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Mormon Stories Podcast

1143: The Lusk Family Disciplinary Council Verdict: Disfellowshipment for Unrepentant Apostasy?

Mormon Stories Podcast

Dr. John Dehlin

Religion & Spirituality

4.55.7K Ratings

🗓️ 8 July 2019

⏱️ 103 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

On 6/30/2019 Mormon Bishop Jared Lusk attended a Mormon church disciplinary council in the Farmington, New Mexico stake on the charges of apostasy. His "sins" included:
 
1) Losing his Mormon faith after reading the Mormon church's own Gospel Topics essays, which discussed topics such as : a) discrepancies in the multiple accounts of Joseph Smith's first vision, b) Joseph Smith's polygamy and polyandry, c) concerns about the authenticity of the Book of Mormon and Book of Abraham, etc.
 
2) Writing publicly about his loss of faith on Facebook, and
 
3) Supporting Mormon Bishop Sam Young's efforts to protect Mormon children from sexual abuse.
 
During the disciplinary council Jared's Mormon Stake President read the charges of apostasy, including several of Jared's Facebook statements. Then, Jared's wife, Gwen, along with two of their daughters (Taylor and Madison) testified on Jared's behalf. Then Jared provided his own response to the charges.
 
At the close of the disciplinary council, Jared's stake president twice asked Jared explicitly if he would agree to stop commenting on social media about his disbelief in fundamental Mormon truth claims. Both times Jared told his stake president that he would NOT stop expressing his disbelief on social media - explicitly defying the counsel of Jared's priesthood leadership (which in and of itself is ground for apostasy).
 
In a somewhat unexpected and heretofore unheard of act in the modern area, Jared was informed by his Stake President that he has been Disfellowshipped for Apostasy.

Transcript

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0:00.0

Music

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0:33.6

and go towards producing the podcast and building communities and programs of support for

0:38.6

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0:40.0

Thanks for your support.

0:59.2

And love you, everyone, and welcome to another edition of Mormon Stories podcast.

1:07.2

I'm your host John Dillin.

1:09.4

It is July 2nd, 2019 in the evening and we are here to continue our coverage of the

1:18.3

Jared and Gwen Lusk family story that involves, you know, many of you will have listened to

1:25.8

Mormon Stories episode, which was 1131 through 1136 where Jared and Gwen and Madison

1:33.0

Lusk all talk about their faithful commitment and devotion to the church for many decades,

1:38.0

mostly in Farmington, New Mexico, how Jared served his bishop and Gwen served his bishop's

1:44.7

wife for five years and how thoroughly they were committed to the church up until, you

1:52.5

know, just a few years ago when Jared stumbled upon the Mormon Church's own gospel topics

1:58.4

essays, started reading them, kind of almost, you know, soon thereafter lost his faith.

2:05.8

And as he and his family members realized that the church wasn't what they thought when

2:11.8

Jared started talking about it publicly, a little bit on Facebook and when he started

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