Dear Blake and others:
I've repented of scathing. However, Branton, like a host of other "former"
or "claim-to-be" Mormons, use a Mormon-of-record-only front, to make claims
of inside knowledge, so that they can freely distort, twist, and misinterpret
whatever they choose to sensationalize for the sake of astonishing the easily
duped and impressed.
As you pointed out, there are those who take these false claims as FACT, all
but swearing that they are verifiable merely because Branton and Icke and
others tell them they are verifiable, and these claims seem like they must be
true because they are represented in print with this supposed air of
authority. These anti-Mormon parasites, and there are many of them besides
Branton and Icke, specialize in taking a thread of truth and distorting,
padding, and intentionally misinterpreting it beyond any truthful
recognition.
It's hard to defend against this type of attack for several reasons.
One reason is because most of those who are willing to get caught up and
believe these pact of misrepresentations aren't about ready to listen to the
simple truth of the matter. It's too simple and unsensational, and they are
the types who are drawn to the sensational aspect of these kind of
publications in the first place.
Another reason is that the arguments are so embroiled in such illogical
reasoning, based on so many half truths, stacked upon so many
misinterpretations, surrounded by so much innuendo, immersed in so many
falsehoods, that it's hard to know where to even begin to untangle the mess.
Another curiosity, is that these sensationalists read each other's material,
and then make additional erroneous claims based upon a compilation of these
other incorrect representations. The mere fact that these obscurely
ridiculous claims keep popping up in multiple sources should be a warning to
the wise reader, however, those who don't know better only take it as another
verifying source.
Mike, I love ya, really, but your claim that, it's a VERIFIABLE FACT that
Joseph Smith was a Mason, or even a Master Mason before he received his
heavenly vision, is absolutely wrong. To what degree of absolutely wrong do
you regard as factually verifiable? And this was only one of several
FACTUALLY VERIFIABLE comments you made which were incorrect. Yet you make
that kind of statement, or should I say, "quote," with no qualms about the
possibility of being absolutely wrong, and then make other incorrect
comments, or quotes, relating to that incorrect statement, and then draw
incorrect conclusions based on all of these incorrect, yet, to your own
satisfaction, factually verifiable comments.
Mike, just because someone writes in a book the claim that something is
factually verifiable, doesn't make it so. Sadly, that's one of the ways in
which they go about duping people, and you have been duped, by duping
experts. As factual resources, these books aren't worth the paper they are
written on. It is difficult for a knowledgeable Mormon to glean out what
little actual fact that might be buried in these books, let alone an
uninformed non-Mormon. And I don't mean to sound scathing here. I'm only
trying to point out the logical truth.
You want truth? Not to be discourteous, but, "I don't think you can handle
the truth."
But, here it goes anyway. When I was nineteen, I was endowed in the Salt
Lake Temple. That means I went through the Temple Ceremony for myself for
the first time. I grew up in Provo, Utah, some 45 miles south of Salt Lake,
and the Salt Lake Temple was our closest, and therefore assigned temple.
Most of the assignments, or jobs in the Temples are voluntary, and are
performed by worthy members. This includes many aspects of maintenance, work
in the laundry, cafeteria, and other areas located in the basement of the
Temple. I spent hundreds of volunteer hours working in the basement of the
Salt Lake Temple. I have been in the crawl spaces reserved for plumbing in
troubleshooting for various problems that have arisen during my service
hours, and in practically every other square foot of these lowest levels of
any accessibility. This includes sump wells and drainage pits. I have been
places in the Salt Lake Temple where I suppose even the President of the LDS
Church has not ventured. This was over at least a dozen years of various
service in the Salt Lake Temple. Sorry, but there are no secret passages, or
hidden rooms, or hollow walls, or forbidden doors, or false floors, or any
such mysterious aspects about the structure. The floor and walls are granite
slabs or blocks. Solid granite columns hold up the upper floors. Most of
the basement rooms are large open areas with the supporting columns visible,
and the other rooms are partitioned off by simple framed walls between these
columns. I can tell you, first hand, that there are absolutely no cavernous
entrances and secret hidden levels underneath the Salt Lake City Temple.
Anyone who claims such, is either outright lying, or quoting a lie. This is
the truth.
Now, you can believe someone who has been there and has seen that every
square foot is accounted for there, and has no reason or hidden agenda to
mislead you;
or you can believe a sensationalist, who, at best, is claiming to have
secondhand knowledge, but, rather, someone who is more probably passing on,
exaggerating, or simply making up false stories for the sake of generating
and promoting a paying audience in furthering their own interests. If this
seems scathing, so be it. But, I will not walk on eggshells either,
especially with something of which I PERSONALLY know to be VERIFIABLE FACT,
and not just someone claiming something to be so, who has no knowledge of
what he claims, but which claim happens to be diametrically opposed to what I
know to be true.
Now, you can still cling to this fantasy by insisting that perhaps I'm the
one being duped by a higher conspiracy to cover-up the real truth. But, I'll
tell you, most of the time I spent in the Temple in these service capacities
were unsupervised, or were in company with other volunteers as myself. There
aren't guards or security personnel lurking around mysterious areas of the
Temple. Believe me, if there were such cavernous structures underneath the
Salt Lake City Temple, I would be the first in line to share that with any
and everyone, and I would be the first in line to explore such caverns, as I
have some spelunking interests and experience as well, and have explored
practically every cave, cavern and abandoned mine along the Wasatch front.
I would insist on knowing for myself why these caverns existed. But, they do
not!
Now, there's the truth about the matter. Let's see how we handle it. It was
shared in good faith and for the honest purpose of informing all who read
this with the truth.
Norlan