Mormon Stories: The Violence Against Mormons

John Dehlin [00:00:02] Hello, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories podcast. I'm your host, John Dehlin. It's October 5, 2025. It is general conference weekend, coincidentally, not intentionally, and we're so happy to have you all. We're doing a live stream today. And today we're covering the topic of violence in the news tied to Mormons. Weeks ago, a very popular conservative YouTuber, Charlie Kirk was assassinated in Orem, Utah while he was speaking at Utah Valley University. I, I've made reference to that just in terms of giving my own personal condolences to Charlie Kirk and his family and his supporters. But we haven't really talked about that violence in the context of Mormonism and current events and news. In addition, just last week, I believe in Michigan, a Mormon congregation was attacked violently. I believe the death count is now five. I believe there's something like eight injuries and, and the shooter died in that conflict. And you know, it. It has come out that both Charlie Kirk's alleged assassin was raised LDS and then, and you know, it's going to be hard to always use the precise terminology, but we're going to do our best. And it was also, it's been reported that the, the Michigan attacker, and we'll be talking about names and everything. The Michigan attacker, it's been reported that he hated Mormons. And from that there has been a lot of talk about the causes of both of these horrible, deplorable acts of violence. Is it Mormonism? Is it liberal Democrat politic politics? Is it conservative Republican politics? Is it ex Mormons or anti Mormons that are to blame for this violence? And that's what we are here to address today specifically. It's not so much to go into details about each of these horrific events. We can maybe do that in a different episode. And it's certainly not to assign blame to anyone. We're going to get into that as well. But what we want to talk about specifically are, you know, the allegations that it's, you know, Mormon critics or ex Mormons or post Mormons or as sometimes we're labeled anti Mormons who are inspiring acts of violence. And so it's a sensitive topic and we're grateful for those of you who are joining us today. We are live streaming and I'm really thrilled to have with us in the studio the panel that we had when we reviewed An Inconvenient Faith just a few weeks ago. So welcome back to the show. Dr. Julie Dezevedo. Have you done a name change? Are you doing a name change?

Julie Deza Hanks [00:03:30] Not yet. I'm pondering it.

John Dehlin [00:03:33] Okay.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:03:33] So, yeah, for today, how are we referring to you, Diaze Hanks.

John Dehlin [00:03:37] Okay. So, Julie, welcome back to Warm Stories. It's always great to have you.

Warm Stories: Building a More Civil Mormon Community

Julie Deza Hanks [00:03:42] Happy to be here.

John Dehlin [00:03:43] We also have back with us Bishop Bo. Bishop Bo Euler. Hey, Bo.

Guest [00:03:48] Hey.

Beau Oyler [00:03:48] Good to be back.

John Dehlin [00:03:50] And we have, of course, the wonderful Jana Spangler. Hey, Jana.

Jana Spangler [00:03:53] Hey.

John Dehlin [00:03:55] And we're excited to sort of soft announce a new initiative. We had such great feedback from our review of An Inconvenient Faith. And there's been so much discussion about polarization and violence and negativity, not just in the space of Mormonism, but also just in the space of religion and in the space of politics and just culturally. And I think what probably everyone who's listening to this podcast on some level will agree, but, but certainly the panelists here today, I think we all believe that we need more light and less heat. We need more peacemaking, more bridge building, more dialogue that's healthy and constructive. And so we're announcing a project that we're coordinating. We're codenaming Mormon bridge builders. But if. If this project has legs beyond today, the idea is it's a new series on Mormon stories podcast where we find ways to have a healthier Mormon community. And we're choosing that term carefully. When we say Mormon, we mean the cultural Mormon umbrella that includes members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints who are active, who are liberal or progressive, who are conservative, who are orthodox, who are inactive. We mean no disrespect to any of them. When we use the term Mormon, we're carefully selecting it as an umbrella term to describe the broader culture, because we are a broader culture. In fact, I think we all agree there are more former Mormons in the world today, probably twice as many former Mormons in the world than there are active attending Latter Day Saints or even more.

Beau Oyler [00:05:59] I mean, the data shows that we have about 4 million active members. Right. So you have 17 million members worldwide.

Guest 2 [00:06:05] It's.

Beau Oyler [00:06:06] It's four times the size. So it's a really big group of people.

John Dehlin [00:06:09] Yeah. And we're just, we're if you can come up with a better term, we're. We're interested. But when we say Mormon, we mean actively attending Mormons of record. We mean inactive Mormons, we mean ex Mormons, post Mormons. We even mean community of Christ members, former community of Christ members, and honestly, people affected by Mormonism, family and friends and community members who are affected, and just anyone interested in Mormonism, like, that's the Group that we're looking to build bridges within. And. And so what I want to do really quickly is give each of you a chance to kind of introduce yourselves again to our audience and within this frame. So, Julie, why don't you go first?

In the Elevator With Julie

Julie Deza Hanks [00:06:51] Yeah. So I am Julie, and I own Wasatch Family Therapy. I work primarily with women who are navigating family and faith. Work a lot with faith transitions. I've written a couple of books. And what I.

Jana Spangler [00:07:10] What else?

Julie Deza Hanks [00:07:10] I don't know. Happy to be here.

John Dehlin [00:07:13] Yeah. And. And you do social.

Guest 3 [00:07:15] You.

John Dehlin [00:07:15] You've been an influencer. I don't know if you like that

Julie Deza Hanks [00:07:17] term or not, but I. I've. I've been a content creator for a couple of decades now.

John Dehlin [00:07:23] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:07:24] Yeah. So have a lot of content out there.

John Dehlin [00:07:27] Yeah. All right, well, we're. We're glad to have you. And how do you like this idea of peacemaking bridge building?

Julie Deza Hanks [00:07:32] I love it because I've always seen myself as a bridge builder. In fact, I have a bridge illustration of a bridge because I like that metaphor. So I'm here for it, you guys.

Bo Euler on the Spiritual Expansion

John Dehlin [00:07:44] All right. Beautiful. Okay, Bo, remind us who you are.

Beau Oyler [00:07:48] Yeah. So, Bo Euler, professionally designer, owned a design agency called Enlisted Design, and now I spend the majority of my time working on, like, consumer brands for celebrities. And then on the spiritual side, I'm a former LDS bishop, served as bishop for five years in the Oakland Stake. Now live in Salt Lake City, Utah, and got an amazing family. And my work within the Mormon community is generally helping people, guiding people, listening to people, working with people who are just kind of beginning their spiritual expansion. And I love that space. Right. I love the space of somebody who's been orthodox, who's been totally committed all in, just like I was. And then they start to think about things and they start shedding, or they start turning the light to certain spots that they never would have otherwise. And it kind of mirrors my experience and certainly my current experience. And so I just love guiding people through and with that spiritual expansion process.

John Dehlin [00:08:51] Beautiful. And, yeah, thanks for helping me make today happen, because you were really instrumental in today as well.

Beau Oyler [00:08:57] Absolutely. I love the idea of bridge builders. I mean, there's within. Within the whole bridge, there's the people that are at the beginning, and maybe they're totally orthodox and just perfectly happy where they are. And then there's people on the other side of the bridge that want nothing to do with it anymore, and that's okay, too. And I think this project that we're going to work on together really Is that center place? Right. We have so many different steps to this journey, and how do we empathize and guide and love those of us who are on that bridge?

Guest 2 [00:09:26] Love it.

The Journey of Faith Transition and Relationship Coach

John Dehlin [00:09:27] All right, Jana.

Jana Spangler [00:09:29] Hi, I'm Jana. I am a faith transition and relationship coach. I've been working with Symmetry Counseling for. It's been almost nine years now, and work with a lot of mixed faith families, mixed faith couples, and individuals who are trying to navigate their complex faith journeys. And I also am an alumnus of the Living School, which is a program that is put on and directed by Father Richard Rohr for anyone who's familiar with him. But it's basically a program in contemplative Christianity and in. In contemplation and how that informs the way that we move through the world to help bless our communities. So, so I, I pull on a lot of that tradition in the ways that I try to do bridge building.

John Dehlin [00:10:24] Beautiful. All right, well, this is a great team, so. And I'm John, John Dehlin. Thank you. Mormon Stories podcast. And I'm happy to be here. That's all I'm going to say about that. All right, well, the, the thumbnail that Julia put together for us are anti Mormons, and I put anti Mormons in quote, quotes responsible for the recent LDS violence. So we're going to be talking about some pretty heated stuff and some of the topics that, that we brainstorm talking about. What does the term anti Mormon mean? Do we identify as anti Mormons? Do we reject that term as a not very useful term? Are there healthier or unhealthier ways to talk about Mormonism? Is criticism okay? Can there be criticisms about the church, even criticisms about the truth claims or the leadership, and still that be a constructive, healthy thing? Can you criticize with love, actually, and with the desire to help? Can you be for the Mormon people, even if you have criticisms or even anger at the church, you know, what are the problems with the term anti Mormon? I think, you know, do we condone violence or not? You know, are we pro Mormon in some ways or even pro LDS Church? So there's so much. And should we all reflect on, are there genuine ways that we're contributing to tension or vitriol that could not be constructive? And I think we're all committed to that. And I know that I probably have the most to contemplate about that because I've recorded almost 2100 episodes and almost 10,000 hours of content. And sometimes I drink too much caffeine. That's my excuse. But also, can we blame killings on anyone. If so, how do we make sense of all the different factors that might cause someone to kill someone else? And then we're going to talk about just LDS apologists and is it appropriate or inappropriate for them to be blaming people like us for violence? So maybe we should just begin and acknowledge that the president or prophet of the church, Russell M. Nelson, if there wasn't enough news in the past few weeks, the president, prophet of the LDS Church, Russell Nelson, passed away just less than a week ago, I believe. And so anyone want to share any thoughts or condolences for President Nelson?

Are Anti-Mormons Responsible for the Recent LDS Violence?

President Russell Nelson

Beau Oyler [00:13:09] Absolutely.

John Dehlin [00:13:10] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [00:13:10] Grateful for him being a change maker within the church. And there are certainly times where, and some of the things he said hurt maybe me as somebody who is transitioning in my faith and on this spiritual expansion. But by and large I'm so grateful to have had a, a president of, of our church that really was looking to make changes and to move beyond tradition for tradition's sake and to look at, you know, what do the members need today in order to, you know, in order for the church to grow. I'm grateful for that. I really am.

Jana Spangler [00:13:42] Yeah. And I would like to acknowledge that just the sacrifice that all of the leaders of the church make. But you know, this, this man didn't get to retire. You know, he was, he was anxiously engaged in a good cause and until the end of his days. So I just think that's an enormous sacrifice.

John Dehlin [00:14:05] He was 101.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:14:06] Yeah. I don't know many people who make it that far. I want to acknowledge that he did, did a lot for women in the church. He made probably more changes than any other prophet did in terms of changing the temple language, the recent garment redesign, women in a more prominent place. What am I leaving women as witnesses for baptism. So some pretty significant changes on behalf of women. Are we there? No. But still I want to acknowledge that that's been a huge, had a huge impact on the women at the church.

John Dehlin [00:14:48] And I'll just say like there, there were people that wanted to count yesterday how many times Joseph Smith's name was mentioned. And I believe it was the fewest times like in the history of like a Saturday in General Conference. And my, my point isn't to say Joseph Smith's good or bad, but I think one of Russell and Nelson's legacies will be really trying to turn the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints focus more towards Christ and less towards any particular human. And how can we not all celebrate President Nelson's desire to make the Mormon Church more Christlike, from increasing the size of Jesus in the logo to discouraging the usage of the term Mormon and instead Latter Day Saints or the Church of Jesus Christ. There's a lot of criticism about that. But can we all agree that he wanted. President Nelson, wanted the church to be more Christlike, and how is that not a good thing?

Julie Deza Hanks [00:15:53] He also focused a lot on personal revelation, which I think is huge because we've had so much focus in the past on obedience and conformity. And so to have a prophet say, you know, you are entitled to this personal revelation, I think that's really significant.

Jana Spangler [00:16:09] Absolutely. Yeah. I was just going to say that same thing.

John Dehlin [00:16:12] Okay.

Jana Spangler [00:16:12] I'm very appreciative of that because I think it's still a message that is difficult to wrestle with when people start really, you know, thinking about the ways that we talk about this, you know, because personal revelation, we. It is a. I, I agree. He, I, and I love that he talked about personal revelation. And on the other side, there was still this obedience and follow the prophet. I mean, no other president of the church has been mentioned as much as this one as Nelson in general.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:16:48] They all. Everyone quotes him at least once in

Jana Spangler [00:16:50] every, in every talk. It has become a thing, you know, so maybe shift away from Joseph Smith, but there's still this very strong, you know, follow the man. So, yeah, good and bad. But I'm glad we're talking about it. I'm glad we're including the personal revelation piece.

Beau Oyler [00:17:09] And for everybody, I would imagine commenting about, you know, yeah, but the harm and. Yeah, but the, you know, his teaching of you can't trust people who, you know, aren't believers. And, you know, I totally recognize that. And there are definitely times that were very, very hard to swallow with him. So do recognize that. I, I'm grateful and attribute him to, you know, during COVID of creating a system that allowed us and enabled us and, and kind of forced us to take our religion upon ourselves. Those are the best Sundays in the Oyler family ever.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:17:43] Same with my family. I was like, PJ Church is the best church ever.

Beau Oyler [00:17:48] Is the best. And so it was like, I would say over all of that, it's like, sure, it was forced upon us, but really what it was was, hey, take this upon yourself. You're responsible for your spirituality. And yes, that was forced by Covid. That's okay, right? For us, it made. It changed our lives forever. And he led that.

President Nelson Rescinding the November 2015 LGBT Exclusion Policy

John Dehlin [00:18:08] Now I'm thinking there's one last thing I want to shout out. We all know that during President monson's tenure, the November 2015 exclusion policy was implemented. And it's generally understood because of President Monson's health at the time, President Nelson and D. Oaks were likely behind the November 2015 exclusion policy dealing with LGBT members. I guess we have to give President Nelson credit for rescinding the November 2015 policy three to four years later, because even though he had denounced it, even though he had said it was doctrine, he was willing to recognize something to the effect of it not being good or valuable. Harmful, possibly. Yeah.

Guest 3 [00:19:00] And he.

John Dehlin [00:19:01] Although those may not have been his words, I think we all probably suspect that that was part of the decision. And, like, I don't think the church has ever withdrawn something that they put out as doctrine within four years. That's a. That's a remarkable thing.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:19:18] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:19:18] To kind of, in a way, admit that we got something wrong and fix it.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:19:22] It would have been even more remarkable if there was an apology for the pain caused by the policy in the first place. But for sure, I'll take, you know, take the. Rolling it back.

John Dehlin [00:19:33] Yeah, yeah.

Beau Oyler [00:19:34] And I'll say, too, as we look forward to, you know, Elder Oaks becoming the president of the church. And by look forward, I mean chronologically. I just send all my love and vibes to those men, good vibes, because I just pray and hope so much that they can make decisions out of love and out of empathy and out of looking out for all types of members of the church, because I have a lot of concerns around the next steps for the church and the next, really four to five leaders there. So let us all pray and hope that they can be empathetic and Christlike as they make these decisions over the next few weeks.

Jana Spangler [00:20:14] Agreed. And can we look out for each other? Because I know there's huge populations who are. Are really worried about this next administration. So let's look out for each other.

John Dehlin [00:20:25] Yeah, there will likely be. One thing's for sure, there will likely be endless topics for discussion for this panel, definitely. So. All right, well, let's. Thanks for that. And again, heartfelt condolences to the anyone who loves and appreciates President Nelson, especially his family, friends, and church members. So, okay, so on September 10, 2025, as we've already mentioned, conservative YouTuber influencer Charlie Kirk was assassinated at Utah Valley University. Norm, Utah. The accused killer, possibly the admitted killer, was Tyler Robinson, who was raised LDS from the St. George area. That was September 10, 2025. And then 18 days later, in Grand Blank. I think it's pronounced Grand Blank, Michigan, a man who is understood to be Thomas Jacob Sanford attacked the church, drove his truck into the church and then set the church on fire. Shot and killed I think at least five people, wounded another eight, and then he passed away. It's been reported since that he lived in Utah for a brief time. At some point had an LDS girlfriend and of course, as we mentioned that maybe he had hatred for the church. And so we're going to be starting there and I think what we'll do first is just play a little audio clip to give to kind of get us all on the same page.

Charlie Kirk Assassination: The Descendants of the LDS Church

The investigation into the deadly Church shooting in Michigan

Guest [00:22:04] It has been two days since a mass shooting and arson attack at a Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in a small Michigan community. Cole Higgins has the latest details on the investigation and the attacker who died in a shootout with officers.

Guest 4 [00:22:18] The investigation into the deadly attack that killed four people and left eight others injured at a Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Grand Blank Township, Michigan continues. I mean the church is basically gone and I just, you really cannot imagine. It's just burnt down to the bricks and the, you know, unimaginable terror that went on in that place of worship during a church service, it's hard to take in. As the community grieves, investigators are combing through the wreckage of the church and searching for a possible motive. The 40 year old gunman and Iraq war veteran Thomas Jacobson Sanford had openly declared his hatred for the LDS church and its followers.

Guest 2 [00:23:02] He did make the statement like that Mormons are the Antichrist, which is a shocking statement.

Guest 4 [00:23:07] Chris Johns is a city council candidate in Burton, Michigan. He says he met Sanford on the campaign trail about a week before the attack.

John Dehlin [00:23:14] He had very strong opinions.

Guest [00:23:16] Nothing that was related to violence that would indicate violence.

Guest 2 [00:23:19] Just somebody who had a very, very

Guest [00:23:21] strong held belief that really he had

Guest 2 [00:23:23] maybe a philosophical animist but not necessarily a desire to do what he did.

Guest 4 [00:23:27] He definitely talked about groups of people

Guest 2 [00:23:30] in ways that weren't acceptable.

Guest 4 [00:23:33] Kara Pattison was a friend of Sanford. If you asked me out of everybody I know to pick 10 people you think might do something a little like this, I wouldn't not pick him. And I hate saying that. Cole Higgins Crim2 News.

Mormons speak out about the Utah shooting

John Dehlin [00:23:53] Any quick, anyone want to share kind of what their reactions were when they

Julie Deza Hanks [00:23:59] heard about this or just horrific, horrific, horrific, that's all it, it's really unbelievable. And, and to do it, you know, intentionally when church is going on and babies are there and children are there and older people, I mean it's just, it's, yeah, it's one of the worst things I can imagine. And I'm just so sad for all of the people who were impacted by that. And it feels personal, you know, it's like, that's my people. Like, you're.

Jana Spangler [00:24:31] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, same. Yeah, same. Just very, very sad. Very. I mean, I can't even imagine the trauma of living through something like that and trying to keep your whole family is there, trying to keep everybody safe. It's just. Just horrific.

Guest 2 [00:24:51] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [00:24:52] It's so easy to put myself on that stand in that congregation, that ward with my people. Right. That I love and serve and serve with and I'm served by. And then to watch something like this happens. Inexcusable.

John Dehlin [00:25:04] Yeah, yeah. And of course. And people. I. I had some people reach out, like, John, why haven't you condemned the violence? I'm like, well, wow. I like his. Like, yes, I contemn all violence. All violence is horrific. And this is about as horrific as you could imagine. But of course, we condemn all the violence. I almost. It's almost weird that that has to be said.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:25:28] Yeah. It doesn't go without saying. I mean, this is a huge tragedy and. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I haven't said much about it, just because it's. I've just been processing. Right. Like, just the secondary trauma of knowing that this has happened to. In our community across, you know, the Mormon spectrum.

