Another day I call and never speak
And you would say nothing's changed at all
And I can't feel much hope for anything
If I won't be there to catch you if you fall
Oh again
It seems we meet
In the spaces
In between
We always say
It won't be long
Oh but something's always wrong
Another game of putting things aside
As if we'll come back to them some time
A brace of hope, a pride of innocence
And you would say something has gone wrong
Oh again
It seems we meet
In the spaces
In between
We always say
It won't be long
Oh but something's always wrong
[Toad The Wet Sprocket - "Something's Always Wrong"]
The next milepost in my faith journey came in
late 2007. I was a young father, still only a few years out of law school,
trying to balance the increasing demands on my time at work, at home, and at
church. Because of the recommendation of a trusted friend, I decided to brave Rough
Stone Rolling — the new biography of Joseph Smith making waves in Mormon
circles. The book, while unabashedly apologetic, was my first confrontation
with troubling historical details about the prophet (details that I couldn’t
automatically dismiss), which threatened Joseph’s heroic portrayal in the
faith.
Up to this point, that heroic portrayal had
been the only version of Joseph I had known. And reading of this other version of
the man was jarring, traumatic even.
My testimony survived the ordeal (for a long
while yet). And eventually, I even told some that the experience had strengthened
my belief in God and his church — though I think that claim was more
aspirational than objectively true. Either way, this marked the beginning of my
shift toward a more nuanced faith.
Work-Life Balance
In the fall of 2007, Michelle and I were
living in La Mesa, California. Our little family had grown to four, and we were
renting a small two bedroom apartment across the street from the Amaya trolley
stop. We'd been in that rather dark apartment nearly a year, after opting to
leave behind the billable hour, as well as a near perfect ward and community in
Irvine (about 90 miles north).
 |
| The Clark Family - 2007 |
I was now a fledgling federal prosecutor in
San Diego — the job I'd hoped for since my first year of law school. Michelle,
in a selfless gesture I didn’t fully appreciate at the time, had supported the
career move, even though it meant a drastic pay cut and leaving behind a
network of friends.
I’ve always said that it felt like I'd won
the lottery landing that job. But even with my good fortune, I still faced
plenty of road bumps those first few years. In fact, I remember an awful lot of
morning trolley rides into work feeling a pit in my stomach about the coming
day.
Some of that was surely just part and parcel
with acclimating to my new responsibilities (and my near perpetual fear of
screwing something up). Some of it, too, was simply because I was an introvert
amongst what seemed to be a sea of extroverts in the office — most of whom
appeared to connect with each other (and the work) so much faster than I did.
Additionally, though, I felt intense pressure
(mostly internal but not always) to get home on time, to try to relieve an
often frazzled wife who'd spent the day in our dingy apartment with two very
active toddlers.
Granted, I had sold Michelle on the
notion that my career move meant I’d reliably be home more often. And to be
clear, I wanted to be home spending time with her and our kids. But
there was a bit more to it.
I've written before about how the church's
(God's) ideal of stay-at-home motherhood proved difficult for Michelle — how
she faithfully lived the ideal, despite the ideal often leaving her hollow and
unfulfilled. These frustrations came on top of the difficulties inherent in
rearing toddlers full-time, so Michelle understandably dealt with bouts of
unhappiness that often turned into outright depression.
Michelle's nagging melancholy, especially in
contrast to my idyllic career pursuit, often left me guilt-ridden.
Beyond the guilt, though, Michelle's
persistent unhappiness felt like my responsibility. And taking on that
responsibility was, after all, how I understood marriages were supposed to work
— even when her unhappiness wasn’t my fault. [In this, I took cues from
prophetic counsel, among other things.] In fact, in the years we’d
been together, I had rather prided myself on the lengths I could and would go
for Michelle’s comfort and happiness.
But my efforts never seemed to be enough to
"fix" things for Michelle — at least not in the long term. And no
matter how hard I tried, I typically felt like I was still, somehow, falling
short.
[In marriage counseling years later, I’d
learn the term for this: co-dependency. Turns out it’s not a healthy approach
to relationships.]
So, while my colleagues (few of whom had
young kids) seemed contented and willing to stick around the office as long as
necessary, I rarely felt like I could. Short of a trial or some emergency, I
was out the door by 5 pm each evening with almost religious devotion — racing to
catch the 5:10 trolley home.
