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Apologetics

FairMormon Conference Podcast #43 – Scott Gordon, “CES Letter: Proof or Propaganda?”

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This podcast series features past FairMormon Conference presentations. This presentation is from our 2019 conference held last month. If you would like to watch the presentations from our 2019 conference, you can still purchase the video streaming.

Scott Gordon, CES Letter: Proof or Propaganda?

Transcript available here.

Scott Gordon serves as President of FairMormon, a non-profit corporation staffed by volunteers dedicated to helping members deal with issues raised by critics of the LDS faith. He has an MBA from Brigham Young University, and a BA in Organizational Communications from Brigham Young University. He is currently an instructor of business and technology at Shasta College in Redding, California. Scott has held many positions in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints including serving as a bishop for six years. He is married and has five children.

Audio Copyright © 2019 The Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research, Inc. Any reproduction or transcription of this material without prior express written permission is prohibited.

FairMormon Conference Podcast #36 – Elder Craig C. Christensen, “Foundations of Our Faith”

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This podcast series features past FairMormon Conference presentations. This presentation is from our 2019 conference that was held last week. You can still purchase the video streaming if you would like to watch all the presentations.

Elder Craig C. Christensen, Foundations of Our Faith

Elder Craig C. Christensen was sustained as a General Authority Seventy of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on October 5, 2002. At the time of his call he was serving as a member of the Fifth Quorum of the Seventy in the Utah South Area.

As a General Authority, Elder Christensen served as President of the Mexico South Area from 2003 to 2007 while living in Mexico City. He has also served in various departments and assignments at Church headquarters, such as Executive Director of the Priesthood and Family Department. He is currently serving in the Missionary Department.

Elder Christensen graduated from Brigham Young University with a bachelor’s degree in accounting. He went on to earn a master of business administration from the University of Washington. Over the years, he has been a visiting instructor of business and religion courses at several universities, including Brigham Young University.

At the time of his call as a General Authority, Elder Christensen was a self-employed businessman in the retail automotive, insurance, and real estate development industries. He previously worked as an executive with several privately owned companies and with an international accounting and consulting firm based in San Francisco, California.

Elder Craig C. Christensen was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, on March 18, 1956. He married Debbie Jones in March 1978. They are the parents of four children.

Audio and Video Copyright © 2019 The Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research, Inc. Any reproduction or transcription of this material without prior express written permission is prohibited.

Book Review: If Truth Were a Child: Essays

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Available from the FairMormon Bookstore

George B. Handley is a humanities professor at Brigham Young University. He has a BA from Stanford University and an MA and PhD from UC Berkely. This book, part of the Maxwell Institute’s “Living Faith” series, is a collection of personal essays he has written about “the seamlessness of humanities and belief, intellect and faith” (page XI).

Handley explains in the preface that “What keeps me in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saint and what keeps me working at living according to its principles is the fundamental fact that I accept the tenets of my faith as plausible, compelling, and deeply moving. They make sense to me intellectually. More importantly, they have taken root in my very being as a result of acts of faith that brought personal witnesses of the gospel’s spiritual truths” (page XII).

There are several essays that I particularly enjoyed. In “Why I Am a Christian,” he says “We talk of sin as a deliberate rejection of God, but sin often feels to me more like being a slave to myself, unable to escape my own psychology, genes, upbringing, habits, or personality even and especially when I am aware that life calls me to better habits and deeper commitments” (page 3). He further explains, “nothing has given me more confidence in the living reality of Jesus Christ as the Redeemer and resurrected Son of God than the way that my trust in him has converted my awareness of my insufficiencies into hope, into a palpable increase of love for myself, for others, and for life itself that is beyond my natural instincts…. A willingness to repent and then to declare my faith has opened me to deeper appreciation for the meaning and power of Christ’s atonement” (pages 4-5). He also makes the important distinction that “Christ’s pure love is not the same thing as blanket tolerance for all human behavior or belief” (page 7). [Read more…] about Book Review: If Truth Were a Child: Essays

FairMormon Conference Podcast #28 – John Lynch, “Strengthen Thy Brethren: Bolstering Those in Faith Crisis”

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This podcast series features past FairMormon Conference presentations. Please join us for the 2019 FairMormon Conference coming up August 7-9! You can attend in person or purchase the video streaming.

John Lynch, Strengthen Thy Brethren: Bolstering Those in Faith Crisis

Transcript available here.

