On Asking Questions

During the last few weeks, I have reflected on current events with the Latter-day Saint community as well as several private conversations relating to asking questions about the beliefs, policies and history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). Most recent of these events was the release of a statement by the First Presidency (the highest governing body of the LDS Church) on the this subject of asking questions. Here is a segment from that statement:

“We understand that from time to time Church members will have questions about Church doctrine, history, or practice. Members are always free to ask such questions and earnestly seek greater understanding.”

A common idea used online to justify asking questions refers to the number of revelations in the early days of the LDS Church that were received in response to church members asking the prophet Joseph Smith questions. In fact, the very beginning of the Joseph Smith’s calling as a prophet came in response to a question that he asked God. These events suggest to me that asking questions can lead to powerful growth experiences and increased knowledge. Yet, I would be willing to venture that most of us know someone whose faith has been weakened or even destroyed by asking questions. What causes the different outcome? I won’t claim to know the entire reason, but I want to present what I think are some of the principles of asking questions in a way that fosters faith and growth rather than loss of faith and apathy. I should note that as I’m writing this, I am primarily considering the rank and file members of the LDS Church who have received a testimony of the gospel.

The first principle to me is also the most important - ask questions in a way that is consistent with the knowledge that you already have. What exactly do I mean by this? If you have a testimony that Jesus Christ and God are real, it doesn’t make much sense to ask if atheistic interpretations of evolution are the way life came into being. If that example seems a little odd, let me give another. If you have a testimony that the Book of Mormon is from God, it doesn’t make much sense to ask whether Joseph Smith wrote it himself, basing it on the writings of others.

When we ask questions that contradict what we already know, we may be doubting our current testimony and opening the door to loss of faith. Rather, the question to ask is for understanding: How does all the scientific evidence for evolution fit together with my knowledge of God? Given that the Book of Mormon is true, were other writings used by God in bringing about its translation?

I think one of the greatest dangers to testimony is allowing what we do not understand and cannot at present explain to rob us of what we already know. That is really the principle I am getting at here. Do not sacrifice what you know because you cannot explain or understand everything. Let me give you a secular example of this principle. I know that the human immune system can successfully fight off pathogens; I even know a fair amount of the molecular biology behind those immune responses. I do not understand much of the intracellular signaling processes that trigger various parts of that response to occur. However, in asking the question “how do these signaling molecules lead to this outcome?”, I don’t start doubting whether immune responses really happen.

You might argue in response to this that even though I don’t understand those signaling processes, there is some expert out there who does and can explain them fully. Likewise, God is an “expert” and understands the circumstances that are causing us to ask questions and he is capable of explain and answering them fully. Don’t surrender your testimony just because you can’t explain or understand everything. I sometimes refer to this as the Anselm principle: do not seek to understand so that you can believe; believe first to qualify yourself to understand.

Related to this first principle is the second: don’t make your questions into an obsession. There are times when we have a powerful emotional connection to our questions. An example might be, “why weren’t black LDS males allowed to hold the priesthood before 1978?” (Note that a small number did in early church history but the vast majority were not allowed to). For some people, particularly black LDS members, this could be an emotionally loaded question. The problem is that if we allow ourselves to obsess over and become consumed by our questions, we run the risk of disregarding what we already know, the testimony we have already received. I use the example of black men holding the priesthood because so many righteous black men and women courageously held fast to their testimonies of the truth of the gospel, the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith despite the fact that the priesthood and certain temple blessings were not then available to them. They exemplify not obsessing over questions to the overpowering of testimony.

The third principle is chiefly related to questions regarding the moral positions of the Church. A contemporary example might be the Church’s opposition to same-sex marriage. In considering these questions we should remember two things. First, we are influenced by the moral standards of the society in which we are raised. A person who is raised in current American society would hear hundreds of times that same-sex marriage is fair and should be legal and morally accepted. If you hear that enough times, it is hard to not begin to agree with it, or at least accept it even if you don’t espouse it. We don’t naturally want to go against the grain. It appeals to the society-based component of our notion of right and wrong. But when society’s moral judgments are at odds with God’s, it is important to recognize the pull of our social upbringing that may try to sway us away from God’s commandments. Certainly there are positive and good morals that can be taught and reinforced by society, but when society impels us to disagree with Heavenly Father, recognize that it is man’s doing and that humans are fallible, even when well intentioned.

Second, remember Isaiah 55:8-9. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.” There will be times that we genuinely do not understand why the Lord has taken a certain position simply because we are human. I take comfort in knowing that someday that understanding will come, but in the mean time, remember that we are still in the process of becoming what God wants us to be. A math teacher may explain to a student how to add numbers and variables to both sides of an equation, but until they have progressed enough to comprehend the concept of equivalence and the meaning of the equals sign in an equation, the rule may not make much sense to them.

This does not mean we must accept a blanket lack of understanding when it comes to difficult questions concerning our faith. Rather, I hope to have conveyed that in my opinion the greatest obstacle to our gaining answers is maintaining faith and being humble to receive whatever the Lord gives us. I have received personal and clear explanations to some of my questions, and others I've had to accept that I am either not ready for or don't need yet. But I have never found any answers by turning away from Christ that can in any way compare to the answers I have found by turning to Him.

