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To someone raised in the Mormon Church, the phrase “Oh ye of little faith” is one of the most stinging criticisms you can receive. Conversely, to be called “a person of great faith” is one of the highest compliments a Mormon can receive. The church goes to great lengths, starting with young toddlers barely old enough to talk and continuing non-stop throughout each member’s life, to ensure that faith is held as one of the highest virtues in the minds of all members. “Great people have great faith. Weak people have weak faith.” The message is repeated endlessly in as many different ways as possible.

As a result of this very successful indoctrination regarding the virtue of faith, I found that when I was asking around, trying to determine whether or not the Mormon Church’s claims were true, very few of my fellow Mormons would even listen to my questions, let alone seriously consider them. I wanted to know how we could possibly believe that Hebrew people would come to the American continents and establish such great civilizations without leaving any trace of the culture that is so clearly described in the Book of Mormon. I wanted to know why no Hebrew writings or inscriptions have been found, why no bones of horses or elephants, why no wheat or barley, why no evidence of steel use, why no sign of people riding chariots, and so forth and so on. I wanted to know why it was that when Egyptian scholars translate the original source document that is shown right there in the Pearl of Great Price, they come up with something that is completely different from what Joseph Smith said it says. At the time that he did his “translation” of the hieroglyphics shown in the Pearl of Great Price nobody could read Egyptian and so hey… who could question his version? But now archeologists can read the facsimile that’s contained in the Pearl of Great Price and it doesn’t say anything even close to what Joseph Smith said it says. And Mormons don’t find that odd? No, they don’t… because they refuse to even think about the question.

The response I got from nearly everyone… from lowly ward members all the way up to a high ranking general authority that I met with… was just the admonition to “Have faith” and the advice, “Don’t delve into the mysteries”. They wouldn’t even LOOK at the evidence, let alone think about its ramifications. My studies had uncovered what I now consider to be overwhelming evidence pointing conclusively to the finding that Joseph Smith was a scam artist, not a prophet. (Don’t get me wrong. I firmly believe that the church today is an organization filled with wonderful people who really do want to help their fellow men. However, we all know what the scriptures say about beautiful buildings that are built on foundations of sand.) I was absolutely amazed that no one would even LOOK at evidence regarding the foundations of the church. They just took it on unquestioned faith that it was true.

The universal response that I got from everyone was just to pray about my questions. I was given sincere assurances that if I would just pray about it, “God will reveal the truth to you by giving you a burning in your bosom, just like he did for me”. I found it astonishing that so many people would rely on a simple burning feeling in their bosom as the basis for determining the course of their entire lives, especially when there was a mountain of evidence to the contrary. I asked the Mormon advisors who I trusted and loved, “What about Catholics or Jews or Muslims who pray to their God to know the truth of their religion? Don’t they get a burning feeling in their bosom when they pray to their God?” Of course those people get the same feelings that Mormons do. They get a burning in their bosoms that’s every bit as hot as the burning feeling that Mormons get. So then how can Mormons rely on that burning feeling as the sole basis for their belief while there is overwhelming irrefutable evidence that clearly shows that the church was founded by a con man? (Yes, I do think “irrefutable” is the correct word. What the FARMS people at BYU have published in hopes of refuting it is so unscholarly and unconvincing that it’s more of an embarrassment to the university than a credit to it.)

Everything in the end all comes back to the indoctrination that Mormons receive regarding the importance of faith. One high ranking Mormon who I had loved and trusted my whole life told me in response to my questions that he had never ever doubted the claims of the church... not even for one second. He had never questioned the teachings of the leaders. He had FAITH… and if I would just do the same then my life would be fulfilled, just like his was. He had never even QUESTIONED whether or not the church was true. That was what finally decided the matter for me. That was the point where I stopped wearing the temple garments. That was the point when I walked away, never to return.

Think about this for a minute…. Here we have a church that teaches us that the destiny of each man is to become a God. (Not the destiny of women of course… but let’s not go there… that’s a whole ‘nother letter.) The Mormon Church teaches us that righteous men will be given a corner of the universe where they will go and create galaxies and solar systems and planets over which they will rule. They will literally and truly be a God, exactly the same as our God is God to us here on Earth. And yet in order to qualify to become Gods what do we have to do? We have to give ourselves lobotomies. We have to close our minds to any questions that aren’t approved by the leaders of the church that we just happened by chance to be born into. We have to refuse to even look at the mountain of evidence around us that contradicts what the church leaders tell us. We have to blindly and unquestioningly trust our leaders, when the only “evidence” supporting their claims is a “burning in our bosom” that we get when we pray…. the very same “burning in our bosoms” that members of every other church on Earth experience when they pray about the truthfulness of their church. Are those sheep-like qualities the ones that qualify someone to rule as God?

It might seem astonishing to someone who hasn’t ever been Mormon to think that so many people can believe something that, if you just look at the evidence, is so obviously based on a scam. But if you’ve been raised in the church then it’s easy to understand. If you’ve been through the Mormon indoctrination system then you know how strongly it is that the virtue of faith is drilled into people’s heads… and how shameful it is to be a person to whom it can be said, “Oh ye of little faith”.