John Dehlin [00:25:53] Yeah. There was a. As I was thinking about, there's always kind of this fear I have of, like, grandstanding or like, trying to commandeer a moment. And maybe in earlier years, I would have felt some obligation that I've got to speak up. And. But more and more, I'm like, oh, maybe that's part of the problem is we're all racing to thinking that our opinions are super important, and we've all got a race to say something, even when we don't have all the facts. So I. I just. I'll just admit I'm not racing to give my opinion or even to cover stories, especially when you don't have all the information. Like when the. When the. The Charlie Kirk thing happened, I could have done a story that day, but. But I just. I wanted to wait and just see what. Is it even a Mormon story.

Guest [00:26:43] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:26:44] You know what I mean? And it wasn't clear.

Guest 2 [00:26:46] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [00:26:46] And I feel like across the whole spectrum of influencers and creators, people do kind of clamor to be the first one to say something, find something, whatever, and. And to turn. I know. It's almost like a necessary evil where we're turning this into content, like context,

Julie Deza Hanks [00:27:02] in a way, it's a form of exploitation, I think. I mean, and it needs to be covered. So I understand that, but I think the intent of the individual who's covering it really matters in these situations.

Beau Oyler [00:27:16] Absolutely.

Jana Spangler [00:27:17] And I think, I think it's important for us to think about how we cover it, when we cover it. Right. And the thing that's been alarming to me in both of these incidents is how quickly people, how quick people are to start to blame groups of people for this. You know, before the, Before Tyler Robinson was caught, they were. The left wing was already being, you know, being blamed. And when people started to get more information, then people were quick to blame it on the right wing because, you know.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:27:52] Right, right.

Jana Spangler [00:27:53] There's some connections there. And I think everyone is just trying to distance themselves, themselves as quickly as possible and scapegoat and find someone to blame because we, if we can blame someone, maybe we can do something about it.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:28:07] Right.

Jana Spangler [00:28:07] And I think that's just the way the human brain works. But I think we have to be really, really careful to just remain humble and say, let's let the investigation play out and let's. Let's see what. What is there. Finding cause is a good thing, but trying to find one cause, one group, one place to blame is. Is never helpful.

John Dehlin [00:28:26] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [00:28:27] And to watch all the infighting as well within Mormonism has been kind of heartbreaking for me because it's like this group calling that group anti Mormon and this group calling that group anti Mormon, and people from the outside calling antimor people on the inside anti Mormons. Like, what does that even mean? Yeah, what does that even mean? And how, are, how, you know, I see John or Alyssa or other people being blamed, like, this is your fault. You're inciting this. Like, couldn't be farther from the truth. And so I think that's really why we're focusing on that today is like, in the aftermath. Let's look at our own community and how we're handling this and how we're speaking of it.

John Dehlin [00:29:00] And of course, you mean Alyssa Grenfell.

Beau Oyler [00:29:02] Of course.

Jeremy Runnels' statement on the Michigan Stake Center Attack

John Dehlin [00:29:03] And for those who don't know, as I was thinking about whether I was going to make a statement at all, I came across Jeremy Runnels statement. He is, for those of you who follow Mormon stories, the author of the CES letter. And I thought Jeremy made a great statement. And I, I won't read it all, but Jeremy Runnels writes, it's no secret that I no longer identify as LDs or believe in the truth claims of the faith. But in a strange and paradoxical way. Paradoxical way, I still identify with the people. I live in Utah. I have believing family members and friends, and I've been around members my entire life. They're my tribe. And if the world was insane and united against them to harm them, I'd absolutely be on the front lines with the tribe to defend them. The attack yesterday felt very personal. I'm very sad for the folks in the Michigan Stake center and their families. I'm very sad for members in general during this difficult time with the loss of President Nelson and this horrible event that hit home. Yes, we can disagree and we can debate in the arena of ideas and words about the Book of Abraham and Book of Mormon anachronisms and this and that and that and this. But at the end of the day, these folks are my family and friends. They're my home. They're people that I trust my life, family and property with. They're my tribe. And I'm just so sad and devastated with them today. And I'm not sure I could have done a better job.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:30:27] Yeah, I thought it was amazing.

John Dehlin [00:30:30] Yeah. So I think. Can we all just sort of say us too? For sure. Yeah. Okay. So thanks, Jeremy. We love you if you happen to catch this episode. So. All right. So I thought maybe we would begin with the end in mind. And just coincidentally, I've been interviewing never Mormon historian John Turner, who is the author of a recent biography on Joseph Smith, which is an excellent biography, I think I've done 16 episodes with John Turner. And incidentally, just in the past couple weeks, we've been covering anti Mormonism. We've been covering Zion's camp, the horrific persecutions against the Saints in both Kirtland, Ohio and, you know, Missouri. And, you know, it's horrific. I. It just. I didn't realize that that long before even Governor Boggs's extermination order which was issued, the governor of Missouri issued an extermination order against Mormons. I think that does qualify as anti Mormon. Long before then, they were burning down the houses of. Of Mormons that settled in Zion as just part of this frontier justice kind of thing. And so we've been talking about that violence, but not just that. The, the, the hurlbut affidavits and Edie Howe and Mormonism unveiled like the church was experiencing. People trying to take it down, to criticize it from the very beginning. So Turner, John Turner is marinating in all of this stuff. And so I just, I interviewed him this week. This episode hasn't been released yet, but I just asked him if he wanted to comment on, on these attacks because honestly, I was wondering whether I should cancel my series with John Turner. I've been so overwhelmed with sadness and frustration and fear around all of this environment that I've, I've been what, do I cancel Mormon stories? Do I retire? Do I move to another country? Do I shut down? What do, do I pivot? Because it's, it's got me spooked out that much. And I think I'm not the only creator that's feeling that way. So I just put it to John Turner and I thought I'd just share what John said and this is kind of giving the answer at the beginning. We're still going to go into more details, but I think this is worth hearing his perspective and he's never been Mormon.

Anti-Mormon Historian John Turner on the Violence

Guest [00:33:00] I guess one other thing I would say is I, and I try to sell my students on this in the classroom that to critically examine a tradition or a movement or a thinker is not hateful. It can be done in a hateful way, but in a way it's also a mark of respect. And you know, I teach classes in which we, we analyze Judaism, Christianity and Islam alongside each other. And it would be disrespectful, for instance, not to take the same approach to the Quran as one might take to the Bible. I think the critical examination of traditions, it can be done respectfully and in a way it is a measure of respect to say, look, I take this seriously enough to take a scholarly look at it.

John Dehlin [00:34:13] He also mentions that whenever there's a killer from his point of view, the number one thing responsible for any murder is the killer themselves.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:34:28] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:34:29] Even if they're influenced or say they're influenced by ideology, you got to look at the mental health aspects. You got to look at this, the context. You got to look at history and trauma and accessibility to weapons and what's going on in their personal lives that may make them feel desperate. Like, I hope that, let's just say, let's put it this way, I hope that if a murder was ever conducted and the murderer said I was influenced by Mormon apologists, for example, or the Mormon Church, the teachings of Joseph Smith or the modern day prophet, I hope, I would say, no, we're not going to pin it. We're not going to jump to any conclusions about what to pin this on. I hope that we would all have that reserve. Any, any, anything I want to say in addition about that specifically Yeah, I

Jana Spangler [00:35:24] mean, I would say that it's really, really complicated. Like you said there. I agree. There's never just one thing. There's never just one thing that goes into this. And also, I mean, I've. I've been invited into some self reflection because I have definitely been critical myself. I critique groups and, you know, I critique the parts of my own religion that are painful. And I don't think we can all just say I have nothing to do with it either. You know, you can't pin. I mean, look at any social ill. Am I personally responsible for homelessness? No, I am not. Do I have some sort of responsibility to look at social ills and problems in. Yes, I do. Do I have some responsibility in the way that I talk about things? Yes, I do. So I think it's a. Both. And I. I don't think we can fully just wash our hands of it and say, it's not me. But I think we also can't take all of the responsibility like this one group is responsible, but we can look at how we feed into it.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:36:33] Yeah, yeah, I agree. Well said.

John Dehlin [00:36:35] Yeah, yeah. And I think hopefully we talk about bridge building. Part of that is I think the theme needs to be holding opposing tensions. I think wisdom always comes in being able to hold sometimes even opposing truths. And so I hope we do a lot of both ands, you know, today and as we talk about lots of different issues within Mormonism, because, yes, words matter, rhetoric matters, and I think we should be very, very careful before we ever pin a murder on any one specific thing, especially without all the information.

Jana Spangler [00:37:19] Agreed. Yeah, yeah. And I think self reflection needs to be a big part of all of it.

Guest 3 [00:37:23] Yeah.

John Dehlin [00:37:24] And we hope to do some of that today. Okay, so let's go ahead and go. You know, it's been. We're gonna play some clips in a bit where people literally say it's. It's people like ex Mormon content creators who caused the Michigan murders. Like, we're gonna play that soon. But before we just jump to that, we're gonna actually maybe share a little bit of the background of what we actually know. And again, even as we play that some of these clips or discuss it, we're not making any claims about who's responsible for these murders. We're just providing some factual context so that, you know, we can all understand more about the factual context. Does that make sense? It seems like a weird disclaimer, but I have to say it because we're about to show American flags. Like, you know, we're about to show that this guy at least had a Trump sign in his yard at one point or another. And I just want to say at the outset, we are not saying that Trump or Republicans or conservatives or any of that is to blame for this either. But we do want to provide facts of what we do know. And is that okay? Does that make sense? Okay. All right. And. And by the way, if we were implicated, I hope we would show those facts too. Right. But we are addressing the allegations that some have made. So let's go ahead and play the first clip. Kind of exploding.

Michigan Murderer Was a Mormon, According to Witnesses

Guest [00:38:54] The church had started at 10 o'. Clock. We had our opening congregational hymn. We were getting ready to take the sacrament and we heard a large. Just a loud bang. And then we saw that the front wall. So the front part of the chapel, the wall was cracked. And then. So we first figured somebody accidentally had done something. So we started rushing out to go help. And then as soon as I saw

Guest 2 [00:39:26] the American flags on the truck and

Guest [00:39:29] that it was on purpose and somebody

Guest 2 [00:39:31] yelled that it was on purpose, I

Guest [00:39:33] started trying to get people out of the.

Guest 2 [00:39:35] Out of the area and away to disperse away.

John Dehlin [00:39:40] Okay, so that's the first clip. That's someone obviously who is in attendance reporting about what they saw really quickly. We just got a comment in. Please acknowledge. I don't even totally am not able to read this, but thank you, Emily, Christina, for the comment. I think she's asking us at least to acknowledge the victims. Hopefully we've tried to do that. Anyway, thank you, Emily, for the support. That. That was one of the people who was obviously in attendance in the ward when it happened. Kind of an eyewitness. We thought we'd share some of the photos that looks to be here. A photo of the truck. It's a gray. It's a silver pickup truck. There are two American flags that are flying from the back. You can see two different angles of Thomas Jacob Sanford's truck. A little bit of the background on Thomas Jacob Sanford. He was 40 years old. He served in the Marines from 2004 to 2008. I think it goes without saying that we are in no way saying that military service people who wanted to jump to conclusions could just as easily have said this was caused by military service. What a horrific and offensive conclusion to make. We would never make that, and we are not making that now. Sorry, that's my dad calling. He's 91. Yeah, hi, dad. But he did serve in the Marines from 2004 to 2008. Iraq War veteran, deployed during 2007 and 2008. And just some comments from CBS News White House spokesperson Caroline Levitt said on Fox Monday morning that FBI Director Keshe Patel told her Sanford told her that Sanford, quote, hated people of the Mormon faith, close quote. And then Chris Johns, who is a candidate for the Burton City Council, said Monday that he had spoken to, quote, a guy, former Marine, who went to Iraq and somehow got to Utah, close quote. After 20 minutes of pleasantries, the conversation took a turn from the Second Amendment to anti Mormon sentiments. Quote, it kept going to, quote, they're trying to put people above Jesus and they're not Christians. John said he did make the statement that Mormons are the Antichrist. And let's just, let's take a second now to talk about the term anti Mormon. I don't want to get us derailed, but I think that's one of the most important things we can discuss. What, what would you all like to say as an opening to just that term, anti Mormon? Have any of you ever been called anti Mormons? And do you have strong feelings about the term?

Anti-Mormon: A Symptomy

Julie Deza Hanks [00:42:48] Yeah, I do. I think it means you are against the Mormon faith or the Mormon people.

Jana Spangler [00:42:56] Right.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:42:57] And I've been called that. And it makes no sense to me because I am for the more like I. All of my work has been to help the Mormon people be healthier, particularly women in their relationships and their faith journeys. Right. It's like, all about supporting the Mormon people. So I'm like, how could I be against the people that I'm passionate about supporting? It makes zero sense. But I think people equate anti Mormon with any type of criticism. And that's where there's the confusion. Right. Anybody who criticizes the church gets labeled as anti Mormon. But that is criticism is not anti Mormonism.

Jana Spangler [00:43:39] Amen. Yeah, I mean, I think growing up in the 70s and 80s, like, I grew up with that term and it applied to anyone who was bringing any of the difficult issues up. And, and it was, you know, don't read any of that stuff. It's anti Mormon. Right. Like, and, and it was, it was an evil force that was going to take over my soul if I, if I looked at it. Right. But I, I've experienced that as well in places where I've brought up difficulties. I think it has morphed into that for a lot of people. If you bring up any, any problem

Julie Deza Hanks [00:44:20] at all, anything uncomfortable, anything, you're against that you're against us. No, no. What. When I was growing up, what was considered anti Mormon is now published in the Gospel Topics essay.

Jana Spangler [00:44:32] Exactly.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:44:32] So it was actually Mormonism.

Beau Oyler [00:44:35] That's what I always say. I'm like, no, no. Anti Mormon is actually Mormon. Mormon from a historical standpoint.

Guest 2 [00:44:42] Right.

Beau Oyler [00:44:42] Like, I remember reading my first anti Mormon pamphlets. I grew up in a town in Carmel, California. I was like some of the only LDS members. And so I remember people giving me anti Mormon pamphlets, reading them. Oh my gosh, this is so anti Mormon. This is so anti. Well, it turns out that anti Mormon is Mormon Mormon. It's just Mormon history.

John Dehlin [00:44:59] So like, yeah, 10, 15, 20 years ago, if you claim that Joseph Smith translated the Book of Mormon with a rock and a hat, yeah, you would be called anti Mormon. If you claim that Joseph Smith had 30 wives and married a 14 year old or whatever, you'd be called anti Mormon. In fact, many people who have stumbled on the church's gospel topics essays, when they're shown the gospel topics essays, they don't believe that they've been authored by and approved by the church. Active, believing, orthodox, Faithful Mormons in 2025 will refer to to today's current gospel topics essays as Anti Mormon. Anti Mormon. Am I wrong?

Beau Oyler [00:45:36] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:45:37] There are people who won't read them because it's like, no, they're. It's like, no, they're on churchofjesuschrist.org like, how can that be? It's published by the church.

John Dehlin [00:45:47] So it's a super problematic term just because, like, what does it mean? And it's been so misused and watered down. It basically means, yeah, someone who's saying something about the church that I don't like or information about the church that makes me feel uncomfortable and being repetitive. But that's like over the past 100 years. And like, who are the biggest anti Mormons in history? Like, Fawn Brody. Like, she is David O. McKay's niece. She, her biography's been vindicated. No man knows my history. She would be listed in the hall of fame top 10 anti Mormons when really she was just trying to create the most accurate biography that she could. Yes, Sandra and Gerald Tanner have been vindicated. Their scholarship is almost flawless. Like, as close to flawless as any prolific scholar I think out there. And that's. We've had Sandra on a million times. She's a lovely, funny, witty person, but she would be number two top anti Mormon of all time. Wait, what? What are you pointing at?

Julie Deza Hanks [00:46:47] Well, I, I've had orthodox Mormons say, well, well, she. Julie's a, an associate of John Dehlin. Like, like that's supposed to mean, you know, well, that. So you must be against the church. I'm like, john's not an anti Mormon.

Beau Oyler [00:47:02] Guilty by association.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:47:04] Yeah, yeah. You're one of. You're one of the top ones, according to a lot of people.

Beau Oyler [00:47:09] And while all three of you are far more public than I am, you've all been called anti Mormon. I've called anti Mormon. Right. Not necessarily you, but like, certainly, like, I have called people anti Mormon. Why? Because they're going against what the current prophet says today. They're making things uncomfortable. They're raising questions. They're making me think they are not helpful.

Guest 3 [00:47:33] Right.

Beau Oyler [00:47:33] It's like Elder Packer said, like, not all truth is helpful. Well, if you are speaking that truth that is not helpful to build the kingdom of God, then you're anti Mormon in the same way that anybody can throw Antichrist out there.

Protestants on Faith

Guest [00:47:46] Right.

Beau Oyler [00:47:46] Oh, they're the Antichrist.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:47:47] Called that too. Right.

Jana Spangler [00:47:49] Well, when. When as an organization, we hold faith very synonymous with belief.

Beau Oyler [00:47:56] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [00:47:57] Which I think they're very different things.

John Dehlin [00:47:59] What's the difference?

Jana Spangler [00:48:01] Well, faith is a much broader term. You know, I think that faith can connote some beliefs, but I think faith is more of a trust. It's more of an act of like, if I have faith in you, it's not that I'm telling you I believe you and everything you say, it's that I have a trust in you and I have a trust in something good. I mean, I think at the. At the core of it, that's what it is. It's a leap of not knowing. It's being willing to not be certain about things. You know, to me, that's faith. I believe it not against my own experience and against science and against everything else. A lot of people hold that as like a. A brand. I have. My faith is strong. Nothing can shake me, which means I have to ignore a whole lot of reality. I don't think that's really a robust faith. Faith is. I can't know this, but I'm moving forward. I'm moving forward because I think something good is in this. That when you have it synonymous with belief, anything that challenges the belief can get thrown in that anti Mormon bucket. And so I get told that a lot, destroying people's faith when I feel like what I'm doing is trying to strengthen people's faith. If we're willing to have a faith that can withstand reality and reality testing and critical thinking, that is a robust faith.

