Tag Archives: History

Past events. Church history contains much that was hidden.

A $3 Million Check and a Genealogy Center: The Church Comes to the Juneteenth Museum

On October 7, 2026, Dr. Opal Lee turned 100. The woman known as the “Grandmother of Juneteenth,” who campaigned for decades until Juneteenth became a federal holiday in 2021, celebrated with a crowd in Fort Worth, a ceremonial demolition on the future site of the National Juneteenth Museum, and a gift. The Church of Jesus …

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The 1832 First Vision Account Leaves Out “Which Church Is True?” Question

The Restoration story most members know starts with a question. In the 1838 account (Joseph Smith—History, every missionary flip chart), fourteen-year-old Joseph walks into the woods near Palmyra, troubled by competing churches, and asks God which denomination is right. The lessons set the hook with Joseph’s honest seeking and provide a foreshadowing solution, simply ask …

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Corbridge’s Belief Trumps Discomfort vs Bishop Darth Vader

Lawrence E. Corbridge is at it again. In his 2019 BYU Devotional Stand Forever, the emeritus General Authority Seventy told members that hard questions about church history, polygamy, racism, translation methods, DNA evidence, and LGBTQ policies were merely “secondary.” Settle the “primary” questions first — Is there a God? Is Jesus the Christ? Was Joseph …

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MLK Chapel of Morehouse College Honors Founder of Racist Church

The historically black Morehouse College campus in Atlanta, Georgia, includes an International Chapel that bears the name of the school’s most renowned alumnus, Martin Luther King, Jr. In 2023, the Chapel added a portrait of the then-president of the LDS Church, Russell M. Nelson. More recently, the chapel also added a portrait of church founder …

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“For the vast majority of human history, we lived in small groups of around 50 people. Everyone knew everybody. If you told a lie, stole someone's dinner or didn't defend the group against its enemies, there was no way to disappear into the crowd. Everyone knew you, and you would get punished. But in the last 12,000 years or so, human groups began to expand from a few dozen to more than a thousand. And now it wasn't so easy to punish the cheaters and the free riders. So we needed something big, vast, an epic force that could see what everyone was doing and enforce the rules. Since individual people could no longer police gigantic groups, the policing had to be done by a force that was superhuman. That force, according to psychologist Azim Shariff, was the modern idea of a punitive God, the kind that many preachers warn can send you to hell.” - Shankar Vedantam, Creating God, Hidden Brain Podcast Episode NPR, 2018 | wasmormon.org
“For the vast majority of human history, we lived in small groups of around 50 people. Everyone knew everybody. If you told a lie, stole someone's dinner or didn't defend the group against its enemies, there was no way to disappear into the crowd. Everyone knew you, and you would get punished. But in the last 12,000 years or so, human groups began to expand from a few dozen to more than a thousand. And now it wasn't so easy to punish the cheaters and the free riders. So we needed something big, vast, an epic force that could see what everyone was doing and enforce the rules. Since individual people could no longer police gigantic groups, the policing had to be done by a force that was superhuman. That force, according to psychologist Azim Shariff, was the modern idea of a punitive God, the kind that many preachers warn can send you to hell.” - Shankar Vedantam, Creating God, Hidden Brain Podcast Episode NPR, 2018
“One thing that seems to be quite common around the world and throughout history is that these gods and spirits have human-like qualities. In some cultures and traditions, it could even be physical human-like qualities... But also, even if they don't have physical qualities, they surely have mental qualities that are human-like. And that is even more common around the world, which again, verifies this idea that our anthropomorphic tendencies feature prominently in the way that our religious mind operates.” - Dr. Ara Norenzayan, Professor of Social Psychology at the University of British Columbia and Author | wasmormon.org
“One thing that seems to be quite common around the world and throughout history is that these gods and spirits have human-like qualities. In some cultures and traditions, it could even be physical human-like qualities... But also, even if they don't have physical qualities, they surely have mental qualities that are human-like. And that is even more common around the world, which again, verifies this idea that our anthropomorphic tendencies feature prominently in the way that our religious mind operates.” - Dr. Ara Norenzayan, Professor of Social Psychology at the University of British Columbia and Author

Millions Shall Worship Brother Joseph Again But Don’t Google Us

In his BYU–Idaho devotional Millions Shall Know Brother Joseph Again, Jayson Kunzler urges students to reject any information—inside or outside the Church—that might “humanize” Joseph Smith or acknowledge his flaws. He warns that those who study inconvenient history “serve the wrong master” and risk their eternal standing. He insists that members can only truly know …

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A Loving God?

