Something For Everyone Today!

Well greetings, welcome to the dividing line. I hope we're working. I look like I've just been out in the sun or something for a long time, which I haven't. I look really red. And I'm not really red, so I'm not sure what that's all about.

Hey! Anyway, Rich has had other things on his mind. Evidently a video card went on vacation today, and he's having to run things with bailing wire and chewing gum and everything else in there. So we'll see if this even happens today.

Who knows? And I myself had to do an end around to get a video downloaded. For some reason it downloaded in a format that automatically brought up an audio program that I couldn't open with anything else.

I don't know what happened to it. But anyway, I got it downloaded, managed to find the segment. I had said that I would do this and hadn't really looked at it since then. But we'll do that, and then there's some fascinating stuff going on online.

That'll probably take up most of the time. And then I was thinking, if I do get through things quickly, which is highly doubtful, that I might just sort of chat with you about the current process of writing a full-length article for the seminary's journal on the pseudo-Dionysius material, and just what's involved in doing that.

A lot of folks sort of wonder what the writing process looks like, and that's changed over the years a lot. With electronic input being what it is now, so many of your books are in e-text, and you're not sitting there with a pile of books around you with bookmarks in them, and breaking the spines, holding them open so you can copy stuff and things like that.

That's how it used to be done. Gotta respect everybody who did that, that's for sure. It's a little bit different now. So anyways, what I'm talking about here is, I had mentioned someone had sent me a video clip.

It was actually somebody else talking about this, that's why I really couldn't use it. I didn't want the other person popping in. It's Alex O 'Connor, a fairly well-known unbeliever, with William Lane Craig.

Again, these are highbrow, philosophical, every young earther is a moron. Yes, the Big Bang happened, and yes, Adam was a primitive hominid 600 ,000 years ago, or whatever. So it's naturalistic materialism with a religious bent to it, basically.

But that's been Craig's apologetic approach for a long, long time. And the reason this was sent to me was the question of animal suffering came up. And I am certainly sensitive to animal suffering. We're trying to find homes for three kittens right now because we don't want them to suffer.

And we try to take care of little animals in the neighborhood, especially during the hot, hot, hot summer months when it can get pretty sad. And yes, I've picked up more than one carcass in my backyard of little animals that didn't make it.

So there's a lot of suffering. And you would think that a discussion with a Christian philosopher, an apologist, and theologian— I'm sure he would use all those terms himself— would probably begin with biblical categories.

The headship of Adam. Federal headship. The creation falling in Adam. But he can't do that. He doesn't have a real Adam. Oh, he says an Adam existed, but it was some advanced hominid, what was it, 600 ,000 years ago?

Something like that. I forget what his speculation was. I really don't care what his speculation about things like that is. He doesn't have a creator. He has a God who started stuff, and he does the fine-tuning thing.

He's really great with the fine-tuning argument. But he's so embarrassed by biblical cosmology that he's basically got a Darwinian cosmology with religious bandages on it. And so he can't do Adam as the federal head of the human race.

He can't do original sin. He can't do the creation falling in Adam and being subject to futility. His theology doesn't have a foundation for all that because he's too embarrassed by having to believe that God could create supernaturally.

And so he wants the seat at the table with all the Darwinians. And that table is full up. And so there they are. And so he can't give a biblical response. And so he gives a response when Alex O 'Connor brings up the suffering of animals.

He literally says that it's a probability issue related to fine-tuning and all this stuff. And even the host says, well, Alex O 'Connor says, well, you're sidestepping the issue. He says, yes, I am. Because his system presuppositionally precludes him from addressing it directly.

And so it's tough to listen to if you are accustomed to listening to people who confess the word of God and aren't trying to get a seat at the world's table in scholarship and things like that. So I eventually got the file downloaded.

It took long enough. And then had to try to find, because I couldn't see on the other guy that was playing it, I couldn't see what the time index was. It wasn't showing up. So I eventually found it just before the program started.

And so let's go ahead and listen to this section and listen to how Craig answers the question of the suffering in the natural world, suffering of animals, and where that fits in God's purposes. And now you're going to see what happens when you try to get a seat at that table and then you bring a grossly sub-biblical theology of God, Molinism, to the table as well.

