This lecture was delivered at the Sunstone Symposium in Sandy, UT on July 29th 2023.

I am pleased to return to Sunstone and to see it again exists in the form we took for granted before Covid-19. I feel more welcomed here among you intellectuals, doubters, apostates, and seekers than I do now among the active Latter-day Saints. Like many of you, I see gaps, contradictions and falsehoods in the claims made by the LDS church. But I also see many gaps, contradictions and falsehoods in the critics of the LDS church. I’m a believer in Mormonism as Joseph Smith defined it: “One of the grand fundamental principles of Mormonism is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may.” When it comes to Mormonism, renegade apostates are often that because they have discovered some new, unpleasant truth about the LDS church. These disappointed former saints are not evil and do not deserve being branded as ‘apostate’—but are in reality practicing a more correct form of Mormonism by accepting more truth.

The theme discussed by this year’s Symposium presenters is “(Main)Streaming Mormonism”—an effort by the LDS church to accomplish that objective is certainly underway. But if you define “Mormonism” as Joseph Smith did; that is: “One of the grand fundamental principles of Mormonism is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may.” Well, then all of you who welcome the truth are Mormons. Even if that search has alienated you from the LDS church, or (in my case) alienated the LDS church from you. If you seek for truth then you are companions with Joseph Smith and “Mormons” as he defined it. [More on that later.]

As for the LDS church, the hope to mainstream their organization has resulted in two things happening simultaneously: First, the original form of Mormonism is being abandoned. Second, political, social, economic and moral trends of modernity are replacing it. Considering many of the titles chosen by presenters at this Symposium, it should be apparent to us all that the present-day LDS church is both threadbare and foolishly attempting to put patches of new cloth on an old garment. The ‘traditional’ believer’s voices no longer dominate LDS meetings, conferences and lessons.

But this is getting ahead of the matter. I should start with another part of this story that requires me to clarify some matters about which many of you will hold very contrary views. I am not going to defend my position on foundational matters. I’ve already done that in some 38 volumes currently in print. This is an hour-long talk, so here is a list of things I believe, but won’t be defending here:

-First, that Joseph Smith was in contact with God and used by Them to accomplish a Divine work.

-Second, that Joseph Smith was a devoted monogamist, faithful to his only wife, Emma. Emma had the stronger personality and better formal education of the two.

-Third, that Joseph Smith opposed plural wivery, did what he could to discover it and eradicate it from Nauvoo, and believed that these secret adulterous crimes would lead to the destruction of the church.

-Forth, that it is wise, noble and virtuous to follow Joseph Smith’s example and counsel, and foolish to hold him in derision and attribute wickedness (including adulterous plural wivery) to him. Ultimately, those who believe and trust lies regarding him will have reason to mourn. 

-Fifth, while Joseph Smith was at the head Mormonism was optimistic, utopian, revolutionary and innovative. It was intent on reshaping the world into a better, more egalitarian place.

-Finally, Joseph Smith was not understood by the majority of those living in Nauvoo during his lifetime. Once Brigham Young ascended to control over the LDS faithful, he implemented a different (although arguably still utopian) form of Mormonism than what Joseph Smith and God intended to accomplish with the restoration.

Joseph was constantly adding to the breadth, depth and width of a religion he understood to have been both ancient and lost. He claimed to be a restorer, not an inventor. When the text of Genesis says that man was formed “in the image of God, male and female…” it only hinted at the truth Joseph would add about mankind: “You have to learn how to be Gods yourselves, and be kings and priests to God, the same as all Gods have done before you, namely by going from one small degree to another, and from a small capacity to a great one: from grace to grace from exaltation to exaltation until you attain to the resurrection of the dead.” Joseph taught we have not only God’s “image” but also Their potential. Joseph held a much more elevated view of mankind than did Christianity of the 1800s.

I prefer the optimistic, self-confident, revolutionary Mormonism of Joseph Smith over the devolving form it has since assumed. The deformities have multiplied and it now is lurching forward toward an unrecognizably abominable form.

