Elder Oaks and Elder Ballard "Face to Face" Event: Dealing with doubts

[rockpond]

1 hour ago, ttribe said:

I believe it DOES matter and I believe we are seeing that these differences are perceived by many as deal-breakers.  Whose souls are not worth saving in this situation? 

It definitely matters.  When I went through my faith crisis, the painful part was not the new facts that I was learning.  Rather, it was discovering that those facts had been hidden from me by the very priesthood leaders in which I had placed my trust and my life.

Ballard asked those listening to his message to trust him.  Sorry - I cannot trust him.  It's not that I think he's a bad person but he was willing to speak to the church and claim knowledge that he doesn't have in order to support declarations that are false.

Edited November 28, 2017 by rockpond

[ttribe]

22 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

That's fine of course but seems a different issue. 

This was not a prepared statement. You can tell by how it's formulated. They may well have prepped for it and known the questions but this was not memorized in the least. 

Again, to be clear, the issue at hand is what Ballard meant by being open and transparent. I'm completely open to being wrong here, but given Ballard's clear statement about being honest, I am just at a loss to understand how this relates to documents being immediately released when first discovered. Put clearly, why did the delay in releasing the 1832 first vision account entail they weren't open and transparent regarding their truth claims? I recognize that people like ttribe read the documents differently. But this is like me given a testimony before a judge trying to be honest and then someone saying I'm not because I didn't address some point they thought I should have.

One - I don't think I said anything about how I read the documents.  Let's not attribute opinions where none were rendered.

Two - Your final statement doesn't make sense in terms of the established need to make sure there are no material omissions from information being used to make critical (i.e. eternal) decisions; hence the need to understand the reasons for people's perceptions that are different from your own.

[clarkgoble]

4 minutes ago, ttribe said:

One - I don't think I said anything about how I read the documents.  Let's not attribute opinions where none were rendered.

Two - Your final statement doesn't make sense in terms of the established need to make sure there are no material omissions from information being used to make critical (i.e. eternal) decisions; hence the need to understand the reasons for people's perceptions that are different from your own.

If people's perceptions are different from mine and thereby may think important information is different from what I think is important isn't the logical implication that all information must be public - the very thing some people are denying they are asserting?

By documents, I didn't mean the First Vision document but the Ballard/Oaks transcript. Sorry rereading that comment I was too ambiguous there.

Edited November 28, 2017 by clarkgoble

[ttribe]

6 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

If people's perceptions are different from mine and thereby may think important information is different from what I think is important isn't the logical implication that all information must be public - the very thing some people are denying they are asserting?

Speaking only for myself, I tend to lean towards more disclosure than less.  Admittedly, that may have something to do with my professional occupation as a fraud investigator.

4 minutes ago, clarkgoble said:

By documents, I didn't mean the First Vision document but the Ballard/Oaks transcript. Sorry rereading that comment I was too ambiguous there.

I don't think I said anything about an opinion on that, either.

 

Edited November 28, 2017 by ttribe

[rockpond]

1 hour ago, clarkgoble said:

Again, to be clear, the issue at hand is what Ballard meant by being open and transparent. I'm completely open to being wrong here, but given Ballard's clear statement about being honest, I am just at a loss to understand how this relates to documents being immediately released when first discovered. Put clearly, why did the delay in releasing the 1832 first vision account entail they weren't open and transparent regarding their truth claims? I recognize that people like ttribe read the documents differently. But this is like me given a testimony before a judge trying to be honest and then someone saying I'm not because I didn't address some point they thought I should have.

I wasn't referring to Ballard's comment about being open and transparent.  I was referring to his comment that "there has been no attempt on the part of the Church leaders to try to hide anything from anybody".  It is false.

I think it's significant spin for you to refer to what happened to the 1832 FV account as a "delay in releasing" it.  It wasn't a delay.  The pages were cut from the journal of our founding prophet, taken out of the church archives, locked in a safe for several decades, and then taped back in the journal with no public acknowledgement of why they had ever been removed in the first place.  That is not simply a delay.  That is hiding a critical piece of church history and doctrine until it could no longer be hid with impunity.

 

[stemelbow]

1 hour ago, clarkgoble said:

That's fine of course but seems a different issue. 

This was not a prepared statement. You can tell by how it's formulated. They may well have prepped for it and known the questions but this was not memorized in the least. 

