Steven Danderson

In the early 20th century, noted Evangelist Billy Sunday proclaimed, “I know there is a devil for two reasons; first, the Bible declares it; and second I have done business with him.” While some people might have doubts about Sunday’s commitment to God, I do not; I can–truthfully–make a similar statement.

It isn’t always easy to tell which is which. While God is mostly known as that “still small voice” [I Kings 19:12] Who loves us, and Satan is a railing accuser, sometimes it is Satan who speaks softly–to lure us to sin, and the phrase “wrath of God” is prevalent in Scripture. If you wish to be REALLY unhappy, try incurring the wrath of both God and Satan! 🙁

It is an economic truism that everybody responds to incentives, and, if we believe the Book of Mormon [II Nephi 2:16], both God and Satan realize this–and act accordingly. God, of course, offers freedom and eternal life, while Satan, the counterfeiter [II Corinthians 11:13-15], offers a perverted form of freedom and pleasure.

Sometimes, though, good people can find themselves unwitting tools of Satan. This is especially true in government. Government desires–with justification–to protect people from various bad things that this fallen world subjects them to, but finds that their actions elicits behavior that makes the maladies government want to spare people more likely. For example, government wishes to make the lot of the single mother more bearable, so it provides monetary assistance to those single mothers that it doesn’t provide to others, then welfare officials wonder why more women become even more promiscuous, skipping even the marrying part–so there’s no husband to abandon the family. Indeed, often the women–and children–have no idea who the father is. Economists call this phenomenon a “moral hazard.”

This phenomenon also happens in religious contexts. Various “ministers to the cults,” never bothering to find out what we really believe, wonder why their targets get angry at them. Here’s a hint: whenever you say that we believe things that we do not; whenever you imply that we are liars or idiots by telling us that we aren’t accurately conveying our beliefs, rather than loving us, as you profess, you hate us–with a passion. I get tired of being told, whenever I deny “swearing death oaths to Lucifer” or that I believe that Adam had sex with Mary to produce Jesus, that I don’t know what I believe–or that I don’t want to know the truth. I cannot conceive of a more effective dialogue-stopper than this insisting that Latter-day Saints are intellectually or morally bad.

Not even Latter-day Saints are immune from this trap of communicating hate instead of love. Too often we forget D&C 121:41-44 when dealing with fellow saints. How often have we chastised people for wearing inappropriate clothes to Church–without bothering to find out if they’re the best they have? How many of us accuse Latter-day Saints of apostasy when they forward questions their non-LDS loved ones ask–heedless of the fact that we cannot easily disown family members–even when they aren’t the best for us–and recklessly ignoring the fact that anti-Mormon acquaintances routinely predict such lashings out? How often have we accused people of being anti-Mormons when they ask difficult questions?

Here’s a hint for us: If a nonmember asks, “I heard you believe X. Is that true?” and accepts that we speak the truth about it, then the odds are that he or she is NOT an anti-Mormon.

May God help us distinguish those who hate us from those who don’t.

A couple of weeks ago, I commented on similarities between Microsoft’s Best Buy  PowerPoint  versus Open Source Advocates flamewar  on the one hand, and the strife between Mormons and their critics on the other.  While in the this, Microsoft represented the anti-Mormon element of the non-LDS community, and Latter-day Saints paralleled the Open Source community, there are many places where the comparison utterly breaks down.

For one thing, the non-LDS community is not the monolithic body that Microsoft is.  This is even (especially?) true of the non-LDS Christians. As non-LDS Christians vary from the liberal Jim Wallis to the conservative Pat Robertson–and beyond, the Open Source community vary from the almost-Marxist Richard Stallman to the libertarian Eric Raymond.  Latter-day Saints, on the other hand, aren’t nearly as diverse, politically; they are the most conservative faith in the USA.

While the Open Source community was the target of false information this time, as I stated in my previous entry, for the most part, it is Microsoft that is falsely accused of being a monopoly by the FOSS community–with assistance from American and European authorities. This antipathy toward Microsoft by open source advocates was denounced by Linux creator, Linus Torvalds–and it perfectly mirrors anti-Mormon antipathy against the Church and its members.

Indeed, either side of one battle can easily find similarities to either side of the other. 

Just as Microsoft provides tech support for users of Linux,(and there are programmes to repair Windows in Linux!) most non-LDS Christians are willing to work with the Church in errands of mercy (and vice versa!). I am grateful for the extended support the Salvation Army gave to LDS clean-up crews (of which I was a part!) when F-5 tornadoes struck the Kissimmee, Florida area about a dozen years ago.

I think these examples of cooperation demonstrate that there need be no flamewars in either computers or religion!

Roughly six months ago, Microsoft sent a PowerPoint presentation to electronics retailer Best Buy–ostensibly to help their employees teach customers the differences between Microsoft Windows and Linux.  Linux advocates objected to what they called Microsoft’s exercise in “FUD” (“Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt“).  However, taking advantage of consumer conservatism is not a sin.  In fact, there is a very good reason for this conservatism.  Information is expensive, and, unless people are convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the new thing/way/system is more cost-effective than the old one, people are simply not willing to spend resources (not just money!) to switch.

