"Backlash against an obituary of its late prophet Thomas S. Monson reveals the existential doubts gnawing at the modern church."

[why me]

6 hours ago, california boy said:

I have pretty much stayed out of this whole thread because I think it is pretty emotionally charged subject.  But I agree with you.  I think Mormons are expecting an obituary to be written from their perspective.  That didn't happen.  The obituary was written in the way most people outside the church view the actions that took place under President Monson's administration.  

Was that issue given too much prominence in the obituary?  Probably.  Should it have been a part of the obituary?  I believe it should have.  The impact both within the church and outside the church is significant.

And yet, in a country that prides itself on its diversity, it is obvious that if one belongs to a social conservative christian group (as the mormons) that person's diversity is not welcome. Likewise for the prolife women's march, which is portrayed negatively by the press and the women's movement. In other words, diversity counts when one goes with the cultrual relativist flow. Lets just say that the LDS church social positions are not respected by the relativist section of the population and yet, a couple of decades ago, the lds church was a champion of morality and praised accordingly. Such is life and its shifting sands. .

Edited January 16, 2018 by why me

[Kenngo1969]

11 hours ago, california boy said:

I have pretty much stayed out of this whole thread because I think it is pretty emotionally charged subject.  But I agree with you.  I think Mormons are expecting an obituary to be written from their perspective.  

Not necessarily.  How about simply striving for some sense of balance and fairness?  Far left-wing revolutionaries think that Fidel Castro is the best thing since sliced bread?  Libertines think the same thing about Hugh Hefner?   Dissidents in, and critics of, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are dissatisfied with the Church's treatment of women, its response to LGBT issues, and so on?  Fine.  The problem is that none of these facts, standing alone, tell the whole story of these individuals or paint a balanced picture of the spectrum of thought as to how they are regarded.

[california boy]

5 hours ago, why me said:

And yet, in a country that prides itself on its diversity, it is obvious that if one belongs to a social conservative christian group (as the mormons) that person's diversity is not welcome. Likewise for the prolife women's march, which is portrayed negatively by the press and the women's movement. In other words, diversity counts when one goes with the cultrual relativist flow. Lets just say that the LDS church social positions are not respected by the relativist section of the population and yet, a couple of decades ago, the lds church was a champion of morality and praised accordingly. Such is life and its shifting sands. .

I am not sure you can draw those strong of lines in the sand.  When a church actively tries to deny a minority group the right to marry people take that kind of egressing pretty hard.  It is one thing to respect anothers right to believe it's own view on what is right and what is wrong.  It is another thing to take the right from a minority  to live their lives the way they see fit.  It is a two way street that Morons often don't see.  

I don't see the branding of the church against women holding the priesthood as I do LGBT issues.  THAT is viewed as being more an internal decision which the church has every right to uphold.  There is no doubt that some disapprove of what they view as discriminating against women.  Not discriminating is a very American value that runs quite deep in our culture for the past 50 years.  Other groups that are preceeved as discriminating against any particular group get similar kinds of disapproval. 

Decades ago, the LDS church was a champion of strong families.  Their whole PR campaign centered around that very American value.  Because the church has decided to attack gay families, it has severely weakened their moral stance in the eye of the public.  The church wants to define what a family is for the rest of the world.  People outside of the church don't share that belief.  What do you think is going to happen?  I think disapproval is a pretty natural consequence.

This is not meant to be an attack on Mormon beliefs.  I am trying to explain how i believe others outside the church view the tactics the church has chosen to take under the administration of President Monson.  When the church was growing at it's peek, there was a message coming from President Hinkley that all are welcome to be a part of the church.  While the church still echos that theme, many no longer feel that is true.  Certainly if Mormons step back a little, they can see the shift that has taken place.  It is a pretty significant shift. The church has every right to embrace it's own beliefs.  No one is saying that it isn't entitled to those beliefs.  But that shift is going to effect how others view the church and ultimately the growth of the church.  

[ALarson]

37 minutes ago, Kenngo1969 said:

The problem is that none of these facts, standing alone, tell the whole story of these individuals or paint a balanced picture of the spectrum of thought as to how they are regarded.

I agree.  And, those facts were not the only things mentioned in the obituary.  However, I wish they hadn't been the first mentioned.

I do believe though that the LBGT policies and actions that took place during the time President Monson was president will be his legacy for many of those outside of the church (for those who even know who he is or care).  Many know he was president during Prop 8 and also know of the new policy that was put into place during his time of leadership.  This will also be the case for some members (when they think of him, the LBGT issues will come to mind first), but for many it will not be his legacy.  