Again, to be clear, the issue at hand is what Ballard meant by being open and transparent. I'm completely open to being wrong here, but given Ballard's clear statement about being honest, I am just at a loss to understand how this relates to documents being immediately released when first discovered. Put clearly, why did the delay in releasing the 1832 first vision account entail they weren't open and transparent regarding their truth claims? I recognize that people like ttribe read the documents differently. But this is like me given a testimony before a judge trying to be honest and then someone saying I'm not because I didn't address some point they thought I should have.

SO when they address whether ethey are hiding something, you don't think they are referencing anything in that thing?  

[ksfisher]

17 minutes ago, rockpond said:

I wasn't referring to Ballard's comment about being open and transparent.  I was referring to his comment that "there has been no attempt on the part of the Church leaders to try to hide anything from anybody".  It is false.

I think it's significant spin for you to refer to what happened to the 1832 FV account as a "delay in releasing" it.  It wasn't a delay.  The pages were cut from the journal of our founding prophet, taken out of the church archives, locked in a safe for several decades, and then taped back in the journal with no public acknowledgement of why they had ever been removed in the first place.  That is not simply a delay.  That is hiding a critical piece of church history and doctrine until it could no longer be hid with impunity.

 

What church doctrine was being hid?

[rockpond]

4 minutes ago, ksfisher said:

What church doctrine was being hid?

Who Joseph Smith saw in the Sacred Grove and what they told him.

But again, Ballard did not say that there has been no attempt to hide any doctrine.  Ballard said there has been no attempt to hide "anything".  I feel like Joseph's first account of his vision falls under that category.  As does polygamy.  And Adam-God.   But some truths are not useful, right?

[ksfisher]

6 minutes ago, rockpond said:

Who Joseph Smith saw in the Sacred Grove and what they told him.

But again, Ballard did not say that there has been no attempt to hide any doctrine.  Ballard said there has been no attempt to hide "anything".  I feel like Joseph's first account of his vision falls under that category.  As does polygamy.  And Adam-God.   But some truths are not useful, right?

I don't think doctrine is the word you're looking for there.  The simplest definition of doctrine is something that is taught.  If another version of the First Vision was not taught then it was, by definition, not doctrine. 

[rockpond]

18 minutes ago, ksfisher said:

I don't think doctrine is the word you're looking for there.  The simplest definition of doctrine is something that is taught.  If another version of the First Vision was not taught then it was, by definition, not doctrine. 

Joseph's first vision including what it teaches about the nature of God and his prophetic call IS doctrine and the 1832 account speaks to that.  In other words, the First Vision is doctrine.  It's one of the very first things we teach investigators.  That a differing account of that vision was hidden rather than being taught, doesn't mean that the FV isn't doctrine.

But this is an aside to Ballard's claim (which wasn't exclusive to doctrine).  Ballard's false claim is that there has been no attempt to hide anything from anybody.

Edited November 28, 2017 by rockpond

[Honorentheos]

3 hours ago, rockpond said:

Joseph's first vision including what it teaches about the nature of God and his prophetic call IS doctrine and the 1832 account speaks to that.  In other words, the First Vision is doctrine.  It's one of the very first things we teach investigators.  That a differing account of that vision was hidden rather than being taught, doesn't mean that the FV isn't doctrine.

But this is an aside to Ballard's claim (which wasn't exclusive to doctrine).  Ballard's false claim is that there has been no attempt to hide anything from anybody.

Along these lines, the doctrine regarding the Godhead expressed in the various first vision accounts aligns relatively well with the evolving doctrine found in LDS scriptural sources. It isn't a case of targeting a particular audience that the 1832 account is relatively well aligned with the language of the BoM prior to the 1837 changes that revised the unmistakable references to Christ being the same being as the eternal father. Abinidi's speech in Mosiah is a relic of this. As Rigdon's influence began to pervade the language used in the Church, one sees the separation of Father and Son into different, distinct beings - one of spirit, one of flesh - and the mind of the Godhead manifest in the holy spirit. The so-called official version of the first vision also reflects this shift to something more familiar to the modern membership. There are absolutely doctrinal issues contained in the first vision account debate.

[Exiled]

13 minutes ago, Honorentheos said:

Along these lines, the doctrine regarding the Godhead expressed in the various first vision accounts aligns relatively well with the evolving doctrine found in LDS scriptural sources. It isn't a case of targeting a particular audience that the 1832 account is relatively well aligned with the language of the BoM prior to the 1837 changes that revised the unmistakable references to Christ being the same being as the eternal father. Abinidi's speech in Mosiah is a relic of this. As Rigdon's influence began to pervade the language used in the Church, one sees the separation of Father and Son into different, distinct beings - one of spirit, one of flesh - and the mind of the Godhead manifest in the holy spirit. The so-called official version of the first vision also reflects this shift to something more familiar to the modern membership. There are absolutely doctrinal issues contained in the first vision account debate.