And the funny thing is, Craig likes to say, Well, I'm a Biblicist. But he's embarrassed by the Bibble. It's hard to be a Biblicist when the Bibble embarrasses you. And he is embarrassed by what the Bibble says.

So he comes up with something, well, it sounds like this. I think that those arguments aren't sound.

They aren't strong, at least to the point where they remain agnostic about the existence of a God, such that the only data that they can really touch and feel that really strikes them as the most important and plausible is the existence of animal suffering.

So I suppose I could frame it this way. Suppose it were the case that all else were equal. That what? That all else were equal. That otherwise, apart from this piece of data. Oh, oh.

Apart from this piece of data. Oh, but why should we make such a hypothesis that all else were equal when it's not?

So that we can isolate this particular point of data and see if it at the very least decreases the probability of God's existence. Uh-huh.

Now catching that decreases the probability of God's existence. That's what we're dealing with here. God's existence in the Craigian universe is not the foundation of epistemology. It's not the necessary precondition for human knowledge.

That's too embarrassing. That's too radical. You'd have to actually believe the Bible is theanoustos and consistent with itself. And look, sadly, amongst knowledgeable, well-read, professed Christians, that's a minority position.

It's a, I admit it, it's a minority position. I'm perfectly comfortable holding minority positions. No, no toys about that. But it's, you know, we're literally talking about, well, couldn't this decrease the probability of God's existence?

That's where these conversations are. And if you want to give the lost rebel sinner all the excuse that he or she wants, give them the right and ability to assign probabilities to God's existence. Remember, this is the pot.

Having a conversation about the possible existence of the potter. I mean, that's what we're dealing with here. A lot of people just aren't willing to see it, quite that stark a reality.

So you're saying, what if animal suffering were just as probable on naturalism as on theism? Then what?

I'm saying let's grant the existence of animal suffering and say, given that fact about the universe. Like, okay, let's grant that there is a universe that exists. Let's grant that there's a universe that exists that abides by physical laws.

Now, if you want to say that we can't have the conversation about why animals would be allowed to suffer until we've addressed the fine-tuning argument, then we'll probably need a bit more time. But also, I don't think that that functions for people who simply are willing to say, well, I just don't agree with the fine-tuning argument.

I still want to know why it is that God would allow animals to suffer.

Well, if that's to be more than just an opinion or psychological autobiographical comment, they need to give some good arguments against the fine-tuning argument. And my impression from reading the literature is that today, this fine-tuning argument is the argument for the existence of God that is taken most seriously by non-theists.

Okay, now think about that for a moment.

Okay, the fine-tuning argument, to me, is just simply a recognition of God's creative purpose. It flows from a recognition that God created the universe for a purpose, and therefore it must be life-sustaining and life-encouraging, and this represents God's sovereignty in his created world.

But did you hear that? This is the argument taken most seriously by non-theists. What do you mean taken seriously? And again, what's this doing? It is granting to the pot the right to call into question the existence of the potter.

That's where you're starting. And this is why us crazy, backwards presuppositionalists keep sitting around going, you can't start there. You have granted to a rebel sinner everything he needs to remain a rebel sinner.

You've given everything to them. So how can you get out of that?

Can you take Alex's just looking at the systemic problem of evil, the problem of evil against theism from evolution by natural selection, ignoring the others? Does that argument itself count against it?

Let me say then, Alex, because I did say I think we can speculate about God's reasons for allowing an evolutionary history to the world.

We can speculate about the reasons for God allowing an evolutionary history to the world. See what happens when you start off embarrassed by God's revelation? Or you end up? You end up with nothing but probabilities?

And you end up with speculation? And someone's asking a question that is directly answered in scripture. I mean, the answer is on the surface of the text in what has been called the summit of Christian revelation, Romans chapter 8.

It's right there. It's not even difficult to argue Paul's point there. But once you have abandoned the foundation that the apostle had and special creation, you can't follow the apostle's theology any longer.

