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Can anyone explain this logic to me? My Father says this all the time. If the church teaches true principles and it’s members are worthy of a temple reccomends, how does this work? I think the church changes it’s policies and beliefs too often. Is that why people think this way? 
I have little time right now, but there are multiple threads here that discuss the general topic of the phrase, “The Church is true,” and how we fit into that as members. I would suggest reading them first – and I will try to find the threads and link to them later. (If anyone else can find them, have at it.) Heh. One of the great teachings I ever heard about this was, “What is the Church?” Not the building, not the leaders, not the organization, not the intangibles. The Church is the collective body of the members, or as you say, the followers. From that perspective, a dichotomy like your father’s kind of dissolves. And yet such a dichotomy may be useful to people who are struggling to maintain their faith that happens to be placed on “the Church”. Better, I say, to put faith in Heaven, not in the church of flesh.
I wonder (just a guess) if your father is getting his thoughts from the D&C 1 vs. where the Lord says the church is the only true and living church….”speaking unto the church collectively and not individually.” I generally take that to mean that any one of the members of the church, leader or not, can blow it or be wrong or act outside the will of God. I think it is important to have our hearts anchored to truth or the spiritual knowledge we obtain from the spirit rather than the “goodness” or “obedience” of all the people around us. The idea being that men fail and truth doesn’t. I wonder if the “true and
living” part of the scripture might help with your last concern…..with the church changing all the time. In principle, this church is suppose to change meaning that is a living, progressing entity. It had to change early on as the saints learned to deal with the flood of new truth. It had to change as the church grew into the international state it is today. I think that is what continuous revelation is all about. It keeps the doctrine pure (which is pretty hard to do through the ages) while attempting to meet the needs of the people and challenges of the changing times. Now…..I don’t know if the process works perfectly. Even Joseph Smith didn’t get it right all the time. You can see that as you read the D&C. Joseph is the most chastized of them all! There is no doubt in my mind the church has made its mistakes. I think the Lord allows this for what ever wise reason. I also think that I/we want him to fix the mistakes in the church on our timelines and I think I am learning that God does it according to His. And that is becoming ok with me especially when I think about issues like blacks and the priesthood. Hope that helps.
Best wishes.
The Church is based on ideals. The members are reaching towards those ideals, which is the positive and nice way of saying they fail most of the time. I mean that in the sense of perfectly reaching the ideal. Trying is the best we can do, from the bottom all the way up to the top. We do a little better each day, even if we have to take several steps back at times to get on the right path. I think a lot of that statement depends on the understanding of what “True” means…which is often overlooked or taken for granted that we are all thinking the same thing when we hear it. I find it is often used differently, or means different things to different people, but is a comforting word to use.
My son said the other day, “Joseph Smith is true”. I think that exemplifies how many in church use it, and how he has heard it in church many times. But to me, that statement doesn’t mean the same thing as what I think he is thinking. He is trying to say, “Joseph Smith is a true prophet.” (… one day, I wonder if he’ll dig deeper into what that statement really means.)
To say “the church is true but the followers are not” is to say the followers are not true. What does that mean “followers are not true”? Certainly they are not perfect, but I’m not sure what it means that they aren’t true.?
If your father is saying that the church is a perfect or an unfailing organization because it is inspired of God, that is one meaning. If he is trying to say it is “good” and led by God to enrich our lives, that is another meaning. If he is saying it is universally factually accurate throughout eternity and teachings will never change, that is another meaning. I would be interested to hear what his response is if you ask him what that means. I don’t think it is all of those things.
Certainly the church changes over time, I think that is what makes it “true” to me…it is truly something that helps my family going forward become better people…regardless of the accuracy of historic events or teachings yesterday, and regardless of the people who are in the church trying to understand it. It is “true” to me just like “True North” points me in a direction.
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