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I'm just saying that when judging how delusional other people are, shouldn't we grade on a curve? 😊

What's ironic about it is that he isn't that misguided or delusional--not when compared to anybody else who believes in religion. He spoke incredibly highly of Mormon people and the Church organization, without qualification. His only problem with the Church is that he believes Catholic doctrine, not Mormon doctrine. That is his only problem with the Church. His fantasy was to join the Church, actively participate, and actively seek opportunities to teach and preach within the Church, but only teach and preach the stuff he believed in, which happens to overlap a lot with what the Church already believes. I think there are a lot of people in the Church that are like that--who are trying to steer it from within to emphasize what they like and deemphasize what they don't like. And the winner is the one who becomes Prophet and changes stuff from the top. This does in fact happen. President Nelson bided his time, and when he was finally in charge did it his way. The guy in the video had (mostly correctly) noted that when talking about doctrine, many members get a little robotic. He was convinced that if he went in and taught about Jesus and the Atonement and so forth with his natural enthusiasm and charisma, it would really impress everyone, they'd feel the spirit, and he'd move into leadership positions. He thought that in 20 years, he'd join the 70 and then the twelve. Then when he became Prophet, he'd shed the doctrine he didn't believe in the way Nelson shedded the word "Mormon." From my perspective, doing all that wouldn't be enough. He'd also have to really fit the role in terms of always showing up for all of the volunteer stuff, making people feel really secure about the faith--fitting in and being sufficiently orthodox in that way, but also being an exceptionally good manager and leader, and paying at least $50,000 a year in tithing, then he'd have a really good shot of at least becoming an area authority in 20 years. But in his fantasy, I think he severely underestimated how crowded it gets at the top. In any case, where did the plan fall apart? It fell apart because in his fantasy, he'd never lie. He would do all this because he thought he could go through the entire thing with only talking about what he sincerely believed in--Jesus, the Atonement, faith, repentance, service, Love, etc., and that nobody would notice that he never talked about how much he loved D&C 132. There were multiple weaknesses in this plan, and he could only see one of them. The weakness he saw is that there was one (and only one) baptismal interview question that he couldn't answer honestly. He felt the question, "Do you believe Joseph Smith was a prophet of God" left no wiggle room for him to honestly answer "yes." So he cancelled his baptism. That's the end of his story. From my perspective, it is a self-deprecating story of an investigator who loved the Church and loved the people, but just couldn't swallow the whole enchilada. He had some fantasies about trying to change the Church, but decided against it. The End.

(4/4) Prompt How do you define agnosticism? How does that differ from atheism? Atheists typically say that atheism means "without belief in God(s)" and generally say they are without belief because "God" hasn't been coherently defined and sufficient proof hasn't been offered. They typically say that they'd change their mind if enough evidence came to light regarding the God hypothesis. In contrast, they tend to say "agnosticism" means the affirmative belief that an answer to the God hypothesis is intrinsically unknowable. With these definitions, "atheism" is actually a more humble position than "agnosticism"--atheism isn't positively claiming that something is unknowable; it's merely claiming that to date, we lack sufficient evidence to justify belief. Can you evaluate whether or not these definitions are coherent and are generally the ones most commonly used by self-described atheists? Based on that analysis, would you like to revise your conclusion that "running that playbook" will most likely lead to agnosticism? Finally, if one is left in this position, what are your thoughts about meaning, morality, and quality of life? Is it possible to find morality, meaning, and joy without God? On this final question, keep the response to 300 words or less. GPT-5 Pro, Reasoned for 5m 13s Definitions (straight up): Atheism: In popular/org usage, “lack of belief in gods.” In academic philosophy, often the stronger claim “there is no God.” Both are live; contexts differ. (atheists.org, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Agnosticism: Originally Huxley’s epistemic norm—don’t claim to know/believe without adequate evidence. In popular use, either “unknown” or the stronger “unknowable.” It’s a knowledge stance, not a belief stance, so you can be an agnostic theist or an agnostic atheist. (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Are