“Shame on the Los Angeles Times!”
By Matt Thurston on Feb 1, 2007
“SHAME ON THE LOS ANGELES TIMES!”-Clifton Jolley, 2006 SLC Sunstone Symposium
With his voice rising and falling like a street preacher possessed by the Holy Spirit, and in a talk that can only be characterized as a degree or two shy of “performance art,” Clifton Jolley may have stolen the show at the 2006 SLC Sunstone Symposium. Unfortunately, I missed the big revival. It was the topic— The Indians Are Lamanites, but the Los Angeles Times Is Not: An Alternate Interpretation of DNA Results and Promises Made to the Chosen People of the Americas —that turned me off. “Not another Book of Mormon Historicity-slash-DNA topic,” I thought. Blah. I think I’ll choose another session.
It wasn’t until last week, while driving down the 91 Freeway in Southern California , that I decided to give Jolley the time of day. Clicking on my iPod, I was transported out of the gridlock and into Jolley’s bizarre, and yet lyrical, world. Equal parts Jon Stewart and Bill O’Reilly, Jolley is irreverent, ironic, sarcastic, offensive, mocking, possibly (according to some) even tad racist, but in the end, he’s an equal-opportunity offender.
Go listen to it HERE. (It’s Free!) 
Of course this will not be apparent until you get to the end of his sermon, and probably not until you’ve listened to it twice. At first you’ll write him off as some ultra-conservative, anti-media, anti-science Kook. “Screw You, Los Angeles Times!” he shouts. “They thought our stories could be proven true or false using the false tools of the apostate priesthood of science,” he deadpans. Then you’ll hear him skewer Mormon Apologists, LDS Church Leaders, (both of whom he labels “cowards”) and non-questioning, “all-is-well” Mormon members. Referring to the DNA “evidence,” Jolley whispers: “The Church, once again, is buying the Salamander Letter— not because we believe it’s a forgery, but because we are afraid it might be true.”
If you’re like me, you’ll be left with that weightless feeling wondering, “Who is this guy, and where does he stand?” It’s no wonder that Sunstone Editor and session respondent, Dan Wotherspoon, upon first hearing Jolley’s paper (at the Dallas Sunstone Symposium), asks, somewhat helplessly, “But what do you really believe?” Having listened to his performance twice, I’m not sure that Jolley ever answers that question— and then again, maybe he does.
So enough beating around the bush, what is this Symposium Session about? Well, without spoiling the fun, Jolley’s paper is a response to a 2006 Los Angeles Times article written by William Lobdell that questions the historicity of the Book of Mormon based on recently uncovered DNA evidence that shows that native North and South Americans are descended from Asians, not Israelites or Middle Easterners. If Jolley is to be believed (a legitimate question for a guy who trades in hyperbole like Nancy Grace trades in self-righteousness), his daughter was unnerved by the Los Angeles Times’ article, and Jolley wrote this paper in response. Jolley’s daughter’s loss is our gain.
Jolley’s rebuttal is not so much a point-by-point counter-argument to the L.A. Times article, as a sprawling, anything-goes meditation on the power of story. He says, “We tell stories to hope, entertain, and edify… to save our souls.” With poignant gravitas Jolley proclaims, “We are the people of the book” (i.e. the Book of Mormon). He sums up, “After we have been defeated and all our stories proven untrue, we will perhaps come to know the more important reason and the only question that ever is— not whether the stories are true, but whether we are true to our stories.” Jolley concludes with a moving, self-penned poem that begins, “Run away, run away, Mormon, Moroni , Abinadi, Alma, Gideon… Geneticists have murdered you…”
Coincidentally, I’ve been reading Joseph Campbell’s The Power of Myth over the past two weeks. Without this framework I might still be puzzling over Jolley’s often paradoxical sermon. With it, I think I’ve found the Rosetta Stone. Like Jolley, Campbell sees in our stories “the rapture of being alive.” They are “the world’s dreams… the archetypal dreams that deal with [our] great human problems.” They represent “spiritual potentiality in the human being, and the same powers that animate our life animate the life of the world.”
Bill Moyers, Campbell ’s interviewer in The Power of Myth, asks, “You’ve seen what happens when primitive societies are unsettled by white man’s civilization. They go to pieces, they disintegrate, they become diseased. Hasn’t the same thing been happening to us since our myths began to disappear?”
Campbell’s response: “Absolutely, it has.”
Finally, Joseph Campbell warns about the social costs of losing one’s “story”:
If your private myth, your dream, happens to coincide with that of the society [i.e. Mormonism], you are in good accord with your group. If it isn’t, you’ve got an adventure in the dark forest ahead of you… you’ll be in trouble. If you’re forced to live in that system, you’ll be a neurotic.
