Rationalization and Other Made-Up Stuff

Recently, I watched an old favorite film, Back to the Future. I listened to the commentary this time through, learning in the process what is perhaps not really all-that-secret of a Hollywood secret: Filmmakers make up a lot of stuff.

One of the filmmakers said that when it comes to science fiction movie plots, there's always a bit of actual science thrown in with a lot of made-up stuff. The flux capacitor, for example, is (gasp!) made-up science.

It can go the same way with religion. Throwing in a bit of actual doctrine together with made-up stuff comes in the form of rationalization.

In one of my favorite talks of the latest general conference, Elder Neil L. Andersen spoke on this topic:

"In today's world, the question 'What is truth?' can be painfully complex to the secular mind. ...

"Caught in today's confusion, it is no wonder that so many consign themselves to the words spoken 2,500 years ago by Protagoras to the young Socrates: 'What is true for you,' he said, 'is true for you, and what is true for me, is true for me.'"

This reminds me of one of the phrase "I'm just living my truth," which you see a lot in social media and in the culture right now. The thing is, there is no such thing as "your" truth. There is the truth, which exists independent of your opinion, and then there is your opinion, and the two do not always meet.

John Adams said: "The truth is always the truth, in spite of our feelings."

Elder Andersen continues:

"In opposition to the truths of eternity, there always have been counterfeits to distract God's children from the truth. The arguments of the adversary are always the same. Listen to these, voiced 2,000 years ago:

"'[You] cannot know of things [you] do not see. ... [Whatever a person does is] no crime.'

"'[God is not blessing you, but] every [person] prosper[s] according to his [own] genius.' (Alma 30:15, 17)

"'It is not reasonable that such a being as ... Christ ... [would] be the Son of God.' (Helaman 16:18)

"'[What you believe is a foolish tradition and a] derangement of your [mind].'" (Alma 30:14, 23, 27)

I am troubled as I see a great deal of this type of rationalization among friends and acquaintances on social media. I've observed multiple friends, including returned missionaries and otherwise faithful Church members most of their lives, let doubts fester and faith decay to the point they leave the Church.

My heart hurts for them. Like Nephi, I am "grieved for the hardness of their hearts" (1 Nephi 7:8). I am saddened for the loss of covenants that would bless their lives and their families' lives in exchange for a road fueled by rationalization that leads only also to anger, bitterness, and cynicism.

In a January CES fireside address, Elder Dale G. Renlund of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles spoke on the snowballing of doubt:

"'Doubt, unless changed into inquiry from reliable, trustworthy sources, has no value or worth. The stagnant doubter, one content with himself, unwilling to make the appropriate effort, to pay the price of divine discovery, inevitably reaches unbelief and darkness. His doubts grow like poisonous mushrooms in the dim shadows of his mental and spiritual chambers. At last, blind like the mole in his burrow, he usually substitutes ridicule for reason, indolence for labor, and becomes a lazy scholar. Doubt is not wrong unless it becomes an end in and of itself. That doubt which feeds and grows upon itself, and breeds more doubt, is evil."

This is not to say that it is wrong to have questions or doubts about doctrine or events in Church history. Everyone does at some point. But if you feed the beast, as the old saying goes, it will come to you every time it's hungry.

Whenever I have a doubt or a question, I think of the many, many times I felt the Spirit burn and testify of the truth of the Restored Church, the Book of Mormon, and other important issues. That knowledge is crucial as I study out issues and work them out through study, prayer, and pondering.

In the same fireside, Sister Ruth Renlund said:

"The blogosphere cannot replace scripture study and reading the words of living prophets and apostles. Foster your faith by going to trustworthy sources to find answers to your questions."

Yes, I realize the irony of sharing that quote in a blog post.

Sister Becky Craven, second counselor in the Young Women general presidency, also spoke on rationalization at general conference:

"Because of our mortal nature, don't we sometimes rationalize our behavior, at time referring to our actions as being in the gray, or mixing good with something that's not so good? Anytime we say, 'however,' 'except,' or 'but' when it applies to following the counsel of our prophet leaders or living the gospel carefully, we are in fact saying, 'That counsel does not apply to me.' We can rationalize all we want, but the fact is, there is not a right way to do the wrong thing!"

In an April 2016 general conference talk, Elder Dallin H. Oaks said that a lot of the rationalization so prevalent in our day not only comes from those who have left but also from those still within the Church:

"The Church in its divine mission and we in our personal lives seem to face increasing opposition today. Perhaps as the Church grows in strength and we members grow in faith and obedience, Satan increases the strength of his opposition so we will continue to have 'opposition in all things.'

