The Crazy Train May Just Lead You To Jesus

Join us for PART 2 of The Crazy Train where we now discuss the intricacies of the Judd's experiences and how it has effected their kids, especially their oldest son who was not allowed to serve a mission due to gossip spread about him. 
-
In this episode we also do a deep dive of Phontaine and Hannah's faith journey.  What has become of their faith through all these experiences!?
-
Tune in for the full episode!
-
@TheCrazyTrain_Begins  
https://www.stopthecrazytrain.org/
-
Want to share your story on the Clairity Podcast?  Email me at clairity.podcast@gmail.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Any organization, church or secular or otherwise, institutes a policy that directly contradicts Scripture, it will end badly.

SPEAKER_05 0:07

If you have a relationship with Jesus Christ, no one can ban you from that.

SPEAKER_03 0:14

I suggest that contention is not the same as conflict. I suggest, according to the definition Jesus gave, contention is anything that leads people away from Jesus.

SPEAKER_05 0:25

When you're knowingly spreading a lie about someone, it isn't just gossip. Oh, I heard this and blah, blah, blah. It isn't just idle gossip. You've stepped into something that's a little more serious, which God calls bearing false witness. Evil speaking, bearing false witness. And the only difference between a good person and a bad person, a righteous person or a wicked person, isn't that they sin. They both sin. It's just the righteous person repents.

SPEAKER_02 0:57

Maybe your behavior is what makes you look bad.

SPEAKER_05 0:59

Telling people they're unwanted. Holy cow. That is so damaging for church leaders to be communicating that to people. I've been a member of the church my entire life. How is this possible that I didn't know Jesus? By getting kicked out of church, I think I became a Christian.

SPEAKER_06 1:24

Everyone has a journey they are walking. And along that road, we are met with potholes, road bumps, rain, storms, and sometimes just fog. But through it all, we're really just looking for one thing. Clarity. They're throwing at you to combat what you're doing. And so I want to get into this justification. Um, it's only a human organization. All the humans make errors and intentionally sin. You're focusing these various people's errors, sins, et cetera, and making it public. So this is kind of the nobody's perfect rhetoric. Can you guys share your thoughts on that, on that rhetoric?

SPEAKER_03 2:38

This is this is a common, again, misconception. It's a justification for doing bad things. It's not actually a it's not an appeal to correct or how how do I articulate this?

unknown 2:56

It's a cop-out.

SPEAKER_03 2:57

It yeah, I guess that would be the easiest way. It's a cop-out. It's only human. The idea, and I think there was another quote that someone had there too, where they're like, you're too harsh on your leaders, they didn't ask for this, you know, that idea.

SPEAKER_06 3:09

Yeah, you're too harsh on your leaders, they didn't ask for these callings, and they're just regular people. What are you expect what you are expecting of them isn't fair.

SPEAKER_03 3:15

Aaron Powell, I think those two comments are very closely related. It's this idea that somehow we're not being fair by asking our leaders to do their job. That strikes me as so bizarre, that mentality, because okay, yes, maybe they didn't ask for the calling, but they accepted it. And they accepted all the perks and the benefits of the calling. They accepted the respect and the social status and and all the opportunities that come with it, but they don't want the responsibilities. They don't want they want all the benefits, but none of the work. That that's I think that's what it boils down to is I don't I don't want to have to work for all of these benefits that I'm receiving. And unfortunately, and I I'm not lambasting the church on this. This is my experience is a a large majority of leaders in all different arenas are are this way, where you got principals at schools, or you've got government officials, or you've got the the teachers' association, or you've got uh people in in in police uh unions or or whatever it may be. They want all the power, all the glory, all the benefits and the perks, but none of the responsibility. They don't want to deal with the hard problems, they don't want to make waves. All they care about is getting what they want. And I take issue with that. And the fact that it has seeped its way into the church, I find that to be upsetting. But also, I think it's funny. So the leaders don't have to be held responsible, but I do. That seems a little hypocritical to me.

