From: “You Must Love Me” – posted on September 18, 2022

I think that a man who must command everyone to love him, and then punish them if they do not, is afraid that he is unlovable. Why should a God be any different?

And if the God who declares you must love him is afraid he is unlovable, then he is not all-knowing in the traditional sense, as what would be the point of commanding people to love you if you already know if they do or do not and if they will or not?

I would think that an all-knowing God would also know that people cannot make themselves love someone they don’t love any better than they can laugh at a joke they don’t find funny, or enjoy eating food that they find distasteful.

Or, what if it’s true and we all really must love God after all? What kind of God takes any pleasure in being loved by those who love him under his own command rather than of their own free will and pleasure? The Church loves to spend lots of time talking about free agency, and what a wonderful gift it is from our Heavenly Father, but much less time talking about what we are commanded to do with it freely.

As Alan Watts has pointed out, and I’m paraphrasing him here, we are caught in a kind of double-bind if we are required to do that which will only be acceptable if we do it voluntarily.

From: “Three Truths for Mormons 091622” – posted on September 16, 2022

• There is no body inside your body.

• You can’t control your feelings.

• You can’t change yourself.

From: “If You Try to Keep GOD in a Box” – posted on September 12, 2022

If you try to keep GOD in a box, the box will eventually break, in which case you would be wise to get a bigger box, or to throw out the box and let GOD be ALL THINGS.

From “Three Truths for Mormons” – posted on September 6, 2022

• There is no good evidence that anyone or anything exists yet that places specific thoughts or feelings in your mind or body other than you.

• There is no good reason for the gold plates to be withheld from the world.

• Although he is all-knowing, God never says or does anything in the scriptures to indicate that he has any special knowledge or insight into why his children do what they do.

From: “The Church Does Not Take a Position” – posted on September 1, 2022

How can The Church impose restrictions on transgender behavior if it does not take a position on why people are transgender?

Doesn’t The Church oppose and penalize transgender behavior because it believes it is sinful, and doesn’t The Church believe that Satan is the ultimate source of all sin? If so, why not just say so?

By saying that it “does not take a position on the causes of people identifying themselves as transgender,” isn’t The Church implying that there is some cause other than Satan and sin?

And if there is some cause other than Satan and sin, why penalize transgender people for behaving like transgender people?

From: “If You Never Admit That You’re Wrong” – posted on August 18, 2022

• If you never admit that you’re wrong, then either you’re never wrong, or you’re wrong and you can’t admit it.

• If you never apologize, then either you never do anything that deserves an apology, or you do things that deserve an apology but do not apologize for them.

• If leaders should never be criticized, then either leaders do nothing worthy of criticism, or they do things worthy of criticism but should never be criticized for them.

• If “The Church is true” no matter what, then either no part of the church is false or parts of the church are false and their falsity should be covered up, explained away, or ignored.

From: “Dear President Nelson 081722 – posted on August 17, 2022

But, how can God be all-powerful if he needs his children in The Church in the mortal world to do the work of salvation for his children in the immortal world over which he himself presumably would have direct and perfect control and stewardship? If God is not able to do his own work in his own world with his own resources, if he needs us and our natural world, and if we have free agency and can tell him no, then wouldn’t God be subservient to us and our natural world in some way? How does the creator of intelligent, free-agent children have all power if he needs their cooperation in order to do what he wants?

From: “Dear President Nelson” – posted on August 17, 2022

To: President Russell M. Nelson, prophet, seer, and revelator of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

From: Mormon Mouse

Re: Two Questions about Three Doctrines

Dear President Nelson,

Why would an all-knowing Heavenly Father send his children to Earth to be tested if he already knows all of the results of all of their tests?  

And if he already knows all of the results of all of their tests, in what way are they free to choose anything other than those choices that will lead to the results that he already knows will occur?

It seems to me that these two questions indicate a potentially serious conflict between The Church’s teachings about free agency, the omniscience of God, and the purpose of our mortal life on Earth.

I am sincerely interested in knowing what you think about these issues and I would give polite and thoughtful consideration to any answers you might provide in response.

Sincerely,

Mormon Mouse

From: “God Cannot Be God” – posted on July 20, 2022

God cannot be God unless God knows everything.

God cannot know everything unless God knows what it’s like to be everything.

