Could faith promoting stories be dangerous?

I don’t know that faith promoting stories themselves are dangerous – I think the danger comes in the meaning and expectations we infuse into them as we add them to our personal narrative (or don’t when everyone else does).

Early in my faith transition, I had this experience that showed me in part the importance of recognizing when we are infusing meaning into a situation.

I had taken off my wedding and engagement ring to do dishes and other grimy stuff. I was in a huffy mood, so I was a little careless where I put them.

Later on that day, I wanted to put them back on but I could not find them. I looked for them for 20-30 minutes and then enlisted the Hubby to help. He spent 5 minutes advising me on various places that I had already checked, and then decided to pray for help. I respected his prayer for assistance and kept searching. Eventually, I decided as a near-last resort to search the trash, it was a “With my luck, they ended up on some papers that ended up in the trash and then fell into the bottom of the disgusting refuse” type of thought. I mentioned to the Hubby that I was going to search the trash next, and he pooh-poohed them ending up in the trash. I shrugged, reverted back to the “with my luck” stance, and searched the trash – which of course had the rings.

The Hubby wanted to credit the prayer with finding the rings – “I was inspired to look in the trash” – but that doesn’t work, because if it was inspiration, then why did he disregard it even though was technically a more “faithful” person then me? And if it was “my revelation”, then why pooh-pooh it at all and why doesn’t it feel like revelation to me?

This story is not a comfortable faith-promoting narrative to pronounce that God may have had nothing to do with me finding the rings – this was at a time that my husband wanted me to have a faith-promoting narrative that would hopefully rekindle my testimony and get me off the borderline atheist/agnostic fence. I wanted my rings, and the space to not insist that God is showing up unless (and not even then absolutely) divine communication is up to the clarity of angels visiting Alma the Younger or Adam completing his offerings.

If you have the time, listen to the podcast. (52+Min) It’s worth it.

The points he (Keith Erekson) makes is:

– When we hear in a talk with a faith promoting story, our response should be: “what is the evidence?”

– Not all evidence is created equal. Thoughts, ideas & meanings change over time (history).

– There are certain principles that apply when we give talks or teach lessons. They may include:

– Personal Assumptions.

– Exaggerations. He used the example of the crickets & early pioneers.

– Amplifying the story for effect.

– Social Acceptance within the church.

– Prophets can be tricked. They used the example of Mark Hofmann & the documentary of “Murder Among the Mormons”.

– HIs conclusion was: don’t let a faith promoting story, that is later proven false, effect your testimony of the gospel or activity in the Church.

They talked about temple garments & the story how we are protected from physical harm. I don’t remember hearing this story for many

years now. I’m sure there are variations that are circulated today.

I think I am a casualty of these faith promoting stories.

I think we have this mindset that almost anything that is said that motivates people to increase loyalty to the church is good and even more specifically anything that motivates them to pay their tithing is good. I believe that there is an “ends justify the means” mentality here.

We have these stories of people being “blessed” and God stepping in to intervene and tip the scales of chance in the favor of the faithful member.

I had felt that my family would be protected by my faithful priesthood service and tithing payment. It was a shock to me that ruptured my understanding of the universe when it seemed that these promises were not fulfilled in my case. This phenomenon is known as an assumptive world collapse and is not limited to LDS communities.

When I talk to bishops one on one about this issue they certainly acknowledge 1) that bad things continue to happen to faithful church members and 2) that sometimes church members, SS teachers, and even leaders will say misleading or inaccurate (though well-meaning) things.

The podcast talked about assumptions. Talking specifically about my conversations with bishops around tithing there is a definite assumption that I need to pay tithing. And then I believe that we can more or less fill in the blanks about specifically “WHY” I need to pay, but the assumption is built in that the only acceptable answer is that I pay. I further have gathered that the reasons that I find that help me to pay are not really important and will not be challenged, even if they are inaccurate, even if they are not in line with church doctrines. As long as I can feel good about paying then the why is less important. And then I can share in SS class my anecdotal story about how tithing keeps one from getting fired, or robbed, or (insert calamity) and it goes unchallenged. Then the next generation hear my anecdotes and internalize them. Some of them will live semi-charmed lives and will feel that everything worked out beautifully, some others will struggle to make the paradigm fit what they experience in their lives.

I’m sorry for any confusion, I just found out that the book: “Real vs Rumor” by Keith A Erekson will

not be released until 6/10/21.

I think these stories are meant to address the following:

1) We believe in a God of miracles that is just as active today as He was in former times. Indeed, the formation of our church seems to be partly in response and rejection of the idea that God already did His work and set up His organization and no longer needs to work miracles.

2) We are relatively small and exclusive. We are the only path (or at least the most direct path) to salvation/exaltation and fulfilling the potential of the human soul. It only makes sense that a church that was uniquely guided/accepted/claimed/authorized by HF and JC would have some special evidences to comfort and buoy the faith of the faithful.