Maybe this explains the disillusionment of former “Lamanite” Jose Loayza, who states in the Times’ article: “We were taught all the blessings of that Hebrew lineage belonged to us and that we were a special people… it not only made me feel special, it gave me a transcendental identity, and identity with God.” His faith shaken and identity stripped, Loayza says, “I’ve gone through stages… Absolute denial. Utter amazement and surprise. Anger and bitterness.”
I remember when the stories of Nephi and Mosiah and Alma and Helaman and Mormon animated my life and my dreams. They’re still there, somewhere, but like Christmas toys from two or three years ago, some have been pushed to the back of my closet, in part by the William Lobdells of the world. Jolley and Campbell have me wondering if I shouldn’t pull them out, dust them off, and put new batteries in them.
What do you think of Jolley’s thesis? Should we string up the William Lobdells like the Catholics tried to string up the Galileos? Or should we jettison our stories and kill our heroes when they prove to be something less than we thought, maybe even nonexistent? Or is there a middle ground (a place Jolley seems to dispute)— can we embrace both William Lobdell and the life-affirming stories of the Book of Mormon?
A few months ago, I had just the experience you describe — this session blew me away. The forcefulness of the presentation, the self-contradictory nature of the content, the sheer rage toward a relatively harmless piece of religious journalism. I didn’t know what to make of it. Like you, I appreciate Jolley’s line that the issue is “not whether the stories are true, but whether we are true to our stories.” And I certainly do think the Book of Mormon narrative is worth keeping — I find as much of God in the story as in the sermons.
On the other hand, I simply don’t know what to make of Jolley’s other thoughts. Is it wrong for our indigenous members to wonder whether the church has mischaracterized their ancestry and heritage? Is it appropriate for us to keep applying the term “Lamanite” willy-nilly when many indigenous groups object to it as racist and our own best thinkers suggest that we don’t really have any way of knowing who is, in any meaningful sense, a descendent of Lehi? Jolley’s answers on these points are clear, but they’re clear because he’s willing to deny the empirical world whole cloth. Are we willing to follow?
Comment # 1 by RoastedTomatoes | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
Interesting thoughts.
I love the inspiration of stories, parables, myths…what I don’t like is being told these things are literally true — the only truth and the only way.
Comment # 2 by WendyP | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
Off with their heads!
If you want some stories to help you through life, why not just rely on Fairy Tales? Better yet, we could be the co-founders of The Church of Brothers Grimm of Latter Day Fables. There are more than enough stories, tales and fables to cover all of the important points in life. These stories are universal in nature, kids love them and people worldwide would readily accept them as well.
We could then honor and worship Jacob and WIlhelm for their prophetic calling to teach and exhort through this great volume of Scripture. We’ll have to reconstruct our line of authority all the way back to the brothers, but we’ll figure that out as we go.
Inspirational stories, fables, myths, parables etc. etc. are great, but why be part of an organization that says it has the corner on Truth and is 100% Divine in nature if you know otherwise? I think its socially irresponsible. This is an organization that has a history and present of division, racism, sexism, inequality, fear mongering, mental and spiritual abuse and a host of other evils.
How good do the stories have to be for you to ignore all of that?
Why would you want your children raised and brought up in a two faced organization like this?
What are you going to say when your children find out the truth and ask you why you didn’t tell them?
Comment # 3 by Simeon | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
Though I’ve tried to make it work, the stories in the Book of Mormon hold no mythic sway over me. The individual characters are melodramatically labeled “good” or “bad” at the beginning and then simply act out their predestined roles. The pride-humility cycle may have some mythic quality as to the anonymous people as a whole, in that “prosperity” is treated as some sort of blessing even though it also contains the seeds of the downfall of the people.
Give me a fatally flawed Greek hero, a fatally good bad guy (a la Darth Vader), or characters making moral choices in a morally ambiguous world (a la Grimm) - and these myths will weave themselves into the fabric of my life. But the Book of Mormon teaches things like we should die preaching absolute good in the face of absolute evil (like Abinadi) - and these stories bore me because nothing in real life resembles this binary world.
Although I try to maintain a religious LDS family for reasons other than the mythic power of the Book of Mormon, I admit I choose D’Aulaire’s or Grimm over the Book of Mormon reader when its time for a bedtime story.
Comment # 4 by odanuki | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
Interesting paper.
I’m not sure I know what his position is. I figure it can be one of three:
1. It doesn’t matter if the Book of Mormon is ‘true’. It has been the bedrock of our culture for so long, that it should be defended because giving up on it is giving up on who we are.
2. The Book of Mormon is true, but we should never have expected science to validate it, because science is the thought of the devil.