God cannot know what it’s like to be everything unless God is everything.

But if God is everything, God cannot be any thing.

And if God cannot be any thing, then God must be everything,

Or God must not exist.

From: “Everything Must Be As It Is” – posted on June 26, 2022

• In order for anything to exist, everything must be as it is.

• In the case of my brain, I can think a thought but I do not know how I think of a thought, how to cause the correct pattern of neurons to fire, for example. I don’t know what a neuron looks like, how or where to find a neuron, how to turn a neuron on or off, or how to relay messages between neurons. I don’t have a clue how my neurons work and yet I seem to be working with them all the time. I believe this is because I am a physical system (a particular human body) that contains neurons, I am not inside the physical system that contains neurons (my body). If I was inside and I was in control, I could perceive, access, and operate the controls from the inside.

• You are not free to be something that you are not, because if you were something you are not then you wouldn’t be anything at all. You are not free to do something that what you are doesn’t do, because if you did then you wouldn’t do anything at all – something else would do what something else does instead. 

• Maybe true “free agency” is simply the freedom for all things to become all possible forms.

From: “You Are That Vehicle” – posted on June 26, 2022

• Can I really be inside a thing that has no entrance?

• Can I really be in control of something that has no controls, at least none that I can perceive or access?

• If you ever find yourself traveling stuck and alone in a vehicle with no entrance and no accessible controls, and you can move it but you can’t move inside it, then most likely you are not inside that vehicle, most likely you are that vehicle.

From: “Is It Possible To Truly Love Someone Who…” – posted on June 18, 2022

Is it possible to truly love someone who…

• …never speaks to you, but requires you to speak to them every day?
• …never lets you look at them, but watches everything you do?
• …is always asking for money but never giving any?
• …takes credit for all good things and blames all bad things on someone else?
• …punishes you for your failure to control that which has no controls?
• …never makes mistakes, but is offended by yours?

From: “Can I Get a Second Opinion, Doc?” – posted on June 17, 2022

As a lifelong Mormon, from time to time I would hear something about how not coming to church because you don’t feel worthy isn’t a good excuse because church is for sinners not saints, just like hospitals are for sick people not healthy people. Well, recently I thought of another Mormon spiritual/medical metaphor. I realized that The Church is kind of like the spiritual version of a general practitioner family doctor that was chosen for me. And no matter what happens I should not get a second opinion, I will never be referred to a specialist, and if I don’t think my prescription medication is helping me feel better, then I’m the one who is doing something wrong.

From: “The Savior Jesus Christ Speaks (Through Layers of Others)” – posted on June 15, 2022

After all, I know someone who believes that her dead father appeared to her and told her the sex and hair color of her unborn child, so why would he get a hall pass to go do that but Sister Johnson’s father wouldn’t? If Sister Johnson’s dad had the time and ability to tell Jesus or the Holy Ghost or both of them so one of them could tell the temple worker who then told Sister Johnson, then why didn’t he have the time and ability to just pop in to the temple and say hi to his daughter directly?

From: “The Anti-Criticism Club” – posted on June 2, 2022

One of the biggest problems with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is that its leaders seem to feel quite strongly that everyone who has ever lived and ever will live could be and should be a member of their church, which is like a very special and most correct club – a club that, conveniently, doesn’t allow criticism of its leaders.

From: “If Satan Is Real” – posted on May 18, 2022

• If Satan is real and as bad as they say, wouldn’t things be even worse than they are?

• Either Satan is not real, or he is not as bad as we’ve been taught as Mormons, or, God himself is monitoring and adjusting the frequency, consistency, and intensity of the temptations that Satan places into human minds.

• Maybe it’s finally time to grow up and take responsibility for our own thoughts – all of them.

From: “If God Really Wants Us All Back” – posted on May 3, 2022

• I can’t help but think that if The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is true and God really wants us all back, then he would have called prophets and apostles, revealed scripture, and established and maintained his church in all areas of the world from the beginning.

• If the original church of Jesus Christ truly did become corrupt and lose its priesthood authority by the time the original apostles died, then the only good reason I can think of to wait until 1800’s upstate New York to restore it all through Joseph Smith is if it was Joseph Smith’s restoration and not God’s.