All of this probably helps explain why I
spent those first few years at the US Attorney’s Office mostly feeling like I
was a step or two behind my peers.
To be sure, I don’t mean to suggest that we
didn’t still have lots of happy memories from that time period. These
were some of the golden years with our kids, when they were still small enough
to beg me to play "Daddy's Lion," and when they demanded bedtime
stories and songs. In these years, they also delighted to “sneak” out with me
for donuts, or to the grocery store, hunting sales on cold cereal and hidden
delights on the day-old bakery rack. And because we had a ground floor apartment,
these were the days we could wear out our little ones near bedtime with
energetic family dance parties.
 |
| Jared and Emily - 2007 |
My daily journal entries from this time
period are filled with so many precious moments with the kids. For example, one
Sunday, as I sat in Sunday School with little Emily on my lap (still too young
even for the nursery), I felt a wave of sadness to realize she had to grow up —
that she’d soon enough be off to nursery and too big to sit contentedly on my
lap. I wanted time to stand still with my daughter. And because I knew it
wouldn’t, I mourned the inevitable loss of my little girl.
Church Responsibilities
On top of my responsibilities at work and at
home, I was also the 2nd counselor in our ward's new bishopric. That calling
had come as quite the surprise because we were still so new to the ward, and
because I hardly talked to anyone at church. [In fact, I’d said little more
than “hello” to the man called to be bishop, but I was still somehow on his
radar (likely from bearing my testimony on fast Sundays)].
The calling initially felt like great
spiritual reassurance — God’s way of telling me I was on the right track! The bishop was such a good man, too, and his
other counselor so fun to joke with. I also kind of liked planning out and
conducting Sacrament meetings, as well as having a voice on issues facing the
ward.
[I was less thrilled with all of the extra
meetings, and having to extend callings and ask people to speak].
The calling, though, soon became yet another
area where I felt I was falling short. This was because one of my chief
assignments was over the youth programs in the ward, and it seemed I could
never give that assignment enough time or energy to satisfy anyone. [I know
this because youth leaders would sometimes tell the bishop as much]. It didn't
help that I really didn’t enjoy camp outs, but I enjoyed even less the
idea of leaving Michelle at home on weekends to care for the kids by herself.
So I usually found reasons to avoid the monthly campouts, and I also ducked out
of the weeknight gatherings as often as I could.
When it came down to it, I was just terribly
reluctant to be away from home any more than I had to be.
In one journal entry from this time period, I
described missing a weeknight bishopric meeting because Michelle had been sick.
The bishop called afterward to fill me in, and in that conversation, I ended up
admitting that I felt terrible about my failings with the youth. The bishop
didn’t contradict me, but he still expressed appreciation for my “grounding in
the gospel” and the support I had given him.
It felt like a timely expression of
gratitude, because I often sensed in those days that I was failing in all
the areas of my life that mattered.
In fact, even now when I think back on that
time period, I can still feel the heaviness of those years, the feeling that I
was barely hanging on.
The upside of that heaviness was that it made
me especially solicitous of Heaven. I knew I needed God's help, so I approached
daily scripture study less out of obligation than sheer desperation —
desperation to hear God’s voice of comfort and counsel, to win his favor through
faithfulness, and to merit his forgiveness, support, and protection. Michelle and
I together tried to do all the things we knew: dutiful weekly family home
evenings, nightly family prayer and scripture study, keeping the Sabbath day
holy, paying tithing and fast offerings, and faithfully ministering to our home
and visiting teaching families. And on those rare occasions when we had the
forethought and energy, we tried to attend the temple.
But more than all this, in what truly
felt like one of the greatest sacrifices of my life, I also gave up watching my
favorite TV show, Lost, midway through the third season — when I could
no longer rationalize away the nudges (from God) that some of the content was
inappropriate.
[I’m not kidding about how hard that was.]
When the calling into the bishopric came a
few weeks later, the timing left me with the strong suspicion that it was
because I had followed the prompting to stop watching Lost.
***
While we lived in La Mesa, Michelle and I
made friends with a few couples in the ward. One friend of mine was the ward
mission leader and a Church Education System (CES) institute teacher [i.e., he
was a church employee, paid to teach religion classes near Grossmont college].