And that's what you're hearing here. It's difficult to listen to, to be honest with you.

But it seems to me that God's overall purpose for creating life on earth is for the purpose of human salvation. Okay.

There's no question that redemption is absolutely central to the self-revelation of God. But what does God say? What is his purpose by his own statement in Ephesians 1, 5, and 6? It's all the praise of his glorious grace.

And he might say, yeah, that's what I mean. That's not what he means. That's not what he's going to say now, anyways. The idea that creation exists to demonstrate the glorious grace of God isn't going to fly real well with the atheist and the naturalist and all the rest of this type of thing.

Because the only way to define that is to define that biblically. What does the Bible say the grace of God is, the glory of God is? Things like this. So, you remember when Dr. Craig and I discussed Molinism, this is his thing.

The reason the creation exists as it exists, including evil and including animal suffering, is that this was, in some mysterious way, the best way to get the maximum number of people saved. That's his argument.

It's an argument no apostle ever dreamed of. It's an argument nowhere mentioned in Scripture, taught in Scripture, bound upon us, but it becomes the operational foundation of Craig's system,.

As you're going to see. And that his goal is to create a world in which the optimal number of people would freely come to know and embrace eternal salvation, which is an incommensurable good to which the suffering in this world cannot even be compared.

And I don't think it is at all improbable, not in a wit improbable, that only in a world suffused with natural and moral evil, that the optimal number of people would freely come to embrace God and his salvation and so find eternal life.

Okay, not a word of Scripture. Not a word of Scripture. And again, from their perspective, it's great that he's not quoting Scripture. That's circular. What's the result of that? God hasn't spoken. All we have is William Lane Craig's, it seems to me, it seems, instead of thus saith the Lord, it seems to me, probabilistic argumentation.

And it's not improbable whatsoever that only in a world suffused with natural evil and suffering could you get the maximum number of people freely coming to embrace salvation. Why? I'm sitting here going, I'm trying to follow along here.

I'm just a simpleton here. I don't know where this is coming from. That's because it's not coming from here. At all. Some of you know it's just the Greek New Testament and you're going, it just looks better than the other one.

Here we've got my, but this is the new Schofield. So this would cause Joel Webben to lose his mind. So we can't do that. Boy, have I seen some weird stuff over there. Yow! Let's not get into that. Let's not even touch that.

No, put that microphone down. So you're not going to get any biblical text here, because we abandoned the foundation of the Bible, both as a source of our belief and the source of our apologetics. And what have I said?

What has been my primary criticism of William Lane Craig's apologetics, and everybody who follows him, this is a major divide. The non-reformed follow Craig. Some of the reformed do too, unfortunately.

But what has been my criticism all along? Your apologetics should flow from your theology. Your apologetics can never determine your theology. And that's not Bill Craig. For Bill Craig, his apologetic argumentation is his theology.

It determines what he can and cannot believe is theology, and is revelation. So, if you're sitting here going, where is he coming up with this stuff? That's because you're one of the simpletons that thinks that maybe, just maybe, probably, what you might want to do is let God speak to the issue of the defense of the faith.

And especially when the scriptures themselves address the topic. Directly. Have the guts, the integrity, to say to the unbeliever, here's what God has said about this. Instead it's, well, it seems to me that it's most probable.

It's not improbable. It's probably this and probably that. That's all you get.

And that could well be the reason for creating the world with a new evolutionary history that involved, as you say, a lot of animal suffering.

Okay, so, that's what I was asked to respond to. And you can go ahead and take it down. There's your, the guy that asked me to do it had called that a face plant. And in many ways I think he was right.

That is a face plant. It's pretty sad. You know what I could do? I could use this one. This one actually looks really good on the screen. It's nice and bright. It's got the blue. It's very pretty. And it's the LSB.

It's the whole Bible. And it's still too small a print for me anymore. But it still smells good. It's a Jeffrey Rice rebuy and that makes it great. And so there. There's my Bible right there.

What? I just, every time I listen to that clip, I keep going back to it. You had never heard that clip before? Actually I heard you playing it last week before the show. And I just keep thinking about his argument for the existence of God.