"Some of this opposition even comes from Church members. Some who use personal reasoning or wisdom to resist prophetic direction give themselves a label borrowed from elected bodies---'the loyal opposition.'

"[T]he Book of Mormon describes three methods the devil will use in the last days. First, he will 'rage in the hearts of the children of men, and stir them up to anger against that which is good' (2 Nephi 28:20). Second, he will 'pacify, and lull [members] away into carnal security,' saying 'Zion prospereth, all is well' (verse 21). Third, he will tell us 'there is no hell; and ... I am no devil, for there is none' (verse 22), and therefore there is no right and wrong. Because of this opposition, we are warned not to be 'at ease in Zion!' (verse 24)."

It's a day in which the mobs "(teach) for doctrines the commandments of men" (Matthew 15:9). I'm grateful for the gospel and also for the living prophets, seers, and revelators, who help us to see "things as they really are, and ... things as they really will be" (Jacob 4:7).

"Churches Which Are Built Up, and Not unto the Lord"

As I mentioned in a post last week, I've been reading the Book of Mormon again. And, in the process, I'm finding some pretty great things.

In chapter 2 Nephi 28:3, Nephi prophesies about the things he writes coming forth in a day in which there would be "churches which are built up, and not unto the Lord" (emphasis added). These churches would spread "false and vain and foolish doctrines" (2 Nephi 28:9). A few chapters after this, Nephi laments, "I am left to mourn because of the unbelief, and the wickedness, and the ignorance, and the stiffneckedness of men; for they will not search knowledge, nor understand great knowledge, when it is given to them in plainness, even as plain as word can be" (2 Nephi 32:7).

I feel Nephi's pain. I look around at a world that has built up churches "not unto the Lord" everywhere; churches to science; churches that champion the natural man rather than the humble disciple, where personal responsibility and consequences are shirked; and even churches that worship celebrities, sports, and other hobbies or schools of thought. I've found that even those who claim to be agnostic or atheist are, for the most part, still religious about other ideas or things.

No, there is nothing wrong with most hobbies and sports. There's nothing bad about science in and of itself, either. It was by far my least-favorite subject in school, but I got no beef with medicine that cures illnesses of both the body and the mind, or a trip to the planetarium to look up at the stars, and learning about other wonders scientific minds have discovered. The problem, I believe, is when we, like Billy Joel once said, "go to extremes."

I cringe, for example, when I see so-called "science" (cough gender is now supposedly "fluid" and is determined not by chromosomes but is on an ever-evolving spectrum on, didn't you know? cough) making new "discoveries" that surpass basic common sense and that, worst of all, confuse and befuddle the children of God about what their true identities and possibilities are.


As G. K. Chesterton taught: "Unfortunately science is only splendid when it is science. When science becomes religion it becomes superstition."

I did a little fact-checking on Twitter to provide an example of celebrity worship, and I learned that the ever-fascinating mind of Kim Kardashian, to name one of our (sarcasm alert) most fascinating modern thinkers, is followed by more than 52 million people. By contrast, only two million people follow the members of the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles combined.

It's a strange, bewildering time we live in. Yes, we have a lot of work to do, collectively, to spread the hopeful, wonderful message that the gospel carries with it. Nevertheless, the Lord has shown us the way so that we may see the truth through the lies and learn to discern "things as they really are" (Jacob 4:13).

Through my latest elders quorum teaching assignment a couple of weeks ago, I came across these powerful words from President Gordon B. Hinckley:

"Of course we believe in the cultivation of the mind, but the intellect is not the only source of knowledge. There is a promise, given under the inspiration from the Almighty, set forth in these beautiful words: 'God shall give unto you knowledge by his Holy Spirit, yea, by the unspeakable gift of the Holy Ghost." (D&C 121:26.)

"The humanists who criticize the Lord's work, the so-called intellectualists who demean, speak only from ignorance of spiritual manifestation. They have not heard the voice of the Spirit. They have not heard it because they have not sought after it and prepared themselves to be worthy of it. Then, supposing that knowledge comes only of reasoning and of the workings of the mind, they deny that which comes by the power of the Holy Ghost.

"The things of God are understood by the Spirit of God. That Spirit is real. To those who have experienced its workings, the knowledge so gained is as real as that which is acquired through the operation of the five senses. I testify of this. . . .

"Let us not be trapped by the sophistry of the world, which for the most part is negative and which so often bears sour fruit."