3. The Book of Mormon is true, but we are just too stupid and cowardly to combat the evil one.
Matt: Your never state what you think his stance is…so what do you think his stance is?
Comment # 5 by Jared E. | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
Jolley casts a wide net over who are the “people of the book.” They include LDS, RLDS, FLDS and all kinds of other Mormon based groups who acknowledge the BoM as their point of reference. I am one of these “people” since birth. As with Michael Quinn, it’s in my DNA. Whether or not any of us must believe “the book” in any literal or symbolic way, its story persists in print. It is our cultural myth.
Yes, Clifton, I heartily agree. The issue is not whether its story is true, but whether we are true to our stories. And, thank God that Sunstone offers us a place to tell each other our stories free from intimidation and dogmatic spin.
Or do I go too far?
Comment # 6 by Eugene Kovalenko | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
Jared (#5). Good question. I’m pretty sure he meant your first idea: “It doesn’t matter if the Book of Mormon is ‘true’. It has been the bedrock of our culture for so long, that it should be defended because giving up on it is giving up on who we are.” This is the same general conclusion Lisa Simpson comes to regarding the less-than-flattering “truth” of city founder, Jebediah Springfield.
But who knows? Seems we’d need to know more about Clifton Jolley to answer that question. How much of his performance was just that, a performance? Are his personal opinions really that paradoxical, really that strong, or was this a kind of performance art where he dials everything up to “11″ to make a greater point, not unlike an extreme painting, novel, or joke. I got the impression that he was a former newspaper columnist and is now a spin doctor of some kind. Both would seem fertile training ground for such a pose as we hear in this session. If anyone knows Jolley or has insight or an opinion on this question, please weight in.
The other comments above are great as well. I’ll weigh in a little later with feedback.
Comment # 7 by Matt Thurston | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
I believe Clifton must hide his sensitivities behind his bravado. The most genuine peek into his inner story that I experienced was a long ago poem he wrote about Joseph Jr. and recited for a Sunstone audience. I don’t remember the name of the poem (he won’t send it to me), but I will never forget how deeply I was touched by that briefest of glimpses into those tender places. One has to insult him well these days to get his attention. I’m not clever enough. I’m sure Dan will remember the poem.
Comment # 8 by Eugene Kovalenko | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
I’ve got to listen to this, but I think the message is like this:
If we depend on science (archaeology, DNA studies, etc) to prove the Book of Mormon is true, then we best be prepared to deal with the science that casts doubt about it.
If we accept that the Book of Mormon is true on faith, and apply that faith, then we are “true to the stories” and able to move forward. I long ago came to the conclusion that even though I am a rational person with a great deal of respect for science, the truth of the Gospel and the Book of Mormon is not waiting around for man to prove it. The proof lies in the realm of faith, which I believe to be “otherworldly”, and not so much subject to our rational senses.
Alma 32 talks about applying an experiment “upon the word”, by applying our faculty of ….faith. Not really what we would determine as the basic scientific method, although it resembles it in some fashion. So while I applaud those who try and answer the questions with other science (there are some interesting links from lds.org), ultimately it is to me, a matter of faith.
Like Jolley, I believe my faith has been rewarded. Good for him to send a wakeup call to the rest of us.
Comment # 9 by Kevinf | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
Kevinf (Comment #9),
I definitely respect your position here, but the main difficulty I see with your approach is that the Church’s claims about the Book of Mormon are not exclusively within the spiritual sphere, where faith is operative. These claims of historicity and physical places and events places them very much in the realm of scientific inquiry. Scientific inquiry cannot prove whether or not the principles taught in the Book of Mormon are spiritually true or valid, but it most definitely can (I’m not saying that it has yet, but it’s getting close…) prove or disprove the claims pertaining to physical events and places.
Some people are willing to treat the Book of Mormon as scripture by virtue of spiritual inspiration, while disregarding its claim to historical truth. Frankly, given the whole history of the Church, I don’t understand how you can do this without eviscerating the Church’s claim to be the Restored Gospel. But that is definitely just my opinion, and I have no problem with others feeling differently. So for me anyway, being “true to the stories,” regardless of whether or not the historical claims about its origin are true, puts Mormonism in a category not different from any other religious group. Not necessarily a bad place to be, but certainly not unique.
Comment # 10 by Questions... | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
Re: # 10, by (anonymous)
Well, I know folks who have been to Mexico and looked at the ruins, and feel like they know the evidence must be out there. I think that BH Roberts, in his study of the Book of Mormon ran into a number of difficulties that he felt could not be defended by external evidences. Maybe it’s that I have taken a lot of the claims and statements somewhat with a grain of salt over the years. We seem to do a good job of backing into policies and folk doctrines when the real ones are not real clear, re the Priesthood and the Blacks question. Over time, we seem to get smarter.
