Recently in Serial Category

"Haven't you ever heard that if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all? So why can't you just keep your mouth shut about us?"

I'm tempted to point out in answer that the Book of Mormon offers some of the most abrasively unkind statements in all the annals of sacred writing, particularly when it refers to what many people interpret as the Catholic Church as "the mother of harlots" and "the whore of all the earth" (1 Nephi 14:10-17). But that would be the glib response.

The fact is, if we all restricted our speech to only nice things, the world would become a far less nice place. It's not nice to accuse a company of fraud, or a politician of corruption, or a husband of assault. But sometimes it's necessary if we hope to preserve what vestiges of civility still remain in our civilization.

As for keeping my mouth shut, should I remain silent about something I see as a threat to my fellow man? Would you remain silent if you saw a blind man about to step into the path of a truck? To those of us who've been hurt by it, Mormonism is a speeding truck. You might get along fine if you're firmly on board, but woe to the unsuspecting victim standing pinned in its headlights. What kind of person would I be if I kept my mouth shut when I saw such a danger?

Not the kind of person who could sleep at night, let me tell you.

"Okay, so maybe you have the right to disseminate your honest opinions. But you're not honest. How can you justify the lies you tell about us?"

You say potato, I say pomme de terre.

You find it convenient to call me a liar when I suggest that Joseph Smith didn't translate the Book of Mormon from ancient plates of gold. You find it convenient to call me a liar when I suggest that there were never horses or steel swords in the Western Hemisphere during Book of Mormon times. You find it convenient to call me a liar when I suggest that Joseph Smith secretly married more than thirty women and then illegally and unconstitutionally destroyed a press that attempted to reveal this fact.

The fact is, I'm not lying. I may possibly be mistaken in my beliefs (though I doubt it), but I'm still expressing an honestly held opinion that I've come to after extensive examination of the available evidence. If you call me a liar, you're implying that I'm deliberately making statements I know to be false in an attempt to deceive and mislead. And that, my friend, is just not the case.

Here's what I think. I think you find it too disturbing and threatening to credit that someone can look at the same historical sources as you and come to a radically different conclusion. I think it's easier for you to shut your eyes and shout "Liar!" than it is for you to confront the idea that I'm sincere in my beliefs. You just can't accept that my intentions are anything but sinister.

Well, wake up and smell the Postum. Not everyone who thinks differently from you is an enemy, and not everyone who says things you don't want to hear is a liar, comforting as those notions might be. The emperor is naked, buddy, or at least that's how it looks from where I'm standing. And when I'm honestly reporting what I see, that's no goddamn lie.

"There's plenty of information out there about Mormon doctrine, history, and rituals. If someone wants it badly enough, they'll find it. Why do you have to be the one to show the way?"

It's an interesting suggestion you make. In response, let me sketch out an analogous situation.

As you say, there's plenty of information out there about Mormon doctrine, history, and rituals. Countless resources are available to those interested in learning more about the LDS Church, perhaps with an eye toward joining. No one can say the word isn't freely available.

And yet the Mormons spend untold millions every year to disseminate their message far and wide. They produce slick radio and television ads to promote the Mormon image and message. They offer free promotional videotapes. They keep a ridiculous number of copies of the Book of Mormon in print, in 102 different languages, and maintain a sales force of 60,000 missionaries at any given time, trudging door to door peddling the LDS worldview all around the globe.

Given that incredible expenditure of time, money, and energy, it's clear the Mormons aren't content just to sit back and let interested parties dig up information about the church at their own leisure. So what makes it reasonable to expect those with differing opinions to adhere to a lesser standard?

Look, as long as the church engages in its full-bore media blitz, you have to expect the opposition to do the same thing. To complain when we do is just crying wolf, a distraction from the real issue—that you want the right to say whatever you like without giving us the same opportunity. Well, I'm not buying it.

Here, I'll make you a promise. If the church will call home all its missionaries and stop its advertising campaigns, I'll take down this site. I guarantee it. How's that for fair?

Yeah, that's what I thought.

"But a person can't understand the beauty and necessity of the temple ceremony without experiencing it. What do you say to that?"

I say that another way to view your assertion is that no one could possibly be expected to go through the mental gymnastics necessary to retroactively turn a degrading experience into an uplifting one without having gone through it under the watchful, coercive eye of a closed community. If you have no other option but to assimilate and rationalize the experience, then you will. That doesn't mean the exercise is good for you, only that it was forced upon you.

Another way to describe what I'm talking about would be "brainwashing."