John Turner on Being called an Anti-Mormon

John Dehlin [00:49:26] And if it's all right, I'll just address my thoughts on this term generally and as applied to me, I think, in theory, I think we could talk about whether there are people that could be fairly categorized as anti Mormon. We could talk about whether that term even does have some place in the world as a label for people. But I started Mormon stories podcast in 2005 as someone, first of all, even when I started questioning my faith in the church in 2000, I just wanted the church to be more open and honest about its faith. I wanted to support people who. Who doubted and questioned. I wanted to have less divorces within Mormonism because of faith crisis. Eventually, I learned about the LGBT depression and suicide crisis. I wanted to help LGBT people. But anyone who knows when I started Mormon Stories Podcast, my intent was to help keep people in the church. And that was true for at least the first five years of Mormon Stories. So certainly I couldn't have been called anti Mormon then. I was. But I was for honest, open discussion of history, for LGBT support, for women, for feminism, for people of color, against racism, like. But I don't think today the church would have any problem with any of that. So anyway, it wasn't until the church excommunicated me, really, that that label really started to get out there. I mean, even before then, I did talk about the second anointing, and I think that made some people upset. But even that was after I'd been called in for disciplinary counsel. So. But yeah, just giving voice to people like Grant Palmer and Sandra Tanner and others, I think is where I started getting that label applied to me. But forever, it's been my goal. First of all, I love the Mormon. Here's why I'm not anti Mormon. Number one. I love the Mormon people with all my heart. And everything I feel like I've done over the past 20 years has been to try and have more healing and growth and honesty and integrity. And with the Mormon people, less divorces, more joy, happiness, healing, healthier families. So I love the Mormon people. I'm actually super grateful to the LDS Church for my upbringing. And I've always loved the LDS Church in spite of all its weaknesses and problems. I feel like the church was an overall good influence in my life. So I love the church. And even when I've criticized the church, like John Turner said, it's been with the desire to help the church do less harm and to be a healthier place for people. And if you ask me today, I've had thousands of people come to me and say, john, I'm struggling my faith. I'm trying to decide if I should leave the church. I don't think you'll find in 20 years anytime where I've ever told somebody they should leave the church. In fact, I think I could come up with hundreds, if not thousands of people who would say, well, when they asked me whether they should leave the church, I probably said to them, if you can stay in a healthy way, you should stay. And to this day, in 2025, I believe, and I get a lot of flack from ex Mormons for saying this, I believe it's my personal opinion that the Mormon Church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, does more good in the world than harm. And I only want to see it get healthier. I don't want to see it destroyed. And I know that it also hurts some people in very significant ways. So I don't say that glibly, but that is my position in 2025. I want a healthy Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, not a dead or deceased Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. And so I don't know if that makes me anti Mormon. I don't know. I don't understand.

Julie Deza Hanks [00:53:14] I think people apply that label when you challenge their certainty. And I think we all challenge the certainty of certain beliefs. And so. But I think that's an inaccurate use. I think it. If your intention is to destroy your anti Mormon, and that's. I think that's it, you want to destroy it, then, yeah.

John Dehlin [00:53:37] And even then, I don't want to take people's faith away. When I talk about truth claims or the history, like you, Jenna, I want people to have their worldview based on reality, on facts, on evidence. But I have. When I talk about truth claims or history, I just want informed consent. I want people to not be fooled into their belief. But. But have it be based in evidence.

Beau Oyler [00:54:00] I mean, for decades, when I was giving, you know, 20 hours a week in service to the church, mission leader, elders quorum presidencies, Bishop, Bishop Briggs, like all of that, there was always this little cloud back here of like, there's stuff, I don't know, there's stuff going on or that's gone on that I'm like, I'm uncomfortable with, but I'm not going to look at it. And then to get to the place in life and in my spiritual journey where I wanted to look at it, I just wanted to see things clearly. And I stayed in the church for years, a decade, right? And then incrementally, increasingly, I started seeing things more and more and more and more clearly as they really are. And it Wasn't the anti Mormons who helped me do that. It was the Mormon Mormons. It was looking inward. It was my own spirit of being able to look at things, just want to see it clearly versus having that kind of shield of protection over me, pun intended.

John Dehlin [00:54:55] Yeah, yeah. And the, the history is the history and the science is science. And the harm that the church has caused people is the harm that the church has caused people. And it's not anyone's fault if somebody loses their faith or changes their faith perspective when they learn the factual history. If you could point the church, you could blame the church and say the church is anti Mormon. If you could say Joseph Smith is anti Mormon because he was a polygamist and that's caused people leave the church. Or you could say the Book of Mormon's anti Mormon because it's got anachronisms and that causes people to lose their faith. You can't blame the messenger. Talking about anachronisms or DNA or historicity or polygamy or masonry or whatever. Those facts are facts. And you have to blame Joseph Smith or the church if you're going to blame people for causing anyone to leave. And the last thing I'll say is, I polled my audience. What percentage of them lost their faith because of Mormon stories? Over 90% of my audience, if I'm remembering right, has said they lost their faith before they found Mormon stories. And what Mormon stories helped them do is process their loss of faith and sometimes even stay in the church. And Julie, you had that conversation with your church leaders, right?

Julie Deza Hanks [00:56:15] Yeah. In fact, I don't have a percentage, but my guess is 80 to 90% of the people who have followed my work online stay in the church, at least for some. Like, some say I stayed longer than I would have, you know, because I have no desire to take people out of the church. Zero.

John Dehlin [00:56:35] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Me either. Me either.

Jana Spangler [00:56:38] I think it's. It's kind of all complicated a little bit. Right. Because we all have our bias. We all have our bias about the history. You know, what some people claim as fact. Other people would say, well, I don't know if that's a fact. You know, it's kind of get squishy.

Janet on Being Biased About the Mormons

Beau Oyler [00:56:56] Yeah. Watch the sources. Right.

Jana Spangler [00:56:58] For sure. And there. And there are very few sources that are not fairly biased when it comes to matters of faith and religion and politics and everything else we get. It gets really hard. And this is why it's so important to examine our own biases. Like catch me on a good day and I can reach my higher self and give everybody the, the, I don't know, the dignity that they deserve as a human trying to understand all of these things to their best ability. And then catch me on a day when I've just talked to three clients that have all been enormously harmed and you might hear a rant from me of all of the harm that can be there. And so I don't know in those moments when my bias and my hurt is, it's, it comes from hurt comes through. I could see how someone could say she sounds pretty anti Mormon. You know, I don't know. I mean, I think there's also, it's not, we're not just, I don't think we can pretend that this is like a hard science, that we're just giving the facts for sure, you know, So I, I don't know, I don't, I don't think I hit that perfectly all the time. I don't know that any of us can. But I know when I'm in my hurt, I don't see it as well. And I really want to place blank.

Beau Oyler [00:58:11] Yeah, I think in my BO Bible I've got the second entrance, the second entry, it's a quote from F. Scott Fitzgerald. It says the test of a first rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function. And so like you, you know, one day you're going to say something that does seem like it's anti Mormon. The other day it's going to be apologist or it's going to be pro Mormon. And that's our ability to be able to say for me personally, Beau Euler, there are ways that the church and certainly church teachings damaged me, full stop, damaged me. And I am and have been in therapy since I was a very young age because of those things and still working on those things. And those are the times where I get so feisty. And so I don't say angry, but angry for the. What was taught to me and how it was taught to me. And at the same time it blessed my life so much. And I don't think that that's a rarity. I think every one of us experiences that. Right. Both of these truths at the same time. And that's what we're going to see in this group as we, as we produce these different topics, the different episodes. And some people are going to be really uncomfortable with us because they're going to be like, what are you doing? Like praising the church. After all the harm that they've done to me 100%. I get it. At the same time, I still feel as a Mormon that it is up to us to be able to make change from the inside, the outside, and everywhere in between the duality.

John Dehlin [00:59:49] Yeah, we talk about hands. The church can do a lot of good and it can do serious harm. And Janet, to your point, have I always given the fairest explanations or context of truth claims or history or the harm the church has done? Absolutely not. So in that sense, I do need to do more reflection. Have I always been fair? Have I always been generous? Have I given biased or hurt or inflamed messages? And the answer is yes. Sometimes I've even taken those episodes down and there's kind of this little category of like, Caffeinated John episodes that I took off the Internet. We re recorded the episodes. But even then, like, I still have work to do. So like from some of these Mormon apologists, one of their main criticisms is these people. Me, Alyssa Grenfell, Nemo, rfm, Bill Real, whoever. They're making church members look bad in dishonest or inaccurate ways. And that's a valid critique that I need to spend more time analyzing. So I appreciate that point, Jenna.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:01:06] Yeah, And I don't think that makes you anti Mormon because you have intense feelings about things or haven't been fair. Right. That's different than wishing the destruction of a church or a people. Being angry is just being human. And so I think, like, there's room for that without being against the church 100%.

Jana Spangler [01:01:33] And I will defend any of that list of people you just, you just said for anger that they bring to the conversation. Because it's is one thing to critique something we're not part of or never have been part of. It's another thing to critique something that you have personal experience with. It is not the same thing. And I think it is important for us to speak to the pain that we see and to be angry about it. That's human. And both. And I would never critique the way another person is experiencing that. I prefer to critique institutions, ideas, you know, things bring to light, things that are hidden, that aren't obvious. I think that is important work to do and that's important work that nothing gets better without that. No one likes the critics, but we need them.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:02:37] And I've said this before, but movie critics don't hate movies. They love movies. They love movies more than anyone else loves movies. You know, exactly like they critique. It comes from love and wanting to improve, not from wanting destruction Absolutely.

Jana Spangler [01:02:54] I mean, this. This country doesn't move forward without Martin Luther King Jr. Critiquing the system.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:03:00] We.

Jana Spangler [01:03:00] And evil hides in systems. It just does. It's less obvious, as when it's part of a system, it's just in the. In the. The water of what we're swimming in. And

Julie Deza Hanks [01:03:14] that.

Jana Spangler [01:03:14] That deserves critique.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:03:16] That.

Jana Spangler [01:03:16] That needs to be critiqued. That does not make something anti. Whatever. I. I think that there probably is a category of anti Mormon that thinks that it needs to be destroyed, that it shouldn't exist. You know, it should cease to exist. Maybe I'd. Maybe I'd call that anti Mormon, but this middle space of people just wanting to bring light and healing and truth, I. I don't see that as anti Mormon.

Don't Jump to the Blame

John Dehlin [01:03:45] All right, well, this is beautiful. There's so much more I want to say, but let's keep. Let's keep advancing on some of the content. Here is another member of the Grand Blank congregation who was an eyewitness, and I love the sentiment that. That he shares in this clip.

Guest [01:04:05] One who did not experience what you

Guest 2 [01:04:08] experienced yesterday is gonna have some opinion. What do you say to them, knowing they didn't.

Guest [01:04:18] Again, they didn't process.

Guest 2 [01:04:20] They didn't experience what you experienced yesterday.

Guest [01:04:25] Yeah, there's. There's so many people that are so quick to judge, so. So ready to point the finger at who. Who did it, why they did it, some political reason, some. Just something. Everybody's making stuff up. We can't be making stuff up. We can't be pointing the finger. We can't. We can't make this political. We can't. We can't let this divide us. Everybody needs to be reporting the truth and all of the truth, not just part of it. We need to come together as a country. We're so divided. We're so. Everybody's so full of hate. I don't like going on Facebook. I don't like social media, and I avoid it because you post something. And there's always somebody that's willing to. They're the keyboard warriors that have to think their opinion is fact, and we can't. We can't be doing that. The country needs to come together right now.

John Dehlin [01:05:29] What do you think? Why'd y' all like that clip? Anyone want to share why you wanted that clip in today?

Beau Oyler [01:05:34] Yeah, I think the peacemaking. Right. Like, we're at a place right now where. Where, you know, especially you, John, and other other content creators, LDs or Mormonism, content creators are being called Antichrist. And I think that clip is so important, because the pullback is, hey, we just need to come together right now. We're being divided in every way possible.

John Dehlin [01:05:55] That guy was in the chapel.

Guest 2 [01:05:56] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:05:56] When the murders were happening.

Beau Oyler [01:05:58] Exactly.

John Dehlin [01:05:58] Right.

Beau Oyler [01:05:59] Yes.

John Dehlin [01:05:59] If anybody had a right to be angry or condemnatory, totally. It's that guy, Right?

Beau Oyler [01:06:05] Yeah, for sure.

John Dehlin [01:06:07] That is a beautiful. I mean, that's the best of Mormonism. Right? That type of response.

Beau Oyler [01:06:11] Yeah. And what we're going to cover a little bit later too, of like, what if the board members done for the family of the shooter. Right. To raise hundreds of thousands of dollars to support this person and help this now widow and child to be able to survive. I mean, that's what Mormons do. And one of the news reporters that I was watching on there, they made a comment of like, I don't know much about Mormons, but I do know this is the kind of thing that they do. Exactly. Right.

Guest 4 [01:06:38] Yep.

Jana Spangler [01:06:38] This is the best of Christianity actually being peacemakers.

Beau Oyler [01:06:42] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [01:06:43] You know, it's. It's embracing people, our enemies and everyone else and just saying, we can set this aside. We're both humans.

Beau Oyler [01:06:51] Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Jana Spangler [01:06:52] And. And I just loved that he said, don't jump to the blame. Don't jump to blaming someone for this or something or some group.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:07:01] I think it's a sense of powerlessness that makes us do that. Right. If we can identify the problem, then we can do something about it, but

Jana Spangler [01:07:11] root it out and we.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:07:12] Yeah, but it. So I think it's just a human tendency to, to want to control and prevent when. And it's hard to know, like we're not going to be able to always prevent it.

Anti-Mormon Criticism

John Dehlin [01:07:25] I'm going to save, as a teaser, a reaction that I want to share now because when I think about the ward radio cardinals and Quakers of the world, or the Jacob Hansen of the world, or this Dr. Richard Wadsworth that we're about to put out there. There's this quote that I learned from Eckhart Tolle once in his book A New Earth, he said, that which we fight, we strengthen. When I've been trying to do my best, empathy and my most bridge building and Christlike influence. There's a degree to which I think I and others may have helped create Jacob Hansen and Cardon Ellis and Kwaku and this Richard Wadsworth, because I think, and again, I want to save this discussion for a little bit later, but I think if I had to give my best faith interpretation of Mormon apologists, they're just trying to defend something they love. They see Something they love, their beliefs, their community. They see that as being under attack and they're seeing people that they love lose faith in and or leave the church and the tradition that they love. And they probably say, we're tired of being beaten up on the Internet and we're going to raise our voices to try and defend and stick up for and maybe even hurt the people that are hurting others that we love. And I guess I'm giving a little bit of the ending away. But as I've tried to do some introspection, I think I've done my part to create the problem that maybe we all are wanting to address today. And so I have to do some reflection about that. And I think that's the spirit with which we've started this bridge building group. We can pass on that. Or if you all want to respond to that, you're welcome to.

Beau Oyler [01:09:22] Amen.

John Dehlin [01:09:23] Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. No one's disagreeing with me, which is good.

Jana Spangler [01:09:30] I will say this.

Beau Oyler [01:09:32] I would imagine that there's some part of the audience today who is thinking like, what does this have to do with Charlie Kirk or Michigan Chapel or sorry, why, why, why is this anti Mormon? I think part of it may be because they're not following feeds or influencers, creators who are pointing the blame.

Guest 2 [01:09:51] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [01:09:52] And that's okay. That's totally okay. But if you look on Reddit, if you look on YouTube, if you look at the Jacob Hansen's and the worst radios of the world as well as outside into evangelical Christianity, and we'll get into this, they're pointing the blame very quickly. And part of that is because Trump's response so immediately was, you know, this was an attack on Christianity to then, and then Christianity. Evangelical Christianity immediately turns and is like they're not Christians. And so it just brought that same conversation back up. And that's why we're addressing, using these current events as a platform to talk about anti Mormonism.

Dr. Richard Wadsworth Denies Mischaracterization of the Mormon

John Dehlin [01:10:26] Yeah, well, to make sure people understand the context, let's jump right in if that's okay. And you know, we try to never dox people, but in this case, Dr. Richard Wadsworth, he's got his own Tick Tock account under his name, including the fact that he's a psychiatrist or medical doctor. That's the profile that he's using on Tick Tock. So there's really no other way to, to kind of talk about it. This is his profile, Dr. Richard Wadsworth. And let's just jump to the clip that, you know, helped bring us here today this morning.

Guest 2 [01:11:05] Just a little bit ago, members of, of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints gathered together, got the, got their children dressed, went to church, and during the meeting someone drove their vehicle into the side of the building, came out with a weapon, unaliving a number of people, and then set fire to the building. I want to take a minute to mourn with those families. What a horribly difficult, traumatic thing. Our only consolation is the gospel of Jesus Christ, our knowledge of being with the Savior in the afterlife as members of the church. This is not the first time this sort of thing has happened. It will not be the last time. With what is happening on social media, with just horrific, continual, perpetual mischaracterizations, misrepresentations by anti Mormons who are purposely trying to demonstrate the church to be misrepresented and presented in terrible ways. There are people making content and this content has millions and millions and millions of views that absolutely demonizes and misrepresents what the church teaches, what it's about, mischaracterizing the members and the doctrines. And it is getting worse and it is picking up. And based on the videos that I've seen by these anti Mormons, the way that they're portraying our beliefs and our practices, I am not in the least bit surprised of anything like this happening and more of it happening in the future. If I believed even a tenth of what is being portrayed in these anti Mormon videos, I would not let my family associate with members of the church. And you can very easily see how someone could justify this sort of thing based on what a lot of these creators are posting online, which so horribly misrepresents and mischaracterizes our teachings and practice and the way we live our life. The way that they worded this in the article the Wall Street Journal, it says, exmo influencers mount a war against the Mormon Church. And it starts with information. And this is where this sort of thing leads. If you are an anti Mormon or an ex Mormon and you hate the church for one reason or another, I think that's totally fine for you to share your story, your experience, but please give context, accurate context, accurate information. Please don't misrepresent and mischaracterize the church. As someone who grew up outside of Utah, this sort of thing's been to say, this sort of thing has been going on for a long time and it has been amplified a million fold with social media and the impacts are real and they are terrible and it really does impact people's lives really negatively. If you've Posted material that, you know, you knowingly misrepresented, mischaracterized the church for not being what it actually teaches and stands up for. Please correct whatever you said. Please try to portray us accurately, and hopefully no more of this sort of thing will happen.

Ex-Mormons on Anti-Mormonism

John Dehlin [01:14:36] So that's the first clip. And just really quickly, because there's one more clip I thought we would play. I'll play one more clip and then we can start talking about it. But this is from Ward radio.

Guest [01:14:51] Exactly what he was saying in a piece that he put out today is that anti Mormonism is sort of like this fundamental bigotry because it's based purely on, like, those people think weird things and, like, that's it. They don't even try to do something with, like, that they do with the Jews where they say, oh, they. They use the blood of children for. For their Passover bread meal or something like that. No, it's just like, no, they think Jesus insane are brothers, therefore gotta put the 9 millimeter in the belt when I go preach to them. Like, what the heck is going on here?

Guest 4 [01:15:27] I guess what's frustrating, too, is it's like, how do you have a conversation with people this illogical or dumb?

Guest [01:15:33] Well, how do you have.

Guest 4 [01:15:35] I'm sorry, I can't exactly. I cannot approach a conversation with you in good faith because I don't trust that you have the intellect to absorb it. That's probably lost.

Guest [01:15:44] No, no, listen, if you. If you come from a place of irrational ability or not reason, you can't. Their. Their basis, their premise is not based in reason. So you can't. You can't reason your way out of that. And when we're talking about something.

John Dehlin [01:15:57] All right, well, that gives you all a sense for the types of blame that's being assessed, y'.

Guest [01:16:04] All.

John Dehlin [01:16:04] Who wants to go first on responding?

Julie Deza Hanks [01:16:09] Yeah, I have so much to say.

Jana Spangler [01:16:10] So much there.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:16:12] Okay. Critiquing the church is not the same as inciting violence. And I think what's so interesting, they're saying the church is being misrepresented in a lot of ex Mormon content creators. The church is actually being more accurately presented than the church is presenting the church. So I think that's important to say. Like, I haven't seen a lot of ex Mormon creators who are talking about things that aren't objectively true.