I take full and personal responsibility for what I have written here. You may find the same concepts taught elsewhere but I have tried to develop these ideas without referencing the writings of others in order to be able to claim that they represent my own opinion solely. I also recognize that I have more to learn in this area. This represents my current understanding and illustrates principles that have helped and guided me in harmonizing my testimony with challenging questions.

Strong Reasons

   I've been hesitant to write this post but in the end, issues like this are one of the things I started this blog to address: how my faith and religion interact with the culture I live in. First a little background.
   I've been interested in science since about 10th grade. One of my friends dared me to read "The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston so I did. I stayed up most of the night two nights in a row to finish it. And once I'd read it, I was both terrified and fascinated. After that, I never seriously considered any career outside of science.
   I didn't think much about evolution back then. My opinion was based solely on what I'd heard my dad say, which pretty much was that evolution had never been proven. Armed with that, I left for college at Brigham Young University - Idaho.
   Let me say now that attending BYU-Idaho was one of the best decisions I have ever made. The experiences I had there have had a massive influence on my life. At BYU-Idaho I took my first real science courses. I'd taken a few classes in high school (Biotech with Ms. Gladowski was the best!), but science at college took things to a whole new level.
   And I loved it.
   Now I was really hooked and planned on going to graduate school after finishing my undergrad and spending my life in research.
   Evolution started to come up more and more as I progressed in my studies. I still remember the day when Professor Kelson started our evolution unit by asking us to write down what our beliefs were regarding evolution (remember that BYU-Idaho is run by the LDS Church). He then spent a little time explaining what had been said by the LDS Church concerning evolution and giving us some information to read. I won't try to summarize it all but here is a good resource (the site referenced is a run by a private group of LDS apologetics and is not considered an official source for the beliefs of the LDS Church). This got the wheels in my head turning for the first time but I still wasn't presented with any real challenge. The gist of my belief then was that the Church didn't have an official stance on evolution so no big deal; whatever it turns out to be then, okay.
   A few months after finishing that class, I found myself in Lebanon, Indiana as a full-time, proselyting missionary for the LDS Church. Here is where evolution first became a snag, and in a very interesting way. I was speaking to a teenage and asked him about his religous beliefs. He said that he didn't believe in God, because he has just learned about RNA (I'm guessing that he was probably referring to self-replicating RNAs). Since life started with RNA, he said there was no God.
   I didn't realize this at the time, but I immediately fell into a line of thought that scientists, atheists and many others have been promoting for a long time. The reasoning is this: because there is an explanation for how something happened, God didn't do it and therefore he doesn't exist. Please read that again. Because there is an explanation for how something happened, God didn't do it and therefore he doesn't exist. Another way to say this is that because the origin of life can be (at least theoretically) explained and evolution explains the origin of species, the Jewish/Christian/Muslim God does not exist.
   This premise has defined the evolution versus creationism/intelligent design debate for decades, if not longer. It is almost always implied in any discussion with atheists about God. An example is a former employer of mine that once jokingly said to me, "The immune system is too complicated to have evolved. Creationism must be true." Over and over again, the anti-religion community imply and employ this either/or ultimatum; it is either evolution or God, one or the other.
   Almost as remarkable as the false premise itself is the way the religious community reacts to it. "Well, if it's either evolution or God then it must be God and evolution is 'just a theory'". Rather than attacking the false premise, the religious often simply reject evolution. This is foolish of the religious community, but please note that the anti-religious have created the situation. Blindfolded creationism is just as much a product of the anti-religious scientific community as it is of Christians and other religious traditions.
   There I was, a missionary that was fooled by the false premise. God is real so evolution must be false. Feeling that way worked fine for me while I was a missionary. I even felt I had a little bit of an edge on people because of my science background (modest as it was). But eventually, I finished my two years of missionary service and it was time to go back to school. I transferred to the University of Utah because I wanted to get involved with research.
   I need to make it clear right now that I had a wonderful experience at the U of U. I had several incredible opportunities and worked with several amazing professors. I believe the U is a great school. That being said, it is unfortunate that some of the faculty there feel the need to define themselves and their courses as not a part of the prevailing LDS culture in Utah. I'm not referring to being neutral about religion or the LDS Church; I'm referring to the intentional, subtle, persistent attacks by some of the faculty on religion, morality, the LDS Church specifically and God in general. I'm sure similar things tragically occur at most universities, but that does not make it any more excusable. It has no place in education any more than other forms of discrimination. We would never tolerate a professor making racist comments, veiled or blunt, but for some reason it is acceptable if the subject is religion.
   Being at the U brought near daily attacks to my faith, most of them in the form of the same old "Evolution is true so God is false." This is when things began to be hard. The more I learned about evolution, the more sense it made. There were so many examples. Darwin's finches, HIV, drug-resistant bacteria, freshwater sticklebacks, to name only a very few. The list could go on and on and on and on. But how did this fit with God? I'd already fallen into the false logic of "evolution or God," and things were starting to point pretty heavily at evolution being real. And then I listened to a lecture by Professor Potts. Every possible work around I had left in my head (mostly crazy ideas involving mass scale divinely organized horizontal gene transfer) were pretty much crushed.
  This wasn't just a theoretical problem I played with in my free time. Evolution was a big deal to me now. I was (and am) absolutely convinced that God was real and that I had a personal relationship with him; but evolution was looking more and more like it was real too. The mental stress at times was enormous. How do you reconcile two things that are mutually exclusive? For that is what the discussion was, a war between two ideas that could not coexist.
   Sometime after hearing Professor Potts, I happened to attend a religious class (Institute) on Christianity during the first few hundred years after Christ. That was the stated topic, but the teacher was constantly making comparisons and applications to us in modern times. One particular night, we got onto the subject of evolution. You see, people have been using their understanding of natural phenomenon to "disprove" God for thousands of years. But for the first time that night, I realized that there was nothing mutually exclusive about evolution and God. Sure, the thought had crossed my mind before; but something clicked in me that night. Did I suddenly know exactly how God created the world? No; but I did understand that evolution posed no problem for the existence of God. Suddenly a whole new range of ideas on how Heavenly Father might have worked to create life come to my mind. There were so many possibilities!
   However, as I went back to school and continued to learn more about evolution, it became obvious that some of those possibilities couldn't work. But that is when I learned one of the most important lessons of all that I've had along this journey: failing to understand how God and evolution coexist is more a problem of creativity than it is of them being unreconcilable. I still don't understand exactly how Heavenly Father created the world and all life. But there is no doubt in my mind the evolution is central in his mechanisms. 
   But what about all the statements in the Bible? For those that can't be explained with understanding of the original language, creativity is the key. By creativity, I don't mean making up ridiculous explanations willy-nilly. I mean thoughtful, perhaps even prayerful, pondering that is open to the infinite possibilities within the evolutionary process and within God's comprehension of it and all other natural processes. I have come to believe that evolution is the explanation for life that is most consistent with my knowledge of my Heavenly Father. Reject the false premise the evolution and God are mutually exclusive. In reality, I believe that evolution is one of God's greatest tools.
   In 1831, Joseph Smith, the first prophet and leader of the LDS Church, received a revelation that included these words: "let them bring forth their strong reasons against the Lord." He is not afraid of secular reasoning.

