The classic theological puzzle known as the “problem of evil” arises when we assert the existence of an all-powerful God who is also perfectly loving, while also asserting the presence of genuine evil in the world. As David Hume puts the case: “Either God would remove evil out of this world, and cannot; or He can, and will not; or, He has not the power nor will; or, lastly He has both the power and will. If He has the will, and not the power, this shows weakness, which is contrary to the nature of God. If He has the power, and not the will it is malignity, and this is no less contrary to His nature. If He is neither able nor willing, He is both impotent and malignant, and consequently cannot be God. If he is both willing and able (which alone is consonant to the nature of God), whence comes evil, or why does he not prevent it?”
Very often, as in Hume’s framing above, the focus of efforts to approach the “problem” is on God. Can God? Should God? Is God? Why does/doesn't God? In a departure from this, in this episode the panelists place greater attention on those who are currently, or who have, suffered great evil, and how traditional approaches so often fail them. In many cases, one of the costs of great suffering, especially when it does not arise as a natural consequence of something we did, is the loss of faith in God altogether. More atheists are created by the fact of genuine, massive, and seemingly unfair distribution of great suffering than any other trigger. Clearly, in such cases, an “omni-everything” concept of God fails as a being or power that is able to comfort those who suffer.
In a new book, God Can’t: How to Believe in God and Love after Tragedy, Abuse, and Other Evils, Christian and open-relational theologian Thomas Jay Oord directly faces the effects on individual faith that arise from evil. Through his posing and discussing five theological claims about God's loving nature in relation to evil, many Christians, and we sense Latter-day Saints would as well, have at last found new hope and the kind of comfort and peace that only an explicit faith in God can bring.
Brittney Hartley and Mormon Matters host Dan Wotherspoon join Tom in discussing the ideas of his book, while contributing as they arise various places where Mormon thought is in close alignment with his theses. In the final section, they also discuss one large disconnect between Tom’s and wider Christianity’s view of God and that of Latter-day Saints: the question of whether God is embodied or not. It leads to a fascinating exchange, even as it primes the pump for many more explorations. We are grateful to Tom as an open-hearted, brilliant, and friendly conversation partner. Here’s to more episodes to come!
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This episode features two wonderful teachers, pastors, scholars, and clergy from non-Mormon faith traditions sharing their own spiritual journeys and the ways that God has moved in them throughout their lives and ministries. Neither shies away from sharing about their most difficult moments, the pain and confusion, the depression, and many other lonely and hopeless feelings they experienced along the way. In the process, we discover just how unique but also universal the experience of God-wrestling and faith transitioning/deeping really is. And it is a rich blessing to us as Latter-day Saints to hear these journeys and their reflections with different vocabularies and new ways of describing the things of their lives and spiritual walks.
Following the telling of their stories, Father Tom Roberts, an ordained priest in the Orthodox tradition, and Father Martin Arredondo an ordained priest in the Independent Catholic tradition, join Mormon Matters host Dan Wotherspoon for a discussion of the phenomenon of faith growth and God’s call to us. They share advice that helped them along the way and/or that they share with those who seek them out now to share their confusion and hurt as they go through their own dark nights and times when God seems distant. Most of all, we get to hear again and again from two powerful men doing the work of God as they understand it to be. May we all seek to find and answer our individual callings, as well.
This is an encore presentation of a December 2011 podcast episode examining the Christmas story as it traditionally gets told—looking closely at what the scriptures actually say and do not say about the birth of Christ and all the pieces of this familiar story. For instance, how do the Matthew and Luke accounts differ—even irreconcilably? What are possible motives behind the Gospel writers’ decisions to shape the stories the way they did? What about Jesus’s place of birth and the reason the family was in Bethlehem (if they were)? Was there a great tax and registration? What about “no room at the inn,” the manger, the star, the magi, the story of Herod killing all male infants under two years old? How did Christmas come to be held on December 25th?
In this episode, Mormon Matters host Dan Wotherspoon and panelists Kristine Haglund, Jared Anderson, and Zina Petersen explore all these questions plus lead a fascinating tour into other parts of the Christmas story. Why are only five women mentioned in the Gospels’ presentations of Jesus’s lineage—and why are the ones listed all women with “questionable” sexual pasts? What are the Twelve Days of Christmas? What is the “Immaculate Conception” and how does it affect theology about Mary and ideas about the Eucharist and other religious devotions? How has pagan history and ideas folded into the history of “Christmas” (not Jesus’s birth but the celebration of it)? The panel discusses solstices and equinoxes, the meshing of calendaring systems, the link between carnivals and holy days, shepherds’ presents to the Christ child, and even a longstanding tradition of “ghost story” tie-ins with Christmas that Charles Dickens resurrected. Why was there a period of time in which Christmas was illegal?
The panel also talks about Christmas music and other aesthetic elements that make this season so compelling for so many. Part of that discussion answers how and why the host and panelists and many other Christians throughout history, knowing all that they know about what likely is and is not factual about traditional accounts, still celebrate Christmas and joyfully sing carols alongside those for whom the stories are less complicated. How can those who "know" we are so often during this time dealing in mythos rather than history (not only with the Christian story but also something like Santa Claus) still experience this season as spiritually enriching?
This is an episode not to be missed!
Something wonderful with long-lasting effect on Mormonism began in 1966 with the publication of the inaugural issue of Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. Beginning as a dream brought into reality by five friends at Stanford University, Dialogue went on to become in the days before the Internet “the” go-to source for the best thinking on Mormonism, especially for LDS students and intellectuals who wanted so much to bring their scholarship into conversation with their faith. During its storied career, Dialogue has published many pivotal articles that have helped shape Mormonism, along with providing an early outlet for great writing and art of all sorts, including personal essays, sermons, fiction, poetry, drama, and celebrations of the visual arts.
