letting him know that I'm an atheist now. And he basically says, well, what will you say when you come to the judgment bar of God and you find out that Joseph was a prophet? My answer was, I'll be damned. Well, son of a bitch.

John Larsen [00:01:46] Yeah, I mean, honestly, you know, people ask that. I really. That doesn't, that doesn't scare me at all. Not at all. Because I think, first of all, the likelihood of it happening is approaching infinitely small. Secondly, the decisions that I make, and I think a lot of people make, are based on integrity. I think that's what a lot of true believers forget. I think there's a lot of integrity in the church. I'm not trying to say people in the church don't have that integrity belief, but I had to follow my conviction. If I were to have stayed in the church, I would have been living a sort of lie and I could have kind of done that. But when I was looking at my children, I just couldn't go on doing that. And so why would a God possibly punish me for doing something that I consider. To be honest, I mean, that's a weird sort of turned out upside down thing. You know, we should act in a moral way. But if the way you think you're acting moral is immoral, I can't Imagine getting eternally punished for that.

John Dehlin [00:02:48] You know what I'm just gonna add, I'm just gonna add, John Larsen, that that's how I feel about, you know, that's how I feel about all religion, theology and doctrine. I'm only gonna, and this is gonna sound arrogant to true believers, but I'm just gonna say it. I refuse to believe. If I'm gonna believe in a God at all, I'm gonna believe in a God that's kind and loving. That's the only God I can get behind. I'm never going to be able to believe again in a God that commits genocide. I'm never going to believe in a God that, you know, that chooses one person over another or that's, you know. So I guess at a maximum, I'm betting on some type of God that's very limited in power and scope and maybe some would argue it's not much of a God at all. But if God is going to curse me for asking questions, if God's going to condemn me for trying to read and learn and to find out the truth, and like you said, for following your conscience, then I guess I don't want to hang around him or her.

Guest [00:03:54] Well, that's why my favorite all time quote from any general authority is Hubie Brown saying, if we have the truth, we have nothing to fear. If we have not the truth, it ought to be harmed, or we have no fear from harm if we have the truth. If we don't have the truth, that I ought to be harmed. He was absolutely right. And to me, the Mormon Church does not have the truth and it ought to be harmed. And in fact, they do a lot of harm to women, to homosexuals and intellectuals, and basically it punishes you for using your brain. But I did have a suggestion for a podcast that I wanted to bring up.

John Larsen [00:04:35] Who's going to get it first?

Guest [00:04:38] What's that?

John Larsen [00:04:39] I said, who's going to get it first, me or John? All right, go ahead. I've got my pen.

Guest [00:04:44] Whoever can pull this off? Because, you know, I'm fascinated by my own fascination with Mormonism when I've left it behind as an atheist. I've never been more interested in Mormon doctrine as a believer as I am as an atheist. So what that brings me to is I don't believe the Book of Mormon came about, obviously, the way that the church presents it. So now I'm utterly fascinated with how the hell did it come about. And I would love for you guys to have Craig Krittle come on and debate John Hamer, because these are two pretty heavyweight. These are two heavyweights intellectually. Crittle got, I think got his PhD at Stanford and my brother knows him personally. He and has always been really impressed with him. I would love to have them debate both of their theories. Crittle has kind of revitalized the Spalding theory and Hamer thinks it's bunk. So if you guys could somehow, even if you just had Craig Krittle on without John Hamer to kind of outline his revised Baldwin theory, I think that would be a fascinating podcast.

John Dehlin [00:05:58] That's a cool idea. And I've, I've actually exchanged some emails with, with Craig a bit. I was really, really intrigued by his textual analysis stuff and I was really surprised when John Hamer just totally poked a hole in it and said that, you know, both the Sydney rig, both the, what is it, the theory, the Spalding theory and the textual analysis stuff was all bunk. And didn't John Hamer just basically say that he thinks Joseph did it himself?

Guest [00:06:30] Yeah, John Hamer believes in the, in the single author, Joseph Smith sole author theory. And Critter believes in at least a three man, probably a four man conspiracy between Rigdon, Cowdery, Smith and possibly partly Pratt.

John Dehlin [00:06:44] Now John Larsen, do you have a theory?

John Larsen [00:06:46] You know, I'm sort of with Hamer here. I'm not as impressed by the Book of Mormon as a lot of people are. I think some of these theories might be plausible and we really need to do a podcast that does an overview of all the different competing theories out there because they get nuanced fast. But I'm just not that impressed with the book. I think that other people have written better books with just as little out there. So I don't have a problem assuming Joseph Smith wrote the whole thing. He had lots of time, he had lots of input, he was a smart guy.

Guest [00:07:19] But the thing that the Krittle, there's other things that the Crittle theory addresses like the amount of time Joseph didn't do anything with the translation. It was almost like he was adhering the headlights. And the Critter theory addresses that saying, okay, he had to wait for Rigdon to give him a new version to put in a stupid top hat that he pretended to be translating out of. I don't know exactly if he supports that he had crib notes in his stupid top hat. But there's other things, and I don't want to just shoot from the hip here about the cradle theory, but it's funny, the First Ward Open Mormon website That I'm a member of.

John Dehlin [00:08:05] Oh, you're not supposed to talk about that. That's the secret. Top secret. Oh, is that a secret?

Guest 2 [00:08:09] Sorry.

Guest [00:08:10] On one non existent, you can edit that out, I guess. On one non existent social form for Mormons, John Hamer's theory was definitely more widely accepted. And on the other one, the Second Ward, which I'm a member of, it's definitely crittle gets the vote. So, I mean, both of them have all kinds of holes you could punch into them, but I think both of them are pretty interesting. I think it would be interesting to go over those.

John Dehlin [00:08:38] Well, I'd be interested in that. I'm sure you would too, John.

John Larsen [00:08:41] Yeah, we reached out to. We've reached out to Crittle too. And it was a while back and he was really busy. He was in the middle of it and he's a busy guy. We couldn't get him on. The only thing that I have an issue with my own theory is I can't quite explain how Joseph got all that Campbellite theology into there. That's the only problem I have with my Joseph Smith rodent theory.

John Dehlin [00:09:08] All right, Randy, well, thanks so much for giving us a call.

Guest [00:09:11] All right, thanks for having me.

John Dehlin [00:09:13] I look forward to see you on Friday.

Guest [00:09:15] And I just want to say I totally appreciate both of you for both the hours of dedication you put, and I enjoy all of it and I appreciate it.

John Dehlin [00:09:26] Hey, thanks, Randy.

Guest 3 [00:09:28] Bye.

John Dehlin [00:09:30] Hello, Joel.

Guest 4 [00:09:31] Oh, yeah, I had a question for you there. Yes, for John.

John Dehlin [00:09:35] All right.

Guest 4 [00:09:38] I was wondering about which John. John Dehlin. Okay, I already know. The other John is exmo.

John Dehlin [00:09:45] Okay.

John Larsen [00:09:46] John Delan. Actually, I'm still a member, but I'm close enough to an exmo.

Guest 4 [00:09:51] Well, in thought, you're an ex Mormon.

John Larsen [00:09:54] That's true.

Guest 4 [00:09:56] So, John Dehlin.

John Dehlin [00:09:57] Yes, sir.

Guest 4 [00:09:58] I'm a member.

John Dehlin [00:09:59] Yes.