Jana Spangler [01:16:45] So I'm noticing a couple of things. I think it's really hard for people to understand that two different people can interface with something and come away with two different experiences. And when. When any of Us is explaining our experience. It doesn't have to be what everybody's experience is. The other thing that I. I'm really. I'm noticing is that in this discussion especially, I noticed this in the word radio. I mean, the vitriol that they're spewing back to the people they're critiquing. They don't understand that they are doing the same thing.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:17:33] You're being so mean to us, you jerk.

Jana Spangler [01:17:36] I don't know that you're so stupid. Yeah. You're so stupid that you. I can't even have a conversation with you. Yeah, I mean that. That attitude is the attitude that leads to so much division. Yeah, it is. It is not what people are saying. But so many people think I'm the warrior for the truth. Mine is the only way to see it. And everyone else is an idiot. It's actually that flavor of that way of being with people that it's me or you. You are my enemy, and you are an idiot. That is what has gotten us to this place, politically, religiously. And you're not helping the situation when you're talking about things that way.

Guest [01:18:18] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:18:18] If we could replace that with curiosity, like, tell me where you're. Tell me where you come from. I wonder where they're coming from. Right. Instead of calling names and. And belittling.

Jana Spangler [01:18:30] Yep. Along the lines of the Eckhart Tolle quote is this. It's the idea that if you fight very directly against something for too long, you become the mirror image of what you hate. And I see that in a lot of the discussions going on about this, you become that mirror image of what you hate rather than saying, hey, you and I are actually probably more similar than we think. And let's try to actually bring us all up to a better way of seeing things rather than, I have to blame you, you're the problem. You know, because honestly, I mean, John, I hear you questioning, am I responsible for the word radios, for the Jacob Hansen's? Am I. Am I responsible for that? Well, I. I don't know where. I think that that sentiment has always been there toward people who question the church. You're just, you know, having a safe place for people who, who do that, who, who have those questions that. That thing is already there. But I think that, again, the way we do it, if you are only in defense of something, you get blinded to a bigger. I don't know, the. The bigger situation that's going on. You. You can't. You. You are also only giving part of the truth and it's only the truth that you can see.

Mormon Stories: We're Not Responsible for Misrepresentation

Julie Deza Hanks [01:19:56] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [01:19:57] The only way that we can see more truth is by getting curious, listening to each other. How do you see that? What am I missing?

Beau Oyler [01:20:07] Yeah. And I have a real tough time with the first guy, the first content creator misrepresenting the church. Nobody misrepresents the church more than the Church. Nobody. And so when a, when he comes out with an explanation of all of us who are voices in the space saying that we're misrepresented, of course there are some people misrepresenting the church out there. There's weird things that you hear. You know, I remember growing up in California, it's like people feeling my head, you do you have horns?

Guest 2 [01:20:37] Right.

Beau Oyler [01:20:38] Like, that's misrepresentation. Like, come on, where did that, where did that come from? That's silly. It's ridiculous. The challenge that I have is as I began to see things more clearly. Nobody misrepresents the church more than the church itself. It just doesn't. And so to put that on us, that we are misrepresenting the Church, I think I kind of go back to that initial definition of anti Mormons where it's like anti Mormons are people who are saying anything that makes me feel uncomfortable or goes against the prophet today, period. And so are responsible. Yeah, I guess we are responsible because there are things like the family proclamation that I now go very much against.

John Dehlin [01:21:19] Yeah. If I'm trying to put on my yes to everything y' all have said. Obviously, Mormon Stories has tried to be all about informed consent and evidence based exploration of history and truth claims and harm. And no and no. Our focus isn't on saying positive things about the church, but that's partly because the church does a great job of having billions of dollars invested every year.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:21:48] You're really good at that. So why compete with that?

John Dehlin [01:21:51] Yeah. Like there's not a need for that content.

Guest [01:21:54] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:21:55] So yes, we do take a critical or an evidence based position. So that's true. If, if I'm trying to put on my good faith hat I think what they would say, it's a matter of context that like, you know, a classic example is don't call Joseph Smith a pedophile. Yes, yes. He married at least two 14 year olds. There's no clear evidence that he had sex with 14 year olds. And even if he did, the term pedophile is usually reserved for prepubescent children. And so a 14 year old wouldn't apply. And so that's just one example. Or to say that women are hurt by the church or the church considers women to be inferior. A Mormon apologist would say, no, women feel great in the church. They feel empowered in the church. They, they feel like the church, you know, loves them and treats them well. And so I think what they would say is either we provide misinformation or we provide the most, least generous, worst faith contextual framings that then lead people to think the church harbors child abusers and is misogynistic and hates all black people and, you know, and so on and so forth. That's my attempt at a best faith interpretation of their framing. Thoughts?

Mormons: The Only True Church on Earth

Jana Spangler [01:23:28] Yeah, I mean, another thing I heard in, in this, and I think it's true, is, I mean, by and large, LDS people are really very nice. You know, they, they're trying to be good members of their community. They're, they really are trying to be Christian people. They, I mean, they're, they're good people. And I have been mystified over the years at how Mormonism can get made fun of so much more than it seems like other, other groups do, you know, and part of that is I've been raised in it, so I notice it. You know, I'm sure there are other things that get made up, made fun of as well, but we do have kind of a persecution complex in the church, for sure. I think it's a little overblown. But also I do think that we, we take a lot of heat. And I'm curious about that phenomenon, actually. I've been really thinking about that. But I can see being very mystified as to why Mormons get so much hate.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:24:35] I kind of think of it like, like in a family, there's like the favorite child that thinks they're so great, like they're the favorite and then everybody kind of like goes after them to, you know, I mean, it kind of feels like that because the Mormon Church is like, we're the only true church. We're, we're God's true people where we have, we're the only ones with a living prophet, right? And so it's like we're kind of setting ourselves up in the church to be picked on because of what the claims are, right? Like, we're the favorite child, God's favorite child right here, you know, and not

Beau Oyler [01:25:08] just favorite, literally stating that we're the only ones, right? It is in our doctrine, it's in our scripture, that you are all wrong or you, that you are an abomination. Not just that we're right, you are an Abomination that is in the Book of Mormon.

John Dehlin [01:25:22] It's in the Doctrine and Covenants. Like, I think it's section one of the Doctrine and Covenants 130. God. God or Jesus or Joseph Smith, whoever it was, declares all other Christian church creeds as an abomination. That's how the doctrine covenant starts.

Beau Oyler [01:25:38] Yeah, right. Yeah, exactly.

John Dehlin [01:25:40] I think, I mean, that's how I understand it.

Beau Oyler [01:25:41] Well, it's the one and only true church upon the face of the earth. Right. So when you come out in, in chapter one in section one and declare that. And then you have the founder, Joseph Smith, declaring that all other churches are abomination, saying, Jesus told me that and we're the only true ones. We're the only ones with priesthood authority. And then you have prophets peddling that for 200 years. We as Benson saying that all other churches are plain church. Right. And then you've got somebody like Brad Wilcox, who's on the road doing it today, saying, you know, isn't that cute when my daughters play church? Well, that's what other churches are doing. And, you know, we all know that we're the only ones.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:26:13] Like, we're asking for it in a way. Right.

John Dehlin [01:26:16] By asking for what I want to

Julie Deza Hanks [01:26:18] make sure, not violence. So, yes, we're asking for

John Dehlin [01:26:23] opposition.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:26:23] Opposition or critique.

John Dehlin [01:26:26] Critique.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:26:26] Right. By. By saying that we're so special. And, and I, I just keep going back to fail, you know, it's like, you're gonna try to tear that kid, like the one that thinks they're so great. Like, you're not that great.

Jana Spangler [01:26:41] Well, and an apologist would say, but we have such an expansive theology that includes salvation for everyone in the lower kingdoms.

Guest 2 [01:26:49] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [01:26:50] Unless you're, you know, your work is done for you, you might have a chance in the next life. Right. I'm just playing Devil's totally right. Like, this is what an apologist would say is we, we, you know, we're not like some of the, like Heaven and Hell. Yeah. Mainline Christians, that it's like, I don't care if you never heard of it, you're going straight to hell if you didn't accept Jesus in this life. You know, which is also true. But I think we have to look at. When you're an apologist, just like they are saying, you need to give context. Well, so do apologists. Yeah, but they need to give the context of. Yes. And we're presenting as the one true church. And what does that say? Does that say, we're trying to be ecumenical and we're trying to be interfaith and we're trying to work with everybody. No, we've always got this idea that we have something to teach you, and that's why we're doing interfaith, is because we have something we have to teach you rather than an ecumenical view of like, what do you have to teach us?

Julie Deza Hanks [01:27:53] Right.

Jana Spangler [01:27:54] You know, it doesn't make for good friends and neighbors.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:27:56] Right.

Jana Spangler [01:27:57] But I just think that apologists need to also look at that. Like, I just want someone out there to acknowledge both.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:28:04] Yeah, right.

Beau Oyler [01:28:05] Imagine two missionaries knocking on your door and instead of saying, we have a message to share with you about Jesus Christ, it's, are you a Christian? And we'd love to learn from you. We're 18 year old kids and I would imagine that you may have some wisdom experience that we could grow from. Never. Of course not. And if a missionary did that, what would happen?

Julie Deza Hanks [01:28:24] Their numbers would go.

Beau Oyler [01:28:25] Well, maybe numbers would go down. I don't know.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:28:27] They may go up.

Beau Oyler [01:28:29] I'll tell you what happens. So I have a. I have a friend who is one of my young men and in my quorum a couple years ago, and he is now on a mission and he's really struggling. Why is he struggling? Because he's doing things like this. He's open to serving and not coming out as the authoritative person and asking, right, what can I learn from you? How can we be part of the Christian community? And he's being shot down by companions. He's being tattled onto his mission president. He's being called in by his mission president. He's being rebuked by his mission president.

Guest 2 [01:29:00] Why?

Beau Oyler [01:29:01] Because we have the truth. You are here to teach the one and only truth.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:29:07] Okay. Which is. Is that not pride?

Does the War mentality still affect Mormons?

Beau Oyler [01:29:12] Of course it is.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:29:13] Right.

Beau Oyler [01:29:13] And we even have it written in our Book of Mormon. The remium.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:29:18] Yeah. And I'm always curious why God has never told some people that someone else is the chosen people.

Guest [01:29:25] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:29:26] Right. Like everybody thinks they're the special ones.

Beau Oyler [01:29:30] Of course. And this isn't a Mormon problem.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:29:32] Right? Right.

Beau Oyler [01:29:32] This is a Christian problem.

John Dehlin [01:29:34] This is a human problem.

Beau Oyler [01:29:36] It's a human problem.

John Dehlin [01:29:36] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [01:29:37] Of course. It's political as well. Right. We're the. We're the right ones. We've got it figured out.

John Dehlin [01:29:42] Yeah. Yep. And again, just if you go back to that adversity in Missouri, the murdering of Mormons and the burning down of their homes and the seizing of their property, that's never excusable. But. But Joseph Smith was receiving revelation saying, hey, you Mormons go down To Zion. You're going to own the whole thing.

Beau Oyler [01:30:06] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:30:06] And you're going to usher in, you know, Jesus's second coming. So take it and take it all. And the same in the. And the citizens of Jackson county didn't take kindly.

Beau Oyler [01:30:18] Of course.

John Dehlin [01:30:18] They were afraid that they were going to be displaced and that they were going to be overrun. So it's just complicated. And I think this is all very human stuff. It is.

Beau Oyler [01:30:28] And our theology also really leans into the war mentality. And so from the war in heaven before we ever came to this earth, all the way to the war of good and evil today.

Guest 2 [01:30:38] Right.

Beau Oyler [01:30:38] War mentality is a big part.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:30:41] Right. The Book of Mormon is like, what, 50% wars.

Beau Oyler [01:30:44] Right. And to war. War mentality is really important to us and important to our theology. And just because it's not 80s 90s Benson Mormonism, which is all about wars, it's still very much in us. And so we have this. This complexion, this like the, you know, it's like we're. We're the victims. We're being attacked because we always have

John Dehlin [01:31:05] and we have been and we have been there.

Beau Oyler [01:31:08] But also, once you begin. Once I began to look at why are we attacked? What is the history between behind the attacks and why people were attacking us? Why do people attack us?

Julie Deza Hanks [01:31:16] It wasn't just because they just decided one day to. And I'm not excusing any violence ever. And we just hear, oh, we were, you know, our people were attacked. It's like, well, there's actually a history that goes along with that. The context.

John Dehlin [01:31:33] Yeah. And I don't care where you are in the United States history, if some millennialistic prophet prophesies that that land is going to be taken over by that religious group and everybody goes in there and starts buying up, buying up the land and displacing people and saying that they're God's chosen people, they're going to be attacked with frontier justice. That's just the math of how humans worked in the mid 19th century, I think, of course.

Beau Oyler [01:31:57] And we kind of, in different ways still have that mentality today as members of the church.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:32:00] Well. And I think this attack actually really activated this latent fear of, like, oh, my gosh, we really are still, like, we have this intergenerational trauma from the early Mormon pioneers and what they went through. And now it's like it's kind of come back alive. Like, oh, my gosh, the world is out to get us. And I mean, of course, the attack is horrible. And I don't think the world is out to get LDS people like, I don't think we're in danger any more

John Dehlin [01:32:33] than Mitt Romney became the nominee for the Republican Party for president. United States Harry Reid.

Beau Oyler [01:32:38] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:32:39] Was Senate Majority Leader, Senate Majority Leader of the United States Senate. We're, we're overrepresented in the House of Representatives and the Senate and in the judiciary and in the X CxO suites across America. Like yes, people think we're weird. Yes people think we're Amish or quirky or polygamists. But they also think we're Donny Osmond and David Archuleta and happy, smiley good families type people.

Beau Oyler [01:33:08] Because most of the time we are like ask anybody. Like do you know anymore? Is like yeah, so and so.

Guest 2 [01:33:13] Right.

Beau Oyler [01:33:13] Listen to you know, I'm not a huge fan of like Joe Rogan. He'll be like I love Mormons. Quirky as hell, but I love them. They're such good people. You know Barack Obama said that when Romney was running. It's like such good people.

John Dehlin [01:33:27] I think we all agree. Well so several comments have been coming up that in response, I believe largely to these Mormon apologists who are trying to blame ex Mormon content creators for the violence. And I'll just share some of those comments. So Amy White752 writes, let's face it John, you being a continuous shill against the church, Jesus Christ, Latter Day Saints fans, the flames of hate. There's nothing balanced about your portrayal and some people feed into your vilification that leads to extremism. Here is Troy Betridge writing. Do you believe you bear any responsibility for potentially inciting violence through the dissemination of partial truths and anti Mormon rhetoric such as in the case of Grand Grand Blank Township, this is someone writing bad days are ahead. Reform the Mormon Battalion. And what that's a. What I think that's a reference to is early instances of Mormon based militias or violence, whether it's the Council of 50 or the Danites or the Nauvoo Militia where right or wrong, the church felt like it needed to defend itself and sometimes even went on the offensive to seize property, steal things or even harm or kill people. That happened too. The Mountain Mills Massacre is an example of that. And there are instances of Mormon on non Mormon violence in Missouri as well. So it wasn't all one way Missourians against Latter Day Saints, even though they weren't called Latter Day Saints back then. But anyway, this is kind of a violent reference. This is on Nemo, the Mormons channel. It's channels like this that produce the mass shooting in grand blank. Well done. So quick to announce the death of the prophet. Why didn't you announce the trading in Michigan jokers? And then this is Alyssa Grenfell on Jordan McKay. Alyssa, the blood of the Saints killed in Michigan is on your hands. From all the anti Mormon rhetoric others said blood of those killed on Sunday are on your hands. Congratulations to you and your whole anti Mormon community for your newest achievement in spreading the hate against the LDS communities and faith. Please. And then another one, please. It is because of the anti Mormon garbage you put out to incite this type of violence. And I won't even just read the whole story.

Anti-Mormon Content Creators Blame Themselves for the

Beau Oyler [01:35:58] There's no way I believe that the guy who went in and killed our, our brothers and sisters has ever heard of Alyssa Grenfeld has ever heard of John DeLand has ever heard of any of us who are creating in the post Mormon space. I'm sorry, I can't believe it. Maybe I guess I'm open to it, but I can't believe it. I think that's just invite him.

John Dehlin [01:36:18] It would be best to have evidence before you at least made that claim. Right? Especially now when we're going to talk about what. Well, we're not. We, we're going to talk about what some have said he might be influenced by. But even then we're not going to tie his murder to any possible influences.

Beau Oyler [01:36:36] And as we go into that, I want to make clear that what, what we're not doing. Just like how the apologists creators are saying they're pointing the finger to John de Lynn, Mormon stories, Alyssa Grenfell, other creators, and they're saying this is your fault, Nemo. This is your blood on your hands, Alyssa. That's what they're doing. What we're not going to do here is say oh no, no, it's not us, it's other people, it's the evangelical Christians.

John Dehlin [01:36:56] We're not doing that. We're not doing that.

Beau Oyler [01:36:57] It's not what we're doing.

John Dehlin [01:36:59] But, but I mean if people are singing allegations, it's at least good for us to gather evidence. But I think that's a fair question. What does evidence matter whether it's Charlie Kirk's murder or this Michigan killer. Is is it wrong to gather evidence about what, what may have contributed or influenced a killer? Like let's just ask that question before we go into the next segment.

Beau Oyler [01:37:26] Of course not. And that's why you said what you said about like listen, we're all reflecting, we're all looking inward. Words matter Right. So if we hold any weight here or any water, like, what is that? What do we want that to be?

Jana Spangler [01:37:40] Yeah, I mean, I come back to this human need to blame. You know, I. I think that I saw a TikTok once, and I can't remember who the creator was, but it was very funny. But just talking about how, if you ask the question, okay, if I'm blaming that group, well, why did they do it? And you keep, you know, asking that question, well, why did. Why did that happen? Why did that happen? The answer to anything, any blame in the universe is the dawn of mankind. If you. If you come down to it. Right, you can see immediate reasons for things. But honestly, some of the apologists are just as guilty if. If John and Alyssa. And if you're to blame, then so are they, because they're also feeding the fire of where.

Guest 4 [01:38:33] Right.

Jana Spangler [01:38:33] You're wrong. Like.

John Dehlin [01:38:35] And also dehumanizing people.

Jana Spangler [01:38:37] Yes, that's the issue. It's. How do we talk about these things? How do we dehumanize people? I think it's far more dehumanizing to call people stupid and I can't even talk to them than it is like, hey, there are some problems here. I. I don't know. I just think you can't. You can't just point to one side. And people are so quick to blame anyone they disagree with. At what point do people start saying, is it. Is it I What? What's my part in this? That would be far more helpful otherwise. You are part of the problem. Maybe not for this particular shooter or this particular act of violence, but how we all play in this sandbox. We have some culpability.

Beau Oyler [01:39:22] And wouldn't it be amazing this conference Sunday to hear the brethren say something along those lines? Right? As things are overturned, as policies are changed, the Family Proclamation is now becoming doctrine. To be able to take a step back and lead by example, to say,

Guest 2 [01:39:38] hey,

Beau Oyler [01:39:40] we made a mistake. There was something we didn't understand, and now we understand it better, and we just want our people to be healthy. Therefore, we apologize for X, Y, and

Jana Spangler [01:39:50] Z. Yeah, I don't think things really get better until institutions learn to do that, to learn to be comfortable with their own shadow and say, we don't really want to look at this, but we're willing to. I mean, that. That's maturity, and we need a little maturity in all of these conversations.