The fact is, someone looking on from the outside is far more likely to be objective about what he's seeing than someone peering out from the inside. By the time you're that deep in it, you have barely the glimmer of an ability to be objective about it.

"See, that's the most repugnant thing of all about you—your lack of respect. Why do you have to debase our most sacred rituals by talking about them openly?"

If I believe in one immutable principle in this crazy, mixed-up world of ours, it's the principle of informed consent. If there's a second principle I believe in, it's letting people exercise their informed consent free of coercion.

In other words, if we agree that I'm going to do something to you, you have a right to know as much as possible about what it is I'm going to do and how, before I do it. And while you're making the decision about whether or not to let me do it, I promise not to bring any undue pressure to bear. Only then can both of us claim we entered into our agreement in good faith, and mean it.

The Mormon endowment ceremony, you won't be surprised to learn, is my case in point. The endowment carries a heavy obligation of obedience and secrecy, one at odds with the demands of informed consent. If you're thinking of joining the Mormon church, or if you're already a member and are contemplating your own first visit to the temple, where can you go to learn more about the endowment—more than vague generalities, that is? Nowhere. Nowhere official, anyway.

Who's going to discuss with you the similarities between the Mormon endowment and Masonic rituals? Who's going to trace for you the many changes in the ceremony over the past century and a half, the steady process of sanitization that culminated with toning down the emphasis on the penalties in 1990? Who's going to tell you what you need to know to make an informed choice before you set foot in the endowment room of the temple?

To speak frankly, my endowment was one of the most degrading and horrifying experiences of my life. By the time an elderly temple worker warned me that I would be taking grave and solemn oaths upon myself that day and that now was my chance to withdraw if I did not wish to continue, I was already dressed in white clothing and sitting in a closed room surrounded by dozens of other Mormons, including my own parents. I wish I'd had the brains and the balls to walk out at that point, but the community pressure was rather intense. I'm not saying walking out would have been impossible, but I am saying the air was damp with coercion.

In any event, that rather vague disclaimer did nothing to prepare me for the blood oaths I would be asked to swear later in the ceremony. By the time those sneaked up on me, I had progressed so deep into the ritual that my only real choice was to continue through it and to labor mightily in the coming weeks to reconcile this bizarre new form of worship with what I had been taught in church all my life. I would much prefer to have known what was coming. I might have saved myself years of tapping my way down a blind alley. But of course, that ideal is completely at odds with the insular, self-protective demands of a secret society like that of temple-endowed Mormons.

I believe that people need to understand the traditions from which their beliefs and practices arose—and not only that, but that they also have a right to seek and receive information about every aspect of a religion or philosophy before they yoke themselves to it and possibly do themselves harm. For me, the damage I may prevent by talking openly about my experiences far outweighs whatever damage I may do you by revealing your supposedly sacred secrets.

"Okay, so go ahead and make your little jokes if it makes you feel better. But why do you feel you have to use profane and obscene language to get your message across?"

When I was younger, I remember hearing one of my church leaders report over the pulpit in General Conference something his mother used to say—that the use of profanity is a sign of an inferior mind grappling with a limited vocabulary.

That statement has stuck with me largely because I find it so insipid. As a professional writer with a fairly advanced vocabulary, I use words very deliberately, with attention to shading and nuance. Words are my cherished tools, and I can say from long experience that sometimes the best word for a particular job is vulgar, profane, or blasphemous. It all depends on the effect I want to achieve.

Profanity, when not overused, conveys strongs emotions. It can elicit surprise, shock, and even outrage. (Except here in New York City, of course, where it often excites no greater comment than words like "very" or "the" or "I'm a kill you.") Profanity can say to the reader, "Listen up, because I really, really, really mean what I'm telling you." Why it should evoke such a powerful response when it's just a series of vibrations in the air or marks on paper, no different from any other sounds or marks, could be the subject of an entire book, but there are times when no milder or more subtle turn of phrase will articulate quite the emotion you want to express. If you've ever dropped a hammer on your toe, you know exactly what I'm saying.

Let me illustrate my point with a practical example.

In 1986, the day after I turned nineteen, I attended the Salt Lake temple to participate in my very first endowment ceremony. I knew the ceremony was so sacred that no one was permitted to talk about it outside the temple, but I suppose I expected something clear, uplifting, and quietly sublime. What I discovered instead was a room full of people dressed in faux-Hebraic bakers' outfits, teaching each other the secret passwords and handshakes you need to know to get into heaven and acting out the bloody executions they swore to submit to if they ever betrayed the secret of these signs and tokens to the uninitiated. I went in expecting an epiphany; what I found instead was a frathouse ritual. I mean, what the fuck?