Guest 4 [00:09:59] And I was curious how your family, your active family, is taking this news of view, embracing the ex Mormon community.

John Dehlin [00:10:09] Well, what do you mean by embracing the ex Mormon community?

Guest 4 [00:10:13] Well, just how you're very open and earlier you suggested that all disenfranchised Mormons should start their own religion. And your Mormon Stories podcast, you interview homosexuals and you let them speak their mind and you're sympathetic to their cause, Right?

John Dehlin [00:10:36] Well, that's been true for. That's been true for a long time. So all that stuff's not new. Mormon Stories was started on the idea of interviewing everybody and trying to build bridges. So I don't think any of that is, you know, conflicting with faith, to be honest. The Only person that listens to my podcast is my mother. My wife doesn't listen. My. My siblings don't really listen. My dad doesn't listen. So they don't really know a lot about what I'm doing. They just know I do this web thing. My mom listens faithfully, and she seems to really like it. She's active in church, but she's also been subscribing to dialogue for, like, 20 years. My wife's very supportive of. Of Mormon stories,

Guest 4 [00:11:29] but do you ever fear that there will come a day when Mormon leadership will come down on you?

John Dehlin [00:11:34] Well, we talked about that earlier. I just. I've never openly criticized the brethren that I'm aware of, and I've never openly denounced the church's truth claims, so they would have to excommunicate me for asking questions. You know, I just. I don't know that it would be worth whatever headache that might get and whatever PR headache they might get by coming after me. Because these days, whenever the church comes after somebody, a reporter quickly finds out and the church backs off. Whether it's Thomas Murphy or Buckley Jepsen, the church tends to back off. So I don't know, I worry about that. I've worried about that every. Every day for the past five years, but so far, I haven't gotten any grief at all. I was called in the bishop's office once. We had a great conversation, and by the time I ended, the bishop told me he felt like what I was doing was inspired. So I don't know. So far, no grief.

Guest 4 [00:12:41] I see. So could I ask you if you believe that Joseph Smith was a prophet?

John Dehlin [00:12:46] Oh, is this a temple recommend interview? I don't think that whether Joseph Smith spoke with God or whether God even exists, I don't think it's knowable. So this. Is it true or false? Is it the truth or not? I just don't think anyone knows. I think that everybody is speculating and interpreting their emotion or whatever spirit in a way that leads them neither.

Guest 4 [00:13:12] But the problem. The prophet knows, I think the probability

John Dehlin [00:13:20] that the church is what it claims to be and that all the you're saying claims are true, I think the probability of that is probably not super high, but I'm not going to deny it. And I'm not going to say I know it's true. I'm just going to say I don't know. And, you know, I think that I differ from Randy, our previous caller. He said the church should be harmed. That's not my point of view. I think the church. I'm in the position of still believing that the church does more good than bad. And so I don't want the church to be harmed. I would like to find the way for the church to succeed and grow, but to do it in a way that's honest and that hurts less people. I don't think you have an organization that doesn't hurt people. Bonner. Richie kind of taught me that. I think anytime you have a large organization, it's going to hurt some people. I'd like to see the church hurt a lot less people. And I feel like it's my culture, my heritage, and so I like to go. I don't go every Sunday. And I certainly don't believe everything that the church teaches, and I certainly am uncomfortable with some of the things the church does. But I'm not going to probably ever take the position of whether it's true or false, because I think that's like saying, is a ham sandwich true or false? I just. It doesn't make any sense to me, that question.

Guest 4 [00:14:39] So would you consider yourself a nom.

John Dehlin [00:14:42] Oh, I don't know. That's probably a decent. A decent description of me right now. But as you guys all know, painfully, I'm always changing too. Hey, thanks for calling, Joel.

Guest 4 [00:14:57] Oh, sure.

John Dehlin [00:14:59] Good to talk to you. Call again.

John Larsen [00:15:03] You know, John, I really liked your statement about the ham sandwich because, I mean, that's absolutely true for me, as I've sort of left the paradigm that the question, is the church true? Makes absolutely no sense to me anymore. It's sort of like people saying, you know, if I say, hey, I went shopping today at Walmart, would you believe Walmart is true? What do you mean? You mean Walmart does good things, Walmart does bad things? Walmart just is what it is. It's a collection of things. And to say, is the church true? Is something that means something to members but means nothing to anybody else. And it's just not a question that can be answered.

Guest 4 [00:15:41] You're saying it's like a Boolean value.

John Larsen [00:15:45] I think that's what you're saying, right? It makes no sense to me. How can. The church is an organization. It's a property owner, it has theological statements. It's a group of people. How can that be true?

Guest 4 [00:16:00] Well, I think that's taken into context that the teachings are true. And if you follow them.

John Larsen [00:16:05] So. Okay, okay. Do you believe that every single teaching of the church is true? Because if we're talking Boolean, it has to be true. True, true, true, true, true, true. No falses. That's demonstrably false. You can show teachings that contradict that. Can't both be true. So if your standard of the church being true is that everything is true, that then you're sunk from the get go. You can't hold that position and have any sort of logic running through your brain.

Guest 4 [00:16:35] But I know that it's true.

John Larsen [00:16:37] Well, you're wrong because it's a false statement. It can't be right. It's like saying that, you know that the moon is the sun. They're not the same thing. I don't care what your religion is,

Guest 4 [00:16:49] but I have a burden in my bosom.

John Dehlin [00:16:51] I think he's mocking. I think you have a troll. Joel, thank you for coming on. It's Jody.

Guest 3 [00:17:01] This is John de Lynn.

John Dehlin [00:17:03] Yeah, sorry it's taken so long to take your call.

Guest 3 [00:17:06] Oh, no, that's okay. I'm just getting a little impatient here. But I'm glad you called me. Thank you so much.

John Dehlin [00:17:11] Yeah. We're here for you, Jody. How's it going?

Guest 3 [00:17:14] It's going pretty good. I'm not calling to argue with you or anything. I just wanted to tell you what. What a difference your podcast has made to me. I had this huge crisis of faith about a year ago, and a good friend of mine who is being me on the chat, he keeps putting my name, Jody, at the end of everything. He cued me into your podcast and it's really, really made a difference for me. So I just wanted to tell you. Thank you so much.

John Dehlin [00:17:43] Oh, that's for me.

Guest 3 [00:17:46] That's for you.

John Dehlin [00:17:47] Oh, thank you so much, Jodi. I appreciate it. It's wonderful to hear that.

Guest 3 [00:17:54] I wanted to ask you a question, though.

John Dehlin [00:17:57] Sure, please.

Guest 3 [00:17:59] I've had a couple issues. Probably the same typical hot issues that drive Mormon or ex Mormons or in between Mormons crazy. And I wondered what was the typical couple doubts that you hear most of the time? Like, what are the standard 30 something people in the church doubts that you hear?

John Dehlin [00:18:21] Yeah. So what are the things that make people start questioning?

Guest 3 [00:18:26] Sure. Or once they question a little bit, that push them over the edge even?

John Dehlin [00:18:31] It's different for a lot of people, I think. I think polyandry is probably number one. Is that your experience, John Larsen?

John Larsen [00:18:38] Yeah.

Guest 5 [00:18:39] Well,

John Larsen [00:18:41] yeah, no, I think. I think most Mormons don't know about polyandry, but I think today most women in the church who know about it have a problem just with plain old vanilla polygamy.