I can't let that go. It's stuck in my mind when I listen to him. And I just keep hearing. So it's 50 plus 1. It's most likely that God exists. Pretty much. For the most part. And you hear him go, It seems to me.

And it's like, that's your entire apologetic. Your entire apologetic is, It seems to me. It is the ramblings of. Trust me. Yes. Trust me. It really is. I am very wise. Trust me.

So we got that one. All right. Now. There is a lot of other stuff to get to here. Let me go ahead and do this one. And I'm not sure that I'm going to be able to pull this over here. I'm going to try anyways.

A fellow by the name of Garrett Ham. Posted a clip. And it's from my debate from up in Colorado Springs. Which by the way. I am going to be speaking in Colorado Springs. About the early second week of August.

I think that's right. And in fact. Someone today contacted me looking for a church. In the Colorado Springs area. And I directed them to James Medina. This was the church where this debate took place.

They have. Changed their name to Calvary Covenant Church. Calvary covenant .org. And. So I'm going to be there. Lord willing. Well, you know, the date should be right here. Yeah. Wednesday, August 5th.

Is what I have right now. I'm going to be heading up to Colorado. A little over three week trip. A little shorter than some of the trips I've done. During the summer up there. But going to be in Dolores.

And then Grand Junction. And then in Denver. Not sure exactly what's going to be happening there. I've got some availability. Hopefully we can work something out. Maybe in Boulder or Denver. That hasn't firmed up yet.

And then on the way back. I'm going to go down the 25. Down to Colorado Springs. And then stop. North Albuquerque. At one more church there. On the way back. So we're catching at least two new churches.

On this circuit. Around Colorado this summer. I'm really looking forward to that. Not really looking forward to being in a now deep blue state. The stuff that you see about Colorado these days is just sad.

But the saints there. Still got old friends they get to see up in Denver. And still going to hopefully get to ride some portions of routes I used to. I just don't ride as far as I used to. It's not because.

I mean. Last year when I rode up there. I weighed 65 pounds more than I do now. Believe me. I can go up hills a whole lot easier now than I could then. I've gotten in really good shape. But I just don't want to spend as much time on the bike.

Because I'm rowing. And skiing on the Concept2. Rowerg and Skierg. And I'm lifting. And I'm running. Yeah I injured myself running. I did. And then I immediately stopped. And gave it. Eight, nine days.

And I'm running again. But I'm doing lots of stretching. And everything else beforehand. Because yeah I'm a little scared when you're my age. But I'm running again. And it's enjoyable. I enjoyed running when I was doing it.

I ran a just barely sub two hour half marathon. At one point. That's not bad. I'm not even trying to go fast. Little old men run past me now. That's not a problem at all. Actually I will tell you. A couple days ago I was running up 43rd Avenue.

Well not on the road obviously. There's a road alongside of it. And I see this older fella. Like me. White hair. We don't look like the guys who just broke two hours in the marathon. Anything like that.

But we're running toward each other. And we're sort of watching each other. We got plenty of time to see each other coming. Because we ain't going very fast. And so I forget what it. Oh I forget. Oh yeah.

I said something along the lines of. I put my arm up and I said. Yay old guys. And he puts his fist above the. Yeah alright. It's just the geriatric guys out there. A high five on each other. Because we're still running.

Most of our compatriots ain't. That's for sure. But we're still out there doing our thing. It was encouraging. It was sort of funny. I'm going to be watching for him. Next time I'll find out what his name is.

Because we're going by each other so slowly. You can find these things out. So anyway. But yeah. So I'm doing all this stuff. And that means I just don't have the time. To be on the bike. I'm not comfortable on it that long anymore.

I mean you got to get used to sitting on a bike seat. For six hours. And I'm just not doing that anymore. So anyways. What was I talking about? Oh yeah. So that's what we're doing up in Colorado. I'm going to hopefully get to at least ride up to Echo Lake.

It's just such a beautiful. If I don't ride up there. I'll drive up there. And ride around Echo Lake. And do stuff like that. Up on the foot of Mount Evans. But yeah. If you're in the Denver or Boulder area.

