This website is long overdue. I followed the link and read just one post and immediately bookmarked the site. I'm sure I'll be back many times.

While Latter-day Saints do a commendable job of living the Gospel, they lack the requisite curiosity necessary to understand the true meaning of the Gospel.

David O. McKay labeled this lack of curiosity as "spiritual Illiteracy" and called it the single greatest challenge facing the members of the Church. He continued, "Our people know a lot about facts and history, but we have not yet caught the true meaning of principles and how to apply them to life.” (Ensign, March 1975)

Isn't this the job of your prophet? If God speake to him, why must your BYU apologist professors have to try to come up with an explanation for your doctrines and sordid history? Can't God explain it through the prophet if an explanation is needed?

After visiting the website all I could see was big words and complicated arguements to support simple truths. The underlying premise for the website though is that they aren't going to question LDS stands on issues but just explain/justify the stand. I find this premise sad. Joseph Smith started the LDS Church with questions not justifications. Even Christ himself questioned the very foundation of his society. I feel that it is the questions we ask that help us find truth, not the justifications.

I spent about a half-hour on the site this morning, and found longer, more eloquent versions of the same arguments: gay marriage is wrong because it will lead to incest, polygamy (and polyandry, which is somehow worse) and bestiality, and marriage is for producing children, which gay people can't do.

None of those arguments is any different from what's already out there in the public discourse, and for all its eloquence, they don't any more sense than they did before.

Gimme a P! Gimme an R! Gimme an O! Gimme another P! Gimme an A! Gimme a G! Gimme another A! Gimme an N! Gimme a D! Gimme another A! What does it spell?! PROPAGANDA

You need to work on your close reading skills. Sherlock never made the argument that same sex marriage will lead to incest, polygamy, bestiality, etc. He even explicitly stated he does not predict those outcomes. His point is that nothing in the foundational assumptions in the pro same arguments can form a basis for rejection of those behaviors.

This website is the beginning of the end of the growth for the mormon church.

When I first questioned my beliefs 9 years ago, I never - NEVER - went to a so-called "anti-mormon" website or info source. I made sure that I was only reviewing sources that had some kind of tie to my church. Back then it was FAIR/FARMS and some Hugh Nibley sources.

Any idea what led me out of the church? It was the intellectual pretzel bending that my brain was asked to do by these apologists. They led me in such a twisty-topsy-turvy path around simple questions that THEY NEVER ANSWERED.

Now here is a website with even less educated apologists offering their view.

After all the time effort & money that the members give the mormon church, the least they could do is answer their questions honestly and in a straight-forward manner. Yes, they will lose members, but will gain respect. The growth will slow, but those who join will join with full disclosure and the activity rate will rise.

You have expressed my sentiments EXACTLY. I remember when Hugh Nibley went through the same contortions trying to defend Joseph Smith's "translation" of the Book of Abraham from the Egyptian papyrus. The same goes for the church's explanation for it revised doctrines and history. The cognitive dissonance was just too much and I just couldn't even pretend to believe any more.

Matt,

The Church will continue to move forward, guided by the Savior. It will do so with or without this website. Nothing in the world will ever change the fact that it is Christ's church, nor can anything hinder the success of its mission.

I find it odd that these university professors have taken on the primary task of defending the church rather than seeking the truth and following it wherever it may lead. Shouldn't it be the other way around?

The fact of the matter is that Joseph Smith never claimed that his translations was from the Book of the Dead. That extant Joseph Smith papyri DOES NOT match the description of the papyri used by Joseph Smith.
Hugh Nibley was the first to point out what the extant papyri actually were. He also began the study of comparing the Book of Abraham to possible comparison texts. This leads to very interesting observations, that strongly support its ancient origin.