John Lynch is a Silicon Valley sales and marketing executive specializing in high-tech startup ventures. He is a member of the Board of Directors of FAIR and serves as its Chairman. Having served in many missionary callings, including twice as a Stake Mission President, multiple times as a Ward Mission Leader, and having worked at the Provo Missionary Training Center as a teacher and trainer, John has seen the impact of both well-prepared and poorly prepared defenders of the faith.

Audio Copyright © 2018 The Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research, Inc. Any reproduction or transcription of this material without prior express written permission is prohibited.

Book Review – Who is Truth? Reframing Our Questions for a Richer Faith

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Available in the FairMormon Bookstore

Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). We take this literally for the words “way” and “life,” but what if we also took it literally for the word “truth”? In their book Who What is Truth? Reframing Our Questions for a Richer Faith, that is exactly what authors Jeffrey L. Thayne and Edwin E. Gantt encourage us to do, changing our way of thinking from truth as an idea (this turns out to be rooted in Greek philosophy) to truth as a person (Hebrew thought).

The chapter headings give a good summary of what is covered: “What if truth is a person?,” “The ancient roots of person-truth,” “Faith in ideas, or faithfulness to a Person?,” “Knowing God vs. believing ideas about Him,” “Person-truth does not give us control,” “Knowing person-truth through covenant,” “Our on-and-off relationship with person-truth,” “What it means to be an authority on truth,” “The archnemesis of person-truth,” “What is sin, if truth is a person?,” “Rethinking the atonement of Christ,” and “Person-truth in a world of science and reason.” There is also a conclusion chapter, a list of further readings, and appendixes with more on Greek and Hebrew thought and questions and answers.

I was initially skeptical when offered this book to review. But it claimed to offer help for those having a faith crisis, and to strengthen faith in Jesus Christ and the Restoration, so I thought it would be worth a look. I was pleasantly surprised, and found myself agreeing with the conclusions (the good fruit being brought forth), even as I am still processing the explanations that led up to them. The authors anticipated skepticism, and they addressed all the potential red flags that came up in my mind as I read. [Read more…] about Book Review – Who is Truth? Reframing Our Questions for a Richer Faith

Tad Callister Interview – A Case For The Book of Mormon

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[A review of the book can be found here.]

Tad R. Callister is author of the book “A Case For The Book of Mormon. Tad Callister received a bachelor of science degree in accounting from Brigham Young University, a Juris Doctorate degree from the University of California–Los Angeles, and a master’s degree in tax law from New York University Law School. He spent most of his professional career practicing tax law. He and his wife Kathryn Saporiti are the parents of six children.

Brother Callister was serving in the Presidency of the Seventy and as a member of the Second Quorum of the Seventy when he was called as the 21st Sunday School general president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He has served in a number of Church callings including full-time missionary in the Eastern Atlantic States Mission, bishop, stake president, regional representative, mission president, and Area Seventy.

Brother Callister was released as Sunday School General President in the April 2019 General Conference where he gave his 6th and possibly last General Conference talk. 1/3 of his General Conference talks were about our subject on this podcast episode, The Book of Mormon. He is the author of the book “A Case For The Book of Mormon”, published by Deseret Book. He is scheduled to speak at the 2019 FairMormon Conference in August. This Podcast Episode is published from the Latter-day Saint MissionCast podcast with Nick Galieti.

Book Review: A Case for the Book of Mormon

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Available from the FairMormon Bookstore

[A interview of the author can be found here.]

Tad Callister is an emeritus member of the Seventy and was the Sunday School General President until his release in the recent April General Conference. He has previously written books on the atonement and the apostasy. He has degrees in accounting and tax law and was a lawyer professionally. He is scheduled to speak at the 2019 FairMormon Conference in August.

This book presents both a spiritual and intellectual case for the Book of Mormon, drawing on previously published and unpublished books and talks by the author. In fact, the last chapter (which is a summary of the book) is a slightly modified version of his October, 2017 General Conference talk, “God’s Compelling Witness: The Book of Mormon,” and chapter two is from a talk he gave at a BYU Devotional on November 1, 2016, “The Book of Mormon: Man-Made or God-Given?” Much of the research cited is from FairMormon, Book of Mormon Central, and FARMS (now the Neal A. Maxwell Institute), along with classic scholarship from B. H. Roberts, Richard Lloyd Anderson, and Hugh Nibley.

The book has five parts, starting with an introduction stating that the Book of Mormon must be either true or false, a divine work or a fraud, and explaining why. And we are reminded why all this is important, with a quote from Anglican theologian, Austin Farrer: “Though argument does not create conviction, lack of it destroys belief. What seems to be proved may not be embraced; but what no one shows the ability to defend is quickly abandoned. Rational argument does not create belief, but it maintains a climate in which belief may flourish” (page 9). [Read more…] about Book Review: A Case for the Book of Mormon

Book Review: Answers Will Come: Trusting the Lord in the Meantime

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Available from the FairMormon Bookstore

[Excerpts from the book can be found here.]