The Power of Association

"Finally,...whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest,...just,...pure,...lovely,...of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things."
Philippians 4:8

     I recently began reading a book by acclaimed author and leadership expert John C. Maxwell entitled Thinking for a Change. In it he tells a story about Mark Victor Hansen (Chicken Soup for the Soul author) early in his career approaching Tony Robbins and saying: "I know for a fact that you made $156 million last year with your speaking and teaching and all of your products. How do you do it? How can I do it?" Robbins asked Hansen who was in his mastermind group (a group that brainstorms together and holds each other accountable). Hansen replied they were all millionaires, to which Robbins said, "That's what you're doing wrong. You need to find yourself some billionaires and begin associating with them!"
     I think this story is interesting because it suggests that there is something in who and what we associate with that can effect the results we get in life, whether in business, finances, character, spirituality, etc. That being said, let me tell you my own experience with changing what I associate with.
     After first reading this story and a few other similarly themed things, I decided to apply it to the entertainment I put in my life, movies and books primarily. For about a month I limited the number of movies I watched, watched only those that were wholesome and inspiring, read more nonfiction than fiction and listened to many positive speeches and audiobooks instead of always music. Now I didn't cut out all the brain candy, but there was a major shift in how I approached my leisure time (such as it is). It took some time to realize but I could almost feel the negative influences in some of the things I watch and read lose their place in my mind. It wasn't as though I used to read/watch things that were repugnant or vile; but the choice to stop filling my mind with that which was merely okay and overtly or covertly promoted philosophies contrary to Jesus Christ's gospel and instead fill it with the great, inspiring, edifying, positive, virtuous, and noble has changed the way I think. Perhaps most significantly, I have felt it easier to listen to and feel Heavenly Father's quiet and gentle communication through the Spirit. That I believe is the power positive association.

     *I was going to end this entry there but I felt the need to add a little more explanation for anyone who might think I only read and watch happy/blue skies/"all is well" kinds of things - I don't. Loosely paraphrasing Brigham Young, there is much to be learned by reading about the consequences of other's actions, good and bad. I happen to read a lot about World War II and the science and history of nuclear weapons. That isn't exactly light reading. I also watched a movie called Perlasca which is about an Italian man who tried to save many Jews in Hungary from concentration camps. Again, not light viewing. I think one of the keys here is the philosophies being promoted. Are they virtuous? Of good report? Praiseworthy? Certainly more goes in to choosing what entertainment we associate with than baseline motives or we might justify many things with ounces of goodness buried in pounds of mental pollution; but it is one test to apply. What I'm trying to say is that choosing virtuous entertainment is not synonymous with choosing watered down, corny, uneducated, boring, or simplistic entertainment that ignores life and its realities. But tell me this: where does your entertainment take you and is that somewhere you want or should want to go?