This friend was extroverted in all the ways I wasn't, and he seemed as willing
as anyone to share the message of our faith at every opportunity (and
watching him work often left me feeling guilty because I wasn't also sidling up to
strangers in hospital waiting rooms and handing them “pass along” cards about
the church). We weren’t the best of friends (Michelle was closer with his
wife), but the two of us had bonded over discussions of church doctrine, and
the "secret" retracted talks of Boyd K. Packer.
The Joseph Smith I Knew
The next part of the narrative requires a bit
of background.
I had grown up in the faith only ever reading
and hearing stories of an idealized version of Joseph Smith. This version of
him came through in his own history (canonized in a volume of LDS scripture,
the Pearl of Great Price), his mother's biography of him, and other correlated
materials.
Joseph was the young boy who, facing a
painful leg operation, had refused alcohol as a form of anesthesia. He insisted
he could make it through the operation if only his father held him.
At 14 years old in Upstate New York, Joseph
felt intense interest and confusion over religion. He wanted to know which
church he should join. After reading in the New Testament (James 1:5) that he
could ask God, who "giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not,"
Joseph set out to the nearby woods to pray. There, he asked God which church he
should join, and in response, experienced the "First Vision."
According to the canonized version of that vision, Joseph saw both God the
Father and Jesus Christ. They told Joseph that he should not join any of
churches of the day — "for they were all wrong" and "all their
creeds were an abomination in [God's] sight" and their "professors
were all corrupt."
As I had always known it, the boy Joseph
thereafter experienced persecution from pastors and townsfolk, who derided him
simply for claiming to have seen a vision.
A few years later, Joseph had another vision
as he knelt in his bedroom one night, seeking forgiveness for his sins. This
time, an angel visited him (several times over the course of the evening),
giving various instructions. Among those instructions, the angel revealed
the location of gold plates, buried in a nearby hillside. The plates
contained the record of ancient inhabitants and their dealings with God.
After four years, the angel allowed Joseph to
retrieve and translate the plates by the "gift and power of God."
That record became scripture known as The Book of Mormon.
 |
| Church Magazine Cover Art Depicting Joseph's Translation of the Gold Plates - 2001 |
God thereafter instructed Joseph to restore
his church to the earth (it had been lost millennia earlier through apostasy),
and he became the church's first president and prophet. As prophet, he received
additional revelations (that mostly comprise the Doctrine & Covenants),
translated ancient Egyptian papyri (now the Book of Abraham in the Pearl of
Great Price), and even rendered his own "inspired" translation of the
Bible.
A loving husband and father, the Joseph Smith
I knew was the man pulled from his home at night by an angry mob, who tarred
and feathered him. After spending the night
cleaning up and nursing his wounds, Joseph preached a sermon the next day on
God's love and forgiveness (with several in the congregation who had been part
of the mob the night before).
Joseph didn't claim to be perfect, but there
seemed to be a perfection even in the way the stories and scriptures framed his
acknowledgment of imperfections.
Joseph was God's prophet on the earth, tasked
with restoring God's true church, priesthood, and ordinances to prepare for
Jesus Christ's Second Coming. In God's revelations (through Joseph), God had
promised to "stand by [Joseph] forever and ever" and that his people
"shall never be turned against [Joseph] by the testimony of
traitors." [D&C 122:3-4].
After Joseph's martyrdom at Carthage jail,
future church president John Taylor wrote (in what's now canonized in D&C
135) that Joseph "has done more, save Jesus only, for the salvation of men
in this world than any other man that ever lived in it."
Among the hymns we sang in church, there is
this vigorous ode to Joseph, "Praise to Man" (written by Joseph's
friend, William W. Phelps), that includes these stirring lines:
Praise to the man who communed with Jehovah!
Jesus anointed that Prophet and Seer.
Blessed to open the last dispensation.
Kings shall extol him, and nations revere
Praise to his memory he died as a martyr;
Honored and blessed be his ever great name!
Long shall his blood, which was shed by assassins
Plead unto heav'n while the earth lauds his
fame
Great is his glory and endless his
priesthood.
Ever and ever the keys he will hold
Faithful and true, he will enter his kingdom
Crowned in the midst of the prophets of old.
