Posted by:
spanner
(
)
Date: April 04, 2012 12:14AM
http://www.radiolive.co.nz/What-is-Mormonism-Raymond-Richards/tabid/506/articleID/27043/Default.aspxThis is the link for an interview with an associate of mine that played on New Zealand's Radiolive last Sunday. the timeslot guaranteed that few Mormons would actually hear it. Which is probably fortunate as Ray has had a lot of trouble teaching objective US history at Waikato University - which is the nearest to Templeview, our Mormon enclave.
Ray did a pretty good job I think. The only thing was that he probably didn't have the time to get specific about animals the ancient Americans were claimed to have (horses etc), and animals they talked about (lions and the like). So a Mormon could jump all over and say the BoM doesn't say there are lions in ancient America. But the BoM does mention them implying ongoing familiarity with lions down to Moroni's time, else why wouldn't Moroni clarify what a lion was. This is a minor point. But one that would get picked up on.
He also infers that the Jaredites took elephants in their submarines. Which is actually a more reasonable inference than that they were native at that time and left no evidence of a breeding population (they fit all the other flocks in there - why not elephants).
If you get offended at terms like "crazy", "cultish", and "nutty" you probably should not click on the link. Ray does state up front that the church is no crazier than other religions, but it is more recent and we can investigate its claims.