I understand pretty well where Clifton Jolley is coming from. If I try to make the church work solely by rational determinations, I come up with the concept of a mostly harmless group of well meaning, but ignorant folks. That is not what I see around me when I go to church, and serve in my callings. But when I apply that nebulous and notoriously fickle faith the the process, it all comes together. Were all the native Americans descended from the Lamanites? Probably not. Were some of them? Probably so. Are there evidences of ancient civilizations in Mezo-america, not all of them clearly understood and identified? Yes. Does the Book of Mormon show some internal evidences of ancient origin, along with those elements that are very 19th century in their nature? I’m starting to sound like Donald Rumsfeld here, answering my own questions.
My personal view of the straight and narrow way is that it is very narrow, clogged with fallen trees, boulders, and obstacles, and lined with many well-lighted easy downhill exit ramps. To me, one of the evidences of the truthfulness of the gospel is that there are problems within it, as well as great rewards, and neither are easily explained. To paraphrase C.S. Lewis, Mormonism is either of the utmost importance, if true, or of no importance, if false, but never of only some importance.
Pardon me, I’ve got to pick my way uphill again.
Comment # 11 by Kevinf | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
Most of you have raised the same question I had upon first listening to Jolley’s presentation which is basically this: Is there really no middle ground? Is it really a choice between being true to our stories and a rejection of any part of the empirical world that contradicts our stories? The first questioner at the end of Jolley’s presentation couldn’t have said it any plainer when he somewhat plaintively asks: “If none of these things [i.e. BOM Historicity] matter — if it’s just what we’ve become since then… then what’s the point?” If you’ve listened to the tape, Jolley does not really answer the question.
Of course, each person has to answer this question individually for him/herself. I find the various responses – wholesale rejection, wholesale acceptance, or some hybrid combination of the two – to all be valid, for different reasons. Since its beginning, the Church has constantly shaped and re-shaped its stories – changing endings, changing meanings, adding chapters, or quietly shelving obsolete stories altogether. I’m more critical of eliminating or changing stories that in some way/shape/form excuse or license oppressive or authoritarian behavior over other people (i.e. with respect to race, gender, or sexual orientation, etc.) than I am over innocuous stories that help someone be all he can be.
It would take a lot for the Church to give up on the historicity of the Book of Mormon as it’s the “keystone” to Mormonism and probably the thing that makes us most unique. Besides, it’s been thousands of years since Noah built the Arc and Moses parted the Red Sea, but Christianity and Judaism are still holding the literalist line and both religions are still going strong. Why would it be any different for literal Nephites and Lamanites?
For whatever reason, people need Story to help bring meaning into their lives, some more than others, and they’re willing to live with a little paradox in their lives to hold onto their stories and everything that goes with them. I think Kevinf (#9) and Questions (#10) represent well the different way to look at the same set of facts. Both points of view are valid, depending on which lens one places the emphasis.
Comment # 12 by Matt Thurston | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
Darn it Simeon. Stop beating around the bush and tell us your real feelings on the church. How are we supposed to know how you really feel if you keep your opinions all bottled up like that? LOL!
For anyone who cares or is interested at all. If you haven’t read them, there are some decent essays on the topic of why the sampling of DNA does not translate to a blanket discreditation of the Book of Mormon over at fairlds.org A couple of them are very well written.
Comment # 13 by cew-smoke | Feb 1, 2007 | Reply
I agree with cew-smoke that the DNA evidence is not entirely damning of the Book of Mormon’s historicity. What is entirely damning is the endless contributing evidence that suggests the Book is not a historical fact. No one lives their life on certainty, we all live with faith upon probabilities - at least in reference to things in the physical world. History, as a record of the physical world, is often blurred by the historian’s mentality and spirituality; however, mentality and spirituality do not change the people and events that really happened.
What difference does it make if the Book of Mormon is historically accurate? What if it an ancient record that contains false doctrine? The importance of the Book to me is not only the message, but how it is presented. Dallin Oakes has stated that a Book of Mormon that is not historically accurate is a “pious fiction with some valuable contents” and entirely without value. I believe there is no all or nothing conflict between the fact or fiction dichotomy.
The value of a story is in the story and the shapes of meaning it can take inside ones mind. Jesus’ story of a certain Samaritan is not pious fiction - it is a story told that could be understood by the people 2000 years ago and can still transform lives today. The Isomorphic ability of stories means that people from the 1830’s could read the Book of Mormon and hear the message they needed to hear in the format that best suited them while people who come afterward will build on the basic story and derive evermore complex spiritual truths from the text - and from the application of the principles it teaches.