John Dehlin [00:18:51] Right, right. Yep. So that's a big one. Book of Abraham is Big for some people. DNA in the Book of Mormon is big for some people. I'll be honest with you, Prop 8 has been huge. I am stunned by how many people have left the church or resigned the church over Prop 8. And that I think that may go down as one of the biggest things. And I think that number is going to grow, not shrink over time. Also, multiple versions of the first vision is a pretty popular one.

Guest 3 [00:19:24] No, all those things were totally doubts for me. But I remember being in the MPC and freaking out like two weeks before I left on my mission because I couldn't, you know, resign myself to our church being such a polygamous church. And it's always bothered me since I was, you know, five years old and learned about the, you know, that was probably the first thing for me. But one thing I just wanted to ask you one more question is I know that you said, stay Mormon. It's who we are, it's our roots. I mean, not for everybody. You're not counseling everybody. But you say, you know, it's a culture now, it's who we are. Have you heard a lot of people who say that's helped them a lot? That idea that they don't have to choose, you know, 100% in or 100% out, but that they can stay in and kind of buffet style the religion has. That helped a lot of people? Because I know that it's really helped me.

John Dehlin [00:20:24] Yeah. Well, I talked a little about this at the opening of the podcast, but I do think Stale DS has helped hundreds, maybe even thousands of people in their journey. But I think that for many of the people I've interacted with, it hasn't been a viable medium to long term. In other words, it can help them reduce their anger, it can help them minimize the collateral damage, it can help them go slowly until they get to the point where they're ready to take more courageous steps. But because the church is so incessantly strident about being the one and only true church, because it's so focused on Joseph Smith, because it's so focused on exclusive authority, and because culturally it's so hostile right now in many places, to liberals, to political liberals, to social liberals, people end up feeling like to remain an active member and to be silent is like being in Germany in 1940, watching them throw the bodies on the. On the pile and just staying quiet. And so most of the people find the Stale DS position over time, medium to long term just isn't tenable on the grounds of integrity alone.

Guest 3 [00:21:48] So that's kind of interesting that these. Because you've interacted with so many people, you've, you know, your idea from the beginning has kind of changed into something different because this isn't what you were saying in the beginning, is it?

John Dehlin [00:22:00] No.

Guest 5 [00:22:01] Yeah.

Guest 3 [00:22:02] Experience has taught you that it's maybe not sustainable.

John Dehlin [00:22:07] Yeah. Because, I mean, ultimately you feel a lot of people feel like they're living a lie. And I was accused of that for a long time. And I, you know, I felt influenced by Eugene England, I felt influenced by Lil Bennion, I felt influenced by James Fowler. And I really wanted to make that work for myself and I wanted to make it work for others because something that's different for me than others. I've loved my church experience. I feel grateful for it. Overall, I've had wonderful leaders and a great time and I still love going. So I just really wanted to make it work for people and I wanted to see the church just stop doing the bad stuff and just focus on the good stuff. So that's plus I was seeing so much damage by people just leaving that I wanted to find a way to minimize that damage. So those were a lot of the motivations going into stale ds. And I still think it's working for a lot of people. And it may be that it just happens that I only talk to the people for whom it doesn't work. But I would say for the majority of people that I've talked to, it's just not sustainable on integrity grounds.

Guest 3 [00:23:11] Fair enough. I'm only about one year into the huge breakdown of faith and trying to rebuild it to something. So I'll have to let you know how it goes in the long term.

John Dehlin [00:23:23] I don't want to discourage you and I don't want to discourage others. I think I want people to do whatever makes them happy. You know what I mean?

Guest 3 [00:23:29] Sure. I think in a way I'm lucky being a single lds. I don't know because I don't have to deal with that spouse issue of being a non believer or a questioner and having a spouse. I think that's maybe the one Mormon blessing is not being, you know, not being married. Because in the Mormon Church it's all or nothing married or you're sort of an outcast as a single person. But I feel lucky that I'm not.

John Dehlin [00:23:57] Right.

Guest [00:23:59] Yeah.

Guest 3 [00:23:59] Anyway, I just, I just wanted to tell you thank you.

John Dehlin [00:24:02] Oh, well, thanks, Jody. Thank you so much.

Guest 3 [00:24:05] Okay, get back to those other callers. They need to debate with you.

John Dehlin [00:24:09] I think our callers are tired out.

Guest 3 [00:24:12] Okay.

John Dehlin [00:24:12] Jody, it's great to talk to you.

Guest 3 [00:24:15] Thank you.

John Dehlin [00:24:15] Thanks for calling. All right, John Larsen, I bet you're ready to go now.

John Larsen [00:24:21] I'm still alright. Hey, the one, one last thing I want to, you know, the question came up, you know, what are the issues that, that send a lot of people reeling in the church? I think we tend to always reel off the issues that people find after they start having problems with the church. You know, like something like Helen Mark Kimball. Well, most members had known nothing about that until they already have a problem. I would think there's really three things in the church that are impacting the members. We're talking about the normal everyday members in the pews. The first one is racism, sexism. It doesn't play very well anymore. I think people in the church still have a big problem with pre1978 and the teachings that still go on today and the, and the misogyny that's in the church. I think a lot of people have trouble with that. I think the constant insistence on obedience doesn't play well in American culture anymore. And I think especially people under 40 have a huge problem with that. And then the last one is the exclusive claims. You know, that's something even 30 years ago when I was a kid, people didn't have any problem with. And now I don't think a lot of members who consider themselves totally tbm, I don't think they feel comfortable with that exclusive claim. We're the one and only true church. I think those three things more send people into those other issues. But I really don't think polygamy actually pulls that many people out of the church, just per se.

The Hardest Doctrinal Issues for Doubting Members

John Dehlin [00:25:48] You might be right about that, John. I'll tell you what, the one and only true church thing is by far the hardest thing for me.

John Larsen [00:25:58] Yeah, you're old enough to know that the rhetoric has changed. I mean, considerably. That shows that the culture is changing. How? There's a lot of things that the temple and all that have changed really drastically about that. When you see big shifts in the church, you know, something's going on underneath the surface.

John Dehlin [00:26:21] Right. Anyway, I was saying, I think you're totally right about some of those things. Gender issues is huge. I'm surprised how many women. I mean, have you ever thought about the fact that, you know, blacks got the vote before women and it just seems like women always come last and isn't it amazing how few women in the church care that they can't fully participate?

John Larsen [00:26:54] You know, Zilpha says it never bothered her My mom says it doesn't bother her. You know, one thing on the women in the church issue, that from the opposite side, you know, we all know that churches all over the United States and all over the west and even into the east, like Japan, are losing members. You know, religion is bleeding members to secularism, but the statistics show that's happening much more with men than women. So more men are leaving their faith. One of the brilliance or the strategic elements of Mormonism that made it successful is it gave men something that appealed to men, and that's accolade and authority. You know, where I think for a lot of women, they don't dig on that as much as men did. So one of the reasons Mormonism was successful, especially up through the, you know, the 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, and 70s, kind of the heyday of Mormonism, was because it. It tapped into that male thing. And the culture would change significantly if you gave women the priesthood,

John Dehlin [00:27:57] right? Yeah. Yeah, it could.

Guest 6 [00:27:58] Really.