SPEAKER_05 4:56

Yeah, it almost seems like um the same issues that we bring up about the police, where yeah, we respect the police. They like make all these sacrifices for us. They're in harm's way they're in harm's way. Um but we've taken that um and we've allowed like the police unions to basically make it so if a police officer is committing like serious crimes, they're held to a much lower st standard and can basically get away with things that are criminal for the rest of normal people. And where there's this exception made for them, instead of holding them to a higher standard of conduct, they're actually given a pass. Oh, because they're police, uh, they do so much good. They're given a pass for their conduct. And so with the church leaders, there's this similar, for some reason, attitude of, hey, their job's hard. We're gonna give them a pass. And so, yeah, nobody's nobody's perfect. We all sin. And the only difference between a good person and a bad person, a righteous person or a wicked person, isn't that they sin. They both sin. Uh it's just the righteous person repents, they confess, they they forsake, they try, they they're trying to do better, and a wicked person doesn't. And so nobody is perfect. I'm not perfect. But saying they're not perfect, therefore it's okay for them to hurt other people and purposely do so and refuse to change that. We're not talking perfect anymore. This isn't just, oh, they're not perfect. They're trying to hurt other people and they're doing it purposefully and they're not willing to change.

SPEAKER_03 6:46

And that's the difference between a mistake and a pattern of behavior. Everybody makes mistakes. Accept it, make it right, and move on. I get that. But when we start noticing a pattern of behavior, that's when we have to intervene and say, Yeah, you know what? This is not okay. Um and then going back to what Hannah was saying about, you know, I I think it's I think that bears repeating that police officers and this this is the thing that that has struck me as odd, is that not only are they not held to a higher standard, they're actually being given a pass and being held to a lower standard than the average citizen. And right now, again, we're seeing that mentality creep into the church where these church leaders that not only are they not held to that higher standard, they're actually given a pass and held to a lower standard. And I'm reminded of I'm no, I'm reminded of Animal Farm, where everybody's equal. It's just some are more equal than others. That that mentality of we're all sinners and we all make mistakes, yeah, that's great. Then why don't we at least keep everybody at the same level and the same standard? Why are we giving, again, police officers and secular leaders and religious leaders and all these others, why are we giving them a pass? At the very least, let's keep us all at the same level, but ideally, they should be held to a higher standard.

SPEAKER_05 8:09

One of the problems with that is if you take your leaders and people with positions of power, whether uh secular or religious, and you give them that pass on bad conduct, on hurtful conduct, what ends up happening is you end up, for example, with the police, you end up scared of all the police. And so similarly, where I'm seeing, oh, wait, wait, wait, uh church leaders are being given a pass, where uh from my experience, I'm like, oh, so if they like make up false, make up confessions that never happen and or and lie and do these things, there's actually no repercussion for it. I know that there are fabulous bishops, fabulous stake presidents. I've had wonderful bishops in my life who have blessed my life. And so has so has my husband. We've had wonderful experiences in the church in the past. I I have a brother who just got called as a bishop who I absolutely like respect him. I'm sure he he'll, you know, do his very best and be as honest and upright as he can. But because I know now that there is no system of accountability in a place and that they are given a pass, it makes me distrustful of all bishops. I would be scared to ever go in and talk to a bishop. I would be scared for my kids to go in because you you don't know if somebody's gonna lie or do something like that, like until they do it. By having accountability in place, you restore the respect of the police. By having accountability in place in the church, you restore the trust and respect uh for for bishops because you know, okay, if the if okay, things can go sideways, but if they do, there's a system to handle it. There's a system of accountability. But giving them a a pass like this, it ends up destroying trust.

SPEAKER_06 10:14

Yeah. So what I'm hearing from you is that by inputting a system of accountability, we would then be able to safely trust and respect these leaders if we saw that they were being accountable. And when we use the term nobody's perfect as a scapegoat for bad behavior, that's when we see problems because you're eliminating repentance, which is the whole point of the gospel.

SPEAKER_05 10:41

We talked for 10 minutes and she just said it like in there.

SPEAKER_06 10:46

It's just active listening. Okay. Okay. And I also want to point on um this comment of you're too harsh on your church leaders, they're just regular people, what you're expecting them isn't fair. My question to that person would be what is the expectation of leaders of God then? Like, what's the expectation? Because I feel like they should be held to a pretty high bar. If you're going to c claim that you are a servant of our God, then you need to be held to a pretty high bar because Jesus was perfect. Okay. And we're not claiming we're going to be perfect as human beings, but this goes back to what you were saying that we should expect these men to repent, to own up, to be accountable.