Now let me ask you, were you offended by my use of the word "fuck" in that paragraph? If so, then I've achieved the effect I was going for. I was shocked by my first exposure to the Mormon endowment ceremony. If you're a temple-going Mormon yourself, you probably felt shocked by your first endowment as well, but repeated exposure has dulled that shock. I want to recreate that experience for you and remind you of how shocking those sights really were. How better to accomplish that than by juxtaposing an outsider's critical view of your sacred-not-secret rituals with one of the most offensive words in the English language? Is this scene not weird and startling enough to merit a carefully chosen expletive?

If you find my rhetorical technique obscene, I ask you to consider the following question as honestly and objectively as you can: Which is more offensive—the spectacle of grown humans pantomiming their own disembowelment and calling it worship, or the word "fuck"?

You make the call.

"Why do you feel you have to make fun of our most cherished beliefs? That's just hurtful. Can't you make your point some other way?"

The leaders of the Mormon church have given its membership two rather interesting commandments: to avoid loud laughter, and to avoid speaking evil of the Lord's anointed.

If you're like me, you'll find it endlessly amusing to imagine the Mormon prophet stamping his foot and saying petulantly: "Stop laughing at me or else!" But there is a good rationale for these commandments. To laugh at a person or institution, to see it even for a moment as pathetic and ridiculous, is to weaken the power it wields over you. And if you laugh at something enough, you may be able to shrug off its influence altogether.

Satirists from Aristophanes to Voltaire, Swift to Twain, Garry Trudeau to James Morrow and Al Franken, have understood this principle well and used it to undermine the power of the most oppressive institutions of their times. They may not have destroyed their targets wholesale, but every derisive laugh they elicited pried a brick from the walls of those hallow halls of power, and soon there was enough of an opening that a few intrepid souls were able to escape.

I'm not in a league with the names I mentioned, but when I write an essay like "I'm Special!" or create a game like "No Man Knows My Pancreas" or crack wise about putting on my Jesus Christ Underoos™, I'm participating in that same grand satirical tradition. Humor is a weapon, and laughter is a wound. Every time I make you chuckle or guffaw, I've struck a little blow against the Mormon church—or rather, I've helped you strike your own blow against its ability to exercise its control over you and your mind and your heart. That's an honorable accomplishment, and I won't apologize for it.

With the mastery of your soul at stake, it's no wonder your leaders don't want you laughing at them. But if you're not laughing, if you find my japes more hurtful than humorous, consider this—I may be hitting a little too close to home for your comfort. Or for theirs.

"My church leaders say that reading anti-Mormon literature and unsanctioned church history will corrupt my spirit. Why do you want me to corrupt my spirit?"

How can I put this delicately?

Your church leaders are lying to you. That's all there is to it.

Pretend you've developed a rare medical condition. Your doctor suggests a radical course of treatment that will have major effects on the rest of your life. When you say you'd like to get a second opinion, your doctor tells you, "No, it's too dangerous. If you consult another physician, it could cost you your life!"

What would you do? If you're a normal, sensible human being, you'd have to ask yourself what your doctor is afraid of. Is he really concerned with your welfare, or is he just concerned about losing you as a patient if you learn something that contradicts his diagnosis? No doubt you'd consult a second doctor anyway, and maybe a third and a fourth, because your health is just too important an issue for you not to make an informed choice.

It's the same with your church leaders and your spiritual health. The question is simply too important for you not to seek second opinions.

Let's take another example. Pretend you're at a used-car lot. You see a shiny blue Mustang that's just cherry, and you have to know more about it. The salesman is happy to answer all your questions—what year it was made, how many miles it has, who owned it before you. He even lets you take it for a test drive, and it seems to handle beautifully. But when you get back to the lot and for a look at the engine, the salesman puts his foot down. He tells you it's wrong for a customer to go poking around in the engine. He says you might hurt yourself and he can't let you take the risk, but he can show you pictures of the engine if you just step over to the sales office. . . .

If this happened to you in real life, your bullshit detector would go nuts. You'd take the salesman's answer as an evasion. You'd walk away from the used-car lot with your money still in your pocket, asking yourself what's under the hood of that Mustang that the salesman doesn't want you to see. Why then should it be that when your church leaders tell you not to look under the hood of Mormonism—a proposition far more critical to your well-being than any mere automobile purchase could ever be—your impulse is to obey them without question?