Catholic Influencers: Ex-Mormons Are Out to Get the

John Dehlin [01:40:07] So there's a Ward radio clip that I. I haven't showed. And maybe just for the sake of time, we're not going to show it. But I'll summarize it. Where one of the panelists on ward radio says, I talked to this Catholic influencer and I asked him, are there YouTube channels dedicated to taking down the Catholic Church or anti Catholic YouTube channels? And the Catholic influencer paused for a second, said, I don't even know what you're talking about. In other words, as if the idea of an anti Catholic YouTube channel was just the farthest thing from this person's mind. And then the word radio panelist said, there's like six or eight of those within the Mormon context. And so what would your response be to that? Like, the truth is, is that of all. Of all religions, probably, certainly all Christian religions in the world, ex Mormons dominate social media like Mormons dominate social media.

Beau Oyler [01:41:10] Exactly.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:41:10] Right. Like the mommy Mormon mommy bloggers. The. The YouTubers are. You're talking eight passengers represented by Utahns who are. Who are LDS. So I, I think it's more about who Mormon people are than who then. Oh, you know, Mormons are out. Ex Mormons are out to get the Mormon Church. And it's just. No, we are taught to. To be public, to even evangelize what we believe. We're taught to, you know, stand for truth and righteousness, put yourself out there, be missionaries. And so the ex Mormons are just doing a really good job, just like the Mormon are.

Jana Spangler [01:41:50] And I also think that the harder it is to leave a church or an institution with your dignity intact, the. The more you're going to have people making commentary about it and helping one another through that difficult process.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:42:06] The higher the demand. Yeah. Of the church. I mean, I know a lot of Catholics that they don't feel like the Catholic Church demands anything of them except for going to church on Christmas and Easter, you know, so.

John Dehlin [01:42:18] Yeah, there's. Yeah. If a Catholic leaves Catholicism, no one.

Beau Oyler [01:42:21] They don't know.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:42:22] No one cares.

Beau Oyler [01:42:23] Nobody in their congregation.

John Dehlin [01:42:25] I mean, their parents might care. Right, right.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:42:27] But not the congregation or the church. Like, also the. I doubt the Catholic Church is surveying people like me. Like, the Mormon Church is keeping an eye on me. Right. Like, so the church acts differently. In addition to the, you know, the, the influencers.

John Dehlin [01:42:45] Yeah. Like, who has the highest per capita X religious group? You know, influencers, Mormons, Scientologists, Jehovah's Witnesses.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:42:58] The higher the demand.

John Dehlin [01:42:59] Evangelicals. Yeah. And that's not to criticize the church or even to call the Mormon church a cult. It's just to say the more demanding the church is, and like you said, Jenna, the harder it is to leave it. The more you're gonna have. If you're going to lose your marriage, if you're going to lose the love of your children, if you're going to be disowned by your parents, if you're going to be smeared by the church or its apologists, or if you're just. Life falls into shambles by leaving. And if you're going to lose your friends in community, which I think is pretty much a lot of people's experience leaving Mormonism, it certainly was mine then. Yeah. There's going to be more channels to process that. Right. Or to even criticize the church or to express anger at the church.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:43:39] Yeah. And I think because we've been taught to do that within the church. And so people carry that zeal outside

Beau Oyler [01:43:45] of the church and the church fuels that fire. Right. With conference talks around. They can leave the church, but they can't leave it alone. And then beginning to demonize people by the prophet saying along the lines of, you know, you can't trust the non

Julie Deza Hanks [01:43:59] believers, don't take counsel from those who don't believe.

Beau Oyler [01:44:02] Yeah, exactly.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:44:03] Including your mom or dad or the

Beau Oyler [01:44:05] way that that tears at families and friends and neighbors is obvious. And so, you know, there's a reason why this. There's so many voices.

Charlie Kirk Assassinated

John Dehlin [01:44:16] Yeah. Okay, so let's go ahead and dive a little bit more into this. So there's a slide we have on Charlie Kirk. Charlie Kirk was an American right wing politician, activist, entrepreneur and Media personality. On September 10, 2025, Charlie attended the American Comeback tour on stage at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah. Charlie was shot minutes after the event began in front of an audience of about 3,000 people. So that's a little context on Charlie Kirk really quickly. Context on this next clip. So I watched this word radio clip where they're basically saying there's no such thing as an anti Catholic channel. And I'm like, that can't be true. Because I mean, at a minimum, there's so much pedophilia and sex abuse scandal. Plus, you know, there's stuff with women's rights and abortion and it's still a patriarchy and women, you know, I'm thinking, certainly there's anti Catholic channels that aren't purely evangelical channels. So as I'm searching for it, it's so weird. But a Charlie Kirk clip pops up because Charlie Kirk has actually commented on Catholicism. And so it was this weird sort of like twisted reality. And so I went and watched. What does Charlie Kirk have to say about Christianity? Or about Catholicism. And I thought it was really interesting. And I'm honestly wondering what the. What, what the apologetic Mormons who probably like Charlie Kirk and probably support him, whether they would call Charlie Kirk himself an anti Catholic based on what he. You're about to hear him say, or another way to say, that is Ward radio. Jacob Hansen, whoever. If we said about the Mormon Church prophet what Charlie Kirk says about the Pope, would you call him someone who's inciting violence and hate? So let's go ahead and roll the clip.

Guest [01:46:13] I, My. I want a better Catholic church. And I, Charlie Kirk, I personally would not be able to be part of an institution with the head, the figurehead, with a worldview that is so corrupted and opposite of what I think the Bible teaches. And I wouldn't. I wouldn't give him the benefit of the doubt. I'd be like, no, I'm actually not part of this. I'm leaving. But today you're part of the United States, but the head of the United States.

Guest 3 [01:46:34] Yeah, but I was.

Guest [01:46:35] Again, I don't think. You don't leave the country. I. I don't take. I don't take religious orders from Joe Biden. No, but you take political orders or you at least follow. Really? I mean, I follow the law, but no political order orders from Joe Biden? No. I guess it would mean, like, we all rebel against corruption, institutions we don't like. But an unjust law is no law at all. It's not. It's okay. Unjust, rather hope without a Pope. Yeah, but was.

Guest 3 [01:46:55] But what's on?

Guest [01:46:56] What's on? There's nothing unjust about the Pope talking about, like, climate change. No, you just don't pay attention to it, you know? Okay, so you just, like, you pick. You pick and choose. What, it's like a buffet line. No, I like what he says about this, but not about that. But yes, he is the inheritor of St. Peter. No, no, I mean, like. No, no. The papal authority is basically that he speaks infallibly when speaking ex cathedral on faith and morals doesn't talk about climate change at all. So the Pope can say things that are crazy. Yeah. So if this is perfect, then then why have one? Because if what he's doing in order to speak infallibly ex cathedral faith. Okay, so that has not happened since, what, Vatican ii?

John Paul on the Catholic Church's Immaturity

Guest 4 [01:47:26] No, it's.

Guest [01:47:26] It's a little bit. When was the last time the Pope. Well, Vatican 2 is part of the matter. When was the last time? Like 50, 60 years? The. The last probably ex cathedra. Infallible teachings from a pope were probably Pope Pius IX, you know, like 150 years ago. Okay, so then therefore there really is no functional use for a pope for 150 years. No, no, he's the, he's the, he's the leader of the Church. You know, he's the. Exactly. Your figurehead, your top leader is not good.

John Dehlin [01:47:55] What do you all think?

Jana Spangler [01:47:56] Well, I'm curious that if we had a conversation with that Catholic influencer they had talked to. I believe it was Trent Horn who didn't, who wasn't aware of anti Catholic channels there. I've seen a lot of this because as someone who has learned a lot from Richard Rohr, I know he is really hated by a lot of conservative Catholics because of what he says. And there are a lot of conservative Catholics who speak out against the Pope, the last two Popes, because they've been a little more open minded, a little more congressional side. Yeah. Talking about, you know, lots of groups that, and climate change and LGBTQ stuff. They, they definitely have a, a more liberal view of things than a lot of conservatives are comfortable with. But I'm curious if the Trent Horns of the world, that even clocks to them as anti Catholicism or if that's just part of what we do as Catholics. We wrestle with this. I mean, they, they've been around long enough to have different factions and different orders and groups. You know, the Franciscans don't believe everything that the, you know, dignations or whoever else, you know, they have different ways of, of viewing things. They, they're, they're a little more open to that than we are. So to your point, is that anti Catholic to be having those conversations?

Julie Deza Hanks [01:49:24] You know, it's a great point.

John Dehlin [01:49:26] It's a great point. And I'm not like I didn't miss it.

Guest [01:49:29] Right.

John Dehlin [01:49:29] Didn't Charlie Kirk call the Pope corrupt and say there's no need for a Pope?

Jana Spangler [01:49:33] Yes.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:49:34] Yeah. Minimum. He questioned the need for a.

Jana Spangler [01:49:37] Said he wasn't a good man.

Beau Oyler [01:49:38] Yeah. And then also ask the same question that so many people within our church begin to ask is, well, when was the last time that they, that the Pope prophesied?

Julie Deza Hanks [01:49:46] And then why have one if they don't? It's been 150 years.

Beau Oyler [01:49:50] So if they're a figurehead, then why do you need one?

Julie Deza Hanks [01:49:53] Yeah, but that would be anti. If, if you insert the prophet, that would be anti Mormon.

Beau Oyler [01:49:59] Oh, everything he said.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:50:00] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [01:50:00] If he was speaking about Russell and Nelson would have been anti Mormon.

Jana Spangler [01:50:03] Absolutely.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:50:04] I think your point is so Great. That it probably doesn't even register. It's like, oh, whatever, whatever.

Jana Spangler [01:50:08] Like, yeah, we have, we talk about that. Doesn't make him anti Catholic.

Guest 2 [01:50:12] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:50:13] That's part of the thing is the Catholic Church has. It's so old that it's like, whatever,

Julie Deza Hanks [01:50:18] yeah, whatever you want. We don't care.

John Dehlin [01:50:20] We learned excommunication from the Catholic Church, but they abandoned it a long time ago.

Jana Spangler [01:50:25] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:50:25] And they're like, whatever. We're, we're strong enough, we're confident enough, we're big enough, we can handle criticism.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:50:32] Right. We're like the little teen, early teens, teenager.

John Dehlin [01:50:35] Like Mormons.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:50:36] The Mormons are.

Guest [01:50:37] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:50:37] Compared to the Catholics with a 300

Beau Oyler [01:50:39] billion dollar trust fund, that teenager.

John Dehlin [01:50:44] I mean, no church has probably ever become that rich that fast. Right. Like in 200 years. 300 billion. Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:50:50] Crazy.

Beau Oyler [01:50:51] But it is, it speaks to our immaturity. Right. If you look at other world religions and then you look at Mormonism, we're 200 years old. Of course we're immature. Of course. We haven't gone through this evolution.

Jana Spangler [01:51:01] Well, we, we have not learned to take criticism. We just haven't learned how to do it. We haven't allowed it in any of our chapels. We haven't allowed it anywhere with, with any dignity. We're very, very young and new and immature of that.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:51:18] We don't take. We don't like, take feedback or apologize for mistakes, which is a very immature dance.

Jana Spangler [01:51:28] Yep.

Beau Oyler [01:51:28] Immature and insecure, I would say.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:51:30] Right, right.

Guest 2 [01:51:31] We're right.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:51:31] We're right. No, we didn't. We're right.

Anti-Mormons: The Right to Criticize Mormons

Jana Spangler [01:51:34] Well, and it's very dualistic. You're either 100% with us or you're absolutely against us.

Beau Oyler [01:51:38] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:51:39] Well, I think that plays into what's an anti Mormon. If you're not 100% in, you're against us. If those are the only two options, it's you're. If you're not in this, you're over here. Yeah.

Beau Oyler [01:51:52] We saw that with the name Mormon. Right. So with our, Our prophet growing up, Hinckley, it's like, we're Mormons. We're Mormons. Celebrated more.

Guest 3 [01:51:58] Good.

Jana Spangler [01:51:59] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [01:51:59] It means we're good. It's great. And then they have their battle, public battle. And 20 years later, Nelson becomes the prophet. It's a win for Satan. Right.

John Dehlin [01:52:06] When Gordon McHinkley was. Loved the term Mormon.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:52:09] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:52:09] Thomas S. Monson loved the term Mormons, Right?

Jana Spangler [01:52:12] Yes.

Beau Oyler [01:52:12] But he had this vendetta and so, you know, he became the man in charge. And so now we're not Mormons. And he says, a win for Satan. Therefore, as members of the church, anytime we hear someone say Mormon now, it's like, oh, well, we know they're an anti Mormon then.

John Dehlin [01:52:25] Yeah, I've been accused of that.

Jana Spangler [01:52:27] Oh, yeah.

Guest 2 [01:52:28] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:52:30] So I just to put a fine point on it, is it fair to say that if, if apologetic Mormons wanted to be consistent, they would have to not only accuse Charlie Kirk of being anti Catholic, but also accuse him of stoking Catholic hate and, and whatever violence happened to Catholics, they would blame Charlie Kirk for it.

Jana Spangler [01:52:53] Was anyone connecting the Minnesota shooter to, to those anti Catholic people?

Julie Deza Hanks [01:52:58] But I, I wonder if they would say, but that's not his entire platform. That was one conversation with a Catholic person. It's not.

Jana Spangler [01:53:05] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:53:06] It's not sure, you know, Mormon stories

John Dehlin [01:53:07] or, I mean, you know what I mean? But, I mean, we're drilling deep. But also, I interview believers. I interview, you know, former general authorities or former, former area authorities or former stake presidents and bishops. And I have as many apologists who are credible on as I can. So I try.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:53:24] Yeah.

John Dehlin [01:53:25] And do believers in both sides. So it's not like all. And yeah. When the church calls me an anti Mormon or excommunicates me, it makes it harder to get believing Mormons to come on.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:53:37] Right.

John Dehlin [01:53:37] But I'm, I'll just open invitation. If you are a credible, operating in good faith, thoughtful, believing Mormon, I would, I would love to bring you on a panel like this or, or have you tell your story. I always try and, and have balance in what I do. It's not going to be perfect balance, but believers and defenders of the church are welcome on Mormon stories as long as they're willing to communicate in good faith.

Jana Spangler [01:54:04] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [01:54:04] And it's like we were brainstorming the other day on our hike around, are there things happening within leadership of the church today that, you know, bishops, stake presidents, Relief Society presidents that are doing innovative things within the church that are really healthy. We want to have them on and broadcast that, to give ideas and give permission to other leaders that are currently serving to say, hey, there's another way of doing this and it's way healthier.

John Dehlin [01:54:25] Yeah. Yeah. We have a clip about what Charlie Kirk felt about Mormons. And I'll have you all tell me why you felt like this clip was important, but I'll, I'll play it first

Charlie Kirk Loves Mormons

Guest [01:54:38] right there. Let me just continue. I love how Mormons and missionaries around

Guest 3 [01:54:44] the world, I love how polite you are.

Guest [01:54:46] I hope my team is Mormon. Terrell's a Mormon Andrews are Mormon, Everybody.

Guest 4 [01:54:55] I'm an evangelical Christian.

Guest [01:54:56] We're gonna have fun with this, but I'm not one of the guys.

John Dehlin [01:55:01] So that's just moments before Charlie Kirk was killed at uvu. And he begins by saying he's not a hater of Mormons. Tell me why y' all felt like that was important to include in the deck. Just because it's.

Beau Oyler [01:55:18] Well, I think that it helps to position Charlie Kirk in. In like he was positioning himself in a crowd that he was speaking at. I mean, it's. You know, we all do that. Right? We speak to the audience. And that's okay.

Julie Deza Hanks [01:55:32] I like you all.

Beau Oyler [01:55:33] Yeah. But also, like half of his staff are lds. Right. And that's. And that's okay. You know, that's a whole nother episode that maybe we want to. Or not want to touch, but it's this whole, like, Christian national. Why does Christian nationalism dovetail so well within Mormon? This on.

John Dehlin [01:55:48] Yeah, yeah.

Beau Oyler [01:55:50] And he's speaking to that. That's why he loves Mormon. One of the reasons why he loves Mormons so much.

Charlie Kirk Shooter: Was He Influenced by His Mormon Parents?

John Dehlin [01:55:59] The next slide we have is about Charlie Kirk shooter. And we're not going to be going into depth on this, but just to share a little bit of what we do know about him in an attempt to kind of be at least a little bit of factual or fact based. And I'm having a hard time getting this on the screen. Let me try and remove it. There it is. Bring it back. Okay. So the alleged Charlie Kirk shooter, I'll just say alleged, even though that may not be the proper term, is named Tyler Robinson. He's a 22 year old who grew up in Utah and briefly attended Utah State University. Glaggies is now facing several charges related to Charlie Kirk's death. Tyler was raised Mormon. And then this is where it gets sticky. His partner and or roommate at the time of the shooting. We have information that he is transgender. Male to female, I believe. And the bullet casings used in the assassination were apparently engraved with messages, officials believe to hint at a motive for the killing. According to NBC Chicago, one of the inscriptions read, hey, fascist, catch. Another read, if you read this, you are gay. A third casing had the lyrics to an anti Nazi and anti fascist Italian folk song called Bella Ciao. I imagine one of the reasons we included this is to say, at least with what we know, there's no evidence that Tyler Robinson was influenced by Nemo the Mormon or Alyssa Grenfell or Mormon stories in any way.

Beau Oyler [01:57:38] Once again, if he could be interviewed today, I doubt that any of those names are even on his radar. It's just not there. Right. And yet so many influencers and voices out there are trying to jump to that conclusion immediately.

Jana Spangler [01:57:52] Well, anyone hears some little fact in that and then immediately wants to jump to that conclusion. You know, I. And what it does is it says more about the person saying it than it does reality, because it shows what my biases are and what I'm trying to distance myself from. So that thing is evil, and that thing must be reason. Evil happens and exists in the world. And so I, you know, and I. I just think that the more I think Tyler Robinson is an interesting case just because it's not clear. And I think that we're gonna probably find that there are influences no one is even talking about because it's mostly the partisan people who are talking about it.

Beau Oyler [01:58:37] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [01:58:38] Again, they're trying to distance themselves from it rather than really trying to understand what happened.

Beau Oyler [01:58:44] Yeah. And the bullet casings and the, you know, quotes, the inscriptions, like, that's dark web gaming culture stuff. Right. And so I think we can speak to all the dangers of that as well. I don't think we're going to go into that, but so quickly. Voices wanted to jump on him as not just not anti Mormon. They wanted to jump on him, as

John Dehlin [01:59:08] I'm going to say.

Beau Oyler [01:59:09] Also, it was the church's fault that he, you know, was like this because he's trans or he's whatever. And because of the pressures of how he was raised, he snapped and killed Charlie Kirk. And it's the church's fault. I think there's just as many voices saying that, which is totally untrue.

John Dehlin [01:59:24] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [01:59:25] Like citing the Nephi thing. Oh, well, he was raised with Nephi, and Nephi was commanded to murder because he believed in a certain way. Therefore, that's why this kid did that. It's like, come on, we were all. We were all taught that, and none of us are killing people.