With this in mind, Microsoft’s choice to highlight Linux’ reputation for being “of the geeks, by the geeks, and for the geeks,” is simply fair game.  It isn’t Microsoft’s fault that traditionally, Linux’ focus on programmer and developer choice tends to leave most users–who tend to be ignorant of computer science–lost. [Read more…] about Flamewars and Polemics….

Conservative author Dinesh D’Sousa has written a new book to follow up on his best-seller, What’s so great about Christianity?–called, Life After Death: The Evidence [http://townhall.com/columnists/DrPaulKengor/2009/12/09/qa_dinesh_dsouza_on_life_after_death?page=1]. I have a copy of the former, as well as others of D’Sousa’s books, including The End of Racism. For those who don’t know about him, D’Sousa immigrated from India as a teen during the 1970’s, and became a senior domestic policy analyst for the Reagan Administration. His analysis is typical of people who immigrated from Asia and attended American schools; the quality is better than anything about 90% of native-born Americans can produce.

There is, however, one issue in his last two books, where D’Sousa’s analysis fails–utterly. One claim made by atheists like Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Sam Hatrris, etc., is that Heaven is a wish fulfillment concept, and thus, so is religion. That is, earth life is so bad, we dream up a place that is wonderful beyond imagination to console us.

D’Sousa’s answer is that he can certainly understand why somebody whose life isn’t that nice might imagine a place waiting for us that is. He has problems, however, understanding hell as a wish-fulfillment. Hell, of course is WORSE than any place that exists temporally, and worse than what humans can imagine–even a Nazi concentration camp is paradise compared to hell.

While hell-as-wish-fulfillment is certainly incongruous with those for whom hell’s existence serves as incentive toward holiness, like, say, Mother Teresa, for most of us, hell’s existence serves as a wish fulfillment as a tool of cosmic justice, which doesn’t exist here on earth. That is, in our worst moments, we might wish hell upon our enemies–those we don’t like. Thus, liberal Democrats wish hell upon former President Bush–and his supporters, “birthers” wish hell upon that “African Muslim Socialist,” President Obama (He isn’t–at least the former two; I’ll explain in a later post.)–and his supporters, and anti-Mormons like Bill Keller (http://www.votingforsatan.com/) wish it for the Latter-day Saints–and those like the late Governor Lilburn Boggs [D-MO] actually attempt to send us there.

Thus, for most of us, hell is indeed a wish-fulfillment concept, and for the rest of us, it is evidence that we are nuts.

Personally, I think a better response–though less dramatic than D’Sousa’s–is Daniel Peterson’s rule of comparative religions: If a person who is undoubtedly sane and intelligent in other subjects adheres to a religion that an observer thinks crazy or stupid, the problem is more likely with the observer’s view than with the religionist’s beliefs [http://www.meridianmagazine.com/ideas/040315respecting.html].

What do you all think?

Remember Bill Keller, who told his parishoners that “a vote for Romney is a vote for Satan“?  While I’m not sure he REALLY thinks that Governor Mitt Romney is Satan, he is quite clear that he thinks we are hellish creatures who, along with those who refuse to join his jihad, should be straightway sent to hell, where we belong.  And, if his web site is any indication, given even the flimsiest of chances, he would personally dispatch us there.

While Keller is obviously malicious, like other venomous anti-Mormons, I find the candor and consistency in his hatred to be most refreshing.  Too often, after hearing a laundry list of untrue evils that we Latter-day Saints are supposedly guilty, I hear the accuser complain with words to the effect of, “But I’m NOT an anti-Mormon!  I LOVE Mormons!”

Sorry, Ace, but spreading untruths about people is NOT a sign of love toward them!

Keller, on the other hand eschews that ingenuousness.  He is adamant that we Latter-day Saints are demons from hell, and non-anti-Mormons are Judases–neither of which merit any love or consideration whatsoever.  I don’t like his malevolent stance, but at least he does us the courtesy of leaving no doubt at all where we stand.  I really do respect that.

Moreover, Keller’s attitude is in refreshing contrast to anti-Mormons who call us demons, but do not advocate the only just punishment for such threats.  CS Lewis (2002) leaves no doubt that those in league with the devil are threats to be exterminated:

If … we really thought that there were people going about who had sold themselves to the devil and received supernatural powers from him in return and were using these powers to kill their neighbours or drive them mad or bring bad weather, surely we would all agree that if anyone deserved the death penalty, then these filthy quislings did. [Mere Christianity.  Scanned from 1952 edition.  Retrieved 26 October 2009 from http://www.ntslibrary.com/PDF%20Books/Mere%20Christianity%20-%20Lewis.pdf, 16]

It irritates me whenever somebody accuses others of serious offences, but advocate unserious remedies.  Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., for example, accuses doubters of global warming of treason, but doesn’t advocate the death penalty.  Either Kennedy is unaware of the gravity of treason, or he misuses the word.

