I've been thinking about religions and how they started. In Joe's case, it started with a web of lies. His followers believed the lies even though Joe knew he was lying. Should the doctrine of the church still be considered lies? Maybe there's a better term. Okay, damn lies. Maybe most truths are convenient lies and they become damn lies when they're no longer convenient. Those are subjective truths. But then there are objective truths where what is actually is. Mormons do not live in that world.

I'm trying to look at Mormonism in some kind of positive light but it's not working. I'm a little disappointed that I can't make lying and self delusion into a virtue.

I would like to believe that in the beginning JS saw a lot of flaws in the teachings of Christianity that didn't quite fit with what he thought it should mean.

Maybe saying he prayed about it and god told him it was wrong was his way of trying to break away from that and have a good enough reason to do it.

I think that a lot of cults have been started exactly like this. When they interviewed Jim Jone's son after the mass murder he said his dad was one of the most loving kind people he knew. I just think when a person gets a lot of power it can corrupt them as it did JS.