LDS Mormonism has not seen such radical changes as Russell Nelson’s since Brigham Young’s reign. At one point Brigham Young’s agenda brought Utah’s Mormonism into a violent, downward spiral that the US Army was sent to dethrone him as governor. President Young hoped to employ Native Americans as the “battle axe of the Lord,” but that came to nothing. A few years later the Blackhawk War from 1865 to 1872 proved that ‘battle axe’ was the Lord’s, and He wielded it against the Mormons rather than the gentiles. Brigham Young did not take the hint when removed as Governor, and he ignored the slap when the Natives made war against the Mormons. Likewise, Nelson is ignoring the tremendous outflow of disaffected LDS now underway. Instead of radically adopting bad ideas, the LDS church should just be truthful.

Truth need not destroy faith in God, in Joseph Smith, or in Mormonism. Once the varnish is removed, keep digging and remove the veneer also. What you will find is that the LDS church has warped even Joseph Smith as part of their false narrative. There is sturdy lumber lying beneath the marketing veneer of corporate LDS-ism.

There is a vast library supporting institutional LDS historical claims. The LDS church has always been prolific-propagandists, whose effort to claim historical support for themselves has been enthusiastic and overeager. It was, after all, the saints who threatened to “exterminate” the Missourians first, but church apologists have preserved that memory only in the form of a cruel order by Missouri Governor Lilburn Boggs. He was only a reactionary.

There were LDS apostles who strayed into bigamy and ‘spiritual wifeism’ in England years before it became something they attributed to Joseph Smith. The LDS reliance on William Clayton’s Journal is misplaced.

The Church History Library withholds many original resource materials, including contemporary journals, diaries and letters from the public. Interesting materials are becoming increasingly available that provide a valuable peek inside censored, authentic LDS history.

Woodruff’s Official Declaration 1 was a lie, and the “Manifesto” was only to mislead the ‘gentiles’ long enough to get statehood for Utah. The document remains part of the LDS scripture canon as if it were an authentic renunciation of plural marriage.

There is another library, not quite so prolific, written by LDS naysayers. They, too, have been enthusiastic if not overeager. After reading both libraries, I’ve reached the conclusion that both overstate their cases and wind up distorting who and what Joseph Smith was. As a result, I do not fit into the LDS church and they properly excommunicated me. As they define “apostasy” I did that. I apostasied [apostatized]. They have every right to define the terms for continuing membership in their religious club, and I violated their terms. However, I do not hold a virulent view of Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, or whether God was up to something beginning in the early 1820s. I believe that something resulted in an inspired renewal of God’s commitment to help mankind. For that reason many of you also have strong disagreement with me.

I doubt anything I have to say will be welcome on either side of the ‘pro vs. con’ LDS divide. But at least my voice is heard and even welcomed here. Sunstone is still a valuable meeting ground for Mormons of every stripe.

As LDS Mormonism undergoes another metamorphosis, one question I think should be asked is, ‘what is the role of religion’ any religion, in any society, at any time in history—what role does it serve? To me the answer is to preserve proven or traditional values, to stabilize society against rapid and often disruptive change. Religion impedes new ideas from diverting society into a potentially unwise detour from traditions that have provided stability. Correspondingly, the greatest criticism of religion is that it interferes with adopting fashionable, new ideas. It is inevitable that when “old flattop” comes “grooving up slowly” with “hair down to his knees” he challenges the status quo, and provokes a chorus of churchgoing criticism.

“Changes” require you to “turn and face the strange,” often leading to an uncertain, unpredictable outcome. The voices urging change offend the religions, all religions, because they oppose social stasis. A good lyricist has put the matter both clearly and persuasively:

Come mothers and fathers throughout the land
And don’t criticize what you can’t understand
Your sons and your daughters are beyond your command
Your old road is rapidly aging
Please get out of the new one if you can’t lend your hand
For the times, they are a-changin’

Because LDS Mormonism is teetering on this brink, the S