With each verse, there is also this rousing
chorus:
Hail to the Prophet, ascended to heaven!
Traitors and tyrants now fight him in vain.
Mingling with Gods, he can plan for his
brethren;
Death cannot conquer the hero again.
The Joseph Smith that I read of and knew,
whose stories had been told to me at home, at church, in the scriptures, and in
general conference was, indeed, a hero. In fact, by all accounts I had
ever known, he was a hero among heroes. And while I would have vehemently
denied that we worshipped him, our praise and veneration of the man probably
came as near as possible to worship without crossing the line.
It's hardly a coincidence that this is the exact
version of Joseph on display in this church produced, hour-long movie of his
life (that shows in the Legacy Theater in the Joseph Smith Memorial Building on
Temple Square).
From all I knew of the man, I idolized Joseph
(in the non-idolatrous sense). I wanted to be like him, and I was willing to
give my life for the church he restored.
"Some Things Are True That Are Not Very
Useful"
I've mentioned this before, but for my daily
religious study, I relied almost exclusively on correlated materials provided
by the church: the four volumes of scripture, sermons from the semi-annual
general conferences, church lesson manuals, and monthly magazines. This was by
design and in keeping with prophetic counsel. These were, after all, the materials that
would help draw me nearest to God and keep the Holy Ghost's companionship.
For better or worse, beyond these daily
efforts, I had little time or appetite for studying church history (outside of
what I found in these resources). I didn't necessarily begrudge those who did,
but I personally didn't see how church history would help with what I needed.
I had long since accepted that the Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was God's one true church on the earth (I had
felt that repeatedly over the years), and that the gospel of Jesus
Christ (as preached through Mormonism) was the one path to happiness in this
life and the next. So I had no interest in anything that threatened that
certainty.
Honestly, I just wanted help with being a
good husband and father — to lay claim to the promised blessings of peace and
fulfillment (that almost always seemed to elude me) in my marriage and family.
Arcane tidbits from church history weren't likely to help much with that.
In fact, I often used to (almost) boast that
I would only get around to studying church history after I had figured out
charity. Until then, I had little use for it.
It didn't help any that I'd also been
conditioned by apostle Boyd K. Packer to be wary of anything but the most
faith-promoting presentation of church history. A World War II veteran and
seminary teacher before becoming a church general authority in 1961, Packer
helped steer the church away from intellectual rigor toward the primacy of feelings
in determining spiritual truths.
In a famous 1981 address to church educators,
Packer, then an apostle, pushed for believing historians and educators to avoid
objectivity when writing and teaching church history. As he viewed it, they
were to be advocates (akin to attorneys representing the church), responsible
for building faith. In that role, he argued, it would be a "breach of
ethics, or integrity, or morality" to "collect[] evidence" [of
unfavorable facts of church and its leaders] and pass that information along to
"the enemy."
For Packer, this meant the church historian
and educator had a moral obligation to leave out stories and facts that
could undermine faith — that contradicted the correlated narrative of church
history: "There is a temptation for the writer or the teacher of Church
history to want to tell everything, whether it is worthy or faith promoting or
not. Some things that are true are not very useful." (emphasis
added).
[Packer apparently wasn't considering the
obligations of criminal prosecutors among the advocates he references. A
prosecutor’s obligation is to pursue zealous advocacy and objective
truth. They are also required, under caselaw interpreting the Constitution, to pass along to "the
enemy" evidence that is unfavorable to their case. In fact it is a
dangerous "breach of ethics, or integrity, or morality" to withhold
such information. Why? Because the law recognizes that, whatever one’s
motives, intentionally withholding negative or contradictory information
presents a distorted reality and works a deception. This is true in criminal cases when someone's liberty is usually at stake. Should it be any less the case with those claiming to hold the keys to our eternal salvation?]
Packer at one point recounted an incident with a church historian, presenting to college students, who "introduced many
so-called facts that put [the prophet] in a very unfavorable light."
Packer inferred that this historian's "purpose" was to persuade the
audience that the prophet "was a man subject to the foibles of men."
This approach may have weakened or destroyed faith, and it "[took] something
away from the memory of a prophet." Packer further claimed the historian
"was determined" "to prove that the prophet was a man."