Jana Spangler [01:59:39] Well, you'll find that people who have committed violence throughout human history, it's been from every walk of life, of course, you know, and. And yeah. Does our. Does everything that we take in influence us? It does. And also it's like we've said it's a million different things. And just like there. There are dangers to partisanship, to religiosity. There are dangers to being apolitical and nihilistic. There are problems, you know, there are dangers in any. Any way that you are just trying to make your way through the world.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:00:14] Yeah. I think this is probably another Podcast also episode too, but I'm making a list. The male, like, what are we doing to men?

The Trans Person Shooting

Beau Oyler [02:00:25] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:00:27] That is creating multiple incidents. Like there's a societal thing that's happening that's, that's funneling vulnerable men into these horrific. You know what? So I think that's worth exploring. I think the, the big deal about this shooter was with a trans person. I'm like, that. That's irrelevant. It seems really irrelevant. And a big deal has been made about it. We wouldn't say they're with, they're with a woman. Like, okay. But a trans woman or a trans man. It's not, it's. It's a nothing to me. And I, I just think that that aspect is being politicized in, In a way that's really unfair.

Guest 4 [02:01:10] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [02:01:11] It's. It's nothing. Unless you're trying to make a point about someone you don't like.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:01:15] Right. Yep.

Beau Oyler [02:01:16] And to point the finger on a, on the other side.

Guest 4 [02:01:18] Yep.

Beau Oyler [02:01:19] Of your opponent.

John Dehlin [02:01:21] And I remember just like I'm so dialed in right now to the political polarization in our country. And so my memory is that as soon as this murder happens, there were groups trying to pin the assassination on. I'll just say the woke left.

Guest 3 [02:01:42] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:01:43] Yep.

John Dehlin [02:01:43] That was the immediate rhetoric that I heard on social media and in media generally. And my reaction wasn't defensive. It was just more like, I don't want this to get politicized. The last thing our police political climate needs is this to be politicized. And then almost immediately, I started hearing within a day that no, it was ultra. Right. Influences that hated Charlie Kirk that influenced Tyler Robinson. And I almost, you know, I, I was almost like too quick to think, well, maybe that's the right answer. And that was also eventually, I think, disproven. And it was a good lesson to me that we just. Just don't need to be jumping to conclusions. It's just not helpful. It's just. It's grandstanding in really harmful ways. And I haven't fact checked this slide. Julia put it together, but according to some studies that she's found. This is. To your point, Julia, if there is one clear trend, it's men.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:02:51] It's not trans people.

John Dehlin [02:02:52] Women. Well, it's. First of all, it is men.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:02:55] Right.

John Dehlin [02:02:55] 9. According to a couple studies, 98 of the shooters in America are men, 2% are women, minors are rare. And according to the study, transgender non binary people are less than 0.1% of shooters. And we won't get into like partisan or political Divides in terms of shooters. But, yeah, I think as someone who cares about straight people and LGBTQ people, I don't want anyone to be unfairly demonized or blamed. And I'll. I'll just say it. The transgender community has a hard enough time existing. They don't need to be reflexively labeled as assassins when there's zero evidence to support that.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:03:50] Amen.

John Dehlin [02:03:51] So, yeah, I hope we navigated that without getting too political.

Beau Oyler [02:03:58] We'll find out in the comments.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:04:01] Well, not soon enough, huh?

Beau Oyler [02:04:03] Yeah, we'll find out in all of the. The splices of other creators who are splicing these things in.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:04:09] Can you believe they said this?

John Dehlin [02:04:12] Okay, so now we're going to transition to a really delicate part, because the. One of the things that I thought was really interesting was that there was a group of faithful, orthodox, conservative, believing Mormon influencers that did express concern about anti Mormonism that wasn't directed at ex Mormon influencers. And in. And actually a lot of their focus was on a name that was familiar to me. So years ago, when podcasts were starting to get really popular, there's a podcast series called Mars Hill, and it was about an evangelical preacher in Seattle called Mark Driscoll that started this mega church in Seattle called Mars Hill. At its peak, it got to like 15 or 20,000 members in this mega church. And. And he used the Internet to help grow a megachurch in the Internet age. And it was Christianity Today, by the way, that published this podcast series. Definitely one of the best things I've ever listened to in terms of podcasts on the Internet. And Mark Driscoll was the head pastor. Surprise, surprise. The megachurch imploded in scandal. Interestingly, not sexual scandal. It was like abuse. It was like financial questions, culture abuse of employees, verbal or cultural abuse. You know, governance types of things and just, you know, personality things and. Or management things. There was. There's no. Or financial. There's no suggestion that it was sexual, which is like the only time I've ever heard of a church. Yeah. Not. Not imploding.

Ex-Mormons Speak Out Against Anti-Mormon Influencers

Beau Oyler [02:06:04] That's so surprising.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:06:07] No sexual schedule. What is happening here?

John Dehlin [02:06:09] But. But, you know, the reason why I'm bringing up Mark Driscoll is because his name is now coming up again in association with Anti Mormonism, but not as ex Mormon influencers, but as evangelical Christian influencers. So here we are with a. A shot of Mark Driscoll's YouTube channel. And I'll just say I kind of wondered whether he was going to just get canceled because his mega church imploded in in scandal. And I thought, oh, we'll, we'll never see Mark Driscoll again. Well, he's kind of reemerged and he's kind of affiliated, I would say, honestly, with the political right. I'm not saying that to be disparaging to any side, but that's my take on. He's kind of like the Internet evangelical YouTube influencer aligning with the evangelical political right. And so this is Pastor Mark Driscoll, flawed but faithful. We know why he's leading with flawed based on the implosion of his megachurch. But just recently, he's issued a book that is written to look just like the Book of Mormon in the font and the color of Mormon church branding. You can go to realfaith.com I guess, to buy it. And it's titled Are Mormons Christian? And it's, it's kind of hard to read. 10 irreconcilable doctrinal differences between Mormonism and Christianity. So that's the book that they've released weirdly, almost like in response to this Charlie Kirk Michigan shooter scandal. It's almost like he's, it seems like he's almost taking advantage of it to like, create and sell a book against Mormons. So here, here's that. And then let's just go ahead and maybe play a clip or two to give a sense, like if there is anti Mormonism in the world. We'll ask you, the audience to decide and you the panel to decide whether this does or doesn't qualify. And again, we are not putting any murder on Mark Driscoll at all. But it's just to come up with the question of, number one, what may have influenced or been in the mind of the Michigan shooter killer? And, you know, you know, why are believing Mormon influencers talking about Mark Driscoll? So let's, let's learn a little bit

Guest [02:08:58] more.

John Dehlin [02:08:58] So let's play that clip.

Guest 3 [02:09:01] It's an angel. See that? In addition, how many of you are familiar with the Mormons? And if you're not, you're new to Arizona. You're going to be very familiar with the Mormons very quickly. Mormonism is a cult. It is not a Christian denomination, but it is trying to reposition itself as a Christian denomination. And it is not a Christian denomination. It is a cult. It is deceptive. And some people will say they're very nice people. Sometimes cults have very nice people. Well, they have great families. Sometimes cults have really great families. I'm not saying they're not nice neighbors. And I'm not saying that they're not decent people. I am saying that they have the wrong Jesus. And if we really do love them, we want them to know that.

Guest [02:09:44] Okay?

Guest 3 [02:09:44] And here's. Here's the summary of Mormonism. The cult of Mormonism, also called the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I don't like that. That's rebranding. It's trying to make it into a denomination, which it's not. Was founded in 1830 by Joseph Smith in New York following the publication of the Book of Mormon. One of the things that happens is that cults will put other books over the Bible to interpret the Bible. And ultimately they are misrepresenting and misreading the Bible. The Holy Spirit reminds me, there's a. There's a scripture I'll just share with you briefly. In Proverbs, chapter 30, verse 5 and 6, the Lord says, do not add to my word, or I will rebuke you and prove you to be a liar. All of God's words are flawless.

Mormon doctrine on Jesus and adoptionism

Guest 2 [02:10:26] Okay?

Guest 3 [02:10:26] So right there in Proverbs 35 and 6, God says, what I give you is flawless. Don't add to it, or there will be a divine rebuke. So we need to be careful that we don't put anything alongside the scripture or over the scripture. And that's what they do with additional books of the Bible that they would claim are books of the Bible and we would not. Smith claimed to have discovered Golden Place with the aid of the angel Moroni. If you drive by, let's say, a place of worship for Mormonism and you see, let's say at the temple, a big golden angel up top, that is Moroni, and that is a demon taking up spiritual dominion over that place,

Guest [02:11:03] which

Guest 3 [02:11:03] he translated into the Book of Mormon using special stones called the Urim and Thummim. He's misrepresenting some Old Testament texts. They teach that Jesus is not eternally God, but rather a created being, the first spirit child of God the Father and his first wife who had physical relations. They believed that God the Father had a first wife. They actually had a sexual relationship and they conceived someone that we know is Jesus. Jesus is also called the quote, unquote, spirit brother of Lucifer. They have the same parents who is also a spirit child from the same heavenly father and mother. They teach that Jesus is one of many gods and that men can become gods like Jesus by a combination of salvation by faith and good works. Jesus was a man who became God. You men can become gods. Jesus got a planet, you can get your own planet. Lastly, Mormonisms do not pray to or worship Jesus. According to Bruce McConkey, one of the 12 quote unquote apostles of the LDS Church, he said in the talk, I've got the footnotes in the book at Brigham Young University named after the Mormon leader, quote, we do not worship the Son and we do not worship the Holy Ghost. It's a different Jesus. They would say that Jesus is a created being, that he is not the creator, that he doesn't eternally exist, but he comes into existence when God the Father and his first wife have sexual relations and birth Jesus. This is part of an ancient heresy called adoptionism. And adoptionism is that Jesus wasn't God, but then he was promoted, elevated or adopted into a higher level of spiritual authority and went from being a man to then becoming God. Joseph Smith, one of the founders of Mormonism, said, and I quote, God himself was once as we are now and is an exalted man. And Lorenzo Snow, the fifth president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, says, and I quote, as man is God once was as God is man may become. It's a different Jesus and it is part of the same demonic deception that was brought to our first parents. Do you remember in the Garden of Eden, there's Adam, there's Eve. Satan comes and he tells them, you can be like God. You can go from being a mere mortal to being a divine being. It's the temptation to the ancient heresy of adoptionism. I'll read it.

Mark Driscoll Describing Mormonism as Demonic

John Dehlin [02:13:39] I'm curious Yalls reaction. And by the way, we're mentioning him because he appeared recently on the Charlie Kirk YouTube channel. Mark Driscoll, I think the day after the Michigan murders, the Charlie Kirk Channel post, charlie Kirk's passing invites Mark Driscoll on the show. So really quickly, first reactions to Mark Driscoll describing Mormonism.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:14:05] Most of what he says is accurate, right? Like most of what he says is accurate. But then he characterizes it as demonic. I mean, what he lays out, and I've never heard that God and his first wife had sex. We don't know how spirits are created. So that was weird, but fair to say.

John Dehlin [02:14:24] I was taught that.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:14:25] Were you okay? I wasn't taught that.

John Dehlin [02:14:26] I was taught that in the 80s. It's kind of an old school Joseph Billing Smith.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:14:30] So I'm a. Makes sense.

Guest [02:14:32] But.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:14:32] So a lot of what he's saying is actual, is actually true. But the way he characterizes it as demonic is. That's the problem. Right. So saying a group of people are demonic or that's, I think, where he, where he crosses the line. It reminds me of like the Chad Daybell, Lori Valo. Right. If you, these people aren't human so we can destroy them, like, that's the danger. It's not, he's, he's teaching truth about Mormonism. But the, the, yeah, saying they're demonic is dehumanizing. And then that's, that's the problem there.

John Dehlin [02:15:10] Okay.

Beau Oyler [02:15:12] I would just say the important, rather than reflecting on what he, what he said, the important thing for me is that our president, the day after the shooting or the day of the shooting tweeted that this is a, this murder at the Mormon Chapel was an attack on Christianity. What that has done is incited a wave or a fire of Christians reminding everyone that Mormons are not Christians. Their own president, our own president, said it and they have to now, hey, just remember, like, they're not Christians. Just remember. And so they're kind of in a panic mode of, oh, no, they're not. They're not one of us. Once again, trying to distance from what's going on.

John Dehlin [02:15:56] That's horrible.

Beau Oyler [02:15:56] And so you see him going on Charlie Kirk's podcast, which is kind of amazing that he went on and said what he said the next day, given how many Mormons follow and, and really like Charlie Kirk, kind of crazy, kind of conflict of interest there. But then other evangelicals are out going like, hey, remember, remember, remember, they're not Christian.

Jana Spangler [02:16:18] Absolutely. I mean, there's a political alignment with a certain number of Latter Day Saints that, that do kind of fall in line with the Charlie Kirk or Christian nationalism or whatever. And yeah, it's a little rough for a lot of people to see. Oh, no, our allies aren't really our allies. They're not taking us with them. You know, Christian nationalism is a great idea, except maybe we're not going to be part of it, you know?

John Dehlin [02:16:43] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [02:16:44] So I just, I don't like the demonization, the othering. I, and we all do it. Yeah, we all do the othering.

John Dehlin [02:16:51] It's so funny. It is literally demonization. Like, we use demonization as a broad term, but he says literally demonizing.

Beau Oyler [02:17:00] Yeah, yeah, for sure. And it's interesting too.

John Dehlin [02:17:03] I didn't mean to interrupt you, Jetta.

Jana Spangler [02:17:04] Wait, no, it's fine.

John Dehlin [02:17:05] Okay.

Jana Spangler [02:17:05] Yeah, no, it's fine. I mean, I, I, I think that I will say I, I don't hear him demonizing Mormons. I hear him demonizing. I'm guessing he thinks we're all just duped you know, by Satan. By Satan, yes. Yeah, but. And that we're just unknowingly, you know, doing all of this.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:17:24] But he says demon there. It's a demonic cult.

Jana Spangler [02:17:27] Absolutely. So that's absolutely pretty close. Well, yeah, he's saying the organization is demonic and corrupt.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:17:35] Yeah, yeah.

Beau Oyler [02:17:36] Which if you have conversations with many family members who are active, orthodox lds, what are they going to say about us? Oh, well, he was duped. He was influenced by Satan. Yep. He was influenced by Satan. You know. How sad.

Guest [02:17:49] Yep.

Beau Oyler [02:17:50] It's the same thing the evangelicals are

Jana Spangler [02:17:51] doing what we, we just.

John Dehlin [02:17:53] Oh, you're saying believing Mormons due to ex Mormons was what Mark Driscoll is doing.

Beau Oyler [02:17:59] Yeah, correct. And that's why, like I thought for a long time, like, Satan is the most powerful character in all of Mormonism. Right. Because we can always put everything on Satan, everything that we don't like of

John Dehlin [02:18:10] Satan and it's the most extreme epithet or you know what I mean?

Beau Oyler [02:18:15] Yeah, it is.

John Dehlin [02:18:16] And it's even baked into the, it's baked into the creation story. It's baked into the temple ceremony.

Guest [02:18:21] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:18:22] Being under Satan's power, like, that's the worst thing. What's worse? Is there anything worse than being under Satan's power?

Guest 2 [02:18:27] Now?

John Dehlin [02:18:27] There's nothing worse.

Beau Oyler [02:18:28] Of course. That's what I'm saying. He's the most powerful character in all of Mormonism. Now, if I put on my empathetic hat toward my evangelical friends, if I see what is happening within modern Mormonism, I am a little worried as an evangelical Christian Right. Because growing up in the 80s 90s, my Christian friends, I'd go to church with them and it is music and dancing and cheering and celebration. And then as I would take that to my young men's classes, like, well, it was really fun. It's really. Well, we don't need any of that. We have the truth. Ours is reverent and quiet because you can then hear the spirit. Right. And that's false Christianity is what I was taught then in the Mormon Church. So if you think about it from an evangelical standpoint, now what you're seeing with these YSA conferences and YSA wards of full on Christian parties, full on Christian rock, full on, you know, people wearing crosses. Right. Like years ago when I was starting to nuance and progress, like I'd wear my cross and it's like, whoa. You know, and then all our hauling comes out. It's like, we don't, we don't wear crosses. And it's like. But then you go down to BYU and every girl down there is wearing a cross.

Mark Driscoll: Who Gets to Define Mormonism?

Guest 2 [02:19:37] Right.

Beau Oyler [02:19:37] Because they're progressive. And so if I put on my evangelical hat, I'm like, ooh, no, no, no, no, no, no. You always differentiated yourself by saying, we were wrong. You don't come in and start bringing in rock and celebration and crosses and worship and crosses and talking about Jesus all. You don't talk about Jesus all the time. Your testimony is, I know the church is true. I know Jesus Smith's a true prophet. I know the Book of Mormon is the most correct book on the earth. And who else was that other guy? Oh, never mind. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen. Like, that's the testimony that I grew up with. And so if I'm. If I'm evangelical, I'm kind of going like, wait a second. You stop moving in on my turf. And we're seeing the pushback.

Jana Spangler [02:20:17] Yeah. Well, you can see Driscoll mentioned he didn't like the rebranding of the church name, as if he didn't know that's been our church name from the beginning.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:20:24] Yeah, that was pretty ignorant for someone who's just written a book about Mormonism.

Jana Spangler [02:20:29] A little bit.

Beau Oyler [02:20:29] Well, ignorant or intentional.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:20:32] Okay, gotcha. Yeah, could do that.

Beau Oyler [02:20:34] He's misguiding the members of his congregation.

Guest 4 [02:20:36] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:20:37] And I agree with him. Mormons believe in a different Jesus.

Jana Spangler [02:20:41] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:20:41] Like, he's right about that. And so I get. I went to an evangelical Christian school growing up, and. And it. It is different. Like, it's not the same. But then there's the question. Who gets to define what I am for me.

Jana Spangler [02:20:57] Right.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:20:57] Or who gets to define whether you're a Christian or not? Like, do other people or do I get to define that? And he wants to define it for Mormons, which I don't think is fair.

Jana Spangler [02:21:07] All of the different sects want to define God and I, which I.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:21:11] But they can't define me. They can define God how they want me.

Jana Spangler [02:21:14] What I am going to be the ultimate hubris for anyone to think that they can define whatever God is.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:21:19] Yeah. Yeah, that's true.

John Dehlin [02:21:21] And I'll just say all of that diatribe that I heard from Mark Driscoll is warmed over stuff that I. I started hearing in the early 80s, and the movie the God Makers came out. Yeah, no, that's new. And, you know, I was told as a young LDS kid in Katy, Texas, in a predominantly Baptist town, that I wasn't Christian. And even today, as someone excommunicated by the church, that many people Think hates the church. I'll say. I really dislike it when people claim Mormons aren't Christian. I think I. Let me go on record and some of my evangelical or Christian listeners won't like this, but I dislike it when people claim Mormons aren't Christian. I believe that Mormons, if anyone, deserves to be called Christians. I think Mormons deserve that as much as Catholics or Protestants or anyone else. I think Mormons are generally kind, loving people who worship Jesus as their savior. By the way, they do view Jesus as a creator. That's just a fact. Like, Driscoll was wrong there. Yes, he was created by his father, God, but he also co. Participated in the creation or he actually maybe even led the creation.

Guest 2 [02:22:35] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [02:22:35] He had stewardship over it and then brought Michael in.