What you say seems pretty clear to me.  As Gregory Prince recently stated, there isn't a church doctrine that hasn't changed over the years and the evolution of the first vision is but one example of this.

[Investigator]

On 11/21/2017 at 9:27 AM, Pete Ahlstrom said:

So, what to you make of the plea by E. Ballard to have everyone everywhere just trust them?  Isn't that a plea to hold them infallible?

Ballard’s plea to “trust him” is counter to the teachings of the BOM. But if you want to be cursed, just trust him, otherwise, I would be checking on anything someone who tells me to trust them says.

Quote

2 Nephi 4:34...I will not put my trust in the arm of flesh; for I know that cursed is he that putteth his trust in the arm of flesh. Yea, cursed is he that putteth his trust in man or maketh flesh his arm.

 

Edited November 29, 2017 by Investigator

[rockpond]

I know that many here do not like it when the Brethren are accused of being "out of touch".  And I doubt that the Brethren themselves would agree with that assessment.  But, in reviewing what they said/did in that YSA devotional:

• Cite a 47-year-old article, by someone who was not a general authority, that is not accessible on the church website as evidence that they aren't hiding something.
• Joke about how they obviously weren't hiding the first vision accounts given that article.
• Falsely claim that there has been no attempt by any church leader to hide anything despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary (including other GA statements that contradict such a claim).
• Tell members to put their trust in them (right after making a false declaration).

I'm sure I only represent a limited viewpoint on this but those statements and actions seem completely out of touch with members who struggle because they know the history of first vision accounts and feel betrayed because of all that has been hidden from them as lifelong members of the church.

[stemelbow]

23 minutes ago, rockpond said:

I know that many here do not like it when the Brethren are accused of being "out of touch".  And I doubt that the Brethren themselves would agree with that assessment.  But, in reviewing what they said/did in that YSA devotional:

• Cite a 47-year-old article, by someone who was not a general authority, that is not accessible on the church website as evidence that they aren't hiding something.
• Joke about how they obviously weren't hiding the first vision accounts given that article.
• Falsely claim that there has been no attempt by any church leader to hide anything despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary (including other GA statements that contradict such a claim).
• Tell members to put their trust in them (right after making a false declaration).

I'm sure I only represent a limited viewpoint on this but those statements and actions seem completely out of touch with members who struggle because they know the history of first vision accounts and feel betrayed because of all that has been hidden from them as lifelong members of the church.

I think there is probably something to who they were speaking to as well.  Since they were YSA I wonder if they were more careless and more focused on the authoritative "just trust us" stuff.  

[rockpond]

7 minutes ago, stemelbow said:

I think there is probably something to who they were speaking to as well.  Since they were YSA I wonder if they were more careless and more focused on the authoritative "just trust us" stuff.  

That's possible.  But wouldn't young single adults born in the 90's...

1)  Consider an article published more than two decades before their birth to be irrelevant and wonder why he couldn't identify something more recent?

2)  If the article was of interest to them, quickly realize that it is not something available in the gospel library app or on LDS.org and wonder why Ballard bothered to cite it?

[stemelbow]

1 minute ago, rockpond said:

That's possible.  But wouldn't young single adults born in the 90's...

1)  Consider an article published more than two decades before their birth to be irrelevant and wonder why he couldn't identify something more recent?

Ya got me, but you're right 1970 was as good as 100 years ago to my son who was born in the 90s.  It makes it sound like forever ago to them. That might have been a big part of the appeal in using it.  If they hear someone say the Church hid the first vision account, the younger generation might wonder what that would mean, by and large, since 1970 was so long ago.   Of course Ballard and Oaks don't mention that the hiding of the 1832 account took place before that.  

1 minute ago, rockpond said:

2)  If the article was of interest to them, quickly realize that it is not something available in the gospel library app or on LDS.org and wonder why Ballard bothered to cite it?

Good question.  I don't really know what he was doing when he went off on it.  

[Amulek]

7 minutes ago, rockpond said:

1)  Consider an article published more than two decades before their birth to be irrelevant and wonder why he couldn't identify something more recent?