For me, it's a mixture.  I am not in favor of the new policy, so I do remember that as being associated with the time of Pres. Monson's leadership.  But I also have overwhelming love and admiration for other things that he stood for and taught.  

 

Edited January 16, 2018 by ALarson

[california boy]

25 minutes ago, Kenngo1969 said:

Not necessarily.  How about simply striving for some sense of balance and fairness?  Far left-wing revolutionaries think that Fidel Castro is the best thing since sliced bread?  Libertines think the same thing about Hugh Hefner?   Dissidents in, and critics of, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are dissatisfied with the Church's treatment of women, its response to LGBT issues, and so on?  Fine.  The problem is that none of these facts, standing alone, tell the whole story of these individuals or paint a balanced picture of the spectrum of thought as to how they are regarded.

I don't disagree with your statement you put in bold type.  I just reread the actual obituary in the New York Times.  While the first half of the obituary addresses the things during his administration that have caused the biggest impact both within the church and how others view the church, the second half addresses his more personal life.  From the obituary.

 

Quote

 

Thomas Spencer Monson was born in Salt Lake City on Aug. 21, 1927, the second of six children of George Spencer Monson and the former Gladys Condie. He grew up in a tight-knit extended Mormon family that lived in proximity and that often worked, vacationed and worshiped together. At 12, he began working in a printing business his father managed.

He graduated from West High School in Salt Lake City in 1944. After starting at the University of Utah, he joined the Naval Reserve in 1945. World War II ended months later, and after stateside training, his tour of duty ended in 1946. He re-entered the University of Utah, graduating in 1948 with honors and a bachelor’s degree in marketing, and earned a Master of Business Administration degree from Brigham Young University in 1974.

In 1948, he married Frances Beverly Johnson. She died in 2013. Survivors include their three children, Thomas and Clark Monson and Ann Dibb; eight grandchildren; and 12 great-grandchildren.

As is common in Mormonism, Mr. Monson’s life straddled the worlds of business and religion. A printer by trade, he was an advertising executive with The Deseret News in the 1940s, and rose in the 1960s to general manager of the Deseret News Press, a church-affiliated printing firm. He was a longtime director and board chairman of the Deseret News Publishing Company.

He rose steadily in the church, too. In the 1950s, he was the bishop of a ward, akin to a parish, of 1,000 Mormons, including 85 widows whom he visited regularly and 23 men serving in the Korean War to whom he wrote personal letters weekly. From 1959 to 1962, he was president of the church’s Canada mission, covering Ontario and Quebec.

In 1963 he became a member of the Quorum of Twelve Apostles, the church’s second-highest governing body. The highest authority is the church president, followed by two counselors, positions based on seniority, which makes transitions free of politics but puts a mantle of age at the top.

Awaiting his turn for the presidency, he embraced humanitarian causes with Christian, Jewish and Muslim groups supporting homeless shelters, food banks, nursing homes and disaster relief efforts in the United States and abroad.

“We don’t ever meet on doctrinal matters,” he said. “It’s strictly on the social side.”

 

What else do you think as a Mormon should have been included?

 

 

 

[Gray]

9 hours ago, SteveO said:

So are you going to just continue pretending that the NYT and just about every other news source didn’t spent most of 2017 stepping on rakes when it came to their reporting of “facts”?

I take you at your word that not everything is “painfully obvious to everyone”.  But trust me, if you think the news media of 2018 doesn’t face serious doubt concerning their journalistic integrity...well, you weren’t paying attention in 2016 or 2017.

Sorry, but this is fake news.

[CA Steve]

Part of the problem when comparing President Monson's obituary to how the NYT handled Castros' and Heffner's obituarys is that both of these other men died long after their glory days, if you will. Castro had become an afterthought, a man famous for a revolution and an incident that happened half a century ago and Hefner's Playboy empire  has become mainstream. President Monson, however, passed away in the middle of the LGBT movement, a movement that has actually become a focal  point in society. So an article that focuses on his impact on current events would lead with those events. Calling it unfair or unbalanced is to miss the intent of the article being placed within the context of the current social environment. 

 

I am also always a bit surprised by the reactions from some which, in my opinion, try and distance both the church and its leadership from LGBT issues. I mean, if the church is correct in its approach to these issues (for the record I am strongly opposed to its actions in this area) then shouldn't what happened within the church under President Monson regarding LGBT civil rights and church membership be seen as one of his greatest accomplishments anyways? Is there something wrong with being known as the Mormon prophet who took a strong stance in these areas?