John Dehlin [02:22:38] Yeah. So. But I. But I just think it's. It's just so distasteful and ugly. And I think Mormons are, on average, great people and we should stop saying they're not Christian. That's my opinion.

Jana Spangler [02:22:49] Yeah. Agree.

John Dehlin [02:22:50] Y' all agree?

Jana Spangler [02:22:50] Yes.

John Dehlin [02:22:51] Everyone agree. Mormons are Christian on this panel.

Mormons: You're Not a Christian

Julie Deza Hanks [02:22:54] And I also agree that we have extra books. We have, like, what he's. A lot of what he said is actually accurate, but I don't think I agree with you. It doesn't disqualify you from being Christian.

Guest 2 [02:23:05] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:23:05] In my view, if you say Jesus is your savior, you believe that he died and is resurrected. You believe in the Bible and his teachings. And most importantly, if you live things like kindness and love and charity and service and forgiveness and love your enemies and serve the poor and you.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:23:23] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:23:24] Call yourself a Christian. You're a freaking Christian.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:23:26] Well, I think what he means is you don't fit my definition of Christian.

Jana Spangler [02:23:29] That's right.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:23:30] You're. You define it differently, which is accurate. Yeah.

Beau Oyler [02:23:33] Right, Right. And to some degree, we are that, like, insecure teenager in the back going, oh, pick me, pick me. I want to be one of you.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:23:40] I'm on the popular crowd.

Beau Oyler [02:23:41] Yeah. Like, we'll spend hundreds of millions of dollars to rebrand so that we can be part of you. And, like, they're never going to be. We're never going to be part of that form of Christianity.

Jana Spangler [02:23:50] Yeah. It's just this human. I don't know, it's this desire to have boundary maintenance. This is what I am. You don't get to be part of me. I'm going to draw my circles small. And. And again, if I'm going to be empathetic, I can. I mean, I can understand if you really Believe. You have to believe in a certain kind of Jesus to be saved. You know, he said it there. If you love your Mormon neighbor, you're going to let them know how wrong they are. I mean, how often do I hear this, actually, in LDS circles as well? I love my neighbors, so I, I, you know, I'm just trying to give them a chance at the right thing. You know, we all kind of do this.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:24:27] Yeah, yeah.

Jana Spangler [02:24:27] And so it's like, yeah, you can be coming from a very good place and, and do a lot of damage to each other with this kind of thinking.

John Dehlin [02:24:35] I think Jesus said, by their fruits, you shall know them.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:24:39] Well, I want to give the LDS Church credit that we, we don't go after other religions. Right.

John Dehlin [02:24:46] Like, anymore

Jana Spangler [02:24:51] abominable church at one point

Julie Deza Hanks [02:24:52] that was named, but actively preaching against. I mean, yeah, it's in scripture. I, I, Okay, I stand correct.

John Dehlin [02:24:59] Well, the Mormon Church used to call the Catholic Church, ironically, the great abominable.

Guest 4 [02:25:05] Yeah, yeah.

John Dehlin [02:25:05] But anyway, sorry, interrupted.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:25:06] But in modern.

John Dehlin [02:25:09] Yes.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:25:09] We don't spend time putting, like, the general conference this weekend. No one's talking about how wrong the evangelicals are. Nobody's talking about how wrong, you know, other sects are.

John Dehlin [02:25:23] And y' all are too. Y' all may be too young to remember this or to have ever witnessed it, but in the old temple ceremony when I first went through, there was literally an evangelical pastor.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:25:32] I remember, I was there.

John Dehlin [02:25:34] And, and he represents evil. These kind of like, it's almost like in the old temple ceremony, a Christian minister is like the voice of Satan.

Guest 2 [02:25:44] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:25:44] In an earlier version of the temple ceremony, and to the church's credit, they took that out in 1990 and stopped demonizing other Christian traditions as part of its temple ceremony. And the church stopped publishing Mormon doctrine, which was one of the main purveyors of this idea that the Catholic Church is a great abominable church. So that to the church's credit, it's improved. We should give it credit for that.

Jana Spangler [02:26:07] Absolutely. And I, I think I've seen in the last couple of decades big moves toward interfaith. Like, yeah, you know, we want to, we want to be with our Christian brothers and sisters and to lift everybody

Julie Deza Hanks [02:26:19] up, even if they don't want to be with us.

Jana Spangler [02:26:22] Even if they don't want to be with us.

Beau Oyler [02:26:23] But many do. I mean, when I was bishop of Walnut Creek 2nd Ward, I would invite other evangelical ministers to come in and teach our Sunday school class. Now, handbook wise, that's not allowed.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:26:34] I want you to be handbook wise.

Beau Oyler [02:26:38] That's not allowed. And some people did have an issue with it, but by and large, like, people loved having ministers come and teach. And then they would invite me to come and teach at their, you know, school or churches or whatever. And so we would. Right. And. And gosh, it was just never a bad experience. But it takes some degree of humility of even, you know, the concept that, like, I could learn something from them.

John Dehlin [02:27:00] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [02:27:01] Wow. And then you have to be rogue enough and confident enough as a bishop to be like, yeah, I think this is what's right for my people. And then do it.

John Dehlin [02:27:10] Yep. All right. And. And to bring it back to Driscoll a little bit, take aside what we've already played. His. His rhetoric online takes a really dark turn. So let's turn to that now. And I don't know if Steven Pinegar deserves credit for. For harvesting some of these screenshots, but Steven Pinegar is a never Mormon YouTuber who does a great job calling out evangelical Christians who spew hate or misinformation about the Mormons. So shout out to our friend Stephen Pineaker. Check out his YouTube channel, Mormon Book Review. These clips may come from him or they may come elsewhere.

Mark Driscoll Suggests Burning the Book of Mormon During His

Beau Oyler [02:27:50] And he's a Christian. He's an avid.

John Dehlin [02:27:52] He's absolutely an evangelical Christian. But here's some clips that have been highlighted. This is. So there's an original tweet from a channel called Patriot Takes that says, pro Trump pastor Mark Driscoll suggests burning the Book of Mormon during his flamethrower giveaway. And so it's literally got, like, pictures of flamethrowers and then associating that with the Book of Mormon. And then it's got a tweet from Mark Driscoll saying, Text Flame to 99383. So literally, Mark Driscoll is encouraging people to torch and take flamethrowers to the Book of Mormon. Like, I don't know. That's. That's starting to seem hateful.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:28:34] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:28:35] And I think if we're going to talk about anti. I know I've never encouraged the burning of a Book of Mormon. Like, of course not. I think that's starting to cross into anti. Potentially anti Mormon. Absolutely.

Jana Spangler [02:28:46] Yes.

Beau Oyler [02:28:47] Right.

John Dehlin [02:28:48] Is that. Is that going too far to say that? I don't know. Let's go ahead and. And go on. And. And I think this is a clip from Mark Driscoll actually on the Charlie Kirk Show.

Guest 3 [02:28:59] So let's play that Charlie Kirk was answering a question when he was shot. Do you know what the question was? It was about Transgender shooters. Charlie didn't get to answer that question. I'll answer that question. All of this is demonic. When you can't find a physical cause, look for a spiritual cause. When you hate someone that has never met you or said or done anything particularly focused on you to the degree that you will murder them, cause their wife to be a widow and their children to be fatherless, the question is why? Why?

Guest [02:29:56] Why?

Guest 3 [02:29:57] And I would say demon. Demon. Demon. Our world doesn't understand the unseen realm. Our world doesn't understand the spiritual. The dsm, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Health Disorders, mentions the human soul zero times. It doesn't believe in God, doesn't believe in demons. It doesn't believe in the soul by faith. We understand what we discuss.

John Dehlin [02:30:28] I just saw an eye roll from you, Julie.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:30:32] There's so much to eye roll in that. So the irony is he is. He's demonizing transgender people while vilifying the shooter for. For, like, the violence against Charlie. I mean, he's. He's doing what he claimed the shooter did to Charlie. Like, why do you hate someone you don't know? And he. Why did he. Right.

John Dehlin [02:31:01] Yeah, but how could the DSM mention gods and demons?

Julie Deza Hanks [02:31:05] The DSM doesn't have a belief system like.

Guest [02:31:08] Like, it's.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:31:08] It's not a person. Right.

John Dehlin [02:31:10] It's a bunch of scientists that are trying to get mental health standards.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:31:13] It's not. It's not a religion.

Guest 4 [02:31:16] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:31:17] I love when people say, I don't believe in therapy. I'm like, you don't have to believe in it. It's not a religion. It's not like, yeah, the. The soul. Yeah. Because that's not what it's measuring. Right.

Jana Spangler [02:31:29] It's totally different.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:31:31] There's so many eye rolls in that.

John Dehlin [02:31:33] And then just to kind of close out this idea, he tweets somewhere else. Pastor Mark Driscoll, the assassin was a Mormon. This is not the same as Christianity. It is a demonic cult. Mormonism. Jesus is no closer to the Christ of the Bible than Islam's Jesus is. He also tweets, there will be zero Mormons in heaven. He's basically saying he knows more than God, I guess, or knows as much as God, because now he's going to determine that there'll be zero Mormons in Heaven. It is a demonic cult. A literal demon is on the top of every morning Mormon building. So now the angel Moroni is a demon. And then he goes on to. Basically, he's got a picture on a tweet of the Book of Mormon. Doctrine of Covenants of Pearl of great price. And he writes public servants announcement. This brand of toilet paper doubles as a doorstop. So he's basically saying use the Book of Mormon scripture, use the Mormon Church's canonized scripture as either toilet paper or as a doorstop. And it's so disrespectful.

"This isn't anti-Mormon," says one person

Julie Deza Hanks [02:32:43] Like it's just so disrespectful of any religion.

Beau Oyler [02:32:45] I mean, that's anti. Fill in the blank. Right? That's anti Mormon. Anti any religion. When you start speaking human beliefs that way.

Jana Spangler [02:32:51] Yeah, absolutely. It's hateful.

Guest [02:32:52] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [02:32:53] It's not Christianity.

Beau Oyler [02:32:54] Yeah. And the interesting thing is that people from in the church who call us or others who are post Mormon or more progressive Mormon, anti Mormons, it's because we're pointing back to the unhealthy aspects of the church. That's not what he's doing.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:33:12] Right.

Beau Oyler [02:33:12] This is not constructive whatsoever.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:33:14] Right, right.

John Dehlin [02:33:17] Yeah, yeah, it's, it's really bad. And again, I hate the term anti Mormon as much as anybody, but he marks wanting me to apply it to him, the way he's talking. So one thing that I loved from the believing Mormon apologist community is the response. Part of the response. I think his name is Greg Matson from Quick Cwiac, the Quick Show. They're really upset and they're not blaming Jeremy Runnels or me or Alyssa Grenfell or Nemo or Zelf on the Shelf or whoever. They're actually identifying what I think is more accurate form of hate inspiring anti Mormonism. So let's go ahead and play that clip from Greg Matson of Quiz.

Believing Mormon Apologists Blame Mark Driscoll for the

Guest [02:34:08] You can believe that we're not saved, fine, that's okay. But to go out and start calling people demonic and part of a cult and satanic and you know you're all going to hell and that these are the focuses of an identity as Latter Day Saints for, for others, that's a problem. And regurgitating lie after lie after lie is a problem. We don't do that to you. Do you see us going out and, and, and preaching on at the pulpit against other denominations? We don't do that. We have a difference in belief too. But I, I want to go over a few of these examples because this rhetoric, this indoctrination, it's indoctrination to, to especially to fringe members of that group that may not be stable is, is a problem. And that's what, this is. What results Michigan is what is a result of that indoctrination and vitriolic hatred and rhetoric. Whenever you dehumanize others and that's where a lot of this rhetoric goes, then you are giving license to people to be violent.

Beau Oyler [02:35:44] Yeah, I agree. Greg, you'll think I agree with him. I think that his position of like peddling lies, maybe not. I think 90% of what he's saying is true. From a, you know, Mormons believe this. We, we don't like that the way he's saying it. But, but I, I think that what he's saying. I totally agree with Greg.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:36:05] Like, yeah, I do too.

John Dehlin [02:36:09] I think he's closer. And I guess again without saying that it's even Mark Driscoll's in any way responsibility for the Michigan shootings. When you hear what is reported to be the types of language that the shooter or the killer in Michigan was saying, it was this language about Mormons being demonic, being satanic and having the wrong type of Jesus. Those are the types of quotes that are reported to be attributed with the Michigan killer. And I'm not saying Mark, Mark Driscoll is in any responsible for murders.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:36:49] Right?

Jana Spangler [02:36:49] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:36:50] But I am going to say that ex Mormon or sorry, believing Mormon apologists who have blamed Alyssa Grenfell and myself and and other ex Mormon creators as to be responsible for those murders. They were grossly irresponsible and wrong.

Beau Oyler [02:37:10] Yeah, agreed. And that's the infighting that we see.

Jana Spangler [02:37:13] And I guess it's a spectrum. This is a spectrum of how our speech lands in the world. Right. I mean there, there are other western democracies that actually outlaw hate speech. We in the US have decided not to legalize that. We, we want, we do more, we want more of the free speech. So we do allow people to spew hate. And there's, I'm not going to say that there's no know that, you know, you're not contributing. Do I think he's personally responsible? No. And again, I don't think one person is personally responsible. And we need to look at the way that we are inviting dehumanization. Do I think that if I dehumanize someone, it's going to make someone dehumanize them? No, we are. Our speech doesn't have that kind of power. I think humans way overestimate the power that we have with our opinions of changing minds. But I do think that for unstable people who are already doing this, can some that. Can speech like that fuel a problem? Sure, sure. But you know, I, who knows how much culpability any one person has in this?

Beau Oyler [02:38:29] Yep.

Jana Spangler [02:38:30] I, I just don't think you can you can point the finger in that way? I would just hope that when things like this happen, and it doesn't seem to be landing with, with Mark Driscoll because of the way he's acted since this happened this week. But, you know, I hope it invites us all to say, huh, I wonder how I'm contributing to the dehumanization of people who think differently than me.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:38:53] Yeah,

John Dehlin [02:38:56] yeah. And I'll say I'm, I'm trying to do that. And that's partly why we created this concept of Mormon bridge building. I, I would love to have a healthy, constructive conversation on the Internet with Cardan Ellis or a Kwaku or a Jacob Hansen or Greg Matson or Richard Bushman or Terrell Givens or whomever, Patrick Mason and many of those people. I've had a Mormon stories before, but the only one, you know, hesitation I have is I want to talk to people who are committed to kindness, who are committed to evidence and, and facts and true, you know, accurate information and that are going to operate in good faith and not turn around and smear and slander me after I've platformed them.

Mormon Stories: We Need More Bridge Building

Beau Oyler [02:39:47] Yeah. Because so often they'll come on and then they'll use that. They'll cut things and edit things to use it to slander you.

Guest 2 [02:39:52] Right.

Beau Oyler [02:39:53] They're coming on to actually get content that they know that they're, you know, their audience is just going to salivate over.

John Dehlin [02:40:00] Yeah. And I, I think I could, you know, I know I've received death threats. I've received death threats this week. I'm not the only person. I know other ex Mormon creators have as well. And if we're going to be talking about rhetoric that incites violence, I think it could just as easily be argued that the rhetoric that Mormon apologists are using to characterize ex Mormon content creators could very well incite violence.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:40:30] Group has absolutely said violent things toward me. Nothing. I, I mean, yeah, not death threat specifically, but it's pretty, it's pretty frightening. In the name of, in the name of Christ. Right. Like defending the faith, then using violent terminology and memes and it's awful.

John Dehlin [02:40:49] I had a commenter just in response to the Charlie Kirk thing. To me say they shot the wrong guy.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:40:57] Are you serious?

John Dehlin [02:40:58] And he used his own real name.

Jana Spangler [02:41:00] Wow.

John Dehlin [02:41:00] Right. So, you know, but, but Jen, I like your call that we all need to do reflection, and I am willing to think about how do we turn down the temperature. I hope that even Carden or Kwaku or Jacob or Greg or whomever will Watch this episode, maybe consider it, and feel like we've tried very hard to be fair, tried hard to be compassionate and to be balanced and to be conciliatory in bridge building. I hope that that's the case. And if you're one of those guys or anyone else who. Jasmine Rapalai, whoever, we would love to have bridge building conversations with believing Mormons and with Mormon apologists to have more light and less heat. I think that's. I think we're all in agreement.

Beau Oyler [02:41:58] Yeah. I mean, could we abandon the whole idea that having enemies increases viewership? Could we move past that?

John Dehlin [02:42:05] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'll admit that, like, I could do an episode on, quote, Joseph Smith's the pedophile, and I'm just picking that as a harmful thing I could do. That would be inaccurate and I could have 10 times the viewership right now. But this is me saying less of that, more bridge building, even if it means Mormon stories going to get less revenue. Mormon stories is going to get less viewership, less subscribers. At this point, I don't care about the money anymore. The subscribers, the growth, growth. I, and I've been talking to Margi about this and my board. I'm interested in pivoting more towards peacemaking and bridge building, and that's the direction I'm hoping to take. Mormon stories. It doesn't mean we'll never talk about truth claims, we'll never talk about history, we'll never talk about concerns with the church. But that's where my heart is. And I just wanted to make that clear really quickly. There's one last clip we have with Greg Matson that I'm going to play again. This is quick.

Greg Matson on Campus Radicalization: It's Not Academic Activity

Guest 3 [02:43:04] What we discover as the information rolls out is that at some point in recent years, this young man got radicalized.

Guest [02:43:14] That is correct. He got radicalized. Right. He's indoctrinated into the religion of academia, into identity politics. And with that, that rhetoric and that religion, that religion, he becomes hateful. Right. It's a religion of hate. It's a religion of identity. It's a religion of othering groups until you, to the point of dehumanizing them. Right, let's keep going.

Guest 3 [02:43:45] So they're tracing his online footprint. Where did he get radicalized? And they say we can't find the cause. Well, maybe colleges are radicalizing people in murderous leftist ideology. That's an interesting question to pose. Are colleges, some classes and professors doing the same thing as jihadists here?

Guest [02:44:08] We're all radicalizing an entire generation here, Mark.

Guest 3 [02:44:13] In addition this man was a Mormon growing up. It was his youth pastor, along with his father, who encouraged him to turn himself in. Mormonism is a demonic cult.

Guest [02:44:28] There you go. Now look at what he's doing. Look at the hypocrisy here. Look at the hypocrisy that this pastor is bringing to his audience. I'm going to other the Latter Day Saints. I am going to put identity politics into place with a theological backbone and I'm going to dehumanize the Latter Day Saint.

John Dehlin [02:44:53] All right. I saw a lot of shaking heads there.

Jana Spangler [02:44:59] I mean, I mean, he's calling out the hypocrisy without noticing his own hypocrisy blind spots. Yeah, it's like we are.

John Dehlin [02:45:08] What do you mean? What do you mean?

Jana Spangler [02:45:09] I mean, we are fine demonizing the thing we don't agree with. So it's fine to now blame the academia, even if we, we have no idea. I mean, Tyler Robinson, as a, as an aside, did one semester of college.

John Dehlin [02:45:27] Well, you know, I think he was at like Utah Tech or Southern Utah. He did, he was training to be an elect. No, he did USU first semester and then he went south and has been studying to be an electrician, one of the technical knowledge.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:45:41] It's not academia.