3) Our church is a high demand church. For many, church participation is an exercise in duty, obligation, endurance, and fortitude. We believe that these things are meant to improve our natures and help us to become more like God is. When someone is making significant sacrifices for an organization, I believe that the need for faith promoting stories increases to help justify and feel validated in those sacrifices.

I believe that these three points work in tandem. “I make deep sacrifices because it is the only way to please God and God gives evidences/tender mercies to let me know that I am on the right path.” “This is the only church with the correct priesthood and authority. God gives miracles to the faithful “after the trail of their faith” in part to confirm that they are in the right place. This path is one of personal sacrifice” etc. etc.

To me, they seem like the three legs of a three legged stool and it seems hard to imagine an LDS church without all three feeding into and supporting each other.

I now know & understand that God doesn’t

work that way. It is difficult to explain that to most members I know.

I have found this to be very difficult to explain to other members. I think that it just does not fit into their paradigm.

I remember a church brother giving a lesson on obedience. He had been out of work and he felt that through his obedience God would bless him with a job to provide righteously for his family. I made a comment that sometimes the blessings that God sends do not come in the form that we expect or feel that we need.

This brother came up to me after church to ask me more about my perspective. He was confused about how this could be. King Benjamin says that when we obey, God “immediately” blesses us. D&C says that God is “bound” when we do as He says. His desire for a job was righteous, was I saying that God might deny him? I did my best to quickly explain my experience and perspective that God may “immediately” bless us but the form that those blessings may take are not clearly spelled out and it could be a mistake to think we know exactly what God is going to do. It is not a simple formula where we can control the outcome. This brother thanked me for my time but still seemed confused. It just did not seem to make sense to him.

I wanted to wait until I was able to listen to the podcast before I responded. I look forward to the book and will add it to my reading list (and probably my Amazon wish list).

My take aways from the podcast:

-Rumors/”I heard”/perpetuating rumors. I think the danger is less critical in those cases. An example used was one that seems to pop up every GC with the mission call that says something like “your mission location will be revealed at GC.” I suppose that’s not doing much more than spreading the hope that some place like China is going to open to missionary work and I don’t know the harm in that hope/belief although I don’t think we’re ready for that as a church yet. According to the podcast there are two remedies for this type of rumor – ask to see the evidence (I did this with someone once in asking why if it was posted on Facebook the letter was not) and stop spreading/sharing those rumors.

-Not all evidence is equal. Rules of thumb include being as close to the “horse’s mouth” as possible and closeness in time to the actual event (this mostly relates to more historical events/rumors/myths).

-Assumptions – “I don’t need evidence because whatever is already in my head is right/correct” thus we don’t think about it or only look at it through the lens of what we think is true/correct or want to be true. Erekeson says this is closely related to the “I heard” problem. Related to our assumptions is the idea that we sometimes need to be humble in being able to admit we are wrong and change (the example of J Fielding S and the moon landing was used here).

-Expecting our church leaders to always be right is unfair and unhelpful (and I add dangerous). Erekson asserts that prophets are subjected to many assumptions which are just wrong and for which there is no scriptural or historical support. He also asserts that when we discover that God works with prophets in ways other than what we assume it leads to crisis (hence my earlier addition of dangerous). While this was a small part of my own faith crisis, it did play a role (a bigger role was played by how God interacts – or doesn’t interact – with us directly). Examples Erekson gives here include the idea of the prophet knowing everything about the future (they may know some things and not others), that everything the prophet says is quotable, and that prophets get very clear revelation. Erekson says this part of the book has so many examples that some had to be put in the appendix.

-Facts don’t speak for themselves. Everything is interpreted and interpretation depends on many other factors.

-Nothing is really either/or, church or otherwise. There are always other options/perspectives and both parts of a binary can be correct at the same time.

-Stories get “expanded” or exaggerated over time (snow gets deeper, fish get bigger, etc.). Leaving out pertinent facts is also part of this. I think these types of things are very dangerous because there is deception involved and the deception plays into faith and emotion. It seems they are usually based on some facts but then non-facts are added to make them more “faith promoting.” Examples include china in the walls of the Kirtland Temple, the gulls and crickets, and Del Parson’s Jesus portrait. Part of my own faith crisis was that I had trouble figuring out what was true and what wasn’t and was it all wrong because this part was wrong? (This is where “don’t dump all at once”* comes from.)

-Social media didn’t invent any of these things, but it can spread it much more quickly than testimony meetings and perhaps like a testimony meeting it can assist us in not thinking about it and just passing it on.

*My standard advice to people in faith crisis is “take it slow, focus on what you do believe, and don’t dump all at once.” I haven’t had as much opportunity to say it of late.