[SteveO]

2 hours ago, Gray said:

Sorry, but this is fake news.

I bet that felt good...you sure showed me

[Gray]

Just now, SteveO said:

I bet that felt good...you sure showed me

More fake news.

[SteveO]

2 minutes ago, Gray said:

More fake news.

 

[Gray]

2 minutes ago, SteveO said:

 

 

Very unfair to me. Fake news posts are becoming worse and worse. The fake news media will never tell you about my great accomplishments. I went from VERY successful poster, to top contributor…..  to President of my own fan club (on my first try). I think that would qualify as not smart, but genius….and a very stable genius at that!” #gray&friends

[bluebell]

On 1/12/2018 at 4:28 PM, cinepro said:

I have pointed out to some critics that President Hinckley's obituary 10 years ago in the NYT was formatted much differently.

They pointed out to me that he hadn't had high-profile events like OW, Prop-8, and the policy against children of married-gay couples during his tenure.

So there's more than one way to look at it (although I still think the NYT obituary for Monson wasn't "fair" when compared to their obituaries for Hinckley, Chavez, Castro, Hefner etc.)

Hinckley died just a few months before Prop. 8 passed though, so it seems weird to say that he didn't have high-profile events during his presidency.   Hinckley was also president in 2000 when prop. 22 was passed and I was serving a mission in California in 99 and remember the push that members had in the state to get it passed.  He was definitely fully at the helm of that one.

The difference is not that Monson took the church in directions that Hinckley didn't.  It's that the church's stances were more socially acceptable when Hinckley died than they are right now at Monson's death.  I think the differences in the OB's of each man reflect the differences in public opinions about the church and nothing more.

[why me]

On 1/16/2018 at 5:49 PM, california boy said:

I am not sure you can draw those strong of lines in the sand.  When a church actively tries to deny a minority group the right to marry people take that kind of egressing pretty hard.  It is one thing to respect anothers right to believe it's own view on what is right and what is wrong.  It is another thing to take the right from a minority  to live their lives the way they see fit.  It is a two way street that Morons often don't see.  

 

The US has been in an oceanic shift when it comes to values. Just a short time ago, very few would have supported gays and lesbians marrying. Most churches would have been against it, claiming that it contradicts the bible. But that was when churches were strong and saw it as their responsiblity to uphold christian values. Hollywood was working overtime in breaking down the christian moral code and they succeeded in influencing large parts of the population. And hollywood was very successful in implanting relativism into the minds of people also. I don't know if we can blame the LDS church  for upholding values that it considers important to safeguard the understanding that marriage is between a woman and a man. Maybe other churches can be blamed for succumbing to moral relativism.

[clarkgoble]

21 hours ago, bluebell said:

Hinckley died just a few months before Prop. 8 passed though, so it seems weird to say that he didn't have high-profile events during his presidency.   Hinckley was also president in 2000 when prop. 22 was passed and I was serving a mission in California in 99 and remember the push that members had in the state to get it passed.  He was definitely fully at the helm of that one.

The difference is not that Monson took the church in directions that Hinckley didn't.  It's that the church's stances were more socially acceptable when Hinckley died than they are right now at Monson's death.  I think the differences in the OB's of each man reflect the differences in public opinions about the church and nothing more.

I think that's right. However I also think that Hinkley was uniquely skilled in dealing with the media whereas recent authorities really haven't been. (That's not a knock on them - that was a fairly unique strength of Hinkley) 

I do think some distinction between the Church's involvement on Prop-22 in terms of how overt it was compared to Prop-8. However the reality is that Church opposition goes back to 1994 and the Hawaii Supreme Court decision. That was just prior to Hinkley becoming prophet (although due to the illnesses of Romney and Benson Hinkley had been de facto in charge in many ways).

The real big change was an extremely rapid and radical social shift of views on these issues during the Obama administration period. Obama went from publicly proclaiming opposition to gay marriage to putting the rainbow on the White House to celebrate gay marriage decisions. While it's completely understandable why many think this was a correct social change, the fact is that people are expecting everything to change just as abruptly. Social change simply doesn't happen like that in an universal fashion.

It's an interesting social change and there's really not been a social change like that in history. It certainly aggravates generational gaps as well. The era where most people in their 70's or older grew up in was so radically different in views that I have to imagine it's jarring. Further they're expected to not simply shift views, but completely and radically shift linguistic patterns.