When deconstructing religious beliefs, examining whether the God we’ve been taught to worship and admire is indeed as loving as we think is on the table for many. Christianity teaches that “God is Love,” but examining scriptural narratives reveals inconsistencies in this portrayal, especially concerning God’s actions as a parental figure. Here are several examples …

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Martha Brotherton: Pressured by Church Leaders to Become a Plural Wife

In July 1842, the Sangamo Journal published the affidavit of Martha H. Brotherton, a young English convert who had only recently arrived in Nauvoo with her family. In it, she recounts a disturbing encounter where she was pressured by church leaders Brigham Young, Heber C. Kimball, and Joseph Smith himself to become Young’s plural wife. …

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Religion and Tribes

The LDS Church is Just Another Man-Made Religion One of the hardest truths to face when stepping back from Mormonism is this: The LDS Church is just a man-made religion, no more divinely authoritative than any other. That sentence alone might feel heavy, especially for a “true believing Mormon” (TBM). It cuts directly against the …

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“I have more to boast of than ever any man had. I am the only man that has ever been able to keep a whole church together since the days of Adam. A large majority of the whole have stood by me. Neither Paul, John, Peter, nor Jesus ever did it. I boast that no man ever did such a work as I. The followers of Jesus ran away from Him; but the Latter-day Saints never ran away from me yet.” - Joseph Smith, May 26, 1844, History of the Church, Vol 6:408-409 | wasmormon.org
“I have more to boast of than ever any man had. I am the only man that has ever been able to keep a whole church together since the days of Adam. A large majority of the whole have stood by me. Neither Paul, John, Peter, nor Jesus ever did it. I boast that no man ever did such a work as I. The followers of Jesus ran away from Him; but the Latter-day Saints never ran away from me yet.” - Joseph Smith, May 26, 1844, History of the Church, Vol 6:408-409

Joseph Smith’s Polygamy Denials: Carefully Worded Lies, Loopholes, and Lasting Damage

One of the most unsettling aspects of Mormon history is the secret practice of polygamy. Joseph Smith publicly denied practicing polygamy while secretly marrying between 30 and 40 women, including teenagers and other men’s wives, as the church’s published essay confirms (in a footnote). The exact number of women to whom he was sealed in …

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The statements emphasized that the Church practiced no marital law other than monogamy while implicitly leaving open the possibility that individuals, under direction of God’s living prophet, might do so. [Footnote: See, for example, “On Marriage,” Times and Seasons, Oct. 1, 1842, 939–40; and Wilford Woodruff journal, Nov. 25, 1843, Church History Library, Salt Lake City; Parley P. Pratt, “This Number Closes the First Volume of the ‘Prophet,’” The Prophet, May 24, 1845, 2. George A. Smith explained, “Any one who will read carefully the denials, as they are termed, of plurality of wives in connection with the circumstances will see clearly that they denounce adultery, fornication, brutal lust and the teaching of plurality of wives by those who were not commanded to do so” (George A. Smith letter to Joseph Smith III, Oct. 9, 1869, in Journal History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Oct. 9, 1869, Church History Library, Salt Lake City).] LDS Church Website, Gospel Topics Essays: Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo | wasmormon.org
The statements emphasized that the Church practiced no marital law other than monogamy while implicitly leaving open the possibility that individuals, under direction of God’s living prophet, might do so. [Footnote: See, for example, “On Marriage,” Times and Seasons, Oct. 1, 1842, 939–40; and Wilford Woodruff journal, Nov. 25, 1843, Church History Library, Salt Lake City; Parley P. Pratt, “This Number Closes the First Volume of the ‘Prophet,’” The Prophet, May 24, 1845, 2. George A. Smith explained, “Any one who will read carefully the denials, as they are termed, of plurality of wives in connection with the circumstances will see clearly that they denounce adultery, fornication, brutal lust and the teaching of plurality of wives by those who were not commanded to do so” (George A. Smith letter to Joseph Smith III, Oct. 9, 1869, in Journal History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Oct. 9, 1869, Church History Library, Salt Lake City).] - LDS Church Website, Gospel Topics Essays: Plural Marriage in Kirtland and Nauvoo

Lying for the Lord

The idea of “lying for the Lord” has long been whispered among members and critics of the LDS Church alike. It reflects the sense that leaders and members sometimes feel justified in withholding, distorting, or even outright fabricating information in order to protect the church or further its goals. In other words, the ends are …

