![\"Poor](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/186\/2016\/04\/800px-Kids_in_Rishikesh_India.jpg\")
<\/a>Is it \u201ccommunistic\u201d to wish that children like these might be educated, have clean water to drink and enough food to eat, and be able to rise out of poverty?\u00a0 That would seem to me a rather odd definition of the word.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
At least by the time I was in graduate school, evangelical Protestant anti-Mormonism was clearly the single most obvious overt challenger to the claims of the Restoration and to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints<\/a> \u2014 as distinct, of course, from the usual tugs of worldly temptation and sheer burn-out.\u00a0 It was the day of The God Makers<\/em> and of Ex-Mormons for Jesus.\u00a0 There was an actual anti-Mormon visitor center in greater Los Angeles \u2014 Todd Compton and I visited it one memorable day \u2014 and there may perhaps have been others elsewhere.\u00a0 The mountebank sensationalist\u00a0Ed Decker<\/a> was riding high, bringing similar charlatans like Bill Schnoebelen<\/a>\u00a0along in his train.\u00a0 It was no coincidence that the periodical that I founded shortly after joining the faculty at Brigham Young University, which eventually became the FARMS Review<\/em>, devoted a not insignificant portion of its attention to the products of the fervent and often rather bizarre anti-Mormon movement.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n But the evangelical anti-Mormon tide began to recede many years ago, and I have, for quite a while now, believed the most important overt challenger to Latter-day Saint faith (and, for that matter, to evangelical Protestantism) to be secularism and\/or leftist social, political, cultural, and moral views, many of them coupled in one way or another with sex and sexuality.\u00a0 The rise of the religious \u201cnones,\u201d unchurched and often sexually \u201cliberated,\u201d sometimes atheistic but perhaps more often vaguely \u201cspiritual but not religious,\u201d is the much noted and obvious indicator of this trend.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n But, to my considerable surprise, I\u2019ve begun to notice another overt challenge \u2014 this time, from what many would call the political and cultural \u201cright.\u201d\u00a0 (I myself dislike putting it on the right, because it has little or nothing in common with free market, federalist, constitutionalist conservatism of the kind that I have known (and to which I\u2019ve been seriously committed) since I was in my early teens.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n What brings this to my mind at the moment is the harsh criticism of their leaders that I\u2019ve seen from some members of the Church since the First Presidency and several apostles quite visibly received vaccinations against COVID-19 yesterday.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I\u2019m not referring to people who have simply said that, for whatever good or bad reason, they themselves would not be seeking vaccination.\u00a0 They\u2019re free to do as they choose, however misguided I may think their choices; it\u2019s not a \u201ccommandment.\u201d\u00a0 Nor \u2014 and I need to bring this up because attitudes toward the pandemic have often (however puzzling it may and does seem to me) been closely related to political attitudes \u2014 am I referring to all of the\u00a074,222,958 Americans (46.8 percent of those who cast ballots) who voted for Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I have in mind, rather, a small handful of (I\u2019m guessing) once stalwart and (hyper?)orthodox Latter-day Saints that I\u2019ve seen and heard \u2014 to choose just one example \u2014 compare the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve to the Gadianton Robbers.\u00a0 Some have also charged them with trusting in man and in the arm of flesh rather than in God and accused them of endorsing a plan to subject the world to communism.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I find such things deeply sad and disheartening.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Until recently, I had never imagined, it had never entered my mind, that very conservative<\/em> Latter-day Saints might be among those described in the Lord\u2019s preface to the Doctrine and Covenants:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Every man\u00a0walketh\u00a0in his\u00a0own\u00a0way, and after the\u00a0image\u00a0of his own god, whose image is in the likeness of the world, and whose substance is that of an idol, which waxeth\u00a0old\u00a0and shall perish in\u00a0Babylon, even Babylon the great, which shall fall.\u00a0<\/strong> (Doctrine and Covenants 1:16)<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I had never imagined that such<\/em> people would, in at least a few instances, put their politics (broadly speaking) ahead of their faith (and perhaps even, eventually, ahead of their covenants), making an idol of their secular commitments.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n And I saw numberless concourses of people, many of whom were\u00a0pressing\u00a0forward, that they might obtain the\u00a0path\u00a0which led unto the tree by which I stood.\u00a0 And it came to pass that they did come forth, and commence in the path which led to the tree.\u00a0 And it came to pass that there arose a\u00a0mist\u00a0of darkness; yea, even an exceedingly great mist of darkness, insomuch that they who had commenced in the path did lose their way, that they wandered off and were\u00a0lost.<\/strong>\u00a0 (1 Nephi 8:21-23)<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I can\u2019t help but recall, yet again, a declaration attributed to the heroic English clergyman William Law (1686-1761).\u00a0 It was a favorite with the late and much-missed Elder Neal A. Maxwell, of the Council of the Twelve:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n If\u00a0you have not chosen the\u00a0Kingdom of God\u00a0first, it will in the end make no difference what you have chosen instead.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I\u2019m thinking of one person in particular, who charges the Brethren with\u00a0supporting critical race theory, disavowing canonized scripture, disparaging past prophets, supporting Black Lives Matter from the pulpit, \u201ccrying racism from the pulpit where there is none,\u201d and openly supporting global communism.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a disgrace,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Indeed.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I\u2019ll be honest.\u00a0 I have no idea what he\u2019s talking about when he accuses Church leaders of supporting \u201ccritical race theory\u201d or rejecting canonical scripture.\u00a0 When he condemns them for disparaging past prophets, I can only guess that he may be referring to the fact that they don\u2019t feel bound to endorse some of, say, Brigham Young\u2019s statements about race.