Did You Hear about Pluto? That's Messed Up!

Whenever the subject of science comes up, the first thing I usually think of is the word science being said, or rather yelled, whether in my head or out loud, just like that one guy in the '80s new wave song "She Blinded Me with Science" by Thomas Dolby:

"SCIENCE!"

Like many other things that happened in the '80s, you had to be there.

Speaking of science, it was, by far, my weakest subject in school. Life Science gave us the chance to dissect earthworms and frogs, which should have been cool in theory but instead let me know I am nauseated by the smell of formaldehyde, as well as earthworm/frog insides. Things didn't get much easier in earth science and Biology, and by the time I took chemistry in the 11th grade, I was downright befuddled by half of the stuff I read and/or was tested on.

The thing is, though, as little as I understand about science, I sometimes feel like some scientists honestly don't understand much more about it than I do.

A couple of days ago, I came across an article online with the headline:

“Everything We Know about the Big Bang Could Be Wrong”

Sarcasm alert: And here I had put so much stock into the Big Bang. My day was ruined for about one-eighth of a second, and then I kept on scrolling.

I think also of the planet Pluto, formerly the non-planet Pluto, which had previously been a planet the first time I learned about it when I was an elementary school kid growing up in the '80s.

Like I said, you had to be there in the '80s, or it just wouldn't make much sense.

I don't say any of this to bring on an onslaught of "Oh yeah, well science gave us this and science gave us that, and here's a Snopes article on this thing, you nimrod, and science cured polio, blah blah blah." If science is "all that" to you and your world, then I say, congratulations. Science has done some great things, to be sure. It has, indeed, cured diseases and helped us understand a lot about how people and animals and things work, and made inventions, and I'm not disputing any of that.

It is not, however, an exact science. So to speak. There seems to be a lot of guesswork involved in which a best guess is simply accepted as fact. In another decade, Pluto could be reclassified an asteroid, or a comet, or a giant, floating space paperweight, or the result of a bowel movement shot into space by Jabba the Hutt thousands of years ago.

My recurring thought is simply this: I'm glad that real, powerful, everlasting truth does not change. By definition, it never has, never does, and never will. It is not altered nor modified when people change their minds, because it comes from God. And I'm grateful I know the places I can go to find it.

The Ever-Changing Narrative

Have you noticed how the narrative is changing, and it is changing very subtly?

In the early days of the same-sex marriage debate, proponents of SSM used to argue that "if you don't want gay marriage, then don't get one" or "who people choose to love is none of your business," and also that "it doesn't affect you."

With SSM now spreading across the country—albeit mostly through judicial fiat and not the voice of the people—these advocates are no longer saying these things. They want more, and they want you to be forced to accept their point-of-view.

I loved today's press conference given by Elders Christofferson, Holland, and Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, along with Sister Marriott of the Young Women General Presidency, calling for nondiscrimination laws for all while also emphasizing the importance of maintaining religious freedom.

"Accusations of bigotry toward people simply because they are motivated by their religious faith and conscience have a chilling effect on freedom of speech and public debate," Elder Oaks said. "When religious people are publicly intimidated, retaliated against, forced from employment or made to suffer personal loss because they have raised their voice in the public square, donated to a cause or participated in an election, our democracy is the loser. Such tactics are every bit as wrong as denying access to employment, housing or public services because of race or gender."

Sadly, the reaction from many of the naysayers to this press conference was predictable, and it shows that their narrative is indeed changing.

A New York Times editorial written in response to the press conference argued that the Church was merely seeking "legal permission to use their religion as an excuse to discriminate." Another Facebook post proclaimed, "I'm for liberty, but I don't see why church owned businesses shouldn't play by the same rules as everyone else."

In other words: That whole claim that SSM "doesn't affect you"? We didn't really mean that. It fit into our narrative for what we wanted at the time, but not now. We are not content anymore to say that it doesn't affect you, because we are going to make sure it affects you, like it or not. It's not enough that SSM is fast becoming legal across the 50 States (and, let's admit, inevitably will be legal in all 50 once the Supreme Court, in all of its wisdom, gets done with the issue this June); we will force you not only to participate in same-sex weddings whether you want to or not, neener neener, you hateful, bigoted, ignorant, knuckle-dragging prudes who cling to your religion and guns.

It's a disappointing because it's a view that is both dishonest and, ironically, demands tolerance while not showing tolerance in return. It is also, as I said, predictable.