• In fact, if God truly is making miracles through mortals which could never happen on their own, then by definition Joseph Smith could not be the only one through whom the restoration of the gospel could come to pass, because it purportedly came to pass through God’s miraculous help and not man’s ability!

• God must be falsifiable in order to know if he is objectively real, because how meaningful is the objective truth, really, if it’s true no matter what the evidence indicates?

• The problem isn’t that the God of the Abrahamic religions isn’t real, it’s that so far he is only subjectively real but is believed and taught to be objectively real.

• I believe that gravity is a true “theory,” but if everything around me started floating away I would question it. The way that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints continues to teach some of their “truths,” it’s as if they wouldn’t question gravity even if everything was always in the air.

From: “Science vs. Religion” – posted on May 3, 2022

• In the quest for objective truth science is ever the way forward and religion is always the way back.

• Some may say that science is a tool for discovering what is and religion is a tool for discovering what ought to be. The way I see it, I need to discover what is in order to discover what ought to be, but I do not need to discover what ought to be in order to discover what is.

From: “Does God Watch Pornography?” – posted on March 17, 2022

• Each being’s experience of being itself is the great unknowable for all other beings.

• Does God know everything there is to know about all pornography? If he does, why is he purportedly so offended by it? Isn’t one who knows everything about a subject considered to be an expert in that subject? Have you ever met an expert who is offended by the very subject in which they are an expert?

From: “Problems with Polygamy” – posted on Janaury 31, 2022

• One of the biggest problems with Mormon polygamy is that no matter what anyone ever says to justify it, isn’t it a system created and controlled by men, which allows men to have more sex than women are allowed to have, with more partners than women are allowed to have?

From: “Braces for Your Brain” – posted on January 30, 2022

• Religious indoctrination is like braces for your brain.

• If everything is physical, including brains and all of the things that brains do, then religious indoctrination of a child (or of anyone really) is a physical attempt to physically influence a physical part of the child’s body so that it will function in a way that accepts the indoctrination.

• But can something be considered abusive, if the abused enjoys and appreciates the abuse and feels that it has made them a better person, maybe even saved their life?

From: “Did Jesus Eat Ice Cream?” – posted on Janaury 21, 2022

• Did Jesus eat ice cream? After all, I’ve been told he knows what it’s like to be me, and I’ve eaten ice cream. And it was good. So I know what it’s like to eat ice cream. But does Jesus?

• And if Jesus didn’t eat ice cream, what else didn’t Jesus do?

From: “Unjust Justice for Jesus” – posted on Janaury 20, 2022

• An unjust act can never satisfy the demands of justice.

• Objectively speaking, blood doesn’t clean, it stains. And how can it be used as currency for payment without making the payee something of a sadomasochist, a fetishist, or a vampire?

• I don’t believe it’s right for an innocent person to be punished for sins they didn’t commit, regardless of who they are and whether they want to be punished or not.

• If God, whether it’s God the Father or God the Son, wants suffering as penalty for sin, why not simply accept the suffering of the one who committed the sin, suffering which surely is contingent upon being the sinner, and leave poor Jesus alone?

From: “Proof for God” – posted on Janaury 3, 2022

If an all-powerful God exists, then there can only be one all-powerful God.

If a god does not know all things then that god is not the all-powerful God.

A god cannot know all things unless that god has all of the same experiences as all things.

A god cannot have all of the same experiences as all things unless that god IS all things.

Only all things has all of the same experiences as all things, therefore ALL THINGS is the one all-powerful  God.

From: “The Feeling of Being the Feeler of Feelings” – posted on January 1, 2022

• I am not the cause of my thoughts, feelings, and behavior – I am the effect of them.

• My body (including my brain) uses its senses to interact with and remember things about itself and the world around it , which produces an endless stream of feelings, and in addition to all the feelings coming in, there is always one additional feeling born of the complex and self conscious nature of the human brain – the feeling of being the feeler of feelings – and that is the thing that feels like “Me,” “Myself,” and “I.”

• I don’t have a feeling, I am a feeling – a feeling which changes and can be changed, but which cannot change itself – a feeling which is the effect of causes outside of itself, but which is never the cause of itself.

From: “Email to Our Ward Missionaries – My Mormon Story, Condensed” – posted on December 31, 2021

• Our beliefs have changed, and we don’t feel like we can be ourselves at church anymore without making conservative, faithful members feel uncomfortable or offended, and without risking being demoted to second class citizens.

