Today on Radio Free Mormon RFM and Bill Reel dissect the talk Stand Forever, given on the 22nd of January 2019 by Elder Lawrence Corbridge, a member of the Seventy of the LDS Church. Several Major Points come out
– Elder Corbridge seems to have had a level of faith crisis himself while on assignment from the Leadership to dig into “antagonistic material” regarding the Church.
-His gloom while claimed not to be Cognitive Dissonance (Belief Bias) and instead to be the absence of the Holy Ghost is irrational and illogical.
– The LDS Flow Chart regardless of your experience leads to the Church being true. If you get an answer that the Church is true, then the Church is true. If you get an answer that the Church isn’t true, you’ve been deceived and the Church is true. If you get no answer, you are to rely on the words of others who know the Church is true because the Church is true. If you decide the problematic issues (Secondary Questions) impose the Church isn’t true, then shift your focus to the the Primary Questions which you already decided point to the Church is true, because the Church is true. All Roads lead to the Church is true. The Church has given you no viable formula to arrive at the Church is false.
– Elder Corbridge argues that the Divine method (Spiritual Feelings) trumps the Scientific Method, the Analytical Method, and the Academic Method (actual science) in spite of the Divine Method being historically demonstrably less effective at arriving at truth. Even Prophets when allowing the Divine Method to trump the Other three have been led to great error decades on end.
– The reason the Divine Method is held up as superior and trumps the other three because the other three if allowed to be given their weight all lead the honest seeker of truth out of the Church. Meanwhile the Divine method is the only method the Church can use to manipulate the person who wants the Church to be true to believe it is true.
– And they finish speaking to how much of his own faith crisis Elder Corbridge has exposed within his talk.
RESOURCES:
https://www.lds.org/church/leader/lawrence-e-corbridge?lang=eng
https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/lawrence-corbridge_stand-for-ever/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belief_bias
http://mormonprimer.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/MormonPrimer7.pdf
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I would class this talk right up there with Pres Hinckley’s hinging the validity of Mormonism on the first vision which is impossible and far too anachronistic to be remotely true, as well as other Prophets staking the whole church on the validity of the BoM and so on.
Elder Corbridge did talk about how amazing hands and eyes were and then how amazing even Pigs are. Little did he know that that won me over. I raise mini pigs and they are truly the most amazing, so, the Church IS true! I say this in the name of mamma and pappa pig and little baby pigs and wiener pigs too
I think what I learned from Elder Corbridge is that the emotion of exhilaration that I felt after resigning form the Church is from the mental freedom fueled by the pursuit of truth wherever it may lie is a sign from god that I’m on the right path.
Constructive criticism: This podcast is much better when RFM flys solo. Bill tends to impute too much of his opinion/conclusions he has reached trying to lead us along to his way of thinking. And if we don’t agree, of course we are not being logical. I much prefer RFMs more benign method of laying out the facts and letting us decide for ourselves. I don’t need someone telling me how I should think about them. Bill’s method is just not my style. We are not cattle who need a nose ring.
This doesn’t mean I don’t like Bill. It just means I like the podcast of RFM without Bill. I like RFMs style in and of itself.
I am going to push back a bit on that. I enjoy them together and get a kick out of their back and forth. I agree that BR did some more interjection in this dual show than previous dual shows but I would suggest that is because this talk has been sent to many doubters. Thus his interjections seem to be addressing the “person” that sent the talk.
thats my nickle keep the three cents.
SB, 100% agree. However, if you knew how smart Bill was, you would let him lead you around by the nose ring. He reminds us frequently that he has an epic IQ.
At my house, if we used the process of elimination to find child-culprits, we would ALWAYS end up accusing the LAST kid questioned. Because kids never admit to these things (like pee on the toilet seat) and they always have an explanation or alibi.
RFM & BR combo provide a interesting energy that make it easy to work while listening them hash up Mormonism.
Enjoyed it.
I would really like to hear more mention of the strategy of inoculation. I think a discussion of any of these BYU talks is seriously incomplete without that. In particular the parts where they start rattling off lists of historical issues without discussing them. So many of us have left the church in part due to the absolute shock of discovering the existence of these issues, and the church is systematically seeking every opportunity to name these issues without addressing them. They rest of the talk is just a garnish for serving up this checklist. For example, while the next generation of mormons will know nothing about BOM and DNA, they will feel like they do. I listen to almost everything you guys make, and I would really like to hear you address this more.
You mention a couple of times that Corbridge was probably on the strengthening the members committee. I don’t think that we can make this conclusion. I think that it is just about as likely that he had to review materials for the Gospel topics essays review process or for publishing the new Saints volumes.
I am still a believer in god, the evidence he gets into I agree with as a Christian, none of that is unique to his church, the unique claims are harmful to his church, the amazing design makes me question god and want to be honest with the data to come to accurate conclusions, it seems to be a decision he’s made to prefer flawed information, the primary curiosity with truth is no longer the goal.