Bill Keller has no such problem.  Neither does Ed Decker, from whom Keller apparently gets his information.  Dr. Dean Helland (1990) (PhD, Oral Roberts University) tells of his break with Ed Decker after anti-Mormon violence incited by Decker spilled over to members of Helland’s denomination [Meeting the Book of Mormon Challenge in Chile.  Ann Arbor, MI: University Microfilms International.  116-130, 198-214]

Jewish groups are upset at the thought of the Church baptising Holocaust victims. It seems that they are being egged on by one Helen Radkey. The Church had agreed that members are to do the work only for those in their line–or with the permission of their next-of-kin. Despite assertions that the Church has reneged on that agreement, the Church’s NewFamilySearch web site has software that would make such breaches extremely difficult.  To add to this woe, the Vatican has expressed concern about the practise of baptism for the dead, and has issued instructions to end LDS access to their records.

Leaving the present difficulty for members of the Church to violate this agreement aside, I would like to comment on both the reasons for Jewish objections and what is actually being done by baptisms for the dead, and to perhaps reassure them of both our intent and the absence of negative effects of those baptisms.

[Read more…] about Disrespecting Holocaust Victims?

Obviously, President Bill Clinton wasn’t the first US president to be involved in sexual shenanigans. Roughly 100 years previous to the start of President Clinton’s term, another Democrat President was involved in a sex scandal: Grover Cleveland. Unlike Clinton’s false “I did not have sex with that woman,” Cleveland instructed his staff to “Tell the truth.”

Cleveland’s supporters, like Clinton’s a century later, took a “What of it?” approach–and, like Clinton, Cleveland was elected to two terms.

During the mid-1980’s, when I was living in the Middle East, I was being worked on by a dentist who was an Evangelical Christian. After detailing to me several of Joseph Smith’s alleged sexual sins–no doubt, gleaned from anti-Mormon sources, he concluded, “How can you accept as a Prophet such a wicked man as Joseph Smith?”

My answer: “So Joseph Smith was wicked. What of it?” [Read more…] about “What of it?”

A recent article of Time magazine, “Mad Man: Is Glenn Beck Bad for America?” has brought to the surface a tension between liberal and conservative Latter-day Saints.  The reason:  Brother Beck is not only militantly conservative, he is also blatantly LDS.

Liberal Latter-day Saints are up in arms about the fact that Beck opposes President Obama’s signature policies: the stimulus, the federal takeover of General Motors, and “Universal Health Care.” What’s more, Beck takes issue with Obama’s supporters calling the opposition liars and racists. Beck has turned the tables on them, though, labelling their gratuitous use of the word, “racist” as racist, too. [Read more…] about Liberals and Conservatives

UPDATE: I know this paper isn’t Friedman’s. Hat tip to Keri Brooks. This is acknowledged in my comment, below, but Peter R of LDSLaw pointed out that I hadn’t actually made a correction. Since my comment appears to not be sufficient, and I DON’T want to appear to not acknowledge my mistakes, I write this update.

Recently, I wrote a posted about a gross misrepresentation of LDS belief–including getting our disciplinary councils wrong, here:
http://www.fairblog.org/2009/04/11/fun-house-mirrors/

Moreover, on 15 March 2009, the HBO TV series, “Big Love,” screwed things up so badly that the Temple scenes were the LEAST inaccurate and the LEAST objectionable part of the programme. It is recounted by others here:
http://www.cliqueclack.com/tv/2009/03/17/big-love-the-mormon-temple-endowment-ceremony-isnt-what-they-got-wrong/

We Latter-day Saints are often subjected to such gross misrepresentations. While it is annoying, like unwanted step-children, we ARE getting used to the abuse.

What is unusual is a portrayal by somebody unsympathetic to our faith who actually tries to get things right. It is on the site of Dr. David D. Friedman (son of Nobel laureate, Milton), or Santa Clara University. Though his field is Law and Economics, he may well be the next Jan Shipps:
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/Academic/Course_Pages/legal_systems_very_different_06/papers_05/LDS.htm

I suppose that the rescue of the US-flag ship Maersk Alabama is old news by now.  As we all know, President Obama ordered US Navy Seals to take out the pirates who attacked that undefended ship.  Like Jonah Goldberg, I praise the President for allowing the US Navy to take quick, effective action on those who would harm the defenceless. While I didn’t vote for President Obama [I DID, however, vote for Alan Keyes in the 2000 GOP Primary in my home State!], and I think that his economic policies will merely bring about what he tries to avert, it is only right to acknowledge his proper actions as they occur.

Moreover, I think that those who fault President Obama in this are merely applying a mirror image of the “Bush Derangement Syndrome.” Like the extreme Left, who could see no good thing from former President Bush, the extreme Right can see no good in President Obama.
[Read more…] about “Mormon Derangement Syndrome”