John Dehlin [00:27:58] I mean, I've. I've heard in one of my early episodes I released called A Gift Given, A Gift Taken Away, it talked about how women used to do healing with the laying on of hands. They used to do washings and anointings before birth. And at some point in the early 1900s, some of the brethren leaders in the church felt like the men weren't really stepping up. And there was a strategic decision made to keep the. To kind of enclose the priesthood on the men, only to make sure that they step up and feel like they have a real significant role to play. And if that theory is true, then then maybe it is true because men. How many times does a man stop working when his wife works and kind of become a lazy slob?

John Larsen [00:28:46] Well, it happens more often than the reverse happens, of course.

John Dehlin [00:28:49] Right.

John Larsen [00:28:50] You know, so I think things like, you know, I'm going to sound sexist here, but things like sitting up on the stand are things that appeal to men much more than they appeal to women. And so I think the church was successful in garnering that because men like to climb that ladder. They like to be the silverback, much more so than women do. And I think one of the reasons of the church, one of the reasons for the church's success is it played to that sex role that the men liked. And to give that up would cause serious change. And I think that's some of the change we're seeing in the community of Christ.

John Dehlin [00:29:22] Right? Yeah, it's crazy. It's tricky to mess with big organizations and culture and stuff.

John Larsen [00:29:29] Oh, I mean, it would be really hard. I mean, you know, I've thought before. I'm sure you have. You know, if they suddenly called me in and said, all right, Mr. Smarty Pants, what do you think we should do? You know, I don't know what to.

John Dehlin [00:29:42] Yeah, man, I'm going to ask you this question. I should have had this planned. If you were. If you were a prophet.

John Larsen [00:29:50] I never said I wasn't a prophet. Let's keep it the president of the

John Dehlin [00:29:52] church, because president of the church and you were to. If you were president of the church and I were to. And your job is to make the church stronger, and the only rules would be that stronger had to mean more attendance and increase in tithing receipts. What changes would you make to improve the church? Have you ever thought about that?

John Larsen [00:30:18] Well, I mean, you're framing the question more even. Like, let's say that I wanted to liberalize the church and let's say I'm a new member of the 12, and then all of them die off and suddenly I'm the president of the church. Well, I think the real risk you face is not losing like the liberals. It's having a break off schism, a sort of Glenn Beckish thing that if you liberalize the church too fast, you might fall. Feed the conservatives into sort of fundamentalism. And that's something that the church has to, you know, if they suddenly gave the women the priesthood today or, you know, allowed homosexuals to have some sort of recognized participation in the church, there would be a schism. Sizable. I think it'd be less than 5%, but it'd probably be around 5%. That's a huge number. And it's not just about tithing receipts. So it's a difficult line to walk of how to liberalize versus. And the same thing happens if you swing more conservative. You're going to lo. You're liberal.

John Dehlin [00:31:19] Exactly.

John Larsen [00:31:22] So tithing, you know, the church needs to. And it has been sort of. It needs to wean itself off of the business side. Because I think then that that sort of creeps in and I think implied in your question, there's a lot of fiduciary thinking that should be more ecumenical.

John Dehlin [00:31:38] Right. So that's a long way of saying you don't have any answers.

John Larsen [00:31:43] No, no. And you know, and to me, it's a weird question because I don't believe that. I don't believe the church, for example. I honestly 100% do not believe the brethren talk to Jesus Christ. I believe they go a long ways to make it seem like they do without actually talking about.

John Dehlin [00:32:03] Wait, John, start over. You said you honestly do not believe.

John Larsen [00:32:06] What, that the Brethren talk to Jesus or whatever. You know, a lot of Mormons believe that the Brethren. As you get further up in rank, then the clarity with which you're talking to heaven increases. And I don't think that's the case, for obvious reasons, but I think they let it be implied that they do. I think that's sort of a dishonest act. So I think there's sort of this whole dishonesty up at the top that has to be fixed before you can even start shaping or pushing the organization. So it's sort of like asking, what would you do if you were the head of R.J. reynolds? Well, I don't think tobacco production is a good business. I would shut it down. So, unfortunately, if I was head of the church, I'd probably have to shut it down. But then they would. They would. They would be. The schism.

John Dehlin [00:32:53] Right? Yeah. So it's basically just a hard question.

Guest [00:32:57] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:32:58] All right, we've got Sarah on the line. Sarah, you've been very patient.

Guest 5 [00:33:02] Hey, can you hear me?

John Dehlin [00:33:03] Yes.

Guest 5 [00:33:04] Oh, thank goodness. I'm so sorry for those difficulties. I could not figure anything out.

John Dehlin [00:33:09] No, early on, it was my fault. I wasn't logged into the right Skype account, so bouncing off. So next time I'll make sure to have that right then. Next time you called and you were muted.

Guest 5 [00:33:20] Yeah, I was. I. Yeah, totally my fault. But, yeah, I'm glad to be talking to you. And I have to kind of echo. Jody from earlier Mormon stories has been really, really helpful for me, and so I'm just. I'm just glad.

John Dehlin [00:33:35] Oh, well, thanks. Thanks so much.

Guest 5 [00:33:38] You bet. You bet. So I kind of just had a. A question for you and for the other. John. I don't listen to Mormon expressions as much, so I don't know, but it seems like one really big taboo in the church is just the temple and everything surrounding the temple, and that has been one of the more difficult things for me in my Mormon life and just trying to figure out where I stand with that and how it works for me and everything. Have either of you ever tried having a. Having a podcast about the temple? And. And with what success do you think that's even something people want to go into? Like, how. Where do you think that is on the spectrum of a concern or an issue for. For the general Mormon populace? I guess.

Temple Experiences and a Collaborative Temple Project

John Dehlin [00:34:27] You know, I'm surprised at how many people didn't like the temple. When they first met, went and never liked it afterwards, words. I would guess that that's the majority of active Mormons today. You can kind of tell that just by the lack of attendance at War Temple Night. But, yeah, I think that's a huge issue for so many people, and I think I'd be open to doing a podcast on it at some point. I mean, it's been on hbo, it's all over the Internet now. And by the way, I'm curious, are we bound to not reveal things that have been discontinued from the temple? Like, if they were discarded as Masonic relics, are we still bound to not reveal them? At some point, we have to get rid of all the taboos, I think. What do you think, Sarah? You think I would be foolish?

Guest 5 [00:35:21] No, I don't. I mean, the thing for me that was really surprising is that before I went to the temple, everybody, you know, all young women leaders, all my relatives would just talk about how, you know, what happens in the temple is sacred, and we don't talk about it like that was the end. And then when I went to the temple, to me, it seemed so clear, like there were certain things that it was like, you are bound not to talk about this, but it was, I mean, percentage wise, very, very little of the temple ceremonies, it seemed to me, were under that. Under that bond. And so it's just. I think it's unusual and maybe just a result of, you know, better safe than sorry. But there's so much that it seems like we could talk about and prepare people for and discuss in our regular church meetings or in family relationships or something, that would be fine. But I mean, maybe just like the now disregarded or the now disavowed parts of the ceremony, it's just like we better not talk about anything just in case. I don't know what the thinking is there, but it was surprising to me the first time I went through.

John Dehlin [00:36:25] Yeah. John Larsen, what do you think about the temple?