your proposed defs coherent/common? Yes—with a caveat. Your atheism = “without belief pending evidence” matches how many self‑described atheists and orgs use it. Your agnosticism = “intrinsically unknowable” describes strong agnosticism; many agnostics just say “not known,” not “can’t be known.” Philosophers stress the belief/knowledge split and note common hybrids (e.g., “agnostic atheist”). (atheists.org, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Do I revise my earlier destination (“agnostic”)? Yep—precision matters. Running the adversarial‑empiricism playbook usually lands people at agnostic atheism: withholding belief in gods while also saying the question isn’t settled to knowledge-level standards. Call it “weak atheism on belief, agnosticism on knowledge.” Confidence: moderate. (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Meaning, morality, joy—without God (≤300 words) Short version: absolutely possible; millions do. The reliably useful ingredients are human, not supernatural. Morality: You can ground “oughts” without revelation—e.g., reduce suffering (consequentialism), respect persons/rights (deontology), and cultivate character (virtue ethics). In practice, pluralistic ethics works by overlapping reasons: harm reduction, fairness, reciprocity, and consent. Meaning: Build a “meaning portfolio”: relationships, mastery, service, and awe. You don’t need metaphysics to feel transcendence—music, nature, art, and hard problems will do fine. Well‑being: Much of religion’s happiness edge comes from community practice (regular gatherings, service, rituals). Those benefits can be reproduced secularly: join or build communities with shared projects and prosocial norms. Data: the “actively religious” report more happiness largely where community is strong—the operative word is active; the mechanism is social. You can get the mechanism without the metaphysics. (Pew Research Center) How to live it: Embed in a real community with recurring commitments. Do visible good weekly (volunteer, mentor, mutual aid). Keep a truth diary: what would change your mind about big claims? Ritualize the good stuff (walks at dawn, Sunday dinners, monthly letters to future‑you). Guard your attention; curate media like your diet. Net: you can have morality, meaning, and joy on a strictly truth‑first path. You’ll trade some cosmic certainty for intellectual honesty and durable human goods—a fair deal for most grown‑ups.

(3/4) Prompt If a smart, open-minded individual with strong spiritual impulses sincerely wants to know the truth about which religious belief system is right, but whose most important goal is to only believe things that are true, what should he do to figure out the truth? If he is really dedicated to finding and embracing the truth and takes these steps that are most likely to lead to what is true, can you predict what belief system or group of belief systems he'll most likely end up? Daniel C. Peterson said something to the effect that from the perspective of rationality, the question of which religion is true is an open question, because smart people believe a variety of things, including Mormonism. Because the question is open, we are free to believe whatever we want and trust the spirit. He suggests this is by divine intent. Please look up his actual arguments on this point and evaluate his actual point, not the way I paraphrased it. Is there a flaw in this analysis? So here is the big question. What mode of investigation has the best track record to finding the truth. If your feelings about truth are captured in the hymn "Oh Say What Is Truth?", what should you do to find it? How confidently can you predict where you'll end up? Where is that place? Is that a good thing or bad thing? Please shoot straight in your answer. 500 words max. Conversational style. GPT-5 Pro, Reasoned for 6m 6s Straight answer: The method with the best track record for finding truth is adversarial empiricism—make risky predictions, blind yourself to outcomes, preregister what would change your mind, and invite critics to try to break your claims. That family of methods (science and the historical‑critical toolkit) works because it rewards reproducible results and punishes stories that only feel good.(Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) How to run that on religion (practically): Write down specific hypotheses (e.g., “X prophecy will occur by Y date,” “Z prayer produces A measurable effect”). Precommit pass/fail criteria and blinding where possible. Seek out the strongest disconfirming evidence first (archives, archaeology, counter‑testimonies). Separate “fruits” (community, meaning) from “facts” (did the supernatural event happen?). Update credences Bayesian‑style; don’t let negatives be explained away by definitions that make the claim unfalsifiable. Prediction of where a sincere truth‑maximizer lands: Applying that process to concrete, testable claims typically lowers confidence in specific supernatural assertions. Large, careful tests of things like intercessory prayer don’t show reliable effects; results cluster around null. Expect many such investigators to end up agnostic or in a thin, non‑dogmatic theism/spirituality—sometimes in ethical communities that don’t hinge on miracle claims. Confidence: moderate.