Drop us a line. I'm going to be up there for about ten days. And it's just been. I've got something. All the other stops. Just not in Denver. Places where I've spoken before. They already had stuff going on.

It was just a scheduling issue. But yeah. Let us know. We can work something out. Anyways. So this is the church. Where I took on Alex. In the debate. And so let me see if I can. Hold on a second. Hold on a second.

There. Get it big enough here to work. And let's see if this works. And reading Athanasius' responses against the Arians. Is just wonderful. And when he uses the term apostolic tradition. It's always sub-biblical.

In other words. It is a belief. Derived from scriptures. Not a belief derived from an oral tradition. Outside of scriptures. Which I'm not sure if that's what you were meaning. In 2 Thessalonians 2 15 or not.

We'll have to clarify that later. Now it is important. The 2 Thessalonians 2 15. Standard text. Used by. Roman Catholics. I think. Now that. John Henry Cardinal Newman. Has been beatified and made a doctor of the church.

I don't know why you're quoting. 2 Thessalonians 2 15. Because you don't believe. That the oral traditions. That you refer to there. Have been passed down. You have development now. So. It's a schizophrenic world.

To deal with Roman Catholic apologetics. Because on the one hand. They'll say. Oh we're the church of 2 ,000 years. And what we believe is passed down by the apostles. And then when you. Push. Oh what's development.

When I say apostolic tradition. I just mean. Nothing that has anything to do with the apostles. I mean I'm not going to trace this stuff back that far. That's how it works. So. This Garrett. Ham fellow.

He says. In this clip. That I argue that Athanasius' argument against Arians. Is always sub-biblical. Actually what I said was. If you listen. When Athanasius. Refers to apostolic tradition. He again.

Is talking about the same stuff that Irenaeus did. The foundational. Monotheism. God's the creator of all things. This is what's been passed down. This is the Athanasius that says. Scripture is sufficient for all things.

The proclamation of the truth. Etc. And so. His argumentation against the Arians. Is not. Well Nicaea is an ecumenical council. No one even knew what an ecumenical council was at that time. Had no idea.

That's a later development. So often. Roman Catholics will completely. Self-destruct. Because they'll say things like. Ariminum and Sirmium. They weren't ecumenical councils. No one at that time. Had a clue what an ecumenical council was.

It's just more. Roman Catholic anachronism. It is. It is the essence. Of Roman Catholicism. It's the essence of Eastern Orthodox. Handling of patristic sources. To engage in anachronism. I am more convinced.

We are the only ones who can do church history. Because we don't have to prove. That the early church. Was us. We don't have to turn them into us. We can let them be. The rather varied group. That they were.

We don't have any. Skin in the game of. That was our apostolic tradition. That they were passing on. All because we've. Developed all this stuff later on. So. When I said. What he's saying is. I was saying.

When he defines tradition. It is tradition. Based upon scripture. It's not tradition. Outside of scripture. It's not the two source theory. It's not written tradition. Or oral tradition. That's what I was saying.

Of course. Athanasius saturates his writings with scripture. Again, going back to the quote here. And he never sets tradition against the bible. Of course. No catholic denies that. Nor would want to do so.

Well, be careful about no catholic. You might want to check Boston College out. However, his whole defense of the homoousius language in Nicaea. Binds the church to a term admittedly not in scripture.

Well, that's not the issue. He didn't even like the term. It was efficient. But he did not claim that it came from the apostles. What it embodied? Yes. The term? No. Was it useful at that point in time?

Because the arguments of the Arians? Yes. Did he say that the apostles gave that? No. He did not. He justifies it in De Decretis and De Synodis. Not by go read the text yourself. But by what the church fathers handed down.

Handed down in regards to what? That term? No. What it teaches? And how does he substantiate that? From Colossians? From Philippians? From Revelation? Wherever he's drawing a gospel of John. He substantiates that not by saying this is a term that the apostles used.

That's not what he's saying. He appeals to the very tradition, teaching, and faith of the catholic church from the beginning which the Lord gave, the apostles preached, and the fathers kept. That's a transmission argument, not formal sola scriptura.