Like the Book of Job or the Creation story, meaning, spirituality and truth can be derived from a narrative that seems to be talking about a particular circumstance, but essentially is much more.
I believe God has vested all of us with the powers of reason to follow the directions in D&C 9 to study things out in our mind, and to ask the questions we really need to know - not useless information about historical concerns that do not influence my spiritual life. I would classify my efforts to gain revelation as to the historicity of the Book of Mormon as not ‘expedient’ as referred to in D&C 88:64.
Comment # 14 by Ricercar | Feb 2, 2007 | Reply
I think we can all agree that stories, fables, myths, scripture or whatever you want to call them help to mold and guide us as we grow as humans in lifes journey.
As Ricercar noted, the story of the Samaritan is universal and continues to transform lives. So does the story of “The Little Engine That Could” or “The Little Red Hen”. For me, it’s not a question of whether or not there is power in myth, stories or scripture to change lives, but whether ones life should revolve around and be governed by those bits of knowledge and their related organizations.
If Ricercar is right in saying, “I believe God has vested all of us with the powers of reason to follow the directions in D&C 9 to study things out in our mind, and to ask the questions we really need to know - not useless information about historical concerns that do not influence my spiritual life. I would classify my efforts to gain revelation as to the historicity of the Book of Mormon as not ‘expedient’ as referred to in D&C 88:64.”, then why not search for truth anywhere you can find it.
If the history and foundation of certain organizations is not important to search out, why subscribe to just one belief system? Why not take a UU type of position and use all wisdom that is available and incorporate that into your lifestyle if ultimate truth is not important?
Many stories from the BOM may have truth in them, but I’ve found I can readily replace them with non denominational ones from a variety of sources. My roots are mormonism but I don’t feel the need to rely on them when I can easily graft in different roots that are just as effective at holding me up and providing nourishment.
Comment # 15 by Simeon | Feb 2, 2007 | Reply
I spent a 5 years on a History Thesis at great expense and great sacrifice to me and my family. I realize the value of history, and certainly do not discount its value - I only seek to appropriately place History, Science, Spirituality or what ever, within their correct sphere and recognize where these spheres overlap.
The spiritual value of a Book like the Book of Mormon is certainly a persons prerogative. I don’t doubt that my perspective is similar to the Unitarian position you mentioned; I believe that the fundamental principles of Mormonism are not tied the church’s political / moral / historical or other non-expedient ideas: The articles of faith, the values underlying eternal progression and the other messages that grow from related doctrines.
I guess I believe the call of God is not to adhere to (or defend) a version of history - at least as far the Book of Mormon is concerned. History and Science like other fields of scholarship exist in separate spheres while spirituality, imagination and philosophy are tools to reconcile each to the Other.
The truth of the Book of Mormon, to a person like me, is found in the fact that it is a tragically flawed story that seeks to communicate the fact that Jesus Christ’s teachings are intended for all people. The call of the Book of Mormon is not to try to dispute issues surrounding whether there could be a River that ‘continually flows into the Red Sea’ as described in the Book of Mormon. The call is for each persons imagination to grasp that all people - even those to whom society exhibits great prejuice (like the First Nations) - are entitled to the blessing of the gospel. All are welcome to be God’s People and God will be their God.
Comment # 16 by Ricercar | Feb 2, 2007 | Reply
I subscribe to the belief that most of what we call “truth” is subjective. This is certainly the case with respect to interior “truths”— the arena of faith, belief, meaning, etc. But I believe it also to be true for so-called objective truths like history, because what we know of history is only reflected through the subjective and limited lens of human perspective, consciousness, and memory.
Paul Toscano expressed this idea better than I can in a symposium session last summer:
“Reality is not accessible directly, we cannot know ourselves or the Cosmos well enough— they are too complicated. We can only entertain changing perceptions of reality, projections of our interiorities on the exterior world, products of our imagination. We wear these illusions like clothes, the best we can do is change our perceptions in response to what we learn by experience and contemplation, abandoning what is outmoded, inadequate, and harmful to achieve some small comprehension of reality so complex it will for awhile seem to fit into any theory we can stitch up for it.”
My own “perceptions of reality” (i.e. my “truths”) have changed throughout my life and will no doubt continue to change until I die. So when I hear an overzealous Elder’s Quorum Instructor (or an apostle, as Ricercar references in #14) tell me unequivocally that “truth is THIS,” and if I don’t accept or follow said truth I will be damned to one degree or another in the next life, well, alarm bells start ringing in my head. Likewise, when an ex-Mormon stridently states that “Mormonism is a FRAUD” with the same beyond-a-shadow-of-a-doubt certainty, well, cue the alarm bells.
