It's Either True or It Is Not

President James E. Faust: "The gospel as restored by Joseph Smith is either true or it is not."

To me, this statement is both obvious and profound. As a missionary, the most frustrating thing was not those who rejected the message. It was not those who would not allow us to clarify misconceptions before judging. The most frustrating thing was meeting people who agreed that Joseph's story might be true, but just didn't care. They didn't feel it was worth the effort to find out.

This attitude never made sense to me. Given the gravity of Joseph's claims, it seems to me to be a matter of eternal significance to investigate whether they are true or not. Of course, we know spiritual truths by spiritual means, so ultimately the knowledge of whether Mormonism is true must come from God. However, the vast majority of those who are not Mormons would not say that they have received a witness from God that it is not true. Rather, they have just not found it worth investigating. Certainly I can understand this; I have not felt it necessary to seriously investigate Islam, for example. But those who don't feel Mormonism is worth investigating must at least reconcile with themselves some of the compelling evidences.

Those evidences include the three and eight witnesses, the acceptance of his family (who can con his own mother and father?), supernatural events witnessed by many, and many evidences from the Book of Mormon itself. In the last category, the most recent one that has come to my intention is Jacob 5, and how accurate it is in describing ancient horticulture.

Of course, evidence is not proof. Calling these things evidence is not the same as saying they prove Mormonism to be true. It is possible to find evidence for things that aren't true. And certainly anti-Mormons would counter with their own list of things they feel Mormons must reconcile, which organizations like FAIR attempt to do. And there are likely some questions that might remain unanswered.

But I believe it is valid, even with those questions unanswered, to ask then how we are to explain the evidences of Mormonism's truth. Both sides can argue that the beliefs of the opposite side are improbable, but that does not exempt either side from offering a more probable explanation.

If I had more time, and didn't fear being misunderstood, I think it would be interesting to write a book describing the most probably explanation for Mormonism, assuming Joseph's story is not true. But my book would not just cherry-pick the most supportive facts, but would attempt to explain all of the difficult questions. The result, I believe, would be a story at least equally as improbable as Joseph's. I hereby give my permission to anyone to steal my idea, and you will have a least one customer.

Cultural Pseudo-Truth

Last night my wife and I watched a television program on the civil rights movement (No, this is not another MLK/Mormon post, it just starts there). I was not alive during the heart of the movement, so it's very foreign to me. It's hard to imagine that all of this happened not so long ago, and that racism was so recently acceptable in our society. How do we explain this? Were all those racists bad people, and now we are so much more moral? I don't believe so. I believe most of them were generally good people. So how could they be so wrong about race issues? I believe it is because of a phenomenon I'll call cultural pseudo-truth. (If there is already an accepted term for this, please let me know.)

In general there are two sources of truth: science (or, more generally, reason) and religion (or, more generally, faith or revelation). Some questions are best answered by science, and some are best answered by religion. However, I think we overlook the influence of a third, false source of pseudo-truth: culture. I believe that, unfortunately, much of the "truth" that we take for granted comes from this third source. Racists in the past accepted that blacks were inferior. Not many people, even good ones, thought to question this cultural norm. It took a revolutionary leader, Martin Luther King, along with other brave individuals to bring scrutiny to this belief.

When I accept the reality that at least some of the things I believe are a result of my culture, and not based on some more sure source, I think of two important questions related to Mormonism:

First, how does cultural pseudo-truth affect how others view us? I think most of the reasons some people think that Mormons are "weird" is a result of the culture that we are compared against. The Word of Wisdom, temple worship, and the missionary program are a few things that are pointed out as things that make us weird. I could go into why I believe each one seams weird when viewed through a cultural lens, but when viewed from cultural neutrality are not all that weird. Not to dwell on a sensitive topic, but I'll just point out that our culture views clothing as an expression of our light-heartedness (Think Joe Boxer and t-shirts with sarcastic comments on them that are all the rage with the kids these days). In such a culture, it's no wonder why Mormons are considered weird for associating some spiritual significance to an article of clothing. However, such a view is not unique in the world, as demonstrated by orthodox Jews wearing yamacas, and other current and historical examples.

But, before we Mormons start congratulating ourselves that we have risen above cultural pseudo-truth, let me explain my second important question: How does cultural pseudo-truth affect how we view the world? Are there things in our culture that we accept as true which cause us to view those who do things differently as wrong? Not surprisingly, it's harder for me to come up with examples of this. Clearly it's harder to recognize cultural pseudo-truth in myself than it is to recognize it in others. One possible example is family size. Mormons traditionally have large families (although this is less so recently). If we assume, for a moment, that this is a cultural phenomenon, and not doctrinal in some way, should it influence how I view someone who chooses to have a small family, or no family?

Or perhaps there is something even more dire. Perhaps I, like the racists of times past, hold some deep conviction rooted in my cultural that is actually dead wrong and deeply harmful. The problem is: how would I know?