The same old rhetoric keeps on pouring forth, and I suppose it will for the foreseeable future. "You can't force your religious beliefs on other people, blah blah blah." Very true; you can't. Yet these are the same people who, ironically, believe that you can, by contrast, in the so-called name of equal treatment, force private business owners who do not agree with SSM to bake cakes, provide flowers, officiate weddings, etc. for SSM ceremonies, or otherwise they will face fines, jail time, loss of business, public flogging, etc.

It all seems to be about revenge and/or retaliation rather than equality, doesn't it?

Unbelievable.

In addition, I'm saddened to see self-proclaimed temple recommend-holding, faithful members of the Church openly criticize what three Apostles said today. As Elder Lynn G. Robbins said at the last general conference, "Thinking one can please God and at the same time condone the disobedience of men isn't neutrality but duplicity, or being two-faced or trying to 'serve two masters.'"

I feel "grieved because of the hardness of their hearts, and also, because of the things which I had seen, and knew they must unavoidably come to pass because of the great wickedness of the children of men" (1 Nephi 15:4).

At the same time, I feel immensely grateful to belong to a church that doesn't budge on the eternal truths of God's Plan of Happiness in the face of critics, detractors, and the ever-changing tide of popular opinion. The straight and narrow can appear to be very narrow at times, but it remains the only way nonetheless.

"Your Focus Determines Your Reality"

Say what you what you will about the Star Wars prequels (aka Episodes I, II, and III), because it's probably already been said—Jar Jar Binks jokes and all of that. One of the few good things about them, hopefully one that most Star Wars nerds can agree on, however, was Liam Neeson's role as Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn in The Phantom Menace.

In one of the few poignant moments of Episode I, Qui-Gon counsels young Anakin Skywalker by giving him this sage advice: "Your focus determines your reality."

Isn't it interesting how this statement applies in our own lives? The question that follows, in my mind, then, is: What is your focus on?

Yes, I ended that last sentence with a preposition; but that's not the point.

What are you focused on? And further: Is it possible to focus on things that are inconsequential, unnecessary, or even false and to then, therefore, make them your "reality"?

The answer is: "Yes."

*Sound of me stepping up onto my soapbox

Take the situation, for example, that has enfolded over the past several months in the town of Ferguson, Missouri. I don't want to go too much into detail because, well, it's a situation that has captured the entire nation's attention. We've all heard different versions of the story. At the same time, there are some very strong feelings about what happened and who was or wasn't charged for murder in the death of 18-year-old Michael Brown.

I recently watched a group of pundits discuss this issue and heard them analyze the claim by some that Brown made a "Hands up, don't shoot!" gesture before being fatally shot. Members of the St. Louis Rams football team made this gesture on the football field in an NFL game. It has been referenced in a number of other situations, as well. Sadly, there seems to be a ridiculous idea being promoted by some that police officers are bigoted, vile racists, randomly gunning down minorities because they carry guns and because they can get away with it.

Well, here's the problem with the "Hands up, don't shoot!" claim: It's patently, totally false.

The evidence presented to prosecutors and to the grand jury overwhelmingly showed that there were powder burns on Brown's arms and injuries to the police officer, proving that Brown was reaching for the police officer's gun when it went off and that he (Brown) was the aggressor. The officer clearly acted in self-defense. Multiple witnesses support this story, which was dishonestly and purposefully distorted by the some of the media and others with evils and designs in their hearts.

No matter how you look at it, it's tragic. An 18-year-old young man, with his entire life ahead of him, lost his life. Even so, a bigger tragedy would have been unfairly convicting a police officer who was simply doing his job and was acting in self-defense. Brown’s poor choices, including using drugs, robbing a convenience store, and attacking a police officer, led to his death.

I don't want to dwell on it any more than has already been done, because I'm honestly tired of the issue being dragged out on the news each night. Suffice me to say, once again, that "your focus determines your reality." In other words, what you choose to believe—whether or not it's based in reality or on the facts or even common sense—then becomes your reality.

*Sound of me getting back down from my soapbox*

One of the most important scriptures for our time, I believe, is found in the New Testament:

"For in those days there shall also arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders, insomuch, that, if possible, they shall deceive the very elect, who are the elect according to the covenant."
 -Joseph Smith—Matthew 1:22

Focus on the truth. Determine your reality by building your reality around the truth. Believe whatever you wish to believe, but don't be deceived by false prophets and by lies, because they come in many forms: the media, politicians, rationalization, relativism, political correctness, apathy, and gossip.

The truth will set you free.