I think the idea is that if you can demonstrate that the church published an article in their official magazine decades before you were alive, then there has never been a point in your life where this information was ever "hidden" from you. 

 

[rockpond]

5 minutes ago, stemelbow said:

Ya got me, but you're right 1970 was as good as 100 years ago to my son who was born in the 90s.  It makes it sound like forever ago to them. That might have been a big part of the appeal in using it.  If they hear someone say the Church hid the first vision account, the younger generation might wonder what that would mean, by and large, since 1970 was so long ago.   Of course Ballard and Oaks don't mention that the hiding of the 1832 account took place before that.  

Good question.  I don't really know what he was doing when he went off on it.  

To the part I bolded above...

That's a good point - perhaps by citing something that was so old it would seem like they haven't been hiding it because the article was publish so long ago.  (Of course, the "rest of the story" is that the article was publish shortly after the 1832 account made its way out of the safe where it had been hidden.)

From my perspective, at 47 years old, I would never have had a chance to read a 1970 Improvement Era article.  I grew up as an active member of the church, graduated from four years of seminary, attended BYU, took missionary prep, etc and yet I went out on my mission having absolutely no idea that there was any other version of the first vision than the one that I was teaching.  I taught and baptized dozens of people on that premise.  So, from my point of view and even ignoring what happened with the 1832 document, the multiple first visions accounts were hidden from me.  And I reject the premise that if it was something that mattered, I should have researched and studied it.  I could not possibly have thought to research something that I never even thought existed.  I trusted the Brethren and they failed me.

[rockpond]

1 minute ago, Amulek said:

I think the idea is that if you can demonstrate that the church published an article in their official magazine decades before you were alive, then there has never been a point in your life where this information was ever "hidden" from you. 

 

That's logical but see my response immediately above.

[stemelbow]

38 minutes ago, rockpond said:

To the part I bolded above...

That's a good point - perhaps by citing something that was so old it would seem like they haven't been hiding it because the article was publish so long ago.  (Of course, the "rest of the story" is that the article was publish shortly after the 1832 account made its way out of the safe where it had been hidden.)

From my perspective, at 47 years old, I would never have had a chance to read a 1970 Improvement Era article.  I grew up as an active member of the church, graduated from four years of seminary, attended BYU, took missionary prep, etc and yet I went out on my mission having absolutely no idea that there was any other version of the first vision than the one that I was teaching.  I taught and baptized dozens of people on that premise.  So, from my point of view and even ignoring what happened with the 1832 document, the multiple first visions accounts were hidden from me.  And I reject the premise that if it was something that mattered, I should have researched and studied it.  I could not possibly have thought to research something that I never even thought existed.  I trusted the Brethren and they failed me.

I get ya.  And I don’t really think the 1970 article was everything Ballard claimed it was anyway.  It seems to be more of an attempt to harmoniZe the accounts rather than inform.  

[Thinking]

If the brethren were always as transparent about things as they claim they know how to be, there would never have been any need for the "essays."

[Duncan]

40 minutes ago, Thinking said:

If the brethren were always as transparent about things as they claim they know how to be, there would never have been any need for the "essays."

So critics want the Church to open up about the past and when they do it's not good enough, is there no pleasing people?! Tell me honestly if people think the Church is a hoax, fraud, Joseph was a con man etc. do you really care how many accounts of the first vision there are? or that Mormons practiced polygamy? People want all this transparency and the brethren to have advanced degrees and say socially acceptable things but does any of that change people's lives for the better? We should live in light of things not in spite of them

Edited November 30, 2017 by Duncan

[rockpond]

2 minutes ago, Duncan said:

So critics want the Church to open up about the past and when they do it's not good enough, is there pleasing people?!. Tell me honestly if people think the Church is a hoax, fraud, Joseph was a con man etc. do you really care how many accounts of the first vision there are? or that Mormons practiced polygamy? People want all this transparency and the brethren to have advanced degrees and say socially acceptable things but does any of that change people's lives for the better? We should live in light of things not in spite of them

Your lashing out here so I’m not going to respond to all of your questions but I want to say this...

I think the point is that if Ballard’s statement (of nothing hidden) were true, the essays would not have been needed. 

[Duncan]

12 minutes ago, rockpond said:

Your lashing out here so I’m not going to respond to all of your questions but I want to say this...

I think the point is that if Ballard’s statement (of nothing hidden) were true, the essays would not have been needed. 

um, what does "lashing out" mean? like eyelashes? Americans expressions are funny sometimes

Edited November 30, 2017 by Duncan