SPEAKER_05 11:26

Yeah. So last year we were studying the doctrine and covenants. And one thing that really struck me, like I had never noticed before. But basically, when it was talking about accountability and church discipline and God was basically laying out the rules and policies of how his church should function, I was kind of surprised because there was a whole section about what to do if the high priest, it seems like it was talking about the president of the church. And basically, the section was talking about how if the president of the church does something wrong, um, there was a system describing the system of accountability that should take place. And it ends with nobody is gonna be exempt from the laws of God.

SPEAKER_03 12:13

Nobody's above the law?

SPEAKER_05 12:14

Nobody's above the law. Not even the not even the president of the church is supposed to be above the law.

SPEAKER_03 12:21

Yeah, it's eighty one oh seven.

SPEAKER_05 12:22

Okay, one oh seven.

SPEAKER_03 12:24

There is not any person belonging to the church who is exempt from this council. Thus none shall be exempted from the justice and the laws of God, that all things may be done in order and in solemnity before him according to truth and righteousness.

SPEAKER_05 12:35

And that was after he was talking about leadership accountability, where the leaders are not above the law.

SPEAKER_03 12:41

It should be a no-brainer. And yet somehow some false ideas have crept in.

SPEAKER_05 12:48

But it ends up hurting the organization and trust in the organization and the legitimacy of the organization if you don't have that. And and God understands that.

SPEAKER_03 12:58

Um this isn't um It's almost like God understands human nature.

SPEAKER_06 13:03

It is. It's so weird. Weird that he would understand that. Right. Um, I just would like to kind of transition this segment by talking about Dr. Covenants 121, 34 through 37, because this is God's expectations of these men in leadership. Um, and it says, Behold, there are many called, but few are chosen, and why are they not chosen? Because their hearts are set so much upon the things of this world and aspire to the honors of men, and they do not learn this one lesson that the rights of the priesthood are inseparably connected with the powers of heaven, and the powers of heaven cannot be controlled nor handled only upon the principles of righteousness, that they may be conferred upon us, it is true. But when we undertake to cover our sins, or to gratify our pride or vain ambition, or to exercise control or dominion or compulsion upon the souls of the children of men and any degree of unrighteousness, behold, the heavens withdraw themselves, the spirit of the Lord is grieved, and when it is withdrawn, amen to the priesthood or the authority of that man. So these men do not have authority to abuse you. They never will, okay, because that goes against the laws of God. And so if somebody is gossiping against you, slandering you, um, all of the false things, they don't have the authority to do that. And so God holds them to a pretty high standard. You need to be honest, tell the truth, have good morals, okay. That's a pretty high standard. Don't cover your things.

SPEAKER_03 14:31

Let's just start there. I I would give a lot. Boy, the the lack of truth telling from Logan Shepherd, Ned Telford, a bishop and a stake president, and then Bruce Holt and Alan Smith, another bishop and stake president, it's mind-boggling to me how they feel like it's okay to lie and to lie repeatedly to my face and to others and not be held accountable. That really bothers me. And somehow this mentality has crept into the church that it's okay to lie as long as it's justified in your mind. Like I as long as you're a leader, I guess it's okay to lie. Like that makes no sense to me.

SPEAKER_06 15:12

No. No, it doesn't. And that I think that falls under covering our sins. So um I also think that in so I love 2 Timothy, so many good things about what's going on in our world in 2 Timothy. But in chapter 3, it says, This know also that in the last days perilous times shall come, for men shall be lovers of their own selves, covetous boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural effects and affection, truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce despisers of those that are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God, having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof. From such turn away. So it doesn't matter how good someone looks on the outside. It does not matter how good someone looks on the outside if their inside is dirty. It just doesn't. And so these men that have this outward appearance of power, authority, godliness. If you're dirty on the inside, you're dirty on the inside and you need some scrubbing to take place to be clean again. And we can do that through Jesus Christ. There's some shame attached to that that these leaders do not want to address. And that's not a good thing for sure.

SPEAKER_05 16:28

If we don't address these problems, the people are like, oh, you're gonna hurt the church, you're gonna hurt the church. But it's like, hey, guys, if we don't address these problems within our community, our community is going to hurt itself. Missionary work cannot happen when things like this are going on internally. Was it Captain Moroni? You have to cleanse the inner vessel first.

