537: Tom Phillips, the Second Anointing, and Apostle Jeffrey R. Holland Holland Pt. 3 - Family Fallout

Mormon Stories Podcast

Dr. John Dehlin

Religion & Spirituality

4.6 • 5.2K Ratings

🗓️ 27 April 2015

⏱️ 45 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In June of 2012 I interviewed Tom Phillips, former LDS church stake president in London, England U.K. In this interview he discusses the following:

His early experiences as a bishop and stake president in the LDS church, along with is friendship with LDS apostle Jeffrey R. Holland.
His experience receiving a secret/sacred LDS church ordinance called the "Second Anointing," wherein he was anointed by the hands of Elder M. Russel Ballard, and assured exaltation in there hereafter.
His subsequent loss of faith over historical and scientific issues with the church.
His direct correspondence with then friend, LDS apostle Jeffrey R. Holland, over these troubling issues.
The pain, suffering, and ultimate divorce that he and his family experienced as a result of his faith crisis.
Additional detail about Tom's story can be found here.

At the time I conducted this interview I was in deep discussions with my stake president, Mark Jensen, over my status with the church, and my ability to baptize my son. Out of fear of church discipline, and as a sign of good will to President Jensen, I decided to not release this episode via Mormon Stories podcast, and instead granted permission to Tom to do with it as he saw fit.

Over the subsequent months and years I have come to regret this decision made largely out of fear, and want to publicly apologize to Tom for it. I now feel it is appropriate to release this interview, not because I seek to show disrespect for the LDS church or its temple ordinances, but because Tom's story a very poignant example of the pain and suffering that can come about as many LDS members continue to experience legitimate struggles with the LDS church's truth claims.

Since this interview openly discusses secret/sacred LDS temple ordinances, listener discretion is strongly advised.

Transcript

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0:27.9	Okay, so let's we're going to come back to your your correspondence with other
0:33.5	Holland, but tell me tell me what the process was for you coming out. Like did you
0:39.8	start with your wife? Yeah, what I did in May 2004.
0:44.9	Well, first was was there a moment where you just said to yourself, I'm not sure the
0:50.2	church is what it claims to be. Did you have like a moment like I I could think of a
0:55.0	moment in time where I said, oh my gosh, I'm not sure the church is what it claims to be.
1:01.8	Did you have a moment like that? I think so when I got that response from the Smithsonian,
1:05.8	I think that was okay. That was your that was you know, I'd been clutching get straws then to
1:10.1	find someone that would just give me the 1% chance. Yeah, okay. They closed the door on me.
1:15.7	Now, but even after I got that, because actually my state president called me in for a call and
1:22.2	they want while I was waiting around, they wanted to call me to the high council. And I actually
1:26.6	said to him at the time, look, I'd love to say, oh, you know, I love serving on the high
1:29.7	council. No question about it. I said, but to be honest, any court, I'm not in now in a situation
1:34.2	where I'm going to go out and reactivate or convert or anything, because I'm having these
1:39.7	issues. I explained some of them to him. He did listen to him to me for a couple of hours,
1:45.4	but he just said, no, I believe the book of Mormon is true and the scientists have got it all
1:48.8	wrong in that end of conversation. And he kept the calling open for me for about three months.
1:54.6	And I said, look, no, at the time I would have loved to have talked to my wife, but she saw the
	...

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