John Larsen [00:36:28] We've had a lot of conversations on the backside about dealing with the temple and what we decided to do. We have a project we've been working on for a few months. It's actually been on the back burner. We are working, and because of the sensitive nature of it, we're actually writing it out in a script. We're scripting the whole thing to have a podcast that we're actually going to.

John Dehlin [00:36:49] Wait, what are you worried about? What are you worried about? Why not just do it?

John Larsen [00:36:52] Because what it needs to be is it needs to do exactly what we're talking about here. For example, there are things that have been left in the temple where they have pulled out the context from previous versions so they no longer make sense. And I'm not even talking about in 1990. There's things from way before that are still there that I would guess that most of the membership doesn't even know about. So no one is explained what's going on in the temple. The reason we're being very careful is we want to do a service which is have a podcast that explains the temple without revealing anything you're not supposed to reveal, which is actually very small, but is very sensitive and clear on the topic. So we're trying to be very, very careful because I want it to be something that a non member could listen to and sort of try to understand the temple, but also somebody who's going to go through the temple could listen to and then understand what's going on in there. So that's why we're trying to be very careful. But yeah, we've avoided temple stuff. I've cut it out of the podcast sometimes and it is a big taboo. And when you start breaking taboos, things get a little dicey. I don't think the Church is going to excommunicate me, but they might for that.

John Dehlin [00:38:14] Yeah. In fact, I know John Charles Duffy, I think, was excommunicated for a website that he put up talking too much about the temple ceremony. So I think that would get me excommunicated.

John Larsen [00:38:26] So if I'm going to get excommunicated for it, fine. I just want to make sure that I'm getting excommunicated for something I really believe in.

John Dehlin [00:38:32] Like,

John Larsen [00:38:35] I've used the example before. I'll say it again. I got a copy about a year into my mission of, of the Masonic Temple, the Masonic ceremony, and it didn't impact my testimony at all. It helped me understand the Temple because it explains some of the grips and other things that are in there because they have Masonic origins. It wasn't a negative thing at all. So many people are going to the temple and nobody at all ever explains what's going on. I think that can be really important for everybody concerned. But there's some stuff that's hard to research because the Church has done itself a disservice by burying some of it.

John Dehlin [00:39:17] Yeah, yeah. But Sarah, I think it's totally an issue. I'll never forget a woman that I met once who she's getting her PhD, very intelligent, very devout, she decides that she's single, she decides she Wants to go to the temple. So she goes to temple prep class, like, three times. Feels like she totally is prepared for the temple. She happens to be a radical feminist, but a devout believer.

Guest 5 [00:39:50] Totally.

John Dehlin [00:39:51] And she goes to the temple for the first time and, you know, here's the part about, you know, women submitting to their husband or something to that effect. And just. It's like her soul gets split in half because she wants to run out of the room because it violates every shred of integrity this woman has in feeling like men and women should be equal and never be subservient. Yet there's all this pressure around her to. Yeah, to keep going. So she goes.

Guest 5 [00:40:28] I mean, I was just gonna say, you know, you can leave, like, you should never really submit to a covenant that you don't feel good about. And I understand that, but my goodness, the pressure in there with your family and the ceremony of it all, I mean. Yeah, I can totally relate to that. That's really hard.

John Dehlin [00:40:46] Yeah. And in her case, she. She went ahead and went through the whole thing, Went home and cried and cried and cried. Felt like she had betrayed her conscience. Went back a couple weeks later to see if maybe she just missed something, had a horrible experience, went back home, folded up her garments, put them in the. You know, put them in the drawer and wrote her letter of resignation.

Guest 5 [00:41:11] Oh, my goodness.

John Dehlin [00:41:12] Yeah. Totally sad story.

Guest 5 [00:41:14] Yeah. Yeah. I mean, as far as the feeling, you know, just the feeling. Feeling conflicted, I guess. And those emotions, that has been really hard for me. And I think from talking to friends, it's been really hard for some of them too. And I just. I can't help but think that if we could just talk about the stuff that is totally okay to talk about, as far as I can tell beforehand, people could figure out if they wanted to take more time, you know, or if they wanted to research a little, and then there wouldn't be this stress. I don't know, maybe that's. I'm kind of an idealist like that, but gotta be a better way.

John Dehlin [00:41:54] I think something I've been feeling lately is, you know, like, 8, 19 years old or 21 years old or 24 years old is a pretty young age to be making the level of commitments that you make in the temple, because some of them are pretty hardcore. And it seems to me like before. Before you make this pressure field commitment where all your family and friends are there to watch, where to say you're not up to the commitment means that you're going to embarrass Yourself and all your friends and family and make a scene and walk out in the middle of this event that lots of people have come to see. It seems like you should be told what the commitments are beforehand, and the

John Larsen [00:42:43] whole event is tied to something else. You know, like normally you go to the temple either right before you get married or right before you go on a mission. So you've got something else that's big, that's hanging on that. Yeah. So the cost of rejecting that or walking out is extremely high socially.

John Dehlin [00:43:02] Yeah, it's impossibly high. In fact, it puts people in this double bind where they have to either lie and be dishonest or totally embarrass themselves and do something that would be shocking to everybody. And that's just. That's just not a nice thing. That's not a nice situation for people.

John Larsen [00:43:22] It took me going through six or seven times where I even understood it, you know.

John Dehlin [00:43:26] So now you got it, right?

John Larsen [00:43:29] Well, probably not, but, you know, it's, you know, to even. Even to go back two or three times, you probably still. Because, you know, it's a little bit odd. It's a little bit. And, you know, this goes to my point I was making a few minutes ago, talking about the things that are not working in the church anymore. I think the temple is a big problem for the church. I think that for people under 40, under 45, it's not spiritual for most people. For the vast majority, I don't think that was true, say, 90 years ago or 120 years ago. I think people found it to be a spiritual experience, the pinnacle of Mormonism. I think culture has changed so much that it just does not speak to people of the last couple generations. And that's why the church has been changing it as often as they have lately, trying to figure out what to do with it. It's a big problem for them because I don't think it's what people expect, and I don't think most people find it a very spiritual experience.

John Dehlin [00:44:21] You know, wouldn't it be fantastic, and this is just me dreaming, if the church would turn the temple into something actually inspirational and motivational.

John Larsen [00:44:32] You mean like the community of Christ?

John Dehlin [00:44:35] I don't know what they do in their temple. What do they do in their temple?

John Larsen [00:44:38] Well, they open it up. You know, they have. They don't. They don't do the, you know, the Masonic, you know, Joseph Smith ceremony. But, you know, you can have a high school graduation in there. It's a beautiful building. Everybody can go into it, but they Treat it more like a tabernacle. More like the Kirtland model. As opposed to the Nauvoo model.

John Dehlin [00:44:57] No, but I'm talking about like the church is. If the church is good at anything, it's good at making you feel good when it wants to. So why not come up with movies or theater or even just spiritual events that you can go to the temple and just get an extra boost of spirituality?

John Larsen [00:45:17] Well, I always wanted to go to the temple just to pray, because that's what I thought it was about without having to sit there and watch the film. And, you know, it's very structured. I don't think most people realize how structured it is in there. It's not something you just go hang out at.

John Dehlin [00:45:29] Yeah, no, it's true.

Guest 4 [00:45:33] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:45:33] And sometimes they tell you, don't stay too long in this or that room, or, you know, it's discouraged to just go and just meditate, which is also sad. It's like they don't want you along with your own thoughts a little bit. Well, Sarah, you're delightful. I hope you call more.

