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🧔 Jesus and The Church

Estimated time to read: 4 minutes

As I visit with members across the Church, I sometimes hear things like “I don’t support the Church’s policy on (you fill in the blank).” Or “I don’t agree with the way the Church does (this or that).”

Could I suggest an alternative approach? Substitute the word Savior or Lord or Jesus Christ in place of “the Church”—as in “I don’t support the Savior’s policy on (again, you fill in the blank)” or “I don’t agree with the way Jesus Christ does (this or that).”

For me personally, that seems to put a very different perspective on things.

— Why a Church?, Elder Kevin Hamilton, General Authority Seventy, BYU Speech January 24, 2023

 

Because The Savior is not disseminating His policies or dispositions to us common lay people, it’s not 100% clear what Jesus Christ’s opinions or dispositions are. Instead, we’re told that Jesus is revealing those policies to the top leadership of the LDS church. So there isn’t really a meaningful difference by that metric. Problems arise when we entertain the possibility that maybe these nonagenarians don’t actually obtain and disseminate Jesus’ will. What do we do, then? Do we abandon critical thinking and refuse to entertain the idea, or do we abandon critical thinking and simply do as we are told?

This sounds like a thought-stopping technique. "You don’t like what I said over the pulpit? Well, I represent Jesus, so that means you don’t like what Jesus said." Ostensibly, yes, but that extension of logic relies on the belief that this guy actually does represent Jesus.

So how do we know? Well, first we need to interpolate a variety of factors— you must read the Book of Mormon up to and including Moroni 10. If you extrapolate that to address you, today in [current year], next you pray and watch for anything that isn’t bad as a sign of divine favor. Since that non-specific response is indisputable proof, you extend that to mean that Joseph Smith was called of God. Disregard any confusion between Smith’s passing and Brigham Young’s presidency; Nelson is now the prophet of God, which means Hamilton is a “General Authority Seventy,” and since he’s standing at a pulpit at his own church’s university, what he says is true and divinely inspired. Unless he says something that might make the church look bad, then he’s just a regular guy speaking as a man and shouldn’t be taken seriously.

 

Let's assume he is divinely inspired, and put that wisdom to practice: “we need 2 volunteer families to clean the savior on Saturday morning, please!”

As a full-time missionary:

  • Jesus Christ made a rule against giving money to impoverished children.
  • The Savior threatened to not help me find the people who needed his help if I failed to wake up exactly on time.

 

In broader contexts:

  • Jesus Christ repeatedly calls sexual predators to positions of trust and power.
  • Jesus Christ was happy about the results of the Bisee Arizona case. (1, 2)
  • Jesus Christ doesn't want to pay for background checks for people who work with children unless it's a legal requirement.
  • The Savior hires lawyers to protect his good name—even if it ends up hurting people who have already been victimized.

 

Culturally:

  • Jesus Christ thinks women will be the most happy when completely financially dependent on their husbands.
  • The Lord is more upset when people have consensual sex outside of marriage than when a person gets raped by their spouse.
  • Jesus Christ asks me to clean his house for free every Saturday.
  • The Savior of the World is very concerned about what kind of underwear I wear.
  • The Lord threatens to keep my away from my family for the rest of eternity if I drink coffee.
  • Jesus Christ decided to let black people into heaven starting in 1978.
  • Jesus Christ decided that wives don't need to covenant to obey their respective husbands in 2019.
  • The Savior continually says he'll be back soon—just to keep me on my toes.
  • Jesus Christ really doesn't want two loving adults to be allowed to be married if they both have the same kind of genitalia.
  • The Lord lied to the US government for over 20 years so that no one would know how much money he had.
  • The Savior of mankind demands money from impoverished people. Sometimes he called it 'fire insurance.' 1, 2, 3)
  • Jesus Christ has a multi-billion dollar stock portfolio.

Many of these points taken from an /r/exmormon thread

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