A second lyrical quote from Toscano:
“We must accept that we are both biological and theological creatures. We need meaning and purpose. Most of us need to feel that the universe is not just a bleak expanse of molecules, that consciousness is not an ephemeral byproduct of protein, and that our lives are not predestined to be poor, nasty, cruel, brutish, and short. Consequently we must adopt perceptions of reality that serve not only our exteriorities but our interiorities, not only our bodies but our souls.”
The above quote gets us back to the idea of “story,” a paradigm or larger narrative/mindset with which we interpret and bring meaning into our lives. It is in this realm where most of the comments in this thread belong. I see how the Mormon story brings meaning to the lives of Kevinf and cew-smoke, but is too constrictive and wanting for people like Simeon and odanuki.
Here I’ll quote some things Stephen Carter said a couple of years ago (somewhere, I don’t have the source or link anymore… I had copied them to a word file)…
“It seems that there are always stories vying for your attention. They [i.e. other people, institutions, etc.] want to interpret your experience for you, and they often want to be the last word on the subject. Our culture (Mormon, American, capitalist) wants to push some [stories] onto us, telling us they are “true” stories— meaning that they have greater claim to our dedication than other stories. If we find meaning and fulfillment in other ways, we’re made to feel out of step and guilty. I think that attitude is one of the malaises of contemporary culture. We’re told what we want so often that we have a hard time listening to what actually fulfills us.
“I spent a good deal of my life thinking that I needed to choose the “right” story to interpret my life by, but recently I’ve been thinking that what really needs to happen is that I need to learn to tell my own story in my own way…
“It takes a certain kind of genius to create a story setting that can act as an archetype for millions of people to interpret their lives through. Joseph Smith had that genius. I don’t.”
What interests me, and why I like Sunstone, is sharing our stories with each other. I want to tell you my story, and I want to learn from your story. From what I’ve seen of the ex-Mormon community, there is zero tolerance for sharing stories that don’t trumpet the Mormonism-is-a-fraud party line. Suggest otherwise and they’ll mock and scorn quicker than you can hit the “send” button. And while attending Church is not without its merits, it is not a community where we can share our stories. Whether its F&T Meeting or PH, we can only share the parts of our stories that mirror (or testify to) the orthodox line. As But this gets us off the topic of “story” and onto the topic of “community” (see M. Scott Peck’s four stages of community) so I’ll stop now…
Comment # 17 by Matt Thurston | Feb 2, 2007 | Reply
According to research by M Hammer et al in 2005, in the USA, the Q-P36 and Q-M3 lineages are found in 31% and 27% of American Indians respectively, 3.8% and 7.8% of Latinos, 0.6% and 0.1% of Anglos, 0.2% and 0% of Blacks. The only group with no Q is Asians. The Asian sample contained only 62 individuals. However, if a representative sample of 62 Jews had been tested, about 5% would be Q-P36. This is according to work done by Behar et al in 2004 for Ashkenazi Jews and work done by Shen et al in 2004 for Iraqi Jews.
Comment # 18 by Doug Forbes | Mar 7, 2007 | Reply
I’m curious why the incoherent rantings of Jolley are given the time of day. Has Mormon discourse really sunk so low that we mistake vapid stupidity for profundity?
(Has Mormon apologia gotten to the point where one can dismiss Joseph Smith entirely yet still believe in Mormonism? What’s the point?)
Comment # 19 by Joe | Aug 19, 2007 | Reply
Jolley’s is a provocative, original voice. The point of this thread was not Mormonism or Joseph Smtih per se, but the power and place of myth/story and the way it shapes and brings meaning to our lives. You can dismiss the specific myth/story of Joseph Smith/Mormonism as pointless for your life, but you cannot dismiss the power and place of myth/story in your life. Your family history, your high school years, your college years, etc. even your rejection (I assume) of Smith/Mormonism is inextricably tied to the hallmarks of myth and story. “Fact” or “truth” are somewhat independent and/or subordinate to your personal myths/stories, colored by the vagaries of memory, interpretation, temperment, time/place, etc. What matters is that they are factual or true to you.
Comment # 20 by Matt Thurston | Aug 20, 2007 | Reply
Matt says: “Fact” or “truth” are somewhat independent and/or subordinate to your personal myths/stories, colored by the vagaries of memory, interpretation, temperament, time/place, etc. What matters is that they are factual or true to you.