Guest 5 [00:45:52] Yeah, I. Yeah, I would love to. I. I really am enjoying Mormon stories a lot.

John Larsen [00:45:57] So.

Guest 5 [00:45:58] Yeah, thank you both for me on letting me talk to you.

John Dehlin [00:46:02] Yeah. Well, please call again and let's meet sometime if we haven't met.

Guest 5 [00:46:07] Yeah, you told you owe me an ice cream cone. I listened to that episode, so. So maybe we can do that.

John Dehlin [00:46:12] All right. Come to Logan.

Guest 5 [00:46:14] Okay, sounds good. Thank you.

John Dehlin [00:46:16] Check out. Check out Mormon expression.

Guest 2 [00:46:17] It's.

John Dehlin [00:46:17] It's. It's pretty good.

Guest 5 [00:46:19] Will do. Thank you, too, John Larsen. I appreciate it.

John Larsen [00:46:22] Thanks a lot.

Guest 3 [00:46:23] Yep.

Guest 6 [00:46:26] I'm a friend of Jody's over at school. Hey, Seth, tell me about your show. So I want to give you a Congratulations on your first episode.

John Dehlin [00:46:33] Thanks.

John Dehlin [00:46:34] Where are you calling from, Seth?

Guest 6 [00:46:36] I'm calling up at school with Jody.

John Dehlin [00:46:39] Oh, cool. Well, thanks for. Thanks for calling in.

Guest 6 [00:46:42] Yeah, you bet. You bet. Well, I understand that you and I share maybe somewhat similar backgrounds. I'm an agnostic Mormon, I guess you could say. But I'm a strong advocate of, you know, playing the Mormon role and going to church and raising a Mormon family. And I understand that you have some theological concerns that make you little bit less happy with. With it. But I wanted to. I wanted to find out, you know, what are your reasons for continuing?

An Agnostic Mormon's Reasons for Staying at Church

John Dehlin [00:47:22] Oh, I kind of addressed this earlier, but I. I love going to church. I love the people at church. I enjoy sacrament meeting almost always. I love the hymns. I love the spiritual traditions. I still feel spiritually fed. When I go to sacrament meeting, I still love General Conference overall and feel spiritually fed there. I love the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and my family likes it. And I want to be with my family. It doesn't feel good to just, you know, split off from them. And I still like some of the teachings. And, you know, to the extent that I still believe in God, I still feel inspiration in the church, and so I still go, but I don't go every Sunday.

Guest 6 [00:48:12] Well, I can understand that. You know, I have small kids, and so I sort of try to make them as much of that as possible. Just like I said, it's pragmatic reasons. I think that there's nothing, there's no other organization that can give us access for service. And, you know, if I've learned anything and if there's anything true, it's that you got to love one another and you got to serve one another. And I don't even know if that's true. But if there's anything true, it's to be charitable. And I don't think there's an organization that gives us more access to that than Mormonism.

John Dehlin [00:48:48] Yeah, I'm of the belief that the church has a lot of good, still more good than bad. Although when it goes bad for someone, it can often be catastrophic. So that's why I do what I do. It's for the 5 or 10% whom the church is fatal. I want to develop more empathy and love and understanding for those people, and that's why I do what I do. But I still believe the church is more good than bad. John, do you have an opinion on that?

John Larsen [00:49:16] No, I agree. If it works for you, do it. And really, the church itself needs to decouple what it is from the truth value of what it is. I think most religions have grown beyond that. But point. And they would be a much better organization for doing so because then people can more focus on that. Because, you know, you're right, there's a lot of good things. There's a lot of things I miss. I don't go to church very often, but, man, I can't get beyond all the constant saber rattling about the, you know, obedience in the exclusive, exclusive claims to truth. So. So, yeah, but I think the church works for a lot of people and works keep doing it.

Guest 6 [00:49:57] Yeah, right. I'm on about that. I mean, yeah, there's some obnoxious truth claims that we make way too strong of claims and too often. But I sort of dismiss most of the theological teachings, any kind of Mystical element of the church really is insignificant to me. So concerns on that level are just not interesting enough for me to kind of like deal with it. I think on a traditional level it creates the backbone of my family's morality and I come from a strong tradition of Mormons. And that enough, I think, is reason to go along with it. And the theological concerns are really just all of its fantasy, in my opinion. And so it's easily dismissed without feeling, you know, concerned about it. Even though it's obnoxious. I'm very pragmatic about my position and, you know, my enthusiasm for the organization.

John Dehlin [00:51:00] So it doesn't grate on you sometimes?

Guest 6 [00:51:03] No, it doesn't matter to me at all. I mean, my, I'm not antagonistic as a result of, as a result of it. I mean, yeah, okay, it's obnoxious, but it doesn't make me antagonistic towards the organization. I mean, because essentially you're not, in my view, I don't think that you can find a better place where there's good intentions and good teachings in such abundance. And maybe I'm wrong about that, but I mean, my experience is that, you know, there's an abundance there and my family's identity, my identity are tied to the organization and the teachings. And that's enough. I mean, it's not worth going through an identity crisis and searching out a new organization that might do it a little better. Even if that did exist just simply because of the rich amount of history.

John Dehlin [00:52:04] And you've never confronted feeling like you weren't being honest or, you know, if you don't have a temple recommend, being a second class citizen for not having one. I mean, I,

Guest 6 [00:52:17] well, I mean, those are good questions. And you know, a lot of my orthodox friends are troubled by my position because I hold a simple recommend. And even though I, you know, I'm virtually faithless, I mean, I would say I'm agnostic, but if push comes at a shove, I can send help. And I think that that can be, you know, exaggerated in the faith and enough to get, you know, to the temple with my wife when I need to. But I don't want to. I don't mean I, like, I don't find a lot of enjoyment out of the temple. I mean, I'd rather go to a mountain or something, but there's family ceremonies you want to attend and every other way I'm worthy to go and because I support teachings, you know.

John Dehlin [00:52:57] So how do you keep from feeling like you're not being dishonest during your Temple recommend interview you?

Guest 6 [00:53:02] Well, because, I mean, I'm not. I'm not an atheist. I'm not. I'm not convinced that there's nothing out there. I'm just not. I just don't think it's possible to know.

John Dehlin [00:53:13] But the interview kind of asks for an affirming belief.

Guest 6 [00:53:17] Well, they're asking for a belief, but I think that I can say that I'm hopeful and. And that for me is a spectrum that lands on the spectrum of faith. And I know that you can get into a theological argument of whether hope is faith or not, but I think that for me, it's enough. It doesn't matter. Enough for me to say no and lose out on some great benefits of being a temple holding member.

John Dehlin [00:53:44] No, I totally. I totally understand that point of view and I think if you can feel good about it, then if it works for you, then that's awesome. And I'm still there. I still have a temple recommendation.

Guest 6 [00:53:58] Good for you. Good for you. Well, again, I appreciate what you guys are doing, and congratulations on your first episode. Jody saw me at school and ran into me just now and said that I'd be a perfect caller.

John Dehlin [00:54:15] No, we really appreciate your call because I don't want people to lose heart in the stale DS position if that's something that they really need to do or want to do. So I'm glad you're calling to represent it. So thanks for. Thanks for calling in. Seth, right?