Packer, instead, wanted historians who could
"convince us that the man was a prophet." (emphasis in original).
He then warned that historians who
"injure the Church" or destroy faith with this kind of "advanced
history" put themselves in "spiritual jeopardy." And if they are
members of the church "[they have] broken [their] covenants and will be
held accountable." If one does so and is also employed by the church, they
"accommodate the enemy" and are "a traitor to the cause."
Packer was not alone in this sort of
preaching in the 80's. Four years later, apostle Dallin H. Oaks (now a
counselor in the First Presidency), made similar remarks in a speech at BYU. Starting at about 16:25 in the audio, Oaks claimed that "truth can be used unrighteously,"
including by "persons who make true statements out of an evil motive, such
as those who seek to injure another…." Echoing Packer's remarks, Oaks
preached that “the fact that something is true is not always justification for
communicating it.” He then offered specific counsel to "readers of history
and biography": “...some things that are true are not edifying or
appropriate to communicate. Readers of history and biography should ponder that
moral reality as part of their efforts to understand the significance of what
they read.”
Additionally, then apostle (now prophet and church
president) Russell M. Nelson was even more explicit. In remarks only a few weeks after Oaks',
Nelson flatly observed, "Some truths are best left unsaid." Invoking
his mother's instruction, "Russell, if you can't say something nice about
someone, say nothing," Nelson excoriates historians who publish unflattering
truths about venerated historical figures:
We now live in a season in which some self-serving historians grovel for “truth” that would defame the dead and the defenseless. Some may be tempted to undermine what is sacred to others, or diminish the esteem of honored names, or demean the efforts of revered individuals. They seem to forget that the greatness of the very lives they examine is what endows the historian’s work with any interest.
For Nelson, absent a "righteous"
motive, the scrupulous historian should remain silent about any
character flaws she unearths while researching "honored names" and
"revered individuals."
***
In 2007, I wasn't aware of the remarks by
Nelson and Oaks on the subject. Packer's, though, were prominent (they remain
part of the preservice readings for seminary teachers), and it would
be hard to overstate the effect of Packer's words on my mindset.
Again, I had been raised not to question
church leaders, rather to prove my faithfulness by adopting and defending their
teachings. Packer's commentary, in fact, seemed to confirm my approach in limiting
my religious studies to church authored/approved materials.
This is my best explanation, anyway, for why I somehow didn't even raise an eyebrow at the idea that
fostering faith in God's one true church sometimes required hiding facts
about its history.
Rough Stone Rolling
In 2005, Richard Bushman, a Columbia University history professor and faithful church member, published Rough Stone Rolling, a "cultural biography" on Joseph Smith. Coming in at nearly 600 pages (plus footnotes), the book is a lengthy and, by many accounts, definitive biography of Mormonism's founder. In fact, even the church owned newspaper promoted the book, and it could be purchased at church owned bookstores.
This was not a small thing, since, as the
comments above suggest, Mormons tend to be wary of any treatment of church
history that is not authored (or at least approved) by the church — any
narrative that threatens the correlated history we'd grown up with.
I had been loosely aware of the book, noting
in one journal entry that reviews I'd read praised it "for revealing the
prophet's weaknesses and bring[ing] him down from the pedestal of perfection we
Mormons are wont to set (and keep) him on."
As I noted above, though, I had little
interest in knowing Joseph's weaknesses and mistakes — I didn't want to bring
him "down to my level." In that same journal entry, I expressed my
reticence about reading the book because I much preferred "[Joseph] were
able to stay up on that pedestal and help raise me up to his."
The church's apparent blessing of the book,
though, offered needed reassurance that it was "safe," meaning it
wouldn't undermine my testimony of Joseph Smith as God's prophet, seer, and
revelator.
***
This is where the narrative picks up for me
again in late October 2007. My CES friend was effusive about Rough Stone
Rolling (in the way that perhaps only seminary and institute teachers can
be), and told me about how much the book had strengthened his testimony
of Joseph Smith as a prophet, seer, and revelator.
I reluctantly decided to give the book a
try. After purchasing it, I began reading it on my trolley rides home from work.