Edited January 17, 2018 by clarkgoble

[USU78]

On 1/14/2018 at 4:03 PM, Scott Lloyd said:

To the extent that President Benson was a polarizing figure, it was not due to decisions he made or presumably made, but rather, strident, politics-tinged statements he made in public speeches and writings. 

In addition to being a religious figure, he was a political figure as the secretary of agriculture in Eisenhower’s cabinet. And even after that, he continued to be passionate about politics and express his views vociferously for many years. If one is going to be a prominent political figure, he is going to have foes. It goes with the territory. 

Nothing like that ever characterized the life of Thomas S. Monson. Even activists who hated the Church for its positions on gay rights and feminism didn’t attack President Monson directly for them — until the end, when some writers chose to use obituaries about him as platforms to yet again express disapproval of the Church. 

If you cannot see — or if you refuse to see — the contrast here in your assertion about one being as polarizing as the other, then I’m afraid we are at loggerheads on this matter. 

I'm still unclear, after the Kremlin opened its archives to the light of day back in the 90s, how one could reasonably conclude that President Benson was somehow mistaken in his views of world-wide Communism/Socialism?  What was it I missed, if anything, that established the TRVTH of his detractors' detractions?

Edited January 17, 2018 by USU78
Couldn't find the "?" first time through.

[california boy]

3 hours ago, why me said:

The US has been in an oceanic shift when it comes to values. Just a short time ago, very few would have supported gays and lesbians marrying. Most churches would have been against it, claiming that it contradicts the bible. But that was when churches were strong and saw it as their responsiblity to uphold christian values. Hollywood was working overtime in breaking down the christian moral code and they succeeded in influencing large parts of the population. And hollywood was very successful in implanting relativism into the minds of people also. I don't know if we can blame the LDS church  for upholding values that it considers important to safeguard the understanding that marriage is between a woman and a man. Maybe other churches can be blamed for succumbing to moral relativism.

I don't see anyone blaming the Mormon church or any other church for upholding their values.  No one has forced the Mormon church to shift one single centimeter away from its values.  Not even Hollywood.  Have you seen any of that?  As far as I can tell the church's beliefs and practices concerning gays and lesbians are still in place.  

Prop 8 was not about the church retaining it's values.  Prop 8 was about taking away the civil rights of others to live their lives the way they see fit.  Prop 8 was about forcing Mormon values on gay and lesbian couples.  

Do you think Hollywood or the gay community should start ballot initiates to force Mormons to live by their standards?  You would be yelling and screaming like a stuck pig if they tried to do something like that.

[Calm]

On January 16, 2018 at 9:02 AM, ALarson said:

I agree.  And, those facts were not the only things mentioned in the obituary.  However, I wish they hadn't been the first mentioned.

I think reaction would have been rather different if the personal stuff had been placed first and the 'controversial' stuff at the end.  First impressions that would have been triggered by the first few paragraphs would have been 'this is a typical obit' and then seeing the stuff added at the end, a likely observation imo would have been 'makes sense a large newspaper would include newsworthy stuff about a leader of an international faith, even if it comes along with a huge bias'.

[california boy]

On 1/16/2018 at 12:01 PM, bluebell said:

Hinckley died just a few months before Prop. 8 passed though, so it seems weird to say that he didn't have high-profile events during his presidency.   Hinckley was also president in 2000 when prop. 22 was passed and I was serving a mission in California in 99 and remember the push that members had in the state to get it passed.  He was definitely fully at the helm of that one.

The difference is not that Monson took the church in directions that Hinckley didn't.  It's that the church's stances were more socially acceptable when Hinckley died than they are right now at Monson's death.  I think the differences in the OB's of each man reflect the differences in public opinions about the church and nothing more.

While the Mormon church supported Prop 22, they didn't take the active role in passing it like they did Prop 8.  BIG DIFFERENCE.  The California Supreme Court also had not yet ruled that gays have the civil right to marry under the constitution of the State.  BIG DIFFERENCE.

President Hinkley passed away in January of 2008, long before the Prop 8 campaign even started.  BIG DIFFERENCE.

The social change has been a factor on how these issues are currently viewed.  I don't think the social changes are responsible for how the Mormon church has handled these issues.

Edited January 17, 2018 by california boy

[Calm]

Quote

I think that's right. However I also think that Hinkley was uniquely skilled in dealing with the media whereas recent authorities really haven't been. (That's not a knock on them - that was a fairly unique strength of Hinkley) 

One only has to look at the percentage of politicians where careers depend on media savvy to see how unique it is.  It can be learned to a certain extent, but I don't think it ever comes across as natural unless it is natural (or at least an ability picked up early in life to where it becomes a second nature).