I was pleased to see this thread recovered, even though Joe #19 seems unable to appreciate Jolley’s passionate challenge and Matt’s serious questions. This is because it allowed me to review earlier posts only briefly scanned earlier in the year. In reviewing them I discovered Matt’s marvelous #17, which I had completely missed before, where he quotes essence thoughts from Paul Toscano and Stephen Carter. All three of these thoughtful brothers have renewed my hope in the vitality and spiritual potential of our Mormon culture–well apart from societal or institutional constraints. Thanks again, Joe, for the heads up!
I had the pleasure of breakfasting with Clifton on Monday morning after the recent symposium (where he had presented an updated version of his original 2006 Dallas paper) and before he dropped me off at the SLC airport. Because of something I said at the café table, he observed with a smile that he considered me the second most naïve person of his acquaintance. Not knowing whether this was insult or irony, I asked who he thought was the first. His answer: “Eugene England”. My confidence in his belief in and love for our Mormon tradition soared. But when I disclosed what it was that had triggered my second excommuniication, he said I’d just moved into first place. What an honor!
Comment # 21 by Eugene Kovalenko | Aug 21, 2007 | Reply
Congrats, Eugene! Truly an honor to be named ultra-naive along with the other Eugene!!
Clifton is indeed one of the most challenging and intriguing people I’ve met, and I’ve been excited to host his voice at our recent symposiums. This essay of his is, as Matt says, practically “performance art”–and like good art, it is really one of the pieces that have stayed with me and continually calls me to think about what makes us as Latter-day Saints a people.
Some here may not know that in July of this year, William Lobdell left his beat as a religion writer for the LA Times citing the toll it has taken on his own faith journey as the primary reason for asking to be reassigned. In reply to a note I sent him thanking him for his long and excellent work in covering things Mormon so well and fairly and for his frequent kindnesses to Sunstone, including being on a panel in which Jolley gave a version of talk and took great delight in pointing at Lobdell and even raising higher the “shame on the LA Times” rheroric, Lobdell replied: ” thanks for the kind words. they are appreciated. i’ll always have a soft spot in my heart for mormons — even clifton jolley.”
Comment # 22 by Dan | Aug 22, 2007 | Reply
Dan:
About that “other Eugene”, you probably don’t know that he and I first met at the U of Utah in 1961, he having just resigned an Air Force commission to return to school and not before he won a Danforth Fellowship that took him to Stanford (where he founded Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought with Wes Johnson). I had come from UC Berkeley the previous year on an NDEA Title IV fellowship with an intensely personal agenda and Gene quickly became my most severe critic. He was deeply concerned about what he perceived as my “egoistic intensity”. (Jolley now generously refers to this as primary naiveté!) To deal with this tension we formed a five-man dialogue group with three other LDS brothers: Rex Mitchell, Lou Olivier and Grant Weed. It became the most exhilarating, challenging, growth producing experience I’d never known. Those were also the days of Lowell Bennion at the U of Utah Institute that Mary Bradford writes so eloquently about in her biography of Bennion. But, my personal focus in those days had blinded me to the stresses in Bennion’s tenure as well as in any others beyond my own story. Gene’s concern had substance.
This brings me back to Joe’s #19 comment, combined with another by John Dehlin during his symposium workshop session and Matt’s #17 Stephen Carter reference to M. Scott Peck’s stages of community. Joe seems clearly angry, especially at Clifton Jolley’s attack on cultural cowardice. John strongly asserted in his workshop that “anger is a cancer” with respect to staying in the institutionalized church after being disaffected. If we can consider Peck’s model of the four stages of community: I Pseudo Community; II Chaos; III Emptying and IV True Community; anger is typically the first thing that can break us out of pseudo or false community and into the chaos that can lead to a more authentic dialogue and on to true community. It is energy to be channeled and not marginalized as disease as John seems to want to do. To not value, include and transcend anger is to let fear govern Sunstone’s development, rather than love. I don’t believe fear should be part of Sunstone’s new strategy, because it threatens to emasculate our young men. Thank God for Clifton Jolley’s channeled anger! Thank God for Joe’s courage in expressing his indignation! This is the stuff of creativity and we need all we can get! I will bless my relationship with that other Eugene (and with Clifton and with the archetype of Joseph Smith) all of my days.
Comment # 23 by Eugene Kovalenko | Aug 22, 2007 | Reply
Eugene,
I’d love to sit down with you sometime and hear you tell stories about the other “Eugene” and Clifton Jolley. You are all rather fascinating individuals.
How was Jolley’s 2007 Sunstone presentation? I missed it, but will listen to the recording for sure.
By the way, what did you say that made Jolley comment that you were the second most naive person of his acquaintance?
Comment # 24 by Matt Thurston | Aug 28, 2007 | Reply
Ah, Matt, thanks for the questions! They made me feel less invisible and absurd, as I often do when I post stuff on SunstoneBlog.