• …the church’s doctrine, history, and culture is not what I thought and not what I was taught.

• …the church is true when you believe it’s true, but it isn’t true on its own

• Never trust that you have the whole truth from someone who won’t let you look at all of the evidence.

• I don’t believe in an embodied God who kills.

• The church does a lot of good and it really works for some people, but it also does a lot of harm and doesn’t really work for other people, and that should be acknowledged and accepted by both the faithful and the critics.

From: “The Less Than Two Percenters: A Speculative Estimate of Mormon Missionary Conversion Rates” – posted on December 20, 2021

• Recently I realized that the average worldwide conversion rate for Mormon missionary work is extremely low by comparison – most likely less than two percent.

• If the church’s message is as true and as powerful as it claims to be, and if the church has the most powerful beings in the universe, namely Heavenly Father, our Savior Jesus Christ, and The Holy Ghost as uniquely in its corner as it claims, then why in the world is it so hard to get people to join up?

• But if a surprisingly low number of people are truly interested in a particular message in any lasting and meaningful way, what does that say about the message itself?  At some point, doesn’t the message itself have to bear some of the responsibility for its failure to inspire conversion in the lives of any significant percentage of those who hear it?

• It seems like if everybody’s eternal life and salvation is at stake, and if the message is the most important message in the world and it truly comes from God himself, then it would sure be nice if he could bring home at least one in ten, but ideally even more than that.

• Once they are converted, how many of God’s children stay faithful and stick around in his one true church? The future population of the celestial kingdom seems to be slipping away like so much sand in an hourglass.

From: “The Hard Problem of Heavenly Mother” – posted on December 12, 2021

• One of the biggest problems with the Mormon concept of Heavenly Mother is that if she is real then most likely one of two things would be true: either there is more than one of her, or polygamy in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints wasn’t divinely sanctioned after all. 

• If polygamy was ever a principle that was inspired, revealed, or commanded by God as a way of bringing his children back into his presence in the highest level of the celestial kingdom, then God himself would need to practice polygamy as well.  Otherwise, some of his male children would have more wives than him in the celestial kingdom.  

• If God isn’t a polygamist but polygamy was divinely sanctioned, then Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, and the rest of the early Mormon polygamists and even modern eternal polygamists such as Russell M. Nelson and Dallin H. Oaks will all have more wives than God in heaven. They will have more wives than everyone else who wasn’t or isn’t a polygamist as well.

From: “From Human Beings to Supreme Beings” – posted on December 10, 2021

• We humans don’t have any more control over the thoughts in our minds or the feelings in our bodies than we do over the blood in our veins or the marrow in our bones.

• The longer we human beings can survive into the future, the more likely we are to actually become the Supreme Beings that we thought were there all along, but we will be much better Supreme Beings than our ancient ancestors ever imagined into existence.

From: “The Whole Truth” – posted on December 10, 2021

• Never trust that you have the whole truth from someone who won’t let you look at all of the evidence.

• The faithful might say that God withholds evidence to test our faith, but that doesn’t work in the case of The Book of Mormon (if ever). Why? Because even with a historically authenticated set of gold plates in a museum, it would still require faith to believe that the supernatural events that the plates describe actually happened and aren’t just ancient stories.

From: “What is the Biggest Problem with The Book of Mormon?” – posted on August 2, 2021

• I’ve come to realize that there is no shortage of affirmative evidence when you’re trying to show that a thing is what it is – it’s when you’re trying to show that a thing is something it’s not that you run into trouble.  

• Isn’t it true that everything about a genuine artifact attests to its authenticity, or at least does not detract from it, because, after all, it’s authentic?

From: “Mormon Missionary’s Family Protected by Apostle Jeffrey R. Holland’s Promise…and they died?” – posted on January 4, 2020

• Finding a way to make church leaders be right even when they’re wrong is the kind of approach that led and still leads people to gladly sign off on a variety of bad behaviors from Joseph Smith and all of his successors.

• If the church is “true” and its leaders speak for God no matter what, and if there is no acceptable evidence that could ever show that the church is not true and the leaders speak only for themselves, then how meaningful is the truth of the church really?