In this episode, the first of two parts, one of Dialogue’s founders, Frances Lee Menlove, an early Dialogue editor, Robert Rees, and the author of an award-winning series of histories of the journal, Devery Anderson, join Mormon Matters host Dan Wotherspoon to explore Dialogue’s history and impact, its aspirations and how they have and have not been met, some of the key moments in its history and wrestles it faced, as well as assessments of its importance within the LDS community. Dialogue is, in many ways, the foundation upon which today’s podcasting and flourishing online discussions about Mormonism are built. It’s history is compelling, with many ups and downs involving the interplay between church leaders and the journal’s decision makers, as well as its finances and reputation. Ultimately, it is a triumphant story--one we are pleased to begin to share with you in this episode.
Following this episode, we will focus in Part 2 on Dialogue’s present and future.
This episode (in two parts) is a continuation of an earlier discussion of Mercy (episode 332, March 2016) but also very different, focusing this time on “mercy” as it functions for so many as a theological concept rather than the way it should: as something transformative in our spiritual lives. The conversation starts out a bit nerdy, with host Dan Wotherspoon laying out some framings about mercy that he senses are very much in play within Mormonism, but it soon turns into a very approachable and insightful discussion of far more powerful understandings of God and the plan of salvation, and especially the concept of “sin,” than one typically encounters. Joining us again are wonderful scholars, authors, and conversationalists Mat Schmalz, Fiona Givens, and Alonzo Gaskill.
This episode represents very well the wideness of views possible within Mormonism and wider Christianity, in this case Catholicism, as well as their power. If in the past you’ve been turned off by “thin” discussions of religion and the way it is presented, I think this is an episode that could help you reconsider the richness that is present but that only needs a bit of prodding to burst forth.
Are Mormons funny? Do we Mormons have a good sense of humor—in general, or more importantly, when it focuses on ourselves? In introducing Mormonism to those who are outside the faith and attempting to share how the gospel and Mormon life make sense to or motivate its adherents, can a light-hearted, humorous approach be more effective than “earnestness”? In this episode, we bring together three people for whom the answer to this last question is a resounding “yes”! Yet each also recognizes that there are lines—sometimes fuzzy, sometimes very clear—that one must not cross. Often it is informed by fear of losing the good will and respect of the Mormon audience who, let’s face it, will be among the majority of readers even for books about Mormons geared toward outsiders. This audience may be comfortable with finding humor in Mormon culture and its quirks, but possibly will balk as one seeks to examine via humor (and its gifts at providing at times very stark mirrors for things under its gaze) certain practices or teachings. When writing for outsiders (and it’s a good reminder when the Mormon audience will be reading, as well), a humorous approach must watch out for pitfalls such as stereotyping, caricaturing, or not recognizing that a particular view of theirs that might feel like “safe” territory to you doesn’t feel so for them.
A wonderful panel consisting of Latter-day Saints who have written or illustrated wonderful books examining Mormonism through fun approaches—Stephen Carter and Jett Atwood (author and illustrator of the new book, Mormonism for Beginners, as well as two volumes of a Book of Mormon comic book/graphic novel called iPlates) and Jana Riess (co-author of Mormonism for Dummies, and author of The Twible)—examine these and many other questions. How does humor function more effectively than taking a serious, dead-eyed laser approach as an aid in our examining things we sometimes miss because of familiarity, or because we are living within certain patterns of thought, or shells, or structures that we forget are not themselves actually the “real” thing? How important is a humorist’s own feelings toward its subject—affectionate, antagonistic, dismissive—in her or his ability to reach their desired audience—and not just to entertain them but possibly also aid in their shifting certain perspectives? It’s a wonderful conversation that also features their recommendations, along with those of Mormon Matters host Dan Wotherspoon, of favorite examples of Mormon humor done well.
In a wonderful new book, Future Mormon: Essays in Mormon Theology, Adam Miller sets his spirit and intellect loose on the important task of helping clear away debris and suggesting some possible new framings for Mormonism that might appeal to coming generations. As he writes in the Introduction, “Every generation must live its own lives and think its own thoughts and receive its own revelations. And, if Mormonism continues to matter, it will because they, rather than leaving, were willing to be Mormon all over again. Like our grandparents, like our parents, and like us, they will have to rethink the whole tradition, from top to bottom, right from the beginning, and make it their own in order to embody Christ anew in this passing world. To the degree that we can help, our job is to model that work in love and then offer them the tools, the raw materials, and the room to do it themselves.”
In this episode, Adam Miller, Rosalynde Welch, and Jim McLachlan join Mormon Matters host Dan Wotherspoon for a discussion of Future Mormon and various themes in Adam’s thinking. What question that we hear quite often in Mormonism seems too thin to lead us to “load-bearing” answers that can serve us in the midst of “white knuckle” prayers? Is “truth” static, sitting in God’s mind or heart like a vault waiting to be opened and shared, or is the ideal approach to truth something more dynamic, something that calls on us each, in our lives, to “make” true, to see how far a truth can carry us? Are there more powerful ways to think of “grace” beyond its role in the Atonement and questions of our salvation? Have we in Mormonism skipped over some elements that the apostle Paul might claim are essential, Christianity 101 kind of things—and how can these animate our lives in fresh and powerful ways? The discussion moves fast, and at times perhaps might seem a bit too “insider baseball-ish” (as the four panelists talk about things in a book most listeners will not have read), but those moments pass and this is an immensely enjoyable conversation.
Please help continue the conversation at the Mormon Matters website!