[why me]

1 hour ago, california boy said:

I don't see anyone blaming the Mormon church or any other church for upholding their values.  No one has forced the Mormon church to shift one single centimeter away from its values.  Not even Hollywood.  Have you seen any of that?  As far as I can tell the church's beliefs and practices concerning gays and lesbians are still in place.  

Prop 8 was not about the church retaining it's values.  Prop 8 was about taking away the civil rights of others to live their lives the way they see fit.  Prop 8 was about forcing Mormon values on gay and lesbian couples.  

Do you think Hollywood or the gay community should start ballot initiates to force Mormons to live by their standards?  You would be yelling and screaming like a stuck pig if they tried to do something like that.

Values have shifted and yes, I do think that hollywood has been responsible for the change in direction. Not long ago, hollywood did have a moral conscience. Not any longer. And by and large it was family centered. TV  and movies were not obscene as they are now. Cursing was forbidden....and people remained clothed on the scene and many programs were family centered. But the 60s generation who went into film making and TV series began to see things differently. Not to mention how there was a conscious direction to put gayness into people's living rooms so that people would begin to have a change of feelings toward gay marriage and gay rights. David Geffen was very influential in causing this change. So, where should the mormons stand? They have a central belief that marriage is between a woman and a man. And they also have a central belief in eternal marriage between a man and woman that puts them in the corner. They also have a proclamation of the family, a set of guidelines for society.

Mormonism and its values have been under attack for the last several years. And mormons have been mocked on TV quite often for their beliefs. And of course, hollywood does have its affect on mormons too with its centrality on premartial sex, violence and its atheist relativism. We will never see ever again a movie such as Going My Way or The Bells of Saint Mary or The Song of Bernedette again.

http://www.nypress.com/the-wretched-geffen-nasty-elites-and-the-fall-of-france/

 

Edited January 17, 2018 by why me

[Scott Lloyd]

4 hours ago, clarkgoble said:

I think that's right. However I also think that Hinkley was uniquely skilled in dealing with the media whereas recent authorities really haven't been. (That's not a knock on them - that was a fairly unique strength of Hinkley) 

I do think some distinction between the Church's involvement on Prop-22 in terms of how overt it was compared to Prop-8. However the reality is that Church opposition goes back to 1994 and the Hawaii Supreme Court decision. That was just prior to Hinkley becoming prophet (although due to the illnesses of Romney and Benson Hinkley had been de facto in charge in many ways).

The real big change was an extremely rapid and radical social shift of views on these issues during the Obama administration period. Obama went from publicly proclaiming opposition to gay marriage to putting the rainbow on the White House to celebrate gay marriage decisions. While it's completely understandable why many think this was a correct social change, the fact is that people are expecting everything to change just as abruptly. Social change simply doesn't happen like that in an universal fashion.

It's an interesting social change and there's really not been a social change like that in history. It certainly aggravates generational gaps as well. The era where most people in their 70's or older grew up in was so radically different in views that I have to imagine it's jarring. Further they're expected to not simply shift views, but completely and radically shift linguistic patterns.

President Hinckley’s last name contains the letter c. 

[bluebell]

56 minutes ago, california boy said:

While the Mormon church supported Prop 22, they didn't take the active role in passing it like they did Prop 8.  BIG DIFFERENCE.  The California Supreme Court also had not yet ruled that gays have the civil right to marry under the constitution of the State.  BIG DIFFERENCE.

President Hinkley passed away in January of 2008, long before the Prop 8 campaign even started.  BIG DIFFERENCE.

The social change has been a factor on how these issues are currently viewed.  I don't think the social changes are responsible for how the Mormon church has handled these issues.

I didn't say that social changes are responsible for how the church handled the issues.  I said that social changes are responsible for the different ways that society (such as the news media) viewed Hinckley and Monson when they died.

Hinckley and Monson both believed the exact same things about SSM, but they were not treated the same on the issue in their obituaries.  It's reasonable to suggest that the difference was caused by society's current views on the subject.

[clarkgoble]

1 hour ago, why me said:

Values have shifted and yes, I do think that hollywood has been responsible for the change in direction. Not long ago, hollywood did have a moral conscience. Not any longer.