(PubMed) On Daniel C. Peterson’s point: Peterson argues God intends “religious ambiguity”: enough evidence to justify faith, but never “decisive, intellectually coercive proof,” preserving freedom to choose; in his words, “We must choose; the choice is unavoidable.” He also highlights scriptural patterns where God avoids spectacular proofs (“clear evidence that God doesn’t wish to convince us by means of dramatic special effects”). This invokes the broader “divine hiddenness/epistemic distance” line—belief shouldn’t be compelled.(The Interpreter Foundation, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) Is there a flaw? As an account of why disagreement persists, it’s coherent; as a method for truth, it’s weak. If a system is designed so evidence is always underpowered and negative results can be reinterpreted as “space for faith,” the test stops being truth‑tracking. You’ve traded adjudication for permission. That’s fine as a theology of freedom; it’s not a way to know which competing revelations are true. (In other words: ambiguity explains pluralism; it doesn’t resolve it.)(The Interpreter Foundation) Bottom line for the seeker who “only wants what’s true”: Use the tools that punish you when you’re wrong—prediction, replication, and open critique. They’re imperfect (science polices itself because bias is real), but nothing else beats their combined hit rate over time. Run that playbook on rival religious claims and you’re most likely to land in agnosticism or a minimalist theism that resists bold, testable miracle claims. Whether that’s “good” depends on your goals; it’s very good for epistemic integrity—less cozy, more honest.(PLOS, nature.com)

(2/4) Prompt The real idea I'm exploring is one of methodology. Latter-day Saints often describe reading the Book of Mormon as an "experiment" (Moroni 10, Alma 32) so you can know for yourself if the Book of Mormon is true and that therefore the Church is true. I'd like to explore whether it really is. Imagine you are an expert at rational thought and have a very good understanding of cognitive science, including how and why we are prone to cognitive biases. Other than this understanding, you are completely open to the truth-claims of the Book of Mormon. In terms of rationality, how would you describe the Church's conversion process, including the tests it proposes to find out if it is true. Is it based on rationality, or is it based on leveraging cognitive biases to integrate people into the community? Or something else? Give us your best single answer to this question. Keep your answer conversational, and under 400 words. GPT-5 Pro, Reasoned for 4m 55s Short answer: it’s not a rational test; it’s a highly effective commitment engine that leans hard on predictable human biases to produce sincere conviction. Here’s the shape of it: The “experiment.” Read, pray, “ask with real intent,” and interpret a warm, salient feeling as confirmation (Moroni 10). Plant the “seed” and treat any perceived growth as proof (Alma 32). Failure is attributed to you—insufficient faith, wrong timing, poor “nourishing.” That makes the test non‑falsifiable. Cognitive mechanics. Affect-as-information: strong positive emotion feels like truth. Expectation effects: priming (“you will feel a burning”) creates demand characteristics. Confirmation & motivated reasoning: you vividly notice hits, rationalize misses. Interoception noise: fasting, novelty, music, group prayer—all amplify bodily arousal that’s easily misattributed to the divine. Identity & consistency: small commitments (lessons, testimony bearing) escalate to big ones (baptism, tithing, callings), and we align beliefs to past public choices. Social proof & belonging: tight community, frequent contact, and shared language generate powerful conformity pressures that most brains label “truth.” Bayesian take. Extraordinary claims start with low priors. Private feelings are low‑specificity evidence—they fit countless hypotheses (“God,” “group uplift,” “placebo”). A good test must risk being wrong; this one routes negative outcomes back to the subject, so it rarely reduces confidence. Pragmatic payoff vs. epistemic warrant. The process reliably delivers real benefits—purpose, norms, mutual aid. That makes it instrumentally rational for joining a tribe. But benefits aren’t the same as truth-tracking about gold plates and angelic visitations. Single opinion: If you’re grading on epistemic rationality, the LDS conversion “experiment” is closer to a skillful use of human psychology—expectation, affect, identity, and community reinforcement—than to a neutral truth test. It’s superb at producing committed Latter-day Saints; it’s weak at discriminating whether the Church’s supernatural claims are actually true. In other words, it’s more “A/B test where B = belong” than a double‑blind on reality.