SPEAKER_03 16:54

This is something I've said repeatedly. I keep telling my wow my wife, this town needs an enema. But I I feel that that's so true though, because it that we talk about cleansing. It really it really does feel like that there needs to be some internal cleansing that needs to happen because something has gone terribly wrong in our particular part of the vineyard.

SPEAKER_05 17:22

When my dad was the bishop, there was a lot of contention in our ward. Just people like little fights all over the place, and it was like non-stop. And my dad was like, geez, I don't know what's going on here. Anyway, uh, at one point he had an interview with the stake president, and the stake president looked at the baptism rate of our ward. And he said to my dad, um, Bishop Jones, people are you're only having like one baptism a year. Um, that means, and he opened up the scriptures and he, I don't know what scriptures he opened up, but he basically showed my dad that if the church wasn't growing and there weren't baptisms, it's because the members, there was sin within uh the church. And he said, Bishop Jones, you need to find out what's going on in your ward and you need to straighten it out. And so my dad's like, he No, no, I want to point out that's what a good leader does. Yeah. So so my dad's like, I don't know, it's interviewing people, trying to figure this out, and he's praying about this. Anyway, um, soon thereafter, in sacrament meeting, uh, they were singing the song Do What is Right, Let the Consequence Follow. Love that one. And there was a person who was engaging in sin, and they heard this song. It gave them the courage to go talk to my dad. They repented. And but my dad was like, when they came, and I started realizing that all the problems were actually circulating around this the sin that was this underlying sin. And um, all of a sudden, all the contention and the bickering and stuff that was going on all made sense. And so repentance started taking place. Uh the ward healed, and there was a good spirit in the ward. But that year, after after the dust settled, after things were set straight, um, thanks to this person who had the courage, who had the courage to do what is right. Which is hard. Which is so hard. I I admire them. But because they had the courage to do what was right, things settled down. That year there were like 26 baptisms. The year after, there were 20-something baptisms. The year after there were 20-something baptisms. We've been visiting a lot of churches this last year because we we just want to be around other Christians. When you walk into a church building and there's the spirit of God there, and there's a spirit of love there, you want to keep going back. That's where you want to be. And that's actually really hard to find, just so you know, that there are very few churches that you walk into where, wow, there's there's a good feeling here. They're serving others. They're um, it touches you, you can feel it. And so I'm like, gosh, if if we could resolve problems internally and bring that unity and and true peace and love, I think I think that missionary work um would explode the way it did in the ward when I was growing up. Resolving the inner problems first before you're worrying about, oh, I'm doing all this missionary work. Yeah, you gotta take care of so you take care of your clean up your own backyard first, type of thing. Like take care of that first.

SPEAKER_03 20:48

So, Claire, and I wanted to uh piggyback on that. So one of our hopes was actually by telling what's happening, because a lot of people have come forward and said that we're leaving something out. These uh they watch our story and they're like, it's so unbelievable. Well, I don't know that they watch it, I think they hear about it.

SPEAKER_05 21:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:08

And they they say, You're leaving something out. There's no way all these things happen. You wouldn't have been banned from church, you wouldn't have gone through these experiences, you wouldn't have been arrested, you wouldn't have had these uh these bishops wouldn't have been saying all these bad things about you. You must be leaving something out, and we're not. We're trying to figure out it's a mystery to us because we're not leaving anything out. What we're hoping is that someone like the person in her ward growing up, someone will come forward and say, Yep, I know what's going on behind the scenes, I was involved in this. And so our hope is someone, or ideally someone, because I think it's more than one, will come forward and have the courage to come forward and say, This is what actually happened. And then I think healing can take place. I think then. Repentance can take place and we can get, as Hannah says, maybe get things back on track, get things cleaned up. And my dream, Claire, I love missionary work with a passion. That's my favorite thing in the world. I don't think there's anything I enjoy more than sharing the gospel with other people. Uh, whereas as St. Francis of Assisi is quite credited as saying, you know, preach the gospel at all times and when necessary, use words. Like that, that to me is is my dream. I would love nothing more than to be doing missionary work. And maybe I don't want to get off track, but maybe, maybe that's what we're doing right now.