In his preface, Bushman further seemed put my
believing heart at ease, describing himself as a "believing
historian" and confessing that, for him, "pure objectivity is
impossible" (here he was speaking Packer's language). Bushman told readers
that he had written the book from an "irenic" viewpoint, which meant
he would describe Joseph’s visions and revelations as if they actually
occurred. Taking Joseph at his word, Bushman claimed, would give readers “unimpeded
access to [Joseph’s] mind.”
In this same preface, though, he also sounded
alarm bells for me. Bushman noted that he intended to "look frankly at all
sides of Joseph Smith, facing up to his mistakes and flaws." Apparently sensing the need to justify this
approach to some readers, Bushman offered that "Flawless characters are
neither attractive nor useful. We want to meet a real person." In apparent
contravention of Packer's and Nelson's direction, Bushman further observed,
"Covering up errors makes no sense in any case."
I honestly wasn't so sure.
Very quickly, the contents of the book
unsettled me. In my journal entries, I started wondering openly whether I
really wanted to finish it. Bushman's position as a faithful, believing member
made the contents impossible to dismiss (I noted that there was no "mal
intent" with the book), but I found it so difficult to read about
the prophet's apparent flaws.
I also found Bushman's detached descriptions
of certain spiritual events (“perfunctory” is the word I used in my journal) to
itself be damaging. For instance, Bushman described the revelations as
"Joseph's" and discussed the development of his “prophetic voice”
(e.g., “The speaker stands above and outside Joseph, sharply separated
emotionally and intellectually.”) In my
apparent naiveté, I'd never thought of the canonized revelations as Joseph’s —
they were God’s revelations to Joseph. And the very idea that Joseph’s
voice would be in them at all (that he had done anything more than,
essentially, take dictation from God) tended to diminish the revelations to me, at least
back then.
Hardly a week into reading it, I wrote in my
journal, "A part of me tonight is wishing I had never picked up that
Bushman book."
Two weeks into the effort (I am not a fast
reader), I couldn't handle the book's contents any longer. Details of a culture
of magic and mysticism mixed with Christian religion (a culture to which the
Smiths seemed at least as susceptible as many others in the region), of a
family prone to believing tales of buried treasure guarded by Native American
spirits, of Joseph's use of peep stones to try to locate this treasure, of multiple accounts of the First Vision (though
the book still obfuscates any serious discrepancies), and Joseph's apparent use
of one of these peep stones in a hat to translate the gold plates (as opposed
to the correlated narrative and images of Joseph interpreting characters on the
plates as he read them) — these and so many other new "facts" left me
very, very uneasy.
I felt darkness, not light, as I read
and the narrative slowly chipped away at my heroic image of Joseph Smith. [And
I hadn't even gotten to discussions of a possible affair with (and his first
plural marriage to) Fanny Alger, or Joseph's extensive practice of polygamy and
polyandry (marrying women still married to other men), of which Bushman offers
precious little detail by comparison].
I'd been taught that those dark feelings
meant the absence of the Holy Ghost (that it had “withdrawn” from me),
and was God's way of telling me when something was not true.
Except, how could these things not be true,
given Bushman's care as a "believing historian" and the church's
promotion of the book?
[I recognize now that those "dark"
feelings were the result of cognitive dissonance, which is typical when one
confronts information that threatens their worldview or deeply held beliefs —
the more deeply held the belief, the darker those initial feelings.]
In my journal entry on November 14, 2007, I
described and tried to justify my decision to abandon the book. Feeling pulled
in competing directions, I pointed to difficulties with the "scholarly
tone" of the book, even though Bushman still credited Joseph's claims of
divinity.
[Looking back over the book now, what stands out is how little attention (and how much justification) Bushman gives to some of the more controversial aspects of Joseph's history. For one critique of what's missing from Bushman's work, including the limitations of taking the subject at his word, I suggest this brief commentary from (non-believing) historian Dan Vogel. Vogel's own work on Joseph Smith would later be one of the final blows to my faith].