That's a transmission argument of what? Of homoousius? No, that's not what he's saying. He is saying that the deity of Christ was believed from the beginning. And isn't it weird that it's primarily us Protestants that have developed the strongest, in-depth, exegetical, foundational defenses of the Trinity from Scripture?

Not you guys. Not you guys, not anymore. James White has conflated material sufficiency, the faith can be shown from Scripture, with formal sufficiency, Scripture needs no church to norm it. Now who gets to define these things?

I remember the first time I ever heard this categorical distinction used was by Patrick Madrid. I think it was 1993. Who gets to define this? Because that's not exactly how Patrick defined it. When it says, Scripture needs no church to norm it, well, what can norm the speech of God?

What can norm the speech of God? The church is not Theanostas. If the church norms that which is Theanostas, the church must be Theanostas itself, but it's not. That doesn't make any sense. Scripture is its own norm because it's God speaking, because the norm has to come from the highest authority.

I mean, we're just talking epistemology here. And if Scripture is what Scripture claims that it is, then the church can't norm it. And of course, the problem you have now is what church? Not just the Eastern Orthodox Roman Catholic argument, but the church of the Papal Solbis of Ares, the church of the Council of Trent, the church of Vatican II, the church of Francis and Leo.

Those are different churches. Oh, no, same thing. You can close your eyes and Pope explain until the cows come home. The changes are obvious to anybody who's honest enough to think about it and to go, you know, the stuff that the Pope says today is not what the Pope was saying 150 years ago.

Something has changed. And you can say, well, this is the new norm, but you can't claim continuity with that old norm that said something different and, in fact, contradictory. And we've given plenty of examples.

You've got the death penalty. You've got the, well, religious freedom is the most important thing, more important than sexual purity. And Papal Solbis of Ares said religious freedom was an error. So what used to be an error for the Pope teaching in his normal, I mean, you're writing this for the church.

It wasn't infallible. I know. Anything you don't agree with isn't infallible. It's just, that's how infallibility works. You don't ever have to worry about something being infallible if you don't want it to be infallible.

It's wonderful. Except, even, you know, Unum Sanctum, 1302. We define. We proclaim. We state. It's absolutely necessary to be subject to the Roman Pontiff for human salvation. Except for the Muslims who now worship the one true God with us.

It's like, you can sit back and go, oh, there's no change there. No, you're Pope-splaining. It doesn't matter what the Pope would say. You'll find a way around it. Because that's your ultimate authority.

You have to. History, facts, just Plato. Put it together the way you want. Athanasius held the first, as the Catholic Church also does. His writings, however, refute the second. Well, they do not. So here's just an error, in his understanding of what I'd said, of what tradition is in Athanasius.

Talk about choosing the wrong guy. Athanasius, you know, the guy that stood against church councils? The church stood alone? Athanasius, contramundum? The church? All the bishops? Hundreds of them were saying, you're wrong?

And what does Athanasius say? No, I'm right, and here's why. And he doesn't quote from some Pope, or apostolic tradition. He quotes from Scripture. You can, again, you can spin circles as tightly as you want to.

That's the reality. And you just might want to ask yourself, why do you have to stand on your head and twist church history? Over and over and over again. Oh, well, Honorius really wasn't speaking as the Pope there, and yes, for 400 years they anathematized him as a heretic, but he was still infallible.

And... I'm sorry. I... Sometimes I really feel sorry for you, given the commitment you've made to your ultimate authority. I just hope you'll find out that that's not the ultimate authority. Now, then we have this.

This is interesting. A guy named Ethan Mews. I don't know if that's his name or not, who knows? Everyone in my timeline is busy debating whether Mormons are true Christians. It has been ever since Senator Lee posted that stuff, all that anybody's talking about.

It happens. You may notice it happens about once a year. And I think the Mormons jump on it. It helps them to get their missionaries out, give them something to do. The interesting question is whether Brighamites are true Mormons.