(one of four) Prompt You are completely open to the supernatural, and in that sense have a completely open mind. Without any guidance from anybody, you decide to read the Book of Mormon. You pray about it according to Moroni 10:4, and get a distinct burning in the bosom, indicating to you that the Book of Mormon is in fact "true," and you decide that the religious beliefs, practices, and institutions described in the Book of Mormon are real and contain God's message to us about such things. Based upon this paradigm--literally believing what is in the Book of Mormon but not being influenced or guided by any individuals about how it should be interpreted--what would you conclude about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, headquartered in Salt Lake City? Would you conclude that it is in fact God's true Church because its teachings, operations, and culture tightly comply with what the Book of Mormon actually says? Or would you suspect that the Mormon pew is a ramiumptom? Does the Book of Mormon teach that the true church *usually* falls into apostasy? If you take everything the Book of Mormon teaches into account, what would you make of the modern Church and its investment portfolio? Keep your response to under 400 words, and use a conversational style. Give me a single opinion on what independently believing the Book of Mormon most likely says about the likelihood of the Church being true. The goal isn't to measure the correlations between believing the Book of Mormon and believing the Church. The goal is to objectively compare the teachings in the Book of Mormon and see if they point to the Mormon Church being God's one-and-only true Church. GPT-5 Pro, Reasoned for 5m 48s Short version: if I read the Book of Mormon straight and use it as the yardstick, I’d be skeptical that the modern LDS Church is “the one true church.” Why? The BoM’s markers for Christ’s church are stark: built purely on His gospel, not adding or subtracting; humble leadership; priests support themselves; radical care for the poor; no rich-vs-poor divide; severe warnings against pride, costly apparel, and institutional drift. (The Church of Jesus Christ) It also depicts a repetitive “pride cycle”: communities flourish, get prosperous, then slide into apostasy—eventually even the post‑Resurrection church corrodes after ~200 years. In other words, apostasy isn’t rare; it’s the default unless a people stay painfully vigilant. (The Church of Jesus Christ) On culture, the Zoramites’ ramiumptom scene is a caricature of religious status—set prayers, exclusion of the poor, spiritual superiority. The book treats that vibe as a neon “not my gospel” sign. (The Church of Jesus Christ) Now compare that blueprint to today’s institution: a highly centralized, professionally managed investment operation (Ensign Peak) that recently settled with the SEC over disclosure failures; the Church’s own statement frames the portfolio as long‑term, prudent stewardship. Whether you buy the rationale or not, a massive, discreetly managed reserve sits awkwardly beside the BoM’s hair‑trigger warnings about wealth and optics of hoarding. That’s a theological red flag on BoM terms. (SEC, newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org) Yes, there are points of alignment—Christ‑centric name, lay local clergy, baptismal focus. But the book’s most consistent tests (economic equality, leaders not living off the ministry, transparent aid to the poor, anti‑elitism) weigh heavier—and they tilt against a Fortune‑100‑style church. (The Church of Jesus Christ) My single take, Book‑of‑Mormon‑only: the odds the modern Church exactly matches God’s “one true church” are low. Sincere disciples? Plenty. Divine good done? Absolutely. But institutionally, it looks too much like the very pride‑and‑prosperity pattern the BoM spends hundreds of pages warning you to distrust. If your pew starts to feel ramiumptom‑shaped, the book would tell you to step down and recalibrate. (The Church of Jesus Christ)

Can you clarify what you’re actually arguing? Are you saying that when people rigorously apply methodological empiricism (predictive risk, falsifiability, evidence-weighted updating, and bias correction) they don’t converge on a broadly naturalistic view of the world? Or are you saying that convergence isn’t meaningful--that there’s no epistemic reason to prefer beliefs that survive these filters over those that don’t?

I happen to have a license to ChatGPT Pro, and to explore my ideas regarding this thread, I asked GPT-5 Pro the following four prompts. If anyone is interested in the answers I got, let me know. Prompt 1 You are completely open to the supernatural, and in that sense have a completely open mind. Without any guidance from anybody, you decide to read the Book of Mormon. You pray about it according to Moroni 10:4, and get a distinct burning in the bosom, indicating to you that the Book of Mormon is in fact "true," and you decide that the religious beliefs, practices, and institutions described in the Book of Mormon are real and contain God's message to us about such things. Based upon this paradigm--literally believing what is in the Book of Mormon but not being influenced or guided by any individuals about