Elder Bednar, a senior leader or apostle of the LDS church, states that the current leader of the church, President Russell M. Nelson shows remarkable courage for insisting that only the official name of the church be used. He states the Mormon nickname was given pejoratively to the church by it’s enemies. This plays into the persecution complex the church portrays.
Reporter: I’ve noticed that you’re not using some words anymore. Mormon seems to not be mentioned as often. LDS, the acronym, I accidentally, I think used it several times when asking you questions. But can you talk about the decision to really emphasize church of latter-day saints as opposed to calling yourself Mormon or LDS?
David A. Bednar, LDS Apostle: I think that President Russell M. Nelson will be known forever as a man of remarkable courage, to say, we will no longer use a nickname pejoratively attached to our church, by our enemies, anymore. And we’re inviting other people to call us what we are called, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
You know, we live in a world where everybody is offended about almost everything. And we don’t take offense, we just ask people to respect what, to us, is very sacred. The name of the church was revealed. We didn’t have a task force and test it with focus groups, it was revealed by the head of the church, who is Jesus Christ. And we simply are asking people to respect that, and call us what we are.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAx1LRSB9kU
David Bednar directly contradicts President Nelson by stating they are not offended by the nickname. Nelson speaks plainly that God himself is offended by the nickname and even states that when it is used it’s a major victory for Satan!
How is Bednar not offended, when God is, and Satan celebrates a major victory?
Maybe Bednar, like Russell Nelson, has pet peeves too. Bednar has spoken at length that to be offended by others is a choice we make. He teaches that ideally if we choose correctly, we choose not to be offended.
When we believe or say we have been offended, we usually mean we feel insulted, mistreated, snubbed, or disrespected. And certainly clumsy, embarrassing, unprincipled, and mean-spirited things do occur in our interactions with other people that would allow us to take offense. However, it ultimately is impossible for another person to offend you or to offend me. Indeed, believing that another person offended us is fundamentally false. To be offended is a choice we make; it is not a condition inflicted or imposed upon us by someone or something else.
Endowed with agency, you and I are agents, and we primarily are to act and not just be acted upon. To believe that someone or something can make us feel offended, angry, hurt, or bitter diminishes our moral agency and transforms us into objects to be acted upon. As agents, however, you and I have the power to act and to choose how we will respond to an offensive or hurtful situation.
In many instances, choosing to be offended is a symptom of a much deeper and more serious spiritual malady… You and I cannot control the intentions or behavior of other people. However, we do determine how we will act. Please remember that you and I are agents endowed with moral agency, and we can choose not to be offended.
One of the greatest indicators of our own spiritual maturity is revealed in how we respond to the weaknesses, the inexperience, and the potentially offensive actions of others. A thing, an event, or an expression may be offensive, but you and I can choose not to be offended.
Elder David A. Bednar, And Nothing Shall Offend Them, October 2006 General Conference
https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2006/10/and-nothing-shall-offend-them?lang=eng
He speaks to members who he thinks leave the church because they are offended and invites them to simply choose not to be offended. This is similar to the talk that insists everyone just choose to believe, despite any doubts or hesitation. Is this what Jesus would do? Not according to Nelson, since God chooses to be offended by mere mortals using a nickname for a church. The nickname that makes more sense than using the official presumptuous church name, which in itself is a full sentence.
Bednar doesn’t think they are (or should be) offended, is he telling God this too? Bednar is asking others to refer to the church as he sees it, as it is, the church of Jesus Christ. The claim is that Jesus himself named the church. Bednar invites the world to use the official name. The circular logic here is that only members of the church believe that Jesus named the church, so following this request is nearly accepting that the church is the church of Jesus Christ, as the church claims, the only True church (with a capital T) on the face of the earth.
This is akin to a cafe posting a sign claiming to serve the best coffee in the world and insisting that everyone respect them as the best. Just because you have the “courage” (or audacity and arrogance) to say it, doesn’t make it true and doesn’t mean anyone else has to respect it.
The Mormon name originates from the scriptures the church espouses, the Book of Mormon, since they are the only sect that believes the book to be true or inspired. The church teaches the book of Scripture was received by Joseph Smith on gold plates written in reformed Egyptian. Joseph was led to this buried treasure by a Native American Ghost of Angel named Nephi Moroni and Joseph’s own seer stone he often used (when others paid him) to find buried treasure. The plates of gold were written by and tell the story of a family from Jerusalem who was led by God to build ships and sail to the Americas to establish Christian nations who devolved into the native American tribes the colonizers found about two thousand years later. Joseph used this same seer stone to translate the caracters on the plates into English. Today, we have this Book of Mormon, first published in 1830, the same year the church was established. The church states the official church name was revealed in 1838, but they don’t mention that it was changed again retroactively when the church was incorporated in 1851. No wonder no one can keep the official name of the church straight, it’s much easier to use the obvious nickname.
It’s no stretch to see that the church became widely known as the Mormon church or the following and splintering of congregations as Mormonism. The splinter group which is now known as the main Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is also known as the Brighamite split group who moved west to colonize Utah when Joseph Smith was killed.
The official name of the church wasn’t even established until the Brighamites settled Utah, and they were forced to use a name registered in the British isles since another splinter group had claimed the name the church was already known by. That’s why the church today has the hyphenated Latter-day.
Pejoratives are insults. Is the church nickname an insult? If so, why did Joseph Smith speak fondly of the nickname? Why did Nelson’s immediately preceding presidents of the church, namely Gordon B. Hinckley and Thomas S. Monson, embrace the nickname also? Why did they speak fondly of it, approve multi-million dollar marketing campaigns, websites, feature-length films, missionary materials, and insist that members proudly proclaim “I’m a Mormon.”
Either those church presidents were not in touch with God, God changed his mind in the space of a couple of years, the current church leadership is not in touch with God, or none of them have been led by God and it’s a man-made and man-run organization professing to be the one true church of God.
Do the church leaders think our memory is so short-lived? It’s not surprising that they expect members to believe the church name has never changed and was revealed by Jesus directly only once, but to whitewash huge church campaigns and whole programs that every attending member of the church was involved in and gaslight the whole church membership and the world that the Mormon nickname is an insult, offends God, and is a major victory for Satan, is laughable.
Is President Nelson courageous? Is God offended or is it Russell M. Nelson? Is Russell Nelson choosing to be offended, and is it a symptom of a much deeper and more serious spiritual malady? Is Mormon an insult? Were Joseph Smith, Gordon Hinckley, and Thomas Monson all wrong? Is Russell Nelson wrong? Are they all wrong, even if well-meaning? Did God himself name the church? Did multiple prophets of the latter days sponsor major victories for Satan? Did the church pay millions of tithing funds to offend God? Is there anything more obviously silly than old men claiming their own pet peeves are revelations from God? Revelations to the whole world where there is so much hate, disease, war, famine, and other serious problems that are so much more important than a church’s nickname?
Did you reconcile this reversal from church leadership to the term Mormon? Did it add to your shelf or cause your shelf to collapse? Let us know in the comments and please, consider sharing your “I was a Mormon” story at wasmormon.org.
More reading:
- https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/style-guide
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vAx1LRSB9kU
- https://www.press.org/events/npc-headliners-luncheon-elder-david-bednar-church-jesus-christ-latter-day-saints
- https://newsroom.churchofjesuschrist.org/article/elder-bednar-national-press-club-speech
- https://www.thechurchnews.com/2022/5/28/23218347/elder-bednar-answers-questions-from-media-following-remarks-at-the-national-press-club/