\u00a0 If so, I must say that I, too, find those statements \u2014 like certain statements from many of his non-LDS contemporaries, including some truly great American icons \u2014 cringe-inducing.\u00a0 When he damns the Brethren for supposedly endorsing the Black Lives Matter organization, I presume that he\u2019s upset that they\u2019ve affirmed that black lives matter<\/em> \u2014 which is entirely distinct from endorsing the highly problematic movement that bears that title.\u00a0 And when he denies the existence of racism, I can only respond that he lives in a different world than I do.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n But what about the accusation that the Brethren have openly endorsed global communism from the pulpit?<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The person that I have specifically in mind justifies his accusation that the Brethren endorse global communism by referring to Elder D. Todd Christofferson\u2019s excellent address in the October 2020 conference of the Church, entitled \u201cSustainable Societies.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0 Elder Christofferson\u2019s remarks begin as follows:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n In 2015 the United Nations adopted what was called \u201cThe 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.\u201d It was described as \u201ca shared blueprint for peace and prosperity for people and the planet, now and into the future.\u201d The Agenda for Sustainable Development includes 17 goals to be achieved by the year 2030, such as no poverty, zero hunger, quality education, gender equality, clean water and sanitation, and decent work.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n The concept of sustainable development is an interesting and important one. Even more urgent, however, is the broader question of sustainable societies. What are the fundamentals that sustain a flourishing society, one that promotes happiness, progress, peace, and well-being among its members? We have scriptural record of at least two such thriving societies. What can we learn from them?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n According to the accuser, Elder Christofferson, evidently (again, according to the accuser) speaking on behalf of the First Presidency, the Twelve, and other leaders of the Church, actually endorsed the United Nations document to which he refers.\u00a0 However, I see no sign of such an endorsement on Elder Christofferson\u2019s part, let alone on behalf of all of the Brethren.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Still \u2014 and I\u2019m speaking as someone who isn\u2019t precisely a cheerleader for the United Nations \u2014 would it really have been so bad if he had<\/em> endorsed the document?\u00a0 Does that document really advocate the imposition of communism?<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Not so far as I can see.\u00a0 Not even close.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n At an official United Nations site<\/a>, I found a handy online summary of the seventeen \u201csustainable development goals\u201d mentioned\u00a0by Elder Christofferson in his remarks .\u00a0 Here they are:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Come on.\u00a0 The seventeen goals above are communist<\/em>?\u00a0 Seriously?\u00a0 Now, plainly, there are free-market conservative approaches to each of the items above and there are more left-leaning approaches.\u00a0 And good discussions can be had about each and every one of them.\u00a0 But the goals are good<\/em> goals.\u00a0 They\u2019re not communist in any way.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Still, the fact is that Elder Christofferson didn\u2019t endorse the seventeen United Nations goals listed above.\u00a0 But they\u2019re certainly not communistic.\u00a0 So, even if he had<\/em> endorsed them, he wouldn\u2019t<\/em> have been endorsing \u201cglobal communism.\u201d\u00a0 To say otherwise is simply contrary to fact (to put it charitably).\u00a0 And, even if he had endorsed them, that would have been only Elder Christofferson endorsing them, on his own, not the entirety of the presiding quorums of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Finally, a thought about anti-pandemic mask-wearing that somebody shared with me quite a while back:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I see people wearing winter coats and hats.\u00a0 What a bunch of sheep!\u00a0 LOL!\u00a0 I did my own research and found out that only 1500 people die from hypthermia in the US per year.\u00a0 That\u2019s only 0.0005% of the population.\u00a0 They live in fear of something that 99.9995% of people won\u2019t die from.\u00a0 And it gets better: A lot of the people who died from hypothermia were wearing coats and hats, and they still died!\u00a0 Coats don\u2019t work!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Posted from Bountiful, Utah<\/p>\n \u00a0 \u00a0 At least by the time I was in graduate school, evangelical Protestant anti-Mormonism was clearly the single most obvious overt challenger to the claims of the Restoration and to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints \u2014 as distinct, of course, from the usual tugs of worldly temptation and sheer burn-out.\u00a0 It […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1019,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2553,1821,1266,21190,4735,1809,3493,14347,8031,15541,13514,9108,17446,5421,10555,21196,9101,17954,6891,21202,21199,21205,21208,2905,1812,1815,13909,2992,19112,15941,6657,1474,11051,13411,16660,13781,6147,788,55,1667,9104,5286,21147,21144,15538,3880,1215,20332,4267,243,21093,21211,17449,8514,21193,1588,14432,11714,17939],"class_list":["post-89965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-apostate","tag-apostle","tag-apostles","tag-brethren","tag-church","tag-church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints","tag-communism","tag-communist","tag-coronavirus","tag-council-of-the-twelve","tag-covid","tag-covid-19","tag-d-todd-christofferson","tag-disease","tag-elder","tag-elders","tag-epidemic","tag-epidemiology","tag-first-presidency","tag-heresy","tag-heretic","tag-heretical","tag-innoculation","tag-latter-day-saint","tag-latter-day-saints","tag-lds","tag-leaders","tag-leadership","tag-leftism","tag-leftist","tag-m-russell-ballard","tag-marxism","tag-marxist","tag-mask","tag-masking","tag-masks","tag-medicine","tag-mormon","tag-mormonism","tag-mormons","tag-pandemic","tag-president","tag-president-ballard","tag-president-nelson","tag-quorum-of-the-twelve","tag-russell-ballard","tag-russell-m-nelson","tag-russell-marion-nelson","tag-russell-nelson","tag-science","tag-shot","tag-shots","tag-todd-christofferson","tag-twelve","tag-un","tag-united-nations","tag-vaccination","tag-vaccine","tag-vaccines"],"yoast_head":"\n\n