Bart S. Croxford: Do not diminish the peace and happiness many church members enjoy

I would like to respond to the article by Tanner Call of Dec. 7 titled “LDS Church gaslights the world and manipulates its members.”

I think it would only be fair to allow a member of the church to present an opposing view.

He claims that, for many of us, the church “didn’t uplift us; it tore us down. It didn’t help us become our best selves; it broke us so that we would be obedient members who gave of our time, money, and energy at the expense of ourselves.”

One could make the same claim against any organized religion or discipline if it didn’t accomplish the results one desired. Any discipline, religious or not, makes demands of its participants, whether it’s physical, emotional, mental, etc., exertion.

Even a gym membership requires that its participants exert themselves physically, even perhaps to exhaustion to accomplish the desired goal of being physically fit. I guess Mr. Call thinks the church should guarantee its members that they will be happy regardless of any efforts put forth its believers.

The church’s founder, Joseph Smith, famously stated “A religion that does not require the sacrifice of all things never has power sufficient to produce the faith necessary unto life and salvation.” The Savior in Matthew 16:25 stated, “whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it.”

Being a member of the church requires the believer to sacrifice much of their time, talents and efforts if one would like to have the desired results, namely happiness in this life and exaltation in the world to come. The Catholic Church requires much of its believers as well as many other Christian and non-Christian religions do.

All the “techniques” that he lists are not unique to the church he is criticizing. “Treasures in heaven” are promised by the Savior in The Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5:12, which is believed by all Christians that I know, yet he claims this is “one of the most insidious ways the LDS Church controls its members by conditioning them to focus on a promised future instead of the actual here-and-now.”

“Blessed be the peacemaker” is another Beatitude that he criticizes the church as using to “teach its members not to rock the boat.” I guess he ought to take this up with Jesus Christ himself, because this is a basic tenet of any Christian religion, not unique to the church he criticizes.

“God’s ways are higher than our ways,” he says, and “the church is nothing more characteristic than the overarching idea that God is omnipotent and, therefore, his servants know more than the average person.” This scripture is taken from Isaiah 55:19 so he is demeaning not only all Christians but all Jews as well.

“A peculiar people,” he says is a psychological manipulation to enforce an “us vs. them mentality.” No member that I know believes that anyone who leaves the church is of the devil, as he claims. On the contrary, our church believes that all but a handful of people that have ever lived will receive some level of glory, depending on what kind of life they lived.

The church does claim to be restored to the earth by God the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ, through the prophet Joseph Smith, and is unapologetic about it. It either is restored or it is not; there is not halfway about it.

There are plenty of mistakes made by its members but, as the Savior himself said in Matthew 7:20, “By their fruits ye shall know them.” The church does not boast about all its humanitarian aid it provides throughout the world and most of its almost 17 million members around the world live by its precepts and have thereby enjoyed joy and happiness that cannot be quantified in this small space. The church has a strong program for youth and aims to build strong character traits and unselfishness in all members.

I am sorry that it didn’t work out for Mr. Call, but he cannot diminish the peace, joy and happiness that many members of the church enjoy.

Bart S. Croxford, Sandy, is a retired CPA and a returned missionary from Germany Duesseldorf Mission.