I have been asked many times whether Mormonism is a destructive cult. I have a couple of Mormon friends, watched the South Park episode about it and have read a few articles but never really dug in to deeply but I’ve been wanting to interview an ex-Mormon to find out more about it. The opportunity finally afforded itself and here is the result. Jonathan Streeter does ex-Mormon advocacy like I do ex-Scientology work and we had a great chat about both subjects. I think anyone who is curious about this will find this interesting.
Jonathan’s YouTube channel: https://goo.gl/wOjqap
Jonathan’s blog: http://thoughtsonthingsandstuff.com
Hi. Thanks for this comparison. I left the LDS church 2 years ago after nearly 40 years as a member because current policies and teachings harmful to LGBTQ people led me to more deeply research the history. (Thank you internet!!) As you continue your research about the LDS church, please be sure to look at that aspect of present-day harm. I see the church trying to have it both ways- washing away some of the whitewashing but not all of it, preaching love while demanding obedience, blaming members for not knowing the hidden and obscured history saying, “It’s always been taught”. I think the church will maintain its tight control of some while many of us leave because we are finally willing to see that the church is built on the fraud of JS.
This is Missionary Kid.
In terms of Christianity’s beginnings, Paul was the person who, claiming inspiration from god, set about codifying Christianity, and acting more or less as the enforcer (as you would call him) to keep Christians on the same path. His letters to the various churches laid out the basic rules for Christians, Those Pauline Epistles were actually written before the books placed at the beginning of the New Testament that describe the life of Jesus.
Those books, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are the result of oral history, set down in writing up to a century after Jesus’ birth.
Eventually, Christianity was split into two groups: the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox, and those bodies became the arbiters of what was appropriate behavior of a Christian.
Protestants broke away from the RC Church, maintaining that the bible should be the arbiter of what is proper conduct, and not the Pope.
Protestant groups each have their own interpretation of what the bible means, and fundamentalist groups are literalists, insisting that the bible is not allegorical, but literal.
Hi Chris – thanks for posting this. I was hoping for a while you would get to this topic. Thomas Smith is a public speaker who talks about leaving the Mormon church after being sent on a mission to Alabama to recruit African Americans. His story in the link below about what and who converted him out into mainstream Christianity is one of the best I have heard. This is the free audio link to his story on YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYXrlIXcNvw&sns=em
Chris Shelton, I am so grateful for you and your videos! I credit them with helping me examine, understand and validate my thoughts as I discovered more and more about Mormonism. I couldn’t discuss what I was learning with my true believing husband so I “investigated” another religion. I had had a high school friend who tried to convince me to take courses in Hollywood. (Channing Limbaugh actually got me to agree to a class, scheduled for the evening of April 29, 1992. Once the riots were reported on the news, I was too scared to drive from Loma Linda towards the chaos, so i skipped the class. But boy, they still got my $140.00!) Curiosity led me to Mike Rinder and Tony Ortega’s blogs, which led me to you. So thank you!
Terrific interview, Chris! Thanks. I could have listened to the two of you for several more hours.
I went to Streeter’s website and found many other fascinating articles and videos. Except for Warren Jeffs and similar fundamentalist plural marriage sects, I think the LDS church has a fairly good to neutral reputation with the general public, and certainly when compared to Scientology. It’s interesting that talk show hosts and script writers now feel very free to mock Scientologists, but Mormonism is still mostly considered a real religion as opposed to a cult, so poking fun at them is rarer.
(Well, doubts about Mitt Romney as a Presidential candidate were rampant, but I think those mostly stemmed from ignorance of LDS teachings. Many people are surprised to learn they’re Christians, for example.)
Thanks again.
Chris, thank you for doing what you do. I am trying once more (I never give up!) to get one single ex-Mormon to respond in any way to me. The sites are incredibly difficult to access if one does not do Facebook, etc. And the word “old-fashioned” as applied to anything electronic is simply funny to anyone from the old school, as I am.
I simply wanted to connect with Jonathan Streeter, but his website is hopelessly difficult to begin to navigate. There only seems to be a log-in for current members. How in the world did they get to be members, anyway? I’m baffled by the lack of response in this community overall, even the ones I do manage to email or leave a post. I simply never hear from anyone.
Can you convince me that you are genuine, by responding to this? I do look forward to hearing from you, as I have some very important information to share with you regarding the Mormon alliance with the Moonies, and the Religious Right. I don’t see anyone else talking about it, or making the connection.
So will I hear from you? Drum roll…………………..an “old-fashioned email” will do. 😉