An Ex-Mo’s Testimony:
I Don’t Know (That?)This Church is True
Seven years. Actually, it has been a little more than seven years since I last wrote on Mormon topics. It was as if Joseph (of the colored coat, not the grove) dreamed of seven sickly cows, foretelling my long silence. But it isn’t prophesy if it goes in reverse, it is hindsight.
Probably one of the biggest difficulties facing anyone coming out of a religion is the philosophical problem of epistemology. Epistemology is a pain-in-the-butt word that is the study of how justified belief differs from opinion or in more simple terms “how do you know if something is true?”
In case you haven’t noticed the entire world is in an epistemological crisis. The crisis at this juncture (and on one simple topic, Covid-19) has resulted in one in five hundred United States citizens dying in the last year and a half. The Mormon Church recently implemented mask requirements in the temple and asked members to get vaccinated. From what I hear, murmuring Mormons are muttering that maybe the nearly-a-century-old medical professional that heads up their church is a fallen prophet for making mask mandates. Of course, I would suggest that their murmuring might be more effective if they did it behind masks, but I don’t think they would listen to me, especially if they don’t like alliteration.
But I digress.
How do we know if something is true?
I think that we forget that the Mormon origin story is an epistemological fable answering this very question. Joseph (of the grove, not the colored coat) didn’t know what religion to follow during the 1820s Great Awakening, in which the Burned-Over district was in a religious epistemological conflagration. His answer was James 1:5. Joseph’s method for getting at the truth was to go straight to the source, a seemingly valid method for getting at the truth. Since it was religion, God was the obvious source.
Joseph went on to spell out the Mormon Epistemology more fully in Moroni 10:3–6.
3 . . .ponder it in your hearts.
4 And when ye shall receive these things, I would exhort you that ye would aask God, the Eternal Father, in the name of Christ, if these things are not btrue; and if ye shall ask with a csincere heart, with dreal intent, having efaith in Christ, he will fmanifest the gtruth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost.
5 And by the power of the Holy Ghost ye may aknow the btruth of all things.
6 And whatsoever thing is good is just and true;
The entire foundation of the Mormon religion is about figuring out what is true and what is not true. Good things are “just and true.” The 13th Article of Faith riffs even more on how to live in this just and true lifestyle:
We believe in being honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous, and in doing good to all men; indeed, we may say that we follow the admonition of Paul — We believe all things, we hope all things, we have endured many things, and hope to be able to endure all things. If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things.
The 13th Article of Faith is an epistemology of experience — try stuff and figure it out. Now you may be asking yourself, “Why the fuck is this wanker giving a bunch of recovering Mormons a Sunday School Lesson?”
Good question. In all the hand wringing and hurt and betrayal those who have left the Church feel, I really believe that the reason most people leave the Church is they are epistemological Mormons. Yep, you left or are considering leaving the Church because you pondered things out, studied things with real intent, having faith you would find the truth, wanting to know the truth and looking for what is good and just and true. Indeed, I would say you were following the admonition of Paul, hoping, believing and enduring all things, and looking for the lovely and praiseworthy. And maybe in your believing and enduring you found that virtue was overrated.
Then like the good epistemological Mormon that you are, you want to share it with those who are still blinded and lost inside the Church. This is the dilemma of a subjective epistemology. The burning certitude comes from the inside, rather than outside.
I can hear the critique as I write this: “I know the Church isn’t true, because of facts, not feelings.” But is that really your basis for deciding the Church isn’t true? In all your pondering, didn’t the sheer magnitude of the inconsistency shift something inside? And even if you decided to leave the Church, not because of your lack of belief, but on a different epistemological basis, whenever you engage with Mormons, you are on the playing field of subjective epistemology and that is an argument you can’t win with a different way of determining the truth. No matter what facts you have at your disposal.
And this is the point as you engage with your old religion, use their language. Use their epistemology. And bear testimony that you know, on the exact same basis as their belief, that you know the Church is not true. Remind them that if it was good enough for Joseph Smith, it should be good enough for you.