how it should be interpreted--what would you conclude about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, headquartered in Salt Lake City? Would you conclude that it is in fact God's true Church because its teachings, operations, and culture tightly comply with what the Book of Mormon actually says? Or would you suspect that the Mormon pew is a ramiumptom? Does the Book of Mormon teach that the true church *usually* falls into apostasy? If you take everything the Book of Mormon teaches into account, what would you make of the modern Church and its investment portfolio? Keep your response to under 400 words, and use a conversational style. Give me a single opinion on what independently believing the Book of Mormon most likely says about the likelihood of the Church being true. The goal isn't to measure the correlations between believing the Book of Mormon and believing the Church. The goal is to objectively compare the teachings in the Book of Mormon and see if they point to the Mormon Church being God's one-and-only true Church. Prompt 2 The real idea I'm exploring is one of methodology. Latter-day Saints often describe reading the Book of Mormon as an "experiment" (Moroni 10, Alma 32) so you can know for yourself if the Book of Mormon is true and that therefore the Church is true. I'd like to explore whether it really is. Imagine you are an expert at rational thought and have a very good understanding of cognitive science, including how and why we are prone to cognitive biases. Other than this understanding, you are completely open to the truth-claims of the Book of Mormon. In terms of rationality, how would you describe the Church's conversion process, including the tests it proposes to find out if it is true. Is it based on rationality, or is it based on leveraging cognitive biases to integrate people into the community? Or something else? Give us your best single answer to this question. Keep your answer conversational, and under 400 words. Prompt 3 If a smart, open-minded individual with strong spiritual impulses sincerely wants to know the truth about which religious belief system is right, but whose most important goal is to only believe things that are true, what should he do to figure out the truth? If he is really dedicated to finding and embracing the truth and takes these steps that are most likely to lead to what is true, can you predict what belief system or group of belief systems he'll most likely end up? Daniel C. Peterson said something to the effect that from the perspective of rationality, the question of which religion is true is an open question, because smart people believe a variety of things, including Mormonism. Because the question is open, we are free to believe whatever we want and trust the spirit. He suggests this is by divine intent. Please look up his actual arguments on this point and evaluate his actual point, not the way I paraphrased it. Is there a flaw in this analysis? So here is the big question. What mode of investigation has the best track record to finding the truth. If your feelings about truth are captured in the hymn "Oh Say What Is Truth?", what should you do to find it? How confidently can you predict where you'll end up? Where is that place? Is that a good thing or bad thing? Please shoot straight in your answer. 500 words max. Conversational style. Prompt 4 How do you define agnosticism? How does that differ from atheism? Atheists typically say that atheism means "without belief in God(s)" and generally say they are without belief because "God" hasn't been coherently defined and sufficient proof hasn't been offered. They typically say that they'd change their mind if enough evidence came to light regarding the God hypothesis. In contrast, they tend to say "agnosticism" means the affirmative belief that an answer to the God hypothesis is intrinsically unknowable. With these definitions, "atheism" is actually a more humble position than "agnosticism"--atheism isn't positively claiming that something is unknowable; it's merely claiming that to date, we lack sufficient evidence to justify belief. Can you evaluate whether or not these definitions are coherent and are generally the ones most commonly used by self-described atheists? Based on that analysis, would you like to revise your conclusion that "running that playbook" will most likely lead to agnosticism? Finally, if one is left in this position, what are your thoughts about meaning, morality, and quality of life? Is it possible to find morality, meaning, and joy without God? On this final question, keep the response to 300 words or less.

My actual words weren’t that 100% of their specific beliefs about everything, even things on the edge of the known and the knowable, would be exactly the same. What I said was their beliefs would be “in the same neighborhood.” And that’s the beauty of having a free mind. You aren’t told by a prophet, priest, or shaman what you are supposed to believe. You can dive into the evidence and follow where it leads. And if you do so properly, it leads to the same general place. Based on the strength of the evidence, having an appropriate level of uncertainty is a feature of the system, not a bug. Debating about it is great.