The main thing that FairMormon as an organization tries to do is to provide reasonable answers to questions and criticisms in an easily digestible format. However, there are some questions that don’t seem to have satisfying answers at this time. These are the questions that require us to have faith and keep holding on, choosing to continue believing and living the gospel while we pray and wait for answers to be revealed to us. This can be very difficult for someone going through a faith crisis or other trials, when it seems as if we have to have answers now in order to just keep going.

That is where this book fits in. It is written by a woman who has been through many trials and a crisis of faith, and has learned to trust while waiting for answers. “When I was a young adult, my unanswered gospel questions threatened to overwhelm my testimony, choking my trust in God. I begged the Lord for doctrinal answers only He could give. Instead, He wisely offered me tutorials in trust. In this book, I share those in-the-meantime answers that for me have created intellectual breathing space. These ideas help me joyfully choose faith until all the answers come” (Introduction page).

The book is written in an unusual way. There is one idea per page, with the body text appearing only on the odd-numbered pages. The alternating pages have a (usually) very brief topical title or summary. This is so that you can read a little bit at a time, and it works remarkably well. [Read more…] about Book Review: Answers Will Come: Trusting the Lord in the Meantime

Jim Bennett: Standing My Ground

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[Jim Bennett is the author of “A Faithful Reply to the CES Letter from a Former CES Employee“]

So it’s been a few days since Bill Reel published our twelve hours of recorded conversations we had for his Mormon Discussions podcast. And since then, I’ve been wading through the comments and finding that the consensus seems to be that in our Historic Podcast Battle for Church Trueness, Bill won handily, and I, and the Church, lost.

That assessment comes from the regular audience for Bill Reel’s podcast, which I’d be willing to bet includes far more disaffected or former church members than it does active Latter-day Saints. I expected their reaction to what I said to be interpreted through a far more skeptical lens than my own, and it doesn’t surprise me to see them giving the victory to “their guy” instead of me. Even so, I don’t think their interpretation is a fair or objective assessment of the discussion that took place.

I did not know Bill Reel prior to these podcasts, but a mutual friend thought it would be fun to see the two of us go “toe to toe” about the response I’d written to the CES Letter. My reply, perhaps naively, was that I was happy to speak to anyone about it, but I wasn’t interested in a debate so much as a discussion. Bill agreed to that, and we had the first of six early-morning recording sessions a few weeks ago. I thought the exchanges were respectful; I thought Bill gave me ample opportunity to represent my position, and I was overall pleased with the conversation as a whole.

Then they were published, and comments like the following started rolling in:

[Read more…] about Jim Bennett: Standing My Ground

FairMormon Conference Podcast #22 – Daniel Peterson, “Apologetics: What, Why, and How”

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This podcast series features past FairMormon Conference presentations. This episode is a presentation from our 2018 conference. (If you would like to watch the video of this and the other presentations from the 2018 conference, you can still purchase video streaming.)

Daniel Peterson, Apologetics: What, Why, and How

Transcript available here.

A native of southern California, Daniel C. Peterson received a bachelor’s degree in Greek and philosophy from Brigham Young University (BYU) and, after several years of study in Jerusalem and Cairo, earned his Ph.D. in Near Eastern Languages and Cultures from the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). Dr. Peterson is a professor of Islamic Studies and Arabic at BYU, where he has taught Arabic language and literature at all levels, Islamic philosophy, Islamic culture and civilization, Islamic religion, the Qur’an, the introductory and senior “capstone” courses for Middle Eastern Studies majors, and various other occasional specialized classes. He is the author of several books and numerous articles on Islamic and Latter-day Saint topics–including a biography entitled Muhammad: Prophet of God (Eerdmans, 2007)—and has lectured across the United States, in Europe, Australia, and New Zealand, and at various Islamic universities in the Near East and Asia. He served in the Switzerland Zürich Mission (1972-1974), and, for approximately eight years, on the Gospel Doctrine writing committee for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He also presided for a time as the bishop of a singles ward adjacent to Utah Valley University. Dr. Peterson is married to the former Deborah Stephens, of Lakewood, Colorado, and they are the parents of three sons.

Audio Copyright © 2018 The Foundation for Apologetic Information and Research, Inc. Any reproduction or transcription of this material without prior express written permission is prohibited.