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I wanted it all to be true. Like so many others, I began researching and chasing footnotes not to prove the church false but to prove it true. I felt sick. I felt angry. I felt deceived. So here I am, after nearly 50 years in the church, realizing that all I had believed in is false. The keystone of my religion has come crashing down taking Joseph Smith and the doctrines of the church with it. The Mormon church is not the one true church. Joseph Smith is not a prophet. The Book of Mormon is not a true history. I don't believe any of it because I can't. - Christi's "I was a Mormon" story. Read more at https://wasmormon.org/profile/avilabeach77/
I wanted it all to be true. Like so many others, I began researching and chasing footnotes not to prove the church false but to prove it true. I felt sick. I felt angry. I felt deceived. So here I am, after nearly 50 years in the church, realizing that all I had believed in is false. The keystone of my religion has come crashing down taking Joseph Smith and the doctrines of the church with it. The Mormon church is not the one true church. Joseph Smith is not a prophet. The Book of Mormon is not a true history. I don't believe any of it because I can't. - Christi's "I was a Mormon" story. Read more at https://wasmormon.org/profile/avilabeach77/

Why Didn’t Cowdery, Whitmer, or Harris Expose Joseph Smith as a Fraud?

A common apologetic argument in defense of Joseph Smith is that his closest early associates—Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer, and Martin Harris—never outright denounced him as a fraud, even after they left or were cast out of the church. The logic goes: if anyone would have known the “truth” behind the origins of the Book of …

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“While the position of Church since 1893 has been repeatedly set forth, namely that polygamous or plural marriages are not and cannot now be performed, yet in order that there may be no excuse for any Church member to be misled by the false representations or the corrupt, adulterous practices of the members of this secret and (by reputation) oath-bound organisation (of which the history of the Nephites and Lamanites show so many counterparts), it is deemed wise again to set out the position of the Church on this matter, at the same time tracing the outlines of the historical facts lying behind the Church's position, of which many young Church members might not be fully aware.” - Official Statement from the First Presidency (Heber J. Grant, Anthony W. Ivins, J. Reuben Clark) of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Deseret News, June 17, 1933. | wasmormon.org
“While the position of Church since 1893 has been repeatedly set forth, namely that polygamous or plural marriages are not and cannot now be performed, yet in order that there may be no excuse for any Church member to be misled by the false representations or the corrupt, adulterous practices of the members of this secret and (by reputation) oath-bound organisation (of which the history of the Nephites and Lamanites show so many counterparts), it is deemed wise again to set out the position of the Church on this matter, at the same time tracing the outlines of the historical facts lying behind the Church's position, of which many young Church members might not be fully aware.” - Official Statement from the First Presidency (Heber J. Grant, Anthony W. Ivins, J. Reuben Clark) of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Deseret News, June 17, 1933.

The 1886 Revelation Denial and the LDS Church’s Longstanding Dishonesty

In the complex history of Mormonism, few documents expose the tensions between prophetic revelation and institutional survival quite like John Taylor’s 1886 revelation. This revelation, written in Taylor’s own hand, declared that the divine commandment of plural marriage would not and could not be revoked. Yet for over a century, the Church of Jesus Christ …

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“[Sidney Rigdon's] passion for learning and preaching the word of God took him into the Christian ministry... He soon found himself within the expanding influence of Alexander Campbell’s Reformed Baptist movement... Sidney Rigdon honed his public-speaking skills as a minister of the First Baptist Church... After his own conversion, Rigdon traveled to New York state with his former parishioner Edward Partridge to meet Joseph Smith. Rigdon’s extensive biblical knowledge and powerful preaching helped nurture the young Church. Rigdon also served as a scribe for Joseph Smith’s inspired revision of the Bible and was the subject of several early revelations.” - LDS Website, Church History Topics, Sidney Rigdon | wasmormon.org
“[Sidney Rigdon's] passion for learning and preaching the word of God took him into the Christian ministry... He soon found himself within the expanding influence of Alexander Campbell’s Reformed Baptist movement... Sidney Rigdon honed his public-speaking skills as a minister of the First Baptist Church... After his own conversion, Rigdon traveled to New York state with his former parishioner Edward Partridge to meet Joseph Smith. Rigdon’s extensive biblical knowledge and powerful preaching helped nurture the young Church. Rigdon also served as a scribe for Joseph Smith’s inspired revision of the Bible and was the subject of several early revelations.” - LDS Website, Church History Topics, Sidney Rigdon