Here is an excerpt from that agonizing journal entry, and note
again the clear influence of Packer's remarks on my thought process (and my
wrestle with the obvious incongruity):
Almost
from the moment I started reading the book, I didn't like where it took me or
the thoughts it lead me to. I've had a hard time putting my finger on
why, and fought against the feeling over and over again that I should abandon
the book. When pressed, I couldn't give a good reason for putting it
down, except that something doesn't feel quite right about what I'm
reading. I'm not keen on the perfunctory tone in which spiritual
experiences or events are described, and I don't really like hashing through Joseph's
apparent weaknesses or the authenticity of the Book of Mormon. Yet even
collectively, I can't be sure that's exactly why. Abandoning the book
makes me feel like an intellectual coward. I want to know about Joseph's
life, but I don't want a "balanced" book. I realized last
night, though, that reading the book has made it harder for me to feel the Holy
Ghost, and after talking about things with Michelle — that settled the matter,
intellectual coward though I may be. I want to know about Joseph's life,
but I can't seem to stand even a "balanced" book. I want to
read a book about him that's every bit as scholarly and intellectually honest
though much more one-sided.
That night I put the book on my shelf (literally and figuratively)
and went back to dedicating my studies solely to the church's correlated
materials. The dark feelings I'd experienced eventually gave way to the
familiar, comforting feelings I got with the correlated curriculum.
It would be three years before I decided to pick up the book again.
Second Effort
In early 2008, Michelle and I moved away from La Mesa and a bit closer to downtown San Diego. The move significantly cut my commute time to work. It also put us in an entirely new ward and stake (wards and stakes are determined by geographic boundaries), which meant a release from my calling in the bishopric.
The relief from church leadership didn't last long.
Within a month, I was called to be the executive secretary in our new ward (which meant
more bishopric and ward council meetings). And within three months of our move,
I was called to be a counselor in the bishopric of the new ward [which,
again, is rather remarkable for someone as introverted as I am].
That ward would be our home for the next 7+
years, and I was in the bishopric most of those years.
I don't remember what prompted me to make
another attempt at Rough Stone Rolling (and my journal is silent in that
regard). In mid-December 2010, there's a brief notation that I had started
reading it again. I recounted in that entry that "I'd put [Rough Stone
Rolling] down years ago because I didn't like what the book seemed to be
doing to my faith. I'm not finding that a problem at the moment." As I remember
it, I wasn't reading the book because I really wanted to learn anything about Joseph, but
mostly just to be able to say I'd made it through.
About two weeks later, I finished. I had not
enjoyed the book so much as I had survived it. My observation in my journal
that night: "I'm still not sure if I liked learning about the prophet – if
it was helpful."
A Move Toward Nuance
There's a fuzziness to the timeline regarding the
exact evolution of my thought process, but my experience with Rough Stone
Rolling proved to be a catalyst. Not away from faith (not for many
years yet) but toward a more nuanced approach.
I came away from the experience even less interested in church history. My marriage had only became more fraught as our family of four turned to five, and as Michelle spent more of her years at home full-time with our little ones.
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| Clark Family - Disneyland 2008 |
I still approached God and my daily scripture
study with a kind of meek desperation: could God show me what I needed to do — who I needed to be — to heal my marriage and make our home a happy one?
I had little time or interest in spiritual
pursuits that weren't bent on answering that question.
I knew now, though, that the correlated
version of church history was effectively white-washed. Bushman's book had
opened my eyes to the reality that Joseph Smith and others had flaws —
sometimes serious flaws.
[Just try to imagine, for example, the Joseph
Smith movie above also depicting a young treasure-digging Joseph —
accepting money from people on the prospect he could use a peep stone to find
them buried treasure. And later using that same stone to translate gold plates
(by looking at the rock in a hat). Then depicting Joseph's polygamy and
polyandry (!) against the scene where (with no hint there were any other women
in Joseph's life but Emma) he counsels a new follower to help with household
chores to improve his marriage. That movie probably wouldn't offer the same
kind of feel-good experience as the current version — and that seemed to be
Packer's point about why he wanted church historians and educators to hide
those kinds of facts in the first place.]
None of this, though, affected my firm
belief in the foundational claims of the church — that Joseph had seen a vision
of God at 14, that an angel had given him the gold plates, that God had given
him power to translate the plates and later to restore his church. I also still
loved the Book of Mormon and other scripture; I still believed they were
God's revelations through Joseph.
I believed all those things because they
still felt true, and I spent my time and energy studying materials that
only reinforced those beliefs.