Guest 6 [00:54:30] Yeah, that's right.

John Dehlin [00:54:31] All right, Seth, good luck and check back in a year or earlier and let us know how things go.

Guest 6 [00:54:37] Right on that.

John Dehlin [00:54:38] Okay, thanks for calling. All right, Cole, you got John Larsen and John de Lynn.

Gay Mormons, Suicide, and Proposition 8

Guest 2 [00:54:44] Hey, sorry it took a while to get in. I have a question. Recently, there's been a big surge in gay Mormon young men.

Guest 3 [00:54:50] Can

Guest 2 [00:54:52] I know. Last night I was on a conference call with a bunch of friends. We all banded together and helped find a friend who had attempted to commit suicide and were able to save his life last night. And unfortunately, things like that don't happen. And in the last few months, we lost a lot of young men to suicide, especially in Utah. What can the church do to curb this problem or to put an end to it?

John Dehlin [00:55:15] Yeah, that's a great question, John. Do you want to go first?

John Larsen [00:55:19] It's a tough issue, and from my understanding, the young gay men have a high suicide rate outside the church. Also, I know that the church's position is not helping those young men cope. I'm not exactly sure how much of the fault we can lay Specifically at the church. Obviously the church does not cater to young gay men. But I don't think the church is specifically doing things that would make them commit suicide other than the already terrible position they're in. I'm not trying to let the church off the hook.

Guest 2 [00:55:54] A lot of actions with Proposition 8 have caused a lot of problems for people, especially in the church and outside of the church. You know, contributing 80% of multi million dollars to an election, really to take away rights of people, even members of your church is pretty troubling.

John Larsen [00:56:09] Lot of people, yeah. Yeah, I'm going to assume, I'm going to go out on a limb and assume that the gay LDS young men who are committing suicide are doing so because of a feeling of zero self worth of feelings from the church that they are flawed, that they're an abomination and all that stuff. And the only thing the church can do is stop teaching that baloney. I mean, they've got and the church has to back away from that. The church first thing could do is say, all right, they have already taken some baby steps this way, but say all right, homosexuality is real. You can't excommunicate them, you can't bar them from taking the sacrament. They can have these callings and recognize them as real people, but the church is going to have a hard time with that. What are your thoughts, John?

John Dehlin [00:56:57] Yeah, I think that the day that the church legitimizes homosexual members, and when I say legitimizes them, I don't necessarily mean allows for gay marriage in the temple, but as soon as they're allowed to have callings, I think that that will probably lead to a pretty significant unraveling of activity and belief levels. I talked about this on the Carolyn Pearson podcast, but I kind of see three great strikes. You know, polygamy was one huge strike against the church in terms of the prophet saying one thing and then doing it about face and doing the complete opposite. And I think blacks in the priesthood represents a major second strike. And there are other major, there are other strikes that probably were viewed as major in their time, but I think homosexuality is going to be a third great strike to the church. And the minute they start. But I think they're inevitably going to have to, I think in 50 years they're going to receive the same type of pressure that they received by excluding blacks. And at some point either their tax exempt status is going to be threatened or they're going to find a generational problem where the common membership just demands it. It's going to be legalized in so many states and in so many countries, missionary efforts at some point are going to be jeopardized.

Guest 2 [00:58:24] And at that point they already are with the actions of Proposition 8. I know here in California, right after that, missionaries had the door slammed in their face. Not that that doesn't already happen. But I know in my community where I live, 60% of the members of my county, 60% of people, the citizens of my county voted against Proposition 8. So it made a really interesting place for missionary work here in this area.

John Dehlin [00:58:47] Yeah, I definitely think Proposition 8 has heard both activity rates and missionary efforts and I think it's going to continue to do so. No one's going to join the church because we're hard on gays, but a lot of people are going to leave because we're hard on gays.

Guest 2 [00:59:02] You know, John, participate in the whole missionary program. They're just going to be turned so turned off by it at the first glance. And it's interesting the social mormon.org thing they're doing where they're having everyone put these little censored profiles up about how, oh, by the way, I'm Mormon.

John Dehlin [00:59:19] Yeah. John, what were you gonna say?

John Larsen [00:59:20] I was just gonna say, I think you have a really good point. I, I've been in a lot of conversation with ex Mormons who talk about, oh, this thing's gonna bring down the church and this thing's gonna bring down the church and you know, they're gonna find out about the Book of Abraham or whatever. There's only one thing the church really is going to have a problem with and it's probably like you say, about 30 years off. And that is the homosexual issue. If you look at polls on acceptance of gay marriage for Americans, they skew age groups. So, you know, like, majority of 20 year olds don't have any problem with gay marriage at all, while a majority of 60 year olds have a huge problem with it. So as that generation grows up, the church is going to find itself further and further and further away from society. I don't think that, you know, the conservatives are afraid that the Gestapo is going to make them do this, that or the other. That's not going to be the case. It's just they're going to look stranger and stranger and stranger and the message won't apply. But the difference between this one and polygamy or blacks in the priesthood is there is no way out for the church. I don't think the church can legitimately fully recognize homosexuals without losing its doctrinal basis. I mean, it completely falls apart. So if anything is going to take the church down, this is it. And it'll probably be about 40 years from now.

John Dehlin [01:00:35] Yeah.

Guest 2 [01:00:35] A great documentary that was put together called eight the Mormon Proposition. It really looks into the church's involvement in Proposition 8. And a great movie to share with friends on DVD and on Netflix.

John Dehlin [01:00:49] Thanks, Cole. Yeah, it's a huge issue. I want to direct our listeners to my Carolyn Pearson podcast episode. It's five hours and Carolyn Pearson on this issue. I also did three hours with Bruce Bastian from Word Perfect on it.

Guest 2 [01:01:03] Couldn't be better people to speak on the issue than those two.

John Dehlin [01:01:06] And I also have Bill Bradshaw coming up. I've already done the interview in full high def. He's a former mission president to Vietnam, former member of Stake Presidency, lifelong BYU faculty member who not only talks about homosexuality, but he has a gay son and he talks about that and he talks about the biology of homosexuality as a biologist. And that's going to be a fantastic podcast as soon as Richard, my admin, produces it. Richard, get busy. What have you been doing the past couple weeks? Oh, sorry. He's the one who produces all my Carolyn Pearson, all my videos, and he set this whole calling infrastructure up.

Guest 2 [01:01:45] So.

John Dehlin [01:01:46] Richard, I'm just kidding. I love you, brother. Take as much time as you want. But anyway, I'm trying to do my small part, and some people think that Mormon stories is all gayed out. If I can not say something that sounds a little offensive, but there's not

Guest 2 [01:02:00] a bigger issue that needs to be talked about than this. There's a lot of discussion outside of the church and whether the church is a front group for the National Organization for Marriage as a front group to the Mormon Church. That would be interesting to see. No one really will talk about it, but there's a lot of talk about whether the church is a political front group for that organization. That organization.

John Dehlin [01:02:23] Yeah. The way I feel is. And I'll be honest, I probably would not have brought Mormon stories back and I probably would not have gone on ABC. Prop 8 flipped me. I was starting to feel comfortable with where I was with the church and just feeling like Mormon stories was ready to be done. Proposition 8 turned me radical because it just, you know, explain this to me. In America, okay, where we have a Bill of Rights that's founded upon the principle that minorities, that the majority should never take the rights away from a minority. We have a religious minority taking civil rights away from another minority that was bequeathed upon them by the law of A sovereign state. So we have a religious minority imposing their religious views, taking away civil rights of another minority in America. This is crazy. This is absolutely insane.