It's quite true that when you start delving into writings that contradict orthodox church doctrine and history, you place your faith at risk. But it's equally true that an unexamined, unquestioned faith is not worth keeping. If Mormonism is true, then it should stand up to any degree of scrutiny. The only reason to fear anti-Mormon literature is if you fear Mormonism won't stand up to the scrutiny. This should tip you off that something is rotten in the state of Utah. A religion with full confidence in its own claims has no need to shield its members from competing claims.

Let's face it, it's in the Mormon church's best interest to keep you ignorant of what its critics are saying. "When our leaders speak," the church tells you, "the thinking has been done" (The Improvement Era, June 1945). Forget making any choice; they don't want you to realize there's a choice in the first place, because once you know that, you're one step closer to shrugging off their control over you.

This philosophy of theirs is all the more insidious because canonized Mormon scripture doesn't support the abrogation of thought and personal responsibility in the first place. According to the Doctrine & Covenants, God said this through Joseph Smith: "But, behold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must ask me if it be right" (D&C 9:8). An interesting and provocative verse. Why study if the thinking has been done for you? And what is there to study if you refuse to examine both sides of the debate? How can you choose the right if you can't evaluate the right?

In the end, it's not a question of being "corrupted" by anti-Mormon literature at all. It's a question of ignorance versus informed choice, enslavement versus enlightenment. It's a question of taking responsibility for your own decisions rather than letting yourself be spoon-fed the answers, and if that sounds like scary proposition, well, I won't lie to you. It is. But it's also the only way to learn and grow and progress. And even if you examine both sides and still choose to stay with Mormonism, you'll find the decision all the more rewarding because you made it yourself and didn't let someone else do it for you.

If that's a corrupt philosophy, then we may as well all be monkeys, because the brains God gave us are good for nothing but playing Follow the Leader.

"Why are you so opposed to Mormonism? It does a lot of good for a lot of people, and it certainly doesn't hurt anybody."

True, Mormonism does seem to work fine for a lot of people. But one of the most insidious fallacies of Mormonism—and of most religions, to be honest—is the idea that because it's good for some people, it must necessarily be good for all people. This just isn't so. Religion is never a one-size-fits-all commodity.

Let me take just one small example from which we can generalize: tithing. I can't tell you how many families I met in my years as Mormon who could not afford to pay the one tenth of their income that the church demands from them in order to enjoy the "blessings" of the temple. Some of them paid their ten percent anyway, and trusted that somehow God would help them get through. Others forewent their tithing obligations, agonizing over the choice of shoes for their children over gelt for God's coffers.

How can you argue that no harm is done in either of these cases? If you can afford it, by all means pay your tithing, but listen to me—this idea that feeding one's children is less important than building a church somewhere on the other side of the world for people who were getting along just fine before the Mormons showed up . . . well, that's not only harmful, it's just plain evil. And it's a choice the Mormon church asks its less affluent members to make every day. (Even those not pinching pennies would be better off in the long run putting their ten percent into a tax-deferred retirement account. I mean, how much tribute money does Salt Lake City need?)

And that's only one example. For many people, Mormonism is a philosophy that simply reinforces a negative and degrading self-image by erecting a standard of behavior that's impossible to live up to. How else do you explain the fact that Utah leads the nation in per-capita use of antidepressants? How many people are trapped in misery in the Mormon church because they're afraid to look less than righteous by bringing up their doubts and hurts with any of the people around them? How many women silently suffer in their conviction that they have no value in the absence of husbands or babies? They may no longer be treated with electroshock at BYU, but how many gays are still oppressed within a worldview that teaches them they're somehow broken by nature, and can hope for no love in this life? How many simply don't fit in, and can't contort themselves to the demeaning demands of a hierarchy that tells them the thinking has been done for them?

Let me tell you, there are plenty—they send me email all the time. Some of them have gotten themselves out of the church already, some are still in the process, and some might never manage it. But most of them could have been spared ages of pain if only they'd known earlier there were other people who'd gone through the same thing—and emerged happier and stronger at the other side.

So don't tell me Mormonism does no harm, or I might have to hurt you.

You wouldn't believe how much email I've gotten about this site over the years, taking issue with my mission and my methods. That's fine—you're entitled to your opinions. But in an effort to perhaps stem the most repetitive portions of that flood, I'll here address some of the concerns that readers express with the most frequency and, er, shrillness. (Stay tuned, because there are more answers coming soon.)