I was just reading an interesting article titled "Drawing the Line on religion" & it made me wonder at what point do you think leadership in the church is made aware of the scam they are perpetrating? Does that make sense? I mean at some point along the way (maybe when you get as high up as being a GA) the truth has got to come out.

Maybe this will help you understand what I'm talking about. The article, as I understood it, was about Steve Benson's disenchantment with the church & how that all came about. About half way through the writer states the following:


"A reporter at the paper sifted some eye-popping information from Utah's corporation records. The published report said the corporation that manages the church effected in 1989 a transfer of power from Ezra Taft Benson to his two counselors, Gordon Hinckley and Thomas Monson. That was done the same year that his grandfather last was seen in public, Benson said.

"This is what's so ironic," he said. "The church leaders and members are saying, 'Steve, where's your faith? Don't you have faith God could raise Ezra Taft Benson to speak and lead the church?' But in secret the leaders of the church had amended the faith that God would do that. . . . They put their faith not in God but in the lawyers who transacted the papers and who actually assured the transfer of power to them."


I have to think that there were more involved in the cover up than just Hinckley & Monson, so that's what made me wonder, "How many people really know the truth, & how far along do they get before they know"?

I think most people in the forum can agree that we've figured out this scam for ourselves, but I think it would be interesting to know how many in Church Leadership know & help to perpetuate the lie. Make sense?

I think it's milk before (or instead of) the meat. It's at all levels of Mormonism. It doesn't mean they don't believe in the religion, just that they are privy to the less faith promoting stuff and don't want those with "weaker testimonies" than themselves to be aware of them. For example, missionaries will NOT talk to investigators about polygamy, blacks & the priesthood, becoming gods, etc., but does that mean they don't believe themselves? Not necessarily. It's just the more brainwashed you get, the higher up in the Morg you go, and the more crazy information you become able to digest. The apostles have a different understanding of the church than then members below them, just as a life long member does than a recent convert, and a missionary than an investigator.

Another example. Non-Mormons will look at us ex-Mormons and ask, 'how could you have believed in all that crazy stuff when its so OBVIOUS that it can't be true?" Well, most of DID in fact believe in it.

Mormonism isn't about Facts, it's about Feelings.

leaders have innoculated the rank-and-file against the facts to the point where they seldom matter.

today's messages to rank-and-file?

"Wear your garments while doing yard work."

The LDS Church promotes the "MATRIX" film "reality" concept. Mormons are convinced by repitition that everything non faith promoting is an illusion of the evil world and the Devil. Even the words and writings of the Prophets are considered illusions, if they test one's faith.

North Koreans are conditioned the same way. They hear how the dictator's family only does good things, and the outside world is an illusion..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_6q51Htw5gY&feature=related

Interesting that you compare the morg to n.korea. Just last night mr. ambivalentmo was ruminating about the same analogy. Very, very fitting

The fact the past and current Prophet paid forger, and con-artist, Mark Hofmann for promised Joseph Smith letters which would prove Old Joe knew he was a con artist, shows they know or suspect it's all a fraud.

. . . thought it significant enough to include in his book, "Extensions of Power."

Here's the background:

By 1993, my grandfather was on his last mental and physical legs, being in full decline on both counts.

He exhibited only brief moments of awareness of his surroundings and was unable to carry on meaningful conversations, including with members of his own family.

I personally witnessed his condition deteroriate to this state over the course of several years.

By 1993, he had had a suffered from series of significant health setbacks, including blood clots on the brain, a stroke and a heart attack, all of which had been downplayed to one degree or another by the Church.

My grandfather eventually died in May 1994, barely a year after the conference to which you refer.

By September 1993, even Apostles Dallin H. Oaks and Neal A. Maxwell were personally (but only privately) confirming the reality of ETB's increasingly debilitated state.

In a visit that month with my then-spouse and I in Maxwell's Church Administration Building office, Oaks admitted that my grandfather's health was declining steadily (a fact that we both, as well as our children, already knew from personal visits with him in the confines of his apartment overlooking Temple Square).

Oaks said the Quorum of the Twelve rotated in pairs each week to visit my grandfather at the apartment, with the purpose of only to check in on how he was doing, not to engage in adminstrative action or to discuss major issues, since my grandfather was incapable of doing any such thing.


Maxwell said that when Church members asked him how the prophet was doing, he would reply only that "he is not in pain."

They also said that major administrative decisions were not being made, given the inability of my grandfather to be involved in the process.

I asked Oaks why he didn't come out and set the record straight on my grandfather's health, especially since the Church Public Relations Department, headed by Don LeFevre at the time, was issuing press releases significantly misrepresenting my grandfather's actual mental and physical condition.

Oaks responded by waving dismissively in the direction of the the Church Office Building (which we could see through the windows of Maxwell's office) and saying, "I don't know what goes on over there in the high rise."

I then asked Maxwell why he didn't speak up on the actual state of my grandfather's health.

Maxwell replied by saying he already had several responsibilities and "didn't need any more."

Oaks then urged me to deal with the issue of my grandfather's health through "back channels," rather than in the public square (a sure-fire remedy for deep-sixing the whole thing).

