The Mormon Mirage: A Former Member Looks at the Mormon Church Today

423 Pages·2010·2.06 MB·English

by  Scott

LATAYNE C. SCOTT

THE
MORMON
MIRAGE
ZONDERVAN
The Mormon Mirage
Copyright © 2009 by Latayne Inc.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright
Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-
exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-
screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded,
decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information
storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or
mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written
permission of Zondervan.
Mobipocket Edition © March 2009 ISBN: 978-0-310-29358-3
Requests for information should be addressed to:
Zondervan, Grand Rapids, Michigan 49530
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Scott, Latayne Colvett, 1952-
The mormon mirage: a former Mormon looks at the Mormon Church
today /
Latayne C. Scott. – 3rd ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.
ISBN 978-0-310-29153-4 (softcover)
1. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints – Controversial
literature. 2.
Scott, Latayne Colvett, 1952 –. I. Title.
BX8645.S35 2009
230'.9332 – dc22
2008045543
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy
Bible, King James Version.
Any Internet addresses (websites, blogs, etc.) and telephone numbers printed in
this book are offered as a resource. They are not intended in any way to be or
imply an endorsement by Zondervan, nor does Zondervan vouch for the content
of these sites and numbers for the life of this book.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic,
mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in
printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.
Published in association with the Books & Such Literary Agency, 52 Mission
Circle, Suite 122, PMB 170, Santa Rosa, CA 95407-5370,
www.booksandsuch.biz

09 10 11 12 13 14 • 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Thank you, God, for leading me to Dan.
Thank you, Dan, for leading me to God.
Thank you, Ryan and Celeste, for keeping me near him.
CONTENTS

Title Page
Copyright
Acknowledgments
Preface: From Mirage to Reality
PART ONE
Chapter 1: A GENTLE APOSTASY
Chapter 2: THE JOSEPH SMITH STORY
Chapter 3: THE BOOK OF MORMON: “THE MOST CORRECT OF ANY
BOOK”?
Chapter 4: ONE BIBLE, TWO BOOKS OF COMMANDMENTS, AND
UNLIMITED WIVES
Chapter 5: THE PERILS OF THE PEARL
Chapter 6: THE PRECARIOUS SUMMIT OF CONTINUING REVELATION
Chapter 7: THE MORMON PANTHEON
Chapter 8: SALVATION AND EXALTATION
PART TWO
Chapter 9: ISSUES AND CHALLENGES FACING MORMONISM IN THE
TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY — PART 1
Chapter 10: ISSUES AND CHALLENGES FACING MORMONISM IN THE
TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY — PART 2
Chapter 11: CONCLUSION
Addendum
For Further Reading
Notes
About the Publisher
Share Your Thoughts
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

F
or the two previous editions of this book I gratefully remember the help of
Sandra Tanner, Dave Wilkins, David and Donna Lusk, Carol (Allen) Norris,
Carol Jantz, Raylie (Lusk) Pribble, Virginia (Lykins) O’Dell, Melissa (Harding)
Taylor, Rhonda Varley, and Ray Smith, as well as my patient family.
For this edition, I acknowledge with great gratitude Clodette Woodhouse,
Gary and Marie Smith, Steve Cable, John Hunter, Sandra Tanner, Candy Evans,
Dennis A. Wright, Janis Hutchinson, John Farkas, Phillip Arnn, Lane Thuet,
Celeste Green, and Mike Strawn. Bruce MacArthur went above and beyond the
call of dedication and duty to supply suggestions, editing, and research. This
book would have been impossible for me to complete without their help.
Two additional chapters, one regarding the LDS version of the story of
Joseph Smith, and another entitled “Priesthood, Purse Strings, and Proselyting”
are bonus chapters that appear only in the e-book version of this work.
All hyperlinks are operational as of June 2008.
All Bible quotes, unless otherwise indicated, are from the King James
Version.
Quotations from the Book of Mormon, Pearl of Great Price, and Doctrine and
Covenants, unless otherwise noted, are from the latest editions of these works in
print in 2008.
Preface:

FROM MIRAGE TO REALITY

The callow chestnut of Mormonism that says if you want to know about
Fords, then you don’t ask a Chevrolet dealer, and if you want to know
about Mormonism, then don’t ask a non-Mormon, is both wrong and lacks
critical judgment. Groups like Consumer Reports prove their maxim false.
Some of the best information comes from outside investigation (like Ford’s
exploding Pinto gas tank), which outside information can be life-saving.
— Kurt Van Gorden

I
n the preface in previous editions of this book I recounted how I once lived
Mormonism fully, responsibly, and joyfully. I never was (nor ever will be)
perfect, but I was a good, faithful Mormon. Finding out that Mormonism wasn’t
true was not initially a liberating experience. It was soul ravaging and sickening.
I will never completely recover from it.
I am middle aged now. The day approaches when I will go before my God
and give account for what I’ve said, done, and written. I ponder the fact that
though the original publishing of this book ceased some years ago, scarcely a
week goes by that I don’t get requests for copies of it. Many, many other books
on the same subject have been published, and to counter them, LDS apologists
use sophisticated and complex arguments to support the Book of Mormon,
Joseph Smith, and the superstructure of a church based on them.
I wrote this book for “regular people,” not scholars, and as I have revised it
for a new century, I have done so with the first aim of updating my statements
about Mormonism that are no longer true — because Mormonism itself has
changed.
Part One of this edition is a replication of the reasons why I left Mormonism
— with updated sources for the information on which I based that decision, and
new resources that validate those original sources and decisions. In some cases I
have left in the text some statements that reflect how I felt, just a few years out
of Mormonism, even though I might not state it that way now.
We are witnessing the sea change of Mormonism. As a result of doctrinal
changes, the LDS Church is in the midst of a significant but invisible split into
two camps. One group of both scholars and regular members still believe and
treasure the doctrines I loved when I was a Mormon. Many of them see the
second group as syncretistic and postmodern, abandoning the uniqueness of a
faith that is based on continuous and reliable revelation. Those of the first group
are struggling with the Church’s new insistence that the prophets of the past
should be discounted when their official (even thus-saith-the-Lord) teachings
disagree with twenty-first-century pronouncements. The second group looks for
acceptance from — and sometimes even fellowship with — Christians, with
immunity from questions about the past. Many in the second group refer to
criticisms of traditional Mormonism as straw-man arguments that are no longer
viable.
Since one sociologist of religion has estimated that “at any given moment, the
majority of Latter-day Saints are first-generation converts”1 (that is, people who
would have no ancestral ties to Mormonism and who would see its past quite
differently from the descendants of handcart pioneers, for example), these
differences are far beyond superficial. I have attempted in this book to provide
thoughtful, researchable material for both groups even though they themselves
have increasingly less common ground between them.
If at all possible, look up references that are footnoted in this book. I have
written this book for the Internet generation (and an expanded-content e-book,
with clickable footnotes, is available at www.zondervan.com). If a footnote is
too long or complicated to type in, go to Jerald and Sandra Tanner’s site,
www.utlm.org, and search for the subject matter among the wealth of documents
and photographs of documents there. For printed books from which I quote, I
have attempted to use only those which are accessible at the time of the writing
of this book. I have directed special attention to those written at a layman’s level
and by both Mormon and ex-Mormon scholars and researchers. I hope to
provide updates of information on my website, www.latayne.com.
Part Two of this book is all-new material. With the vantage point of years
away from Mormonism — and yet as a more-than-disinterested observer — I
have outlined nine issues and challenges the LDS Church currently faces. In a
final chapter I provide a personal retrospective that might make Mormons,
Christian friends, and even my closest associates a bit uncomfortable, a
perspective via representational theology, and some final assessments.
My reasons for leaving the LDS Church were then, and are now, quite
simple. They don’t really have much to do with archaeological findings (nor
with the absence of them). Nor do they have to do, so much, with the false
prophecies, suppressed history, and constantly changing doctrine of the
Mormonism of the past.
Its claims that it is a gospel different from traditional Christianity remain
unchallenged. No matter how you dress it up or water it down, Mormonism is
not Christianity. Jesus Christ promised that the gates of hell would not prevail
against the church he founded — it could not be taken from the earth for 1,700
years.
The once-human, fleshly god of Mormonism is not the Almighty God of the
Bible. And none of us will ever become a god. There is only One.
To him alone, who is worthy, be all praise and glory.