Now, Brighamites is often a term used by the organized, the old RLDS church, that I don't know what the name has become since then. I forgot. Community of Christ or something like that. The RLDS church has sort of disintegrated because they made the mistake of imbibing liberal Protestant epistemology and theology, and it's gotten ugly.

Listen to what Ethan Mews says in a follow-up. Two interesting questions. One, Brighamite theology bears little resemblance to Book of Mormon theology. Now, Brighamite would be Brigham Young. Mormons flee after Joseph Smith's death.

They go to Utah, settle Salt Lake City, start getting established there, build the Salt Lake City Temple, the Tabernacle. You get that period of isolation where they're sort of cut off from the rest of the world.

And they have time to develop their Orthodox theology. Now, there are differences between the Prats and Young and Wilford Woodruff, and they all have their takes, but this is sort of the heyday of the development of what was, until recently, as we'll see in a moment, Orthodox Mormonism.

And he's exactly right. Brighamite theology bears little resemblance to Book of Mormon theology. The Book of Mormon is almost irrelevant when it comes to the unique doctrines of Mormonism in regards to God, man, temples, priesthoods, all that stuff.

It's just, it's not in the Book of Mormon, because Joseph Smith didn't believe any of that stuff. And that's why Jacob Hanson, for example, can say, hey, our scriptures say one God, because he can go back to 1829, 1830, and yeah, that's what Joseph Smith believed.

He was a modalist. He wasn't a Trinitarian. He thought he was. He just didn't understand. Most people don't. But the original Book of Mormon is very modalistic. In fact, a number of the changes, the significant theological changes in the Book of Mormon had to do with its clear, explicit modalism and changing that later on.

So God becomes Son of God, things like that in the changes that take place in the text. Anyway, so yeah, then he says even later, Smith deviated so far that he effectively apostatized from Mormonism if it is defined by reference to his earlier revelations.

True. Now, of course, they would say, well, he was a prophet and he's receiving more revelation. And, of course, the response to that is, but if he was a prophet, he wouldn't be contradicting himself.

Number two, it seems that there are multiple candidates for successors that had more credible claims than Brigham. The constitutional basis for Rigdon's claim was stronger because he had control of the First Presidency and Brigham only had Quorum of the Twelve.

He lost because of politics, not because of constitutional structure of the Church. The issues of LDS ecclesiology, one thing that today should prove to anybody, the system they have today for the top leadership is absolutely broken, decrepit, and foolish.

The prophet is always the oldest doddering Alzheimer's patient amongst the Twelve. That's just how it is. And that's clearly not what Smith ever would have intended, but he was murdered before he could even start thinking about succession or anything like that.

So, yeah, there you go. And then there's stuff about Joseph Smith III had the most credible claim to have been personally designated as successor, which would be completely decisive. David Whitmer had the most theologically consistent position, which was that Smith was a fallen prophet.

That's right! Most Mormons don't know that one of the three witnesses of the Book of Mormon at the time of Smith's death believed that Smith was a fallen prophet. David Whitmer talks about and addressed all beliefs in Christ, talks about the development, the evolution of things like the priesthood claim, that Joseph Smith did not claim to hold priesthoods on April 6, 1830.

I mean, what does that do to your whole theology? How do you have a restored church without a priesthood? All that stuff came later. Look at all the changes in 1833 Book of Commandments, 1835 Doctrine and Covenants.

It's just obvious, but it is fascinating that someone in the midst of all this argumentation going on would point out, you know, there's lots of other questions to be dealt with here too that go back rather than to the new situation where a fellow named America Only by Nico at America Only cast.

America Only fighting globalists, new world order, socialists and censorship and all sorts of American flags and then a negation symbol over the LGBTQ flag, the Israeli flag, the Ukrainian flag and the globalist symbol.

So you can figure out where they're coming from. This was someone responding to someone from NXR, by the way, which doesn't have anything to do with what they said. But this was one of the best statements that I've seen summarizing and explaining what a Neo-Mormon is.

That's a term I came up with. Neo-Mormonism and Neo-Morm is a person who no longer believes what every Mormon I talked to for 25 years believed. What every Mormon I debated believed. What every Mormon author I talked with believed.