I chose not to follow that advice.

A few weeks later, during 1993 October Conference, I encountered Don LeFevre of the Church PR Department and asked him why he was releasing statements about the health of my grandfather that were clearly not true.

LeFevre told me, "All my statements have been approved by my superiors."

I responded, "Don, that doesn't make them true."

LeFevre simply replied, "Steve, this is a difficult job."

It is a matter of public record (thanks to the reporting of the Salt Lake Tribune) that--in direct contravention of established protocol for the transfer of power in the event that the Church president should die OR become incapacitated--Hinckely and Monson had the power of attorney over LDS corporate affairs shifted to them in the Church's incorporation documents a few years before my grandfather's death (see Talmadge's treatment of Church governance procedures in Articles of Faith).

Instead of having the First Presidency dissolved and an acting president installed to administer the affairs of the Church in a situation when the sitting president was unable to perform his duties, Hinckely and Monson had legal authority to run the Mormon empire transferred directly to them by the highly unusual method of employing my grandfather's autopen signature machine on Church incorporation documents (see an account of this episode in Quinn's Extensions of Power).

It's rotten, folks--to the core.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 04/15/2012 05:39PM by steve benson.

I've not read "Extensions of Power" yet but sounds like a must read. The more I look into this scam I believed in for 40yrs, the more I feel like a "Sucker".

I realize a lot of folks here will disagree with me on this, and that's fine, but I've always had a hard time believing that the prophet or any GA's actually "know" that the church is false.

This isn't to be charitable towards them, but rather is a realization of the ability of humans to deceive themselves to a large degree when necessary.

By the time you are called to be even a 70, you have devoted a large portion of your time and money to a belief. By the time you are called to the quorum of the 12, you are mostly defined by your religion. You are so heavily inoculated against the truth, that it would be almost impossible to stop believing.

You might say "Well, at that level, they have access to more damning information than the average church member." This is undoubtedly true, but even average church members - who have a lot less invested in the church - have easy access to significantly more information than they could possibly need to determine the falsehood of the church.

Conspiracies are surprisingly hard to perpetuate, and I'd think if any significant percentage of church leadership knew that it was false and internally acted accordingly, it would unravel fairly quickly.

This and the fact they are ONLY surrounded by the faithful (other apostles and subordinates who kiss their butt). They live in a kind of bubble.

Never underestimate the human capacity for rationalization and self-deception. On some level, they probably understand that the church doesn't operate the way they thought (such as by revelation), but my guess is that they've convinced themselves that they are God's chosen servants and what they do is inspired.

I don't buy it. There is just NO WAY, with the way these guys came up through the church, that they did not run into the real facts about the true history of LD$inc.

Just NO WAY.

Why do you think they need an army of lawyers and gazillions of $$$$$ for PR? These guys may be old,doddering,lying crazy dudes: but they aren't dummies.

Crazy and/or drunk with power does not equal stupid. Preponderance of evidence and all that. Maybe there are a few scattered here and there who aren't privy to the holy of holies:(the $$$ and the dirty, nasty inner politics/whatever of the guys with the reins), who still are still 100% engaged and True blue.

Im thinking they all have dirt on each other and its like a game of perpetual blackmail. Just my 2 cents

I mean, Its a HUGE corporation. Why do we think they are any better than all of the "gentile and worldly" corporations?



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 04/15/2012 05:43PM by ambivalentmo.

The Mormon Royals may attempt to justify their fraud by stating / thinking the LDS Church promotes morality, healhier lifestyle, ect (better organization than a private nightclub).

AT the point they get to the top their whole family life would be destroyed, not to mention the perks. The LDS Royals are like when the mafia discovered Vegas.

LDS INC fleeces millions/billions off members, but they cant be convicted of any crimes due to the Constitutional right to free exercise of faith.
A confidence man or con artist is like a duck in water with a church, The faithful want to trust you, pray to trust you.

Jim Jones and Joseph Smith were narcisisstic con artists who were ready andplanning to "take the money and run," but actually began to beleive thir own bullshit and got killed due to it.

all of the above.

just as they deal exclusively in imprecise numbers, they exist on the basis of imprecise definitions.

Church Leadership and the Truth....polar opposites....

The evidence is clear that the Mormon Leadership has been hiding vital and damning information from the membership: You may LOSE things by accident--but you don't HIDE things by accident.

Mormon leaders know WHY they HIDE such information. They hide it for a REASON.

That's why so many members are now shocked by the ugly things that they now discover about Mormonism on the Internet. For instance: How many members grew up in the church as seminary and institute graduates, as teachers, as returned missionaries etc. -- but only NOW, after so many years, are discovering that Joseph Smith was a polygamist, and engaged in polyandry as well!

How could such significant facts never have been know to the members for so long!

This--and so many OTHER things--were intentionally HIDDEN by the church's leaders who knew full well WHY they were hiding them.

These leaders couldn't have been ignorant--they had to have been well informed. Their actions had to have been a matter of INTENTIONAL DECEPTION.

All the inspiring, faith-promoting stuff never got hidden, did it?

So, there had to have been a careful selection process.

This required knowledge.

This required lying.