There are so many stories about both these guys…
It was England who introduced me to Jolley in the fall of 1978 at one of those fabulous cultural gatherings at the England’s Provo home. I gave Clifton my original (and only) tape recording of the first performance of my play The Defense of Cain for him to listen to and return. He became excited by the play’s idea, but thought he could improve it. That delighted me. He therefore asked to keep it for a while longer, but then proceeded to loose–er, misplace it. That was almost 30 years ago and we soon lost contact with each other. Then, just three years ago we reconnected at a Sunstone banquet where he was the featured speaker. I came up to him afterwards and reminded him about the tape. He was appropriately mortified that I was still in mourning about it and promised to keep looking. He still swears it’s somewhere in his garage, since he throws nothing away. As a gesture of good intent, he assigned his playwright son Calvin to help me with the long overdue rewrite.
Jolley’s 2007 presentation was an update of his original “Shame on the Los Angeles Times!” I enjoyed this performance even more than the original Dallas version.
As for what I said to Clifton that changed his opinion of my naiveté, actually I was already in second place when we sat down at that recent café breakfast table. He simply verbalized this to me for the first time as we wiped our respective beards and discussed mustache cups. Second place had already been achieved because of my having earlier forwarded to him some correspondence with the local SP here in Los Alamos earlier this year. See: Orthodox Odyssey: Parts 2.1, 2.2 and; 2.3: God’s Fool, God’s Fool Befuddled, and God’s Fool Undaunted on my blog in http://www.kovalenko.org.
What promoted me to first place in Clifton’s opinion was this story:
In January 1992, as a member of the Ventura California stake, I came to its annual stake conference prepared to raise my hand in silent opposition to the current leadership of the Church. Bob Rees, who knew about my intent, had warned me that I risked being ex’d, but I didn’t believe him. (He was right.) I prepared months for this event and made two duplicate copies of carefully crafted materials, one for the visiting general authority and one for the stake president, in the event I was called upon to explain myself. (Which did happen). Each package contained a copy of a carefully written letter to President Ezra Taft Benson explaining my concern and objection about what appeared to be an officially sanctioned Church policy of intimidation of the intellectual community of the Church. Each package contained a collection of poems, stories and recorded singing performances, plus copies of two earlier Sunstone West presentations Mormon Mission to Moscow (1989) and The Values Crisis (1990). After all, I had confidence in the scripture: “…by their fruits ye shall know….”
That did it. I won first place!!
Comment # 25 by Eugene Kovalenko | Aug 29, 2007 | Reply
Matt: I’m not finished!
That is, I’m not finished embarrassing myself or you or other readers with ample evidence of the naiveté, Clifton Jolley points out. You may even be embarrassed for Clifton, but he is incapable of that, which he proves again and again to our (my) great delight.
At our recent café breakfast and with my status in his naiveté index firmly established, he asked for the quote I’d recited after his latest “Shame on the …Times” performance. Some old guy–possibly older than I–came to the mike and went on and on with mind numbing physics jargon relative to the DNA argument, which I thought totally missed the point of Clifton’s paper. (Physicists tend to do that!) I probably didn’t get the guy’s point either, but a quote from Astronomer Edwin Hubble’s The Nature of Science came forcibly to mind. He wrote: “The world of pure values, that world which science cannot enter, has no concern whatever with probable knowledge. There finality, i.e., eternal ultimate truth, is earnest sought. And sometimes, through the strangely compelling experience of mystical insight, a man knows without a shadow of a doubt that he has been in touch with a reality that lies behind mere phenomena. He, himself, is completely convinced. But he cannot communicate the certainty. It is a private revelation. He may be right, but unless we share his ecstasy, we cannot know.”
But enough of that. I want to share with you Clifton’s comments from earlier this year after sending him that “God’s Fool” stuff. He wrote:
“Part of your trouble, Gene, is that you wear out ecclesiastical leadership. You take everything so much more seriously and imbue everything with such meaning and importance that eventually a priesthood leader says (in effect): SHUT UP! I’m the authority here, and I’ve got plenty of people to talk to who will simply do as I say and not worry me about what the Holy Spirit is saying to anybody!”
“You are a MAGNIFICENT harmony of God’s Fool and L’Enfant terrible.
“How WONDERFUL you are for us. How HARD it must be for you to be so wonderful for us.
“God bless.”
He knows! How can I not help but love this guy? Later I found myself reflecting on and identifying with Bess, that immature, naïve, but faithful character in Breaking the Waves.
Comment # 26 by Eugene Kovalenko | Aug 30, 2007 | Reply
Amen.
Comment # 27 by Clifton Jolley Ph.D. | Jun 10, 2008 | Reply