As for Joseph’s imperfections that I'd read
about — the hazier the details in Rough Stone Rolling became with time,
the easier it was for me to take comfort in the idea that Joseph's flaws simply
highlighted God's ability (and willingness) to work through obviously imperfect
people.
For someone like me, who often obsessed over
nagging imperfections, it felt like a very hopeful approach. Hence my claims to some in the years afterward that Rough Stone Rolling had actually strengthened my faith. Again, that was probably more aspirational than objectively true.
The Opposite of Helpful
I did, however, become increasingly
disillusioned with Packer's comments and approach to church history. While
stopping short of criticizing him or the church outright (which you just don't
do), I blamed Packer's mindset for the turmoil I felt when I learned the
"truth" about Joseph.
I even went so far as to confide in others
that I found Packer's approach to be "the opposite of helpful."
In recent years, the church has made much
greater efforts at transparency. This is evident in its numerous recent
projects (e.g., the gospel topics essays, the Joseph Smith Papers project, and the Saints history series),
as well as the simple fact that it embraced Rough Stone Rolling 16 years
ago. But, as I'll likely discuss in a later post, even with these efforts,
there’s still a sense of clear limitations to how transparent the church
is willing to be — that it's mostly just trying to retake control of (and reshape) the narrative for its members.
I sense this, in part, because the church now apparently denies any prior efforts to hide unfavorable
historical details. For instance, in this Face to Face event (the relevant portion quoted below begins at about 47:30), apostle M.
Russell Ballard, with Oaks supportively at his side, at best seemed to
have forgotten Packer's (and Oaks' and Nelson's) vehement counsel in the
1980's. Assuring the youth of the church that the brethren have never tried
to hide anything, Ballard asserted, "There has been no attempt on the
part, in any way, of the church leaders trying to hide anything from
anybody." Moments later he continued, "So just trust us, wherever you
are in the world, and you . . . share this message with anyone who raises the
question about the church not being transparent: we're as transparent as we
know how to be in telling the truth. We have to do that. That's the Lord's
way."]
Frankly, as much as I have respected Ballard over the years for his seeming candor, this feels like gaslighting. For as earnest and folksy as Ballard comes across in the clip, his comments strike me as disingenuous with Packer’s, Oaks’, and Nelson’s remarks on “advanced history” still ringing in my ears. And it was this very inability of the church to own and admit to mistakes (manifest in far more than Ballard's remarks here) that eventually hastened the erosion of my faith: as the spiritual threads began to unravel years later, I realized that I could not trust these men to be honest with me.
That turning point, though, was still years away
for me back then.
But during this time period, I still began to
yearn for transparency from current leaders. Not because I questioned
whether they represented God (I didn’t), but because I felt hungry for some
sense of vulnerability — some hint that they, too, had real weaknesses.
I wanted to hear from someone that they had dealt with recurring depression. I
wanted reassurance that they had also weathered troubled marriages like
mine. I wanted someone to be strong enough to admit that they, too, were trying
to stop yelling at their kids. More than anything, I wanted someone in leadership willing to own up
to unflattering mistakes, if for no other reason than to feel a little less
alone in mine.
With few exceptions, though, I rarely
sensed that kind of vulnerability from the general authorities.
A few years ago, I came across this saying: “Catholics
say the pope is infallible but don’t really believe it; Mormons say the prophet
is fallible but don’t really believe it.” At least on the Mormon end of that
observation, there’s a hint of humor, but also an uncomfortable dose of stinging
truth (at least for me). In fact, as much today as ever, the public persona of
the church’s general leadership seems to be so carefully cultivated that the
believing, unsuspecting membership [e.g., me back in the day] is left with the
strong impression that, like Joseph and other past church leaders, these men are the living embodiment of righteousness (though we'd
still give lip service to the idea that of course they aren’t perfect, only
Jesus was perfect).
I feel like I’ve seen that movie before. And Bushman's observation in the preface to Rough Stone Rolling feels more salient now than ever: "Flawless characters are neither attractive nor useful. We want to meet a real person."
While I no longer believe in or affiliate with the faith, I would still love to see more vulnerability from the church’s general authorities. The fact that it remains the rare exception, though, rather confirms for me that these same leaders are probably a long way from being ready to steer the church to a point where it can be truly vulnerable (truly honest) about its history — including its history with history.
