[screenshot at latterdayquestions] New subreddit aims to take a crack at questions leading to faith crisis. Oh, boy! Will McConkie, Kimball, and Benson make an appearance, or are their tomes out of fashion?

Do you mean that the contents of L. Tom Perry's briefcase are finally going to see the light of day? Billy Preston said it best, "Nothing from nothing leaves nothing. You gotta have something if you want to be with me."

The Swedish Rescue happened in 2010, and Hans Mattson went public with his dissatisfaction with the answers on tap in 2013, link. When people attempt to piece together their shattered faith, they're asked to defend the indefensible. They have to look the other way at Smith's lechery and accept some pure and noble reason for the threats against his wife, canonized in D&C 132. Are the faithful down for the full program, or can apologists present it in a way that is adequately diluted that although distasteful, is not a deal breaker for them? Mattson was one who had the courage to say Smith was wrong to be sneaking around behind his wife's back and bedding the housemaids, the wives and daughters of his friends. If Smith's movement could stand on its merits, then that would be one thing. However, Smith's lechery is simply a pointer to the fraud in total.

LDS apologists do not have a single question to deal with. There are hundreds, but the key points for me,

1. The Book of Mormon is not as claimed to be. It is both fraudulent and racist. It contains anachronisms and plagiarisms, including ideas from Hunt's The Late War being rearranged into the Book of Ether. The errors from the KJV 1769 version are a major flaw and anachronism.

2. The Book of Abraham is not as claimed to be. It is not a translation of some ancient documents that have fallen into our hands from the catacombs of Egypt. Smith had his followers by the short hairs and could say anything and they would simply believe him.

3. The Kinderhook Plates were designed to test whether Smith could tell if he was being tricked. He called them genuine. The subsequent leaders of the church also called them genuine, indicating that no deity was whispering facts into their ears. Their pretense that they do talk to god seems to be completely without foundation.

No amount of apologetics can overcome the facts. Those who stick with mormonism despite knowing about the hundreds of problems may be doing so for lots of reasons, including wanting to belong to the social group. Including wanting to keep their job and standing within business networks. Including not wanting to be divorced and thrown to the wolves. The pressure to conform and "make it work" is immense.

I also think this common phrase is something that bears repeating when the faithful want to lock their doors to outside, or critical information,

[Ralph Waldo Emerson] Let me never fall into the vulgar mistake of dreaming that I am persecuted whenever I am contradicted.

If I am wrong about my assessment of Joseph Smith, then I want to know it. Any deity that would present a grifter as leading a "reformation" is wholly incompetent. Occam's Razor says look for the answer requiring the fewest assumptions. The faithful are tasked with looping back around, again and again, in a vain attempt to justify Smith's character flaws and outright lies and deceptions because they have to. If they don't the whole thing comes crashing down in a house of cards.