In general, these people all use the tools of rationality. Ayaan Hirsi Ali apparently became a Christian 2 years ago. Quoting Wikipedia: Personally, it seems awfully cynical to me to strategically believe false things because society can’t survive without doing so. But on the other hand, the most common insight Yuval Noah Harari talks about is that our capacity to believe false things is the secret to humanity’s ability to create civilizations. In any case, there is a fundamental difference between embracing Christianity because you read the Bible and accepted it as God’s Word, and embracing Christianity because you believe it is better equipped than atheism to win a culture war against Islam. I think you missed the point. While its true that the people I listed reject belief in astrology, werwolves, magic elves, a flat earth, etc., you reject almost all of those same things, too. What they have in common that is more interesting is the positive conclusion in naturalism. Rationality leads to this. It doesn’t lead to an infinite long list of false belief systems. Calling my position circular misses the distinction between process and outcome. I’m not defining the method by the fact that it leads to naturalism; I’m pointing out that when you use methods that force predictive risk, survive falsification, update in proportion to evidence, and actively correct for known cognitive blind spots, you repeatedly get a map of reality that’s drained of the supernatural. That’s an empirical observation about where the method lands, not a premise I’ve baked into it. So, sure, the people I listed don’t share an academic field or data set. What they share is a willingness to run their beliefs through those error-correcting tools and follow the results, even when the results kill cherished intuitions. That’s the common methodology, and that’s why the convergence matters. Did you read my post to the end? These are the type of people I had in mind when I said: If, instead, you want a "truth" that sidesteps these proven tools, you have the full buffet of human tradition. You can believe what you're taught in seminary. Or the Sunday school of your choice. Or the synagogue. Or the mosque. Or the psychic. Or the Wiccan. Drink the sacrament wine. Or smoke some peyote. Or climb a mountain and meditate with a Buddhist in Tibet if that is your thing. Do whatever you want and you'll get an answer, and the odds are good you'll choose the same one you set out trying to believe in the first place. If somebody like Hirsi Ali or Don Bradley decide they don’t want to be an atheist they are free to choose whatever belief system they like. That’s my point. But, there is a difference between choosing a religion based on what you like and choosing a religion on what rationality indicates is actually literally true. If you do the latter, it leads to the same place.

You have it backwards. When we use the tools of rationality, the truth gets sharper. For example, in the 19th century physicists thought the world was a couple million years old, because according the laws of physics as then understood, the sun couldn't have more potential energy than that. Then Darwin came around and said no, the sun must be billions of years old because we can tell from the fossil record that life on earth is billions of years old. Then came our understanding of nuclear physics, and we now know Darwin was right, the sun is billions of years old, which is consistent with the fossil record. There are dozens of good examples of this trajectory. I don’t think "skepticism" is the right frame here. The real fork in the road is this: do you want your beliefs to match reality, or to match your community? If you care most about truth, the next question is what tools you trust to find it. Do you use the ones with the best track record for correcting bias and predicting reality, or the ones that are basically engineered to reinforce whatever you already believe? When people lean on the former, i.e. the tools of methodological empiricism, tested against our known cognitive blind spots, the trajectory is remarkably consistent. Whether they began as evangelical, Jewish, Mormon, Catholic, Muslim, or Southern Baptist, they converge on a naturalistic view of the world: no credible evidence for the supernatural, no surviving "god hypothesis." Call their belief systems atheism, agnosticism, humanism, naturalism, or "none," they are all in the same neighborhood. Think of Steven Pinker, Bertrand Russell, Carl Sagan, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Steven Weinberg,Sean Carroll, Bart Ehrman, David Bokovoy.... While there is diversity is in the starting points, following real-world evidence in a way that overcomes cognitive biases leads to the same place. If, instead, you want a "truth" that sidesteps these proven tools, you have the full buffet of human tradition. You can believe what you're taught in seminary. Or the Sunday school of your choice. Or the synagogue. Or the mosque. Or the psychic. Or the Wiccan. Drink the sacrament wine. Or smoke some peyote. Or climb a mountain and meditate with a Buddhist in Tibet if that is your thing. Do whatever you want and you'll get an answer, and the odds are good you'll choose the same one you set out trying to believe in the first place. Is that how God works? Or how our brains work?

I like this, and I really like @california boy’s idea of a painting about them. Stephen Covey said seek first to understand, then to be understood. I’d dial that back a bit and settle for the more humble goal of seek first to see, then to be seen. Not to beat a dead tapir, but the reason the BoM as a gift backfired had two components. First, it was more about you being seen and appreciated for what is meaningful to you, and less about making them feel seen and loved unconditionally. Second, in LDS religious practice, giving away BoMs is a missionary activity. It is something you specifically do to people you are trying to convert. They knew this and rightly or wrongly, felt it.

