Friday, October 6, 2017

I don't believe...

Let me make this real simple and clear,
I don't believe...
  • That God would send an angel with a drawn sword to threaten a 37 yr old man (Joseph Smith) to threaten a 14 yr old girl (Helen Kimball) with his death if she didn't marry him, and promise heaven to her whole family if she did. 
  • That God would have his prophet (Joseph Smith at 38 yrs old) send a widower (John Walker) away from his children, and then marry his now foster daughter (Lucy Walker at 17 yrs old) and give her only 24 hours of intense pressure to decide if she wants to reject "heaven's blessings"
  • That God would have his prophet (Joseph Smith) marry 11 women already married to other men.
  • That God would have his prophet (Joseph Smith) lie his entire life about being married to 34 women.
  • That God would have his prophet (Joseph Smith) marry 34 women and not tell his wife about most of them.
  • That God would have his gospel written in a book (Book of Mormon) that through rationally looking at the evidence makes the book look clearly like a fraud.
  • That God would have his prophet claim to translate Kinderhook plates and have it discovered a fraud.
  • That God would have his prophet claim to translate papyri into the Book of Abraham to have it proven totally incorrect.
  • That God would allow his prophets to teach racism and white supremacy as part of his gospel for 130 years.
  • That God would have his prophet teach blood-atonement as official true doctrine only to have later prophets declare it as false doctrine.
  • That God would have his prophet teach Adam-God as official true doctrine only to have later prophets declare it as false doctrine.
  • That secret handshakes are required to get into heaven.
  • That secret code words are required to get into heaven.
  • That a loving God would threaten us in the sacred temple with gory threats of violence. Slitting our throats, ripping out our tongue, slicing open our bowels, and our breasts be torn open if we told anyone the secret words or handshakes.
  • That we will have less freedom in heaven than we have on earth to be with the ones we love.
  • That there is anything someone could do in life to justify an eternal punishment.
  • That God would want us to trust elusive feelings that contradict our clear rational thinking, feelings that tell nearly all people to believe different things as his truth.
  • That God would erase all archaeological evidence of the one civilization that preserved his truth.
  • That God would have his prophets teach for 100+ years the ancestry of the American Indians to have it be proven false by DNA science.
  • That a loving God would leave his children alone without any guidance for 1800 years.
  • That Jesus would kill all the men, women, and children of the Canaanites and Amalekites, and every man woman and child in the cities of Zarahemla, Moroni, Moronihah, Gilgal, Onihah, Mocum, Jeruselem, Gadiandi, Gadiomnah, Jacob, Gimgimmno, Jacobugath, Laman, Josh, Gad, and Kishkumen.
  • That God would kill children if their parents didn't put blood on the doorway.
  • That God would curse a people and their children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren and beyond with "dark skin" so that they were "loathsome"
  • That God would create people (homosexuals) who should not have any romantic or sexual fulfillment in life. 
  • That God would have his prophet appoint a rapist (Joseph Bishop) to lead his Missionary Training program and allow that man to take sister missionaries down to a secret room in the basement and sexually assault them.
It's fine if you want to believe in a God that would do those things, 
but I don't.

link to another who could not believe this either