The LDS church "Pulls a Brad"

When Anne and I were first married, I worked for my uncle’s laundry equipment company in the parts department.

We occasionally played pranks on each other and one time I got a nice big frosted donut in my face on my birthday. Anyway, one day while working there the service coordinator, Brad, came in to work limping. Apparently he and his friends had gone out clay pigeon shooting and had brought along a .22 pistol with a holster to play “Quick-Draw McGraw.” When it was Brad’s turn, the pigeon was launched, and he reached down to draw the gun but accidentally pulled the trigger. The bullet grazed his leg in both the thigh and the calf, and landed on the top of his foot. Luckily it hit his shoe in a spot where several pieces of leather overlap, and it stopped the bullet. We had a good laugh about it, and from that point forward, anytime we could use the phrase, “Shooting ourselves in the foot,” we instead called it, “Pulling a Brad.”

Why do I bring this up? Besides being a funny anecdote, it’s a good analogy for what the LDS church is doing this week by going after its own members: John Dehlin, Kate Kelly, and Rock Waterman.

John Dehlin is what is known as a “New Order Mormon,” (NOM) in that he chooses the parts of the LDS faith that he likes to follow and rejects others, sometimes known as a “cafeteria Mormon.” As part of his Ph.D., he conducted a survey of 3,000 former members of the church on why they left. It’s an excellent video that refutes the ideas that people leave because they are lazy, want to sin, or were offended by someone.


He likes the church for the sense of spirituality, community, service, and friendship and stays for those reasons while rejecting some of the claims, such as “the one and only true church” and other claims. He has a website called Stay LDS that is like a safety net for those who suddenly discover the church isn’t what it claims to be. In essence, he says that if it’s going to cause divorce (which it often does for those not lucky to have a spouse who investigates the issues with the church) or other problems with your occupation, family, or neighborhood, that perhaps you can keep going to church and become a NOM to keep the peace and avoid conflict.


He also runs the website Mormon Stories podcast website where people get to talk about their experiences of being LDS, and in some cases, how their life has been since leaving the church. There are probably untold thousands who stay because of these reasons, and his website and suggestions definitely help. But I suspect that in the wake of his impending discipline, those thousands will leave with him. Being a priesthood holder, he has to be disciplined by the stake high council, which is comprised of 12 HC members and the Stake Presidency (15 men).

Listen to KUTV Channel 2’s interview with him here.

Kate Kelly is a true believing member (TBM) of the church who is the founder of the Ordain Women (OW) movement. They have organized several events demonstrating to the leaders of the church that they would like to have a hand in the leadership and direction of the church alongside the men. Basically what they are asking Monson to do is go into the Holy of Holies and ASK if it’s the Lord’s will to give the priesthood to women. You know, kinda like what Emma asked Joseph to do and thus the Word of Wisdom was born?

[Full disclosure: While I appreciate wanting to run a women’s organization without needing to be overseen by a man (bishop/SP) and wanting to take an active role in church leadership, I think it’s kinda contrary to totally believe in the church and its apostolic succession claims while thinking that they can “change god’s mind” about this issue. But that’s not the point here.]

All the First Presidency would have to do is announce that they did, in fact, talk with god and he said “no” and the OW would be over and done with. Instead, they are holding a “Court of Love” which is really a church discipline court to send a message to everyone else who is a member of the OW group. As it turns out, since she is a woman, she can be excommunicated by her local bishopric (4 men). They have also decided to hold the court in her “home ward” in Virginia even though she’s more or less moved to Utah. So she won’t even be present during the proceedings.

You can see some of her reaction here. 

As it turns out, even her parents got into a little bit of hot water for supporting her.


There is a third member who was issued a church court summons, but for some reason his is not making headlines like John and Kate.

Alan Rock Waterman is a blogger and a deep believer of the church. He loves the restoration, and the gospel as restored by Joseph Smith. His position can be summed up by saying that he takes what was revealed and restored by Joseph Smith is absolutely true, but the church has slowly moved away from it. He has many, well thought out articles dealing with how today’s LDS church doesn’t resemble the one Joseph Smith started almost 200 years ago. These topics include how today’s church is more like a corporation than a church, the original definition of tithing, and the City Creek mall. His articles are kinda lengthy, but absolutely worth reading, be you a TBM or disaffected member. He encourages people to do their homework and find out what the Lord originally meant when he revealed things to Joseph Smith and follow that.

[The Denver Snuffer issue is another similar case where someone was excommunicated back in September of 2013. I won’t go into details, but you can read Rock Waterman’s explanation of what happened.]

On the day that these three were informed that they were being considered for church discipline, the church issued a press release that any kind of discipline is originated by the local congregations. Doesn't that seem kinda fishy? That 3 prominent members who are advocating people to think for themselves are all given church discipline notices on the SAME day (one in Utah, one in Virginia, and one in California) that the church says that it’s not coordinated from the top down?

This is starting to reek of the September Six, where members were excommunicated for being “feminist and intellectual,” all in the same month.

[This is in reference to when Boyd Packer said, “The dangers I speak of come from the gay-lesbian movement, the feminist movement (both of which are relatively new), and the ever-present challenge from the so-called scholars or intellectuals.” Read the whole talk here.]

There’s even a hypothesis going around (though it has no evidence to support it) that Boyd Packer is behind the discipline of these three, since he appears to have injected himself into at least one of the September Six’s excommunication according to reports by Steve Benson (Ezra Taft Benson’s grandson) in an interview with Dallin Oaks and Neal Maxwell.

CORRECTION: Apparently it originated from Russell Ballard

To contrast, these three are being called to church courts, while Cliven Bundy is still a member in good standing. One suggested that the brethren to take a question to God, and the other suggested, "Africans were better off as slaves."

Go figure, huh?

In an unrelated story, the church is also going after one of its own members for copyright issues, not disciplinary issues.

It makes one wonder why they don’t go after exmormon.org, Mormon Expressions, and other websites that use the word ‘mormon’ without the church’s “authorization.” My guess is that it’s because the copyright issue won’t hold up in court, and they’re only going after people they know will “bow their heads and say ‘yes’”.

Taken all together, the church is once again proving itself to be an authoritarian, anti-intellectual, bullying organization. How much longer until Joanna Brooks and others are in a similar boat? (UPDATE: it's bigger than I originally thought) I think they've taken a page from the Galactic Empire's playbook.

I’ll end with this quote from Joseph Smith:

“I never thought it was right to call up a man and try him because he erred in doctrine, it looks too much like Methodism and not like Latter-day Saintism.  Methodists have creeds which a man must believe or be kicked out of their church. I want the liberty of believing as I please, it feels so good not to be trammeled.”

                    – Joseph Smith Jr., The Essential Joseph Smith, Ch. 37



(Written by Joseph)