Hi Maestrophil, I've personally been dealing with issues like these since I was born into a part-member family 50+ years ago. Over that time period, I've been on both sides of the divide, and I've watched other family members cross the divide, as well. I've seen both believers and apostates behave towards others with love, grace, and understanding, and I've seen both believers and apostates do and say some boneheaded things. For what its worth: Is it their fault or your fault? I'd suggest you are both at fault. What you need to realize is that from their perspective, for some people the Church isn't a particularly healthy thing. You love it; good for you. They don't. You need to accept that. Giving somebody who has decided that the Church isn't for them a Book of Mormon painting would be like them giving you a painting of Hillary Clinton to hang on your living room wall (or if you happen to like Hillary Clinton, then a painting of Donald Trump). Even if they hand painted this themselves and included a note that they gave it to you because they love you and accept you, it would still come across as extremely tone-deaf and passive aggressive. That said, we all need grace. Here are a few stories that happened to me this last Christmas in Utah that illustrate good and bad cross-religion family behaviors. Good Example: Alta Bombs I live in the Midwest, and once a year, go skiing with a group of friends. We usually go to Utah, and when there always ski at Alta at least one day. A tradition we have is to always drink an "Alta Bomb" there. An Alta Bomb is a small glass of cold beer with a shot of espresso (coffee) poured in. The cold beer and hot coffee make a lukewarm concoction of beer and coffee that is every bit as nasty as it sounds. But for whatever reason, it's a tradition for us to drink those there. It suits the experience somehow. My daughter married one of my ski-friend's sons, and this last Christmas I was in Utah for Christmas with the extended family, and a group of us went skiing--me, my sister, her husband (who is a bishop), a couple of their kids, my daughter, and me. My daughter is a new skier and this was her first time at Alta. Near the end of day when half of us were done and some were still skiing, I sheepishly asked my sister if she could drive my daughter and me from the Albion lodge where we were parked down to the Goldminer's Daughter lodge where they serve the Alta Bombs. It would be an initiation ritual to talk about with her husband. My sister graciously agreed, took us down there, dropped us off, and then picked us up 15 minutes later after we had our shot. My bishop brother-in-law asked about the Alta Bombs on the way down the canyon, and was extraordinarily gracious and non-judgmental in talking about it. The good-will points they earned that day were off the charts. Bad Example: Wine On Christmas day, the extended family was over at my dad's house. My dad was never a member, but married one. Perhaps 20% of the guests were non-members. One of my nephews decided this would be a good time to signal to his mother that he had left the Church, so he casually poured himself a glass of wine and started drinking it in front of everyone. His mother freaked out when she saw her son with a glass of wine. After thinking about it overnight, his mother went to my dad's (her father-in-law's) house to confront him. She announced: "I don't care if you drink, but my [30-year-old] son is not allowed to drink in front of his cousins, and if you dare allow him to drink in front of his cousins, you are going to have a problem with me! I don't care what you think or say about that. That's just the way it is." As she lectured him for about 10 minutes about how it was wrong for him to serve a glass of wine to an adult grandchild, she literally had some sort of panic attack and went to the E.R. Good Example: Gracious Hosting After she left and the rest of the family were processing this spectacle, somebody asked my father what he was going to do. Everybody was braced for him to say, "It's my house, my grandson is an adult, and if I want to offer him a drink in my own home I'm going to do that, that is my right." But he didn't say that. Rather, he said, "You know what? My father always told me that it's very, very, important to be a gracious host and do whatever you can to make your guests feel welcome. From now on, I'm going to make sure my daughter-in-law feels welcome here, and I won't drink or serve alcohol in front of her." My dad had been serving alcohol in his home for 60 years, and everyone in the family knew that some wine being poured was part of the package of going there. But hearing him say he would stop serving it because he wanted to be a good host and make his guests feel comfortable won him an infinite amount of good will from everyone. My Advice on Making Your Kids Feel Welcome Is it wrong of you to ask your kids not to drink in your home? No. Of course not. It's your home. Your rules. But here is what you should ask yourself. What's more important, keeping wine out of my home, or making my kids feel loved? If I were in your shoes, making my kids feel loved is what I would choose. If you want to do that in a huge way, here is what you should do. If you don't have any wine glasses, go buy some. Buy a single bottle of inexpensive but classy wine (a bottle of Woodbridge Cabernet Sauvignon might cost $8.00. That is exactly what I'd get if I were you). And a $2.00 cork screw. The next time they come over for Sunday Dinner or whatever, have the wine bottle and glasses out. Then tell them, "We are as dedicated to the Church as ever, but we want to let you guys know how much we love you and accept you just the way you are. Would you like a glass of wine?" (If you wanted style points, you could say that while you opened the bottle and poured it.) Of course you aren't morally obligated to do that. Your home. Your rules. I'm just saying that if you want to make your kids feel unconditional love, pouring them a glass of win will do it. It would be an incredibly powerful symbol that you love them. You accept them. Just the way they are. If you showed them that much grace, I'm confident they would reciprocate. Jesus served wine at parties. Are you willing to follow the example of Jesus and be Christlike in this way?