Bob Rees
SUNDAY | MARCH 25, 2018 | 7:00-9:00 pm
The so-called “faith crisis” in Mormonism is much more complex than most recognize. This interactive activity and presentation explores the multiple dimensions of the rupture many experience in the household of faith.
GATHERING AT:
Home of Aimee & Bryant McConkie
3373 Oakwood St
Salt Lake City, Utah 84109
Besides sharing your hearts and thoughts: You are welcome to bring something tasty for all to consume.
THE DISCUSSION:
The Mormon “Faith Crisis” as it is common called, is much more complex than most assume. That is, it isn’t just a crisis of faith, which has to do with belief and devotion; it also often involves cognitive dissonance, an inability to make things “fit” as they once did, the challenge of accommodating new information and experience with traditional ideas and expectations, and the negotiation of multiple relationships. It also has to do with being itself. Thus, in addition to constituting a crisis of faith, this phenomenon is also a crisis of reason and, especially, a crisis of love, since, without love, faith and hope have no ultimate meaning. This discussion attempts to look at the multiple dimensions of the spiritual crisis that many Latter-day Saints (and other believers) experience as existential—a deeply disturbing, disillusioning, and even depressing state—and how to accept, adjust or transform it in one’s self, family and community.
ABOUT BOB:
Robert A. “Bob” Rees, Ph.D., is a scholar, teacher, and humanitarian. He has taught at UCLA, UC Santa Cruz and and UC Berkeley and currently teaches at Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, where he serves as Director of Mormon Studies. For a dozen years (1996-2008), Rees was Director of Education and Humanities at the Institute of HeartMath, a research and education center in the Santa Cruz Mountains focusing on the heart. He is the author/co-author of numerous studies in religion, education, psychology, politics, cultural studies and the arts and humanities. He is the co-author of “New Perspectives On the Role of the Heart in Positive Emotions, Intuition, and Social Coherence” ( The Oxford Handbook of Positive Psychology, 3rd Edition, 2017). His book of poetry, Waiting for Morning, has just been published (Zarahemla Press, 2017).
STUFF TO STUDY:
- Thomas McConkie, Navigating Mormon Faith Crisis
Book | Podcast Interview | Faith Again Discussion - Patrick Mason, Planted: Belief and Belonging in an Age of Doubt
Book | Podcast Interview | Faith Again Discussion - Jon Ogden, When Mormons Doubt: A Way to Save Relationships and Seek a Quality Life
Book | Podcast Interview | Faith Again Discussion - Peter Enns, The Sin of Certainty: Why God Desires Our Trust More Than Our “Correct” Beliefs
Book | Podcast Interview | Faith Again Discussion - Wendy Ulrich, Faith, Cognitive Dissonance, and the Psychology of Religious Experience
Conference Presentation
In addition to the first three sources, which I heartily endorse, I also highly recommend these last two. – Jay
RECORDING OF THE CONVERSATION:
Not great quality. Sorry.