John Dehlin [02:45:43] Right, that's right. It's a tech college.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:45:44] Right.

Jana Spangler [02:45:45] Okay.

John Dehlin [02:45:45] But anyway, I don't mean to be pedantic.

Jana Spangler [02:45:47] No, no, it's, that's, it's good and I can be corrected for sure. But I, I just, I think that it's. He's fine because he's picked his enemies.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:45:57] He's picked the leftist.

Jana Spangler [02:45:58] It's academia. They're. They're the other.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:46:01] I agree with that. Othering. But don't other me. Don't other me and other them if we agree.

Jana Spangler [02:46:06] And how human is this? We all tend to do this. Like, I will pile on just like you said, John. Like, oh, this guy has right wing. This might be right wing. I'm far more quick to jump on to that right. Because I am more horrified by the far right than I am the far left.

John Dehlin [02:46:24] You know, because Democrats wanted the killers to be Republicans or maga.

Jana Spangler [02:46:30] Right, Absolutely, of course. And we're all just happy to have any narrative that isn't me.

Guest 2 [02:46:35] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [02:46:36] And we all do it.

Guest 2 [02:46:37] Right.

Beau Oyler [02:46:37] It's almost like instinctual, where it's like, oh, no, it's them and here's why. And then the other side's not always them and there's why.

Jana Spangler [02:46:42] Absolutely. So. So I just thought it was interesting. I agree with him. That this is hateful speech and. And what Mark Driscoll is doing all of that. But I just wanted to note how quickly he jumped to, oh, I totally with you. Totally with you now that you're demonizing the thing. I demonize? Yes.

Beau Oyler [02:47:03] Then the second he turns it to him, it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:47:06] But it was so. It was so immediate and so blatant. So there was such a lack of awareness of like, yeah, yeah, let's other them. Yes, we're on the thing. What Psychic. Don't other me. You know, it was just like.

John Dehlin [02:47:19] And. And just to try and be good faith. Could Ward Radio or Greg Matson say that now we're othering Matson and quick for his. You know what I mean?

Julie Deza Hanks [02:47:30] No, we're just pointing out his othering. I'm not saying he's a horrible person. I'm not saying he's caused anything. I'm not.

Trump on Dehumanizing the Other

Jana Spangler [02:47:35] I'm not saying he should be deplatformed. I'm not saying, you know, I just.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:47:40] Isn't that interesting that we can't see ourselves?

Jana Spangler [02:47:43] It's an example.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:47:44] You.

Jana Spangler [02:47:45] It.

Guest 4 [02:47:45] He.

Jana Spangler [02:47:46] It's an example of a great person.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:47:48] He's. You know, we're not. There's nothing personal.

Jana Spangler [02:47:50] Absolutely. We agreed with the last clip, right?

Julie Deza Hanks [02:47:52] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:47:52] So we're not calling him demonic, right?

Jana Spangler [02:47:55] Absolutely. We're just saying this is interesting. We're just showing how there can be hypocrisy.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:48:01] And it's all of us.

Jana Spangler [02:48:03] It's all of us. It's all of us. I do it. I jump on my team's bandwagon.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:48:08] Right.

Jana Spangler [02:48:08] It feels really, really good to do that.

Guest 2 [02:48:10] Yeah.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:48:11] We like being right.

Jana Spangler [02:48:12] Of course we do.

Guest 2 [02:48:14] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:48:15] So the takeaway.

Guest 3 [02:48:16] What are the.

John Dehlin [02:48:16] What are some takeaways from all of this? You know, I think one takeaway I'm hearing is we've got to stop dehumanizing the other side.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:48:27] Anyone?

Jana Spangler [02:48:29] Yes. And I think we. What? I. I want to make clear that I'm not saying people shouldn't have teams. I think when I start talking in this belt down way, people think of that. I think we shouldn't have teams. I. I'm actually fine with anyone having the opinions that they do. I am fine with, you know, if people want to critique what we're saying here, I am fine with that. Please. It makes me better when I hear people's critiques. So I think it's fine to have teams. But let's be aware. Let's be aware of what that is doing. To us what bias that is bringing and particularly what harm we are doing with our own rhetoric. For me, I just think that I've got to be really careful when I call out hypocrisy, because I probably am doing some of it myself. Right. I just think we need to be open and teachable to all of this so that we can have strong, different opinions. But it doesn't lead to violence. It doesn't have to lead to violence. And part of that is all of us doing the work of getting to the point where we can be criticized. I actually think it's a huge takeaway. I don't think you get violence if people can take in criticism and difference of opinion and be like, huh, you know, I wonder what's here. I wonder what I can leave behind. I don't really agree with this part, but thank you for bringing some things to my awareness. Doesn't mean I have to take it all in. But I think we've got to learn how to be able to. To roll with people having different opinions and not good opinions of what we say.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:50:16] I think that requires a sense of self that a lot of people haven't invested in developing in order to tolerate negative input.

Jana Spangler [02:50:25] That's right.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:50:26] That takes some groundwork.

Jana Spangler [02:50:29] It does.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:50:30] That most people don't even know exists or are willing to do.

Jana Spangler [02:50:35] Absolutely. It's. It's difficult to do.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:50:37] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [02:50:38] And. And when we don't have that sense of self, our identity comes from the groups we're part of. And so we're really susceptible. Yeah, we're really susceptible. If someone goes after my group, they're going after me.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:50:47] Well, I think we get into trouble when we start ranking the groups. Like, I think everybody's on the same playing field. It's when we start ranking our groups better, yours is less than this group groups down here. That's where we get the dehumanization and. And the division. Like everybody's part of different groups. But it's when we think that our group is better or right or true or the only or those kind of

Beau Oyler [02:51:15] things, and we all slip into it.

Jana Spangler [02:51:17] Absolutely.

Christians on the Righteous Way

Beau Oyler [02:51:18] One of my core values is curiosity over certitude. And almost everybody other than the. The evangelical minister, pretty much everybody that we showed today, I listen to, I follow, I watch their. Their content because I'm curious. I want to know. I want to. I want a blend of all, you know, all the inputs. And I think that we could do better as a community if we had a broader blend of inputs, trying to

Julie Deza Hanks [02:51:47] be curious and perspective Take instead of looking for validation of our correctness.

Jana Spangler [02:51:54] Yeah, absolutely. And it's. It's a. It's a practice of giving dignity, that if I were raised with this person's DNA, with their. The way they situate in the world, with their teachers, with their parents, with their experiences, I would likely be saying the same things they do.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:52:12] People make sense when you. If there's someone I don't understand, I will make up a backstory that makes them make sense because it helps me be more compassionate. It's like, well, they probably had a. Really. Probably lost a loved one and they probably have. They're going through a really hard time right now, so that's why they're being this way, you know?

Jana Spangler [02:52:30] Absolutely.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:52:31] It helps because it helps me be more compassionate.

Jana Spangler [02:52:33] Yeah, right. I mean, we. We all try to make sense of other people. You know, we all go through our lives trying to make sense of. Well, that doesn't make sense. What. And, and I think it's something to look at. Are we assuming that what makes them different is evil? Or are we assuming that it's just their life and their experience?

Beau Oyler [02:52:52] And a great video on that is. It's like an eight minute video on YouTube if you just search. What is Water? An amazing, amazing video of a graduation speech that was turned into infographics and video. I love it.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:53:06] So great.

Beau Oyler [02:53:06] I've taught it in elders quorum multiple times. I've taught it in seminary. I've taught it at work. My family. What is water? And it's just, you know, at the end, like, go watch it. It's worth your eight minutes. It's empathy. And I struggle with that. Like, I tend to just, you know, reflex, not demonize so much, but to put people or comments in a certain way.

Jana Spangler [02:53:28] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [02:53:29] I think we can all benefit from empathy.

Jana Spangler [02:53:32] Well, just notice how empathy in all of us shuts down when we're on the defensive.

Beau Oyler [02:53:37] Totally.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:53:37] Right.

Jana Spangler [02:53:38] And that we are on the defense of less when we have a more solid sense of self. To your point, Julie?

Julie Deza Hanks [02:53:43] Well, and I think a gift of being a coach and a therapist is that that is what we get to do every day, is perspective. Take. Develop empathy. And I'm not saying I'm good at it, but I get a lot of practice is what I'm saying.

Jana Spangler [02:53:56] I'm good at it in the office. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, I don't take that everywhere I go. I'm human. I have a controlled environment in my office.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:54:04] I think that is a gift, is that we get to practice that all the Time as perspective. Take, be curious and develop empathy and feel with people.

Jana Spangler [02:54:14] Absolutely. Because I mean there are people of all different ideas and ideologies who have come to. To talk to me.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:54:20] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [02:54:21] And yeah, that's what I do in my office all the time is giving this person the dignity of their experience. And I try to bring that with me and I fail because I get. I become on the defensive quite easily, especially when people come after me. I don't do well.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:54:38] Yeah. I don't think anybody does.

Jana Spangler [02:54:40] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [02:54:40] That's why I'm so excited to do this Mormon bridge builders group with you because I get to sit and learn from you and learn how to do this and see this in action.

John Dehlin [02:54:52] Love it. Thank you for everyone's comments. The final reflection I have, you know, is this is tricky to kind of tease out because there's a world. I tried to express my best faith empathy for online Mormon apologists that they just feel that they're something they love is being attacked and people that they love are being hurt in their view by ex Mormons and so they want to defend it. An attack back. That's my best faith interpretation of what's going on. My worst faith interpretation of what's going on is that it's just dirty pool. It's just like let's take a really horrific thing that's happened and associate it with ex Mormon content creators and hopefully violent things will happen to them.

Don't Judge Ex-Mormons

Guest 2 [02:55:48] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:55:49] As a result.

Beau Oyler [02:55:50] Or at least my friends and family will see how evil John de Lynn is.

John Dehlin [02:55:54] Yeah.

Beau Oyler [02:55:54] Right. Yeah, exactly.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:55:57] Yeah.

John Dehlin [02:55:58] And I am not saying that that's what I think is in the heart of Jacob Hansen Cardinalis Kwaku, you know, Mark Greg Matson, whatever. I'm not saying that. I'm not alleging it. I'm. I don't believe you could ever really know someone's heart. So let's. So I love the call number one, that we all do our best to stop trying to judge people's motives. Let's try and have thoughtful evidence based, respectful dialogue across bridges. I think we can. I think when you know someone, it's really more difficult to demonize than otherize them. One, the closer you get to them, the more you talk to them. Y if the conversation is respectful, the harder it is. So this is a call for bridge building. This is a call to stop judging. We need to stop at people's motives. Other we're calling other people to consider stopping it as well. I am going to try and be more reflective about rhetoric that I use on Mormon stories. To talk about truth claims and history and the harm that the church might do. I want to do better. Call me out when I violate that. Let's try and do more bridge building and let's see if we over the next year or two or five can change the dialogue fundamentally where instead of it being ex Mormons, quote anti Mormons and, and apologists, never really talking with or to each other and potentially throwing grenades at each other, what if in five years from now we've pivoted Mormon or LDS discourse towards more thoughtful, respective, compassionate, kind, direct dialogue?

Julie Deza Hanks [02:57:58] Love it.

Jana Spangler [02:58:00] That's the, the big barrier I see to all of that is that a lot of these Mormon apologists get in trouble if they even have discussions with people who are ex Mormon or progressive. Too progressive or personal risk. It is a personal risk to them. And so I just want to acknowledge that I, I bet there are a lot of people who are Mormon apologists who would engage if they felt safe to do so, if they didn't think their positions would be threatened and their reputations would be threatened. I think it's a real problem.

John Dehlin [02:58:31] Yeah, that's real. Julie, I'll never forget when you did retreats with me very early on I would have you help out with some mixed faith marriage retreats. I thought what would be better if we've got 20 mixed faith marriage couples to have John de Lynn as one of the Therapists or psychology PhDs at Julie Hanks believer, faithful Mormon as the other co leader of the mixed faith marriage group. And I was always just so impressed that 10, 15 years ago you were willing to be associated with me as a very faithful, committed Latter Day Saint.

Julie Deza Hanks [02:59:12] Well, I just don't think in those terms. I do not think like active like it's Mormon. If you have a Mormon background, you're my people. Like I don't care where you are. And so I've just never, that's never made sense to me the camps because that's not how I experience people. And so anyway I've, it was such a great experience working with you and yeah. And then people did you like, oh, she's a colleague of John de Lin. You know, I'm like, yeah. And you don't associate with anyone who's been excommunicated professional. You know what I mean? It was just, it's so ridiculous.

Jana Spangler [02:59:51] And this is, this is the soup that we're in. But I will just say as an aside, I have talked to people who attended some of your retreats together and lds, very believing LDS people were Just dismayed at how amazingly open you were, John, to their side and empathetic. And they were so surprised. Just to the point of all of this. Like, I think it's so easy to hear what you do and to villainize and say you're anti Mormon. Right. But when I talk to people who have actually engaged you in your retreats and your coaching and other things, they have felt very respected, by the way.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:00:36] Yeah, I was very impressed with that too. I remember you saying, you know, the, the ex Mormons of, of the couple were like, well, what if my kids stay in the church? And I remember you saying, there are worse things than your kid being a Mormon. You know, like, it's not a bad thing. And I just thought that was really, really great that you, you always have seen the value in it as well. And so thanks for that.

John Dehlin [03:01:02] Thank you. And Janet, you were an early participant in those retreats as well. So that all for you too. Yeah. And just to close, like, part of that is my training. It's why I got my PhD in psychology, to learn the ethics of not taking sides when you're supporting people. But honestly, what it really comes down to is I love Mormons and I love my Mormon heritage. I consider myself a Mormon. I love the church. I'm grateful for its influence in my life and in the world. I want it to be its best self and I want Latter Day Saints to have the best experience in the church. And I only want goodness in and out of the LDS Church. That's it's sincere. I'm not anti Mormon. I'm pro Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I'm pro members of the Church of Jesus Christ Latter Day Saints in my heart. And I think everybody on this panel is.

Jana Spangler [03:02:01] Yeah, absolutely. I always say that I have the best job in the world because I get to work with people who maybe they're still part of it, but at least were raised or spent time within the Mormon Church. And they are the best people. I work with the best people. I just love them.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:02:18] Yeah, My favorite people on the planet have been raised lds. So.

John Dehlin [03:02:24] So wait, are we saying Mormons are better than everyone else? Is that we're so much.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:02:27] No, I'm just saying.

John Dehlin [03:02:30] Are we dehumanizing? No, we're not people who were never raised.

On Charlie Kirk and the Michigan Shooting

Julie Deza Hanks [03:02:34] Can I have a preference, John?

Jana Spangler [03:02:35] Trust me, I have. I have a number of, of clients who are never Mormon and I love them.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:02:40] I love them too.

Jana Spangler [03:02:41] They are. No, for sure. They're. They're not bad people. I'm not saying that at all.

John Dehlin [03:02:45] I'm just like, I have a gay friend.

Beau Oyler [03:02:46] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:02:49] I have a never. I'm kidding.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:02:50] I'm totally busted.

Jana Spangler [03:02:51] No, I'm not. I'm not trying to say that.

John Dehlin [03:02:53] I know. I'm kidding. I'm teasing.

Jana Spangler [03:02:55] But what I am saying is that there are. There are really. I don't know, there's something that happens when you are engaged and it would, it would happen with any. Doesn't have to be Mormonism.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:03:09] That's our.

John Dehlin [03:03:10] Our.

Jana Spangler [03:03:10] That's. That's my reference. That's who I see. Right. Mostly. But there is something really beautiful that happens when you are raised in a place that is. That is thinking about values and thinking about how to be better people in the world. And I. That's the best part of Mormonism to me.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:03:28] And trying to be like Jesus.

Jana Spangler [03:03:29] Yes, it's great. And there are a lot of places to do that, by the way. And there are a lot of places to do that outside of religion. I'm not saying it's better.

John Dehlin [03:03:38] Well, we didn't quite make an hour to hour and a half, but we made three, which is better than three hour five. Right.

Jana Spangler [03:03:46] Trending in a better jersey each episode.

John Dehlin [03:03:50] And I'll just say in our defense, this is some delicate stuff. Charlie Kirk, the Michigan stuff, apologetics, anti Mormon label. We took on some heavy lifting and I'm proud of us.

Beau Oyler [03:04:03] Yeah, for sure.

John Dehlin [03:04:04] Yeah. So thank you.

Beau Oyler [03:04:06] There are hot topics and I think that we treaded lightly but still brought meaningful discussion to it. And just my heart goes out to all of the families affected by the shooting and catastrophe. It's just horrific in. In Michigan. And so, yeah, just love going to those families.

John Dehlin [03:04:22] Yes, agreed. And all of the people that love and appreciate Charlie Kirk and the shooter of Charlie Kirk. Right. And the families of families of the Michigan. Yeah, all of it. Yeah. Yep. All right, well, Julie Diazebedo, Hanks, Bo Euler, Janice Bangler, thanks for being a part of Mormon bridge building. Should we, should we try this again?

Bridge Building: Please Email us

Julie Deza Hanks [03:04:48] Let's do it again.

Jana Spangler [03:04:49] Yeah, I'm in.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:04:50] Sounds good.

John Dehlin [03:04:50] And viewers and listeners, if you like what we did today, please comment. Please email us. Let us know, because I think we're going to do it no matter what. But we would love.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:05:01] We'd love you to validate us, but

Beau Oyler [03:05:03] also we'd love to know what topics you'd like us to discuss. What do you want us to cover? We've got 50 topics that we've already brainstormed on and like, we're very open to. What do you want us to cover?

Jana Spangler [03:05:13] Absolutely. What topics have you heard that you're just. You've only heard from one place or another and you would like to hear something, you know, that, that incorporates all of it.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:05:25] Yeah.

John Dehlin [03:05:26] And if you are a thoughtful, believing Latter Day Saint, social media influencer or not, and you want to sometimes be on a panel or be a part of this discussion, wouldn't be great if

Julie Deza Hanks [03:05:41] we could have, you know, it would be so great.

John Dehlin [03:05:43] I mean, Jenna, you're still, you know, a member of the church and you still attend from time to time occasionally.

Jana Spangler [03:05:53] Like I've been, I've been more online. I, I zoom in.

John Dehlin [03:05:57] Yeah.

Jana Spangler [03:05:58] More than I don't.

John Dehlin [03:05:59] Yeah. Yeah. Well, in addition to Jenna, we would love to have other voices as it makes sense. So please reach out to us. Our only rules are kindness, evidence based, fact based, discuss the desire to listen, a desire to give ground and to try and find common ground in the spirit of bridge building, you know, and not to turn around and demean or smear later. You know that. That's it. Anything else that we'd add.

Julie Deza Hanks [03:06:35] Thank you.

Mormon Stories: Thanks to You!

John Dehlin [03:06:36] All right. All right. So thanks again, y'. All. Thanks for joining us today on Mormon Stories. Thanks to Julia who helped gather all this content. Thanks to Brooklyn, who does the post production, our board, and thanks to all the donors. We could not do this without our donors. So thanks to everyone who donates to Mormon Stories in the Open Stories Foundation. We couldn't do it without you. Be good to each other. Be kind to each other. Give us your feedback@mormonstoriesgmail.com or in the comments. Subscribe, like, share all the stuff and we'll see you all again soon on another episode of Mormon Stories podcast. And on the next episode of Mormon Bridge Builders. Take care, everybody.