Hollywood never had a moral conscience. However they had to appeal to people who did and there were also lots of regulations limiting them. As soon as those regulations disappeared Hollywood immediately changed the types of things they portrayed. I'm not saying the regulations were right. Indeed I'm a big freedom of speech person so I find them horrible. But let's not think Hollywood made all those religious dramas in the 50's & 60's out of moral conscience.

2 hours ago, Calm said:

One only has to look at the percentage of politicians where careers depend on media savvy to see how unique it is.  It can be learned to a certain extent, but I don't think it ever comes across as natural unless it is natural (or at least an ability picked up early in life to where it becomes a second nature).

Yup. Even most politicians can't do it. They can appeal to a certain set of groups constituting their base but often fall apart talking with other groups. Being able to speak to very diverse groups in a way that feels natural and not alien or inappropriate is extremely rare.

2 hours ago, california boy said:

While the Mormon church supported Prop 22, they didn't take the active role in passing it like they did Prop 8.  BIG DIFFERENCE.  The California Supreme Court also had not yet ruled that gays have the civil right to marry under the constitution of the State.  BIG DIFFERENCE.

President Hinkley passed away in January of 2008, long before the Prop 8 campaign even started.  BIG DIFFERENCE.

The social change has been a factor on how these issues are currently viewed.  I don't think the social changes are responsible for how the Mormon church has handled these issues.

I mostly agree. That said I think the Church was far, far more active in Prop-22 than you suggest. However they didn't get the attention because there were so many others active plus there was less division in society on the issue. (Or rather most people at the time agreed with Mormons) By the time of Prop-8 things were changing. But more significantly there weren't as many overt Catholics and Evangelicals doing things the way Mormons were. So even though it was a voter initiative Mormons got the blame in a fashion they didn't in the other cases. (This reflects a rather common view blaming people persuading voters rather than the voters themselves I might add) However I also agree that the framing of Prop-8 was different from Prop-22 even though the effects were the same.

I'd disagree that the campaign for Prop-8 was much later. It was underway well before the California Supreme Court made their decision (which was widely predicted to be what they decided). Further given Hinkley's actions in Prop-22 I think it fair to have expected similar actions after the court decision. Where I agree with you is that I think Monson pushed more overt action than had gone on under Prop-22 and characterized it as more of a threat.

So I certainly agree that the social changes don't explain the Church actions, I do think they account for most of how the Church is viewed for those actions. I think it pretty safe to say that had the California Supreme Court made that same decision 10 years earlier most people would have viewed it quite differently from how they viewed it in 2009 or especially 2018.

Edited January 17, 2018 by clarkgoble
Fixed typo

[clarkgoble]

25 minutes ago, Scott Lloyd said:

President Hinckley’s last name contains the letter c. 

I was trying to make people C. (See -- get it?)  OK, I'll just blame autocorrect then.

Edited January 17, 2018 by clarkgoble

[Five Solas]

On 1/15/2018 at 10:30 PM, SteveO said:

So are you going to just continue pretending that the NYT and just about every other news source didn’t spent most of 2017 stepping on rakes when it came to their reporting of “facts”?

I take you at your word that not everything is “painfully obvious to everyone”.  But trust me, if you think the news media of 2018 doesn’t face serious doubt concerning their journalistic integrity...well, you weren’t paying attention in 2016 or 2017.

When I think about how the LDS Church & the attitudes of its membership have continued to change/evolve in the decade+ that I've been out of it--I think this is a powerful illustration of a big change, and one that I don't think has been given enough attention. 

I honestly don't recall anyone ever rubbishing an American institution like the NYT when I was LDS.  To be sure, individual articles in the press were questioned and debated--but never like this.  It's the largest circulation newspaper in our largest American city--and judging from the number of likes you got for you post--for many LDS it's now just an example of garbage in, garbage out.

If you had told me 15 years ago that the LDS Church was going to part company with the Boy Scouts of America, that the US military ROTC programs were going to draw back from BYU, and that on public message boards LDS members would loudly denounce the NYT as corrupt and a source of "fake news"--I would have thought you were a false prophet if ever there was such a thing.  

In 50 years when interested students of Mormonism look back on the Thomas Monson years--they are without doubt going to see a period of retrenchment and retreat.  In fairness to Monson, I think the LDS Church  peaked before he took the helm and was already started down the other side of the growth curve.  But it's difficult to see how his leadership accomplished anything but accelerate the trend. 

--Erik

__________________________________________________________

Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin
Dance me through the panic till I'm gathered safely in
Lift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove
Dance me to the end of love

--Leonard Cohen (1934 - 2016)