Guest 2 [01:03:25] The Perry v. Schwarzenegger case, the federal Prop 8 case, will be very interesting to watch as that makes its way up to the Supreme Court.

John Dehlin [01:03:32] Yeah, I'm hoping that that case is successful. Yeah, it's crazy. But here's how I feel. I am not going to be quiet on this issue, or when I die or when I'm old, I'll feel like I was silent and complicit in the violence. That's how I feel.

Guest 2 [01:03:54] And it just really turned a lot of people off. The church became political. You know, they push every year, you know, this big thing about being non political, and then all of a sudden they get involved.

Guest 3 [01:04:05] Huge political issue.

Guest 2 [01:04:07] And I'm so glad that I wasn't actively attending the church during Proposition 8, but I went back once right after one of the court decisions, and this lady's giving this talk, and I can't remember what the topic was, but it had nothing to do with Proposition 8. Maybe it was about prayer or something. And then all of a sudden she starts talking about Proposition 8. And as soon as she said that, I just walked out. I couldn't deal with it anymore. So this is an important issue that we need to share our stories about. And that's the way that we're going to change hearts and minds. By sharing our stories.

John Dehlin [01:04:39] That's right. Cole, I really appreciate you calling in. I hope you call again.

Guest 2 [01:04:42] I will. Thank you.

John Dehlin [01:04:43] All right, brother. Take care. All right, John Larsen. Well, we keep trying to quit, but people keep wanting more. What do we do when they want more? When the unwashed masses demand more, do you turn them away?

Closing Thoughts and Keeping the Podcasts Going

John Larsen [01:04:55] Well, at some point. Have you got somebody hanging on who wants to call?

John Dehlin [01:04:59] There was one other person that was going to call, but would you believe it's 11:30 Utah time and I'm stalling here to see if someone else calls. It's 11:30pm Utah time, which makes it 1:30 on the eastern coast and 10:30 Pacific time. We still have 37 people who are tuned in.

John Larsen [01:05:18] You know what I'm most upset about, John, is you pulled me into one of your three hour podcasts and you

John Dehlin [01:05:23] kept saying, let's keep going. What is wrong with you? I gave you so many opportunities to end this.

John Larsen [01:05:29] Well, I wanted to hang with the big dogs. I want to show that I was up to doing a three hour podcast and not just my penny. Annie, one hour.

John Dehlin [01:05:38] You're the big dog. You're the big dog, John.

John Larsen [01:05:41] Well, John, it's been a blast. I think we should do it again sometime. I sort of like the format. It's a lot of work, but. But hopefully it was worth it.

John Dehlin [01:05:51] I hope it's not too much editing for you.

John Larsen [01:05:55] Yeah, maybe you and I talk about how we're going to approach that, but we'll see. I want the big shout out to Richard, the man behind the curtain for the Mormon Stories podcast.

John Dehlin [01:06:06] Yeah, Richard's awesome. He's amazing.

John Larsen [01:06:10] He's the one who made this all take place. I just called in at 8:30 and thanks, Richard.

John Dehlin [01:06:16] Yeah, I'll tell Richard that if my wife ever broke up with me, Richard, I'm coming after you. Just kidding, Richard. Just kidding. Hey, I want to thank these listeners. I want to thank all these guys and gals that called in and who've been on the chat boards. I hope we can archive the chats because the chat conversation in and of itself is fascinating.

John Larsen [01:06:40] Oh, yeah, yeah, I've been watching it go buy the whole nine. It's been, it's been a kick.

John Dehlin [01:06:45] Well, listen, man, I'll just get, I'll leave you with one thought and that's that I, I, I want to figure out, like, sometimes I'll be honest, obviously, and I don't know if you'll own this as well, but, you know, when you guys came online, at first I felt a little bit, oh, that's hard to see someone else do a Mormon themed podcast. And, oh, are they going to be better? And you know, I initially felt a lot of competitive things and it's still hard when you guys do excellent work. It actually does discourage me sometimes, although I don't, I can't explain it, I don't like it, and sometimes it motivates me to do better. But I've tried really hard to keep a good relationship with you guys. Not because it's hard, but because I really want to crack Mormon culture wide open. I want us to collectively penetrate Mormon culture, Mormon consciousness, and just wake people up. You know, if all we do is make it so everyone knows the major issues and then people decide to join or believe in the church with full information, and then they do it because they really believe and want to believe, then I think that's fantastic. But I want to wrestle Mormon culture away from the church because I want Mormon culture to thrive regardless of the church, without the church's permission. And so, like, I would love to think about sometime what we could do to go bigger, you know, what I mean, do you ever think about that?

Guest 4 [01:08:17] Yeah, yeah.

John Larsen [01:08:17] We're always thinking about going bigger. Yeah, I agree with everything you're saying, you know, and it's time to pull it out of the memory hole. It's time to wrestle Mormonism away from the bureaucrats, really is what we need, that it's its own thing. The history is interesting, the people are interesting, and the church has left a field. The field is white, ready to harvest. John.

Guest 6 [01:08:45] Yeah.

John Larsen [01:08:45] And you and I can't do it alone.

John Dehlin [01:08:47] Yeah. So let's invite our listeners to help out. And John, I just want to say, dude, let's collaborate. Let's view each other as coopetition or compa. Friendly. What's the word? Friendly.

John Dehlin [01:08:59] Competition.

John Dehlin [01:09:00] I don't know. But let's coopetition, cooperation and competition simultaneously. What do you say?

John Larsen [01:09:05] Yeah, yeah, I think a little. A little tensions healthy, especially if it's perceived tension. But yeah, yeah, let's. Let's keep. Let's keep it moving forward.

John Dehlin [01:09:13] All right, brother, keep up the good work. Thanks for making this happen.

John Larsen [01:09:16] You too. Thanks for. Well, thanks for bringing your minions, man. All right.

Guest [01:09:21] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:09:22] And I'll end as you do and let people know that the conversation continues on mormonexpression.com website and on mormonstories.org thanks to all of you for joining in today. Please email us if you have any questions or thoughts and please continue to support us. Tell your friends and family. And I think at Mormon Stories we're going to do this at least monthly, so expect a monthly call in show. And it may be that every interview we do, we just have a call in segment with our guests. So, you know, expect this to continue. And John Larsen, I hope you'll come out again.

John Larsen [01:09:59] Yeah, yeah, sure.

John Dehlin [01:10:01] All right, brother, take care. And thanks again to all of you for listening.

John Dehlin [01:10:05] Thank you for joining us today on Mormon Stories. To comment on this episode or to discuss it with others, please check us out online@mormonstories.org if you want to find other friends, family members, former missionary companions, or ward members who approach Mormonism like you, consider adding me, John Dehlin, as your Facebook friend. This may seem like a strange idea, but many of my closest friends have discovered that they are not alone in their thoughts or feelings or family or even award situation through discovering mutual Facebook friends. Finally, to keep Mormon Stories alive, please consider a donation@mormonstories.net music on this episode was provided by Clayton and Sky Pixton.

John Dehlin [01:11:07] The nearer my God, nearer to the.

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