SPEAKER_06 22:38

Well, and that goes back to that topic of, you know, we all want to look glamorous on the surface, but um, if you're dirty on the inside, who cares what you look like, you're not doing missionary work if you got to cleanse your interestle first and you haven't done that yet. And I think we even see that in the missionary field where these missionaries are really struggling with some really horrendous sins and we're sending them on missions anyways. Yeah.

SPEAKER_07 23:02

So that's a problem as well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 23:06

This this idea of being more concerned about what we look like than what is is a problem where um there have been members of the Granite Bay ward who people who were there at the church the day that we were kicked out. And they've gotten online and they've said, hey, how dare you know, they're furious that this this was recorded.

SPEAKER_03 23:31

Um, not that we record it, that we've put it out there.

SPEAKER_05 23:34

That we put it out there. They're their number one concern, like um one person who wasn't there, but who's a m who was a member of the church was commenting, they were like, oh, yeah, what the juds are doing, it's making all of us look bad. It's making us all look bad, but no concern of what they're doing. And no talk about, hey, yeah, maybe let's let's try to do better.

SPEAKER_02 24:00

Maybe your behavior is what makes you look bad.

SPEAKER_05 24:03

Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, um, thank you. Yeah, maybe your behavior is what makes you look bad.

SPEAKER_03 24:09

Shining a light on behavior, I didn't do the behavior you did. I'm just shining light on it because it's hurting me and my feelings.

SPEAKER_05 24:16

And just to clarify, uh, me broadcasting this out, this happened a year and a half ago. I had been trying for the past year and a half to go, hey, what's this ban about? What's going on? Can we talk about this? Can can I talk to somebody in leadership? Friends of mine have all been like reaching out. I didn't just turn around and blare this out to everybody. I I gave I gave them ample opportunity to once again quietly deal with it. The only reason I'm having to show it is because there is absolutely no sign of anyone involved wanting to rectify this. A lot of times, uh the people involved, they'll they'll post stuff and their concern is how it makes them look, but there is no concern about what's taking place.

SPEAKER_03 25:12

Or how it affects us and our children.

SPEAKER_05 25:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 25:15

Um we need to be concerned about what's in our hearts as individuals. And if what's in your heart is how you look on the outside and that's your top priority, that is a you problem, not a not the problem of somebody that is just telling the truth about how you're behaving. But it's so crazy how how people perceive that and how they just want to clean up their own image when their own image is dirty anyway. So I'm gonna encourage everybody to repent all the time. It's a wonderful thing. Okay. So I want to transition into our next segment, which these are comments that, to be honest, they're either coming from ex-Mormons or they're coming from people like me, which I don't consider myself to be an ex-Mormon, but I do consider myself to be someone that left the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to follow Jesus Christ. And so let's read some of these comments. Hate to say it, but I don't think you're going to have a big impact on the church. The church has weathered so many issues from its inception. Um, the LES Church is a cult. Run, be glad you got kicked out. Why you would continue pushing this issue of attending when you're clearly not wanted is beyond me. I get that it's the principle you want of the thing, but get real, stop being ignorant, stop being so naive. So tell me your guys' responses to this idea that you guys are pretty ignorant and that's why you're staying in the church and you should just get out and run and be glad. And let me say before you answer that question, I am the person that I think people should get out of the church. Like I'll be totally honest. People know that. I've said that on this podcast because the church is dirty on the inside. But with that said, I think you need to first follow God no matter what. Don't follow me, follow the Lord and what he tells you personally. So that's where I want to hear your perspective and I want to hear what God has told you because I think that allows us to be human with each other and for me to understand where you're coming from. And for the people that are in this place of get out, this stinks, we all need to understand where we're coming from.

SPEAKER_05 27:16

So that we've thought about that a lot. And uh yeah, yeah. And I've had friends that are not members of the church who are like genuinely confused, saying, Hannah, if your church is treating you this way, why the heck are you trying so hard to go back?

SPEAKER_03 27:33

But I think these are but I think these are sincere. I think it's coming from people who have left the church and go, oh my gosh, it was so horrible. I'm so glad I'm gone. I don't have to deal with that anymore. And then they're watching what we've gone through and they're like, what is wrong with you? Are you just a glutton for punishment? Are you are you trying to get your kids hurt? Like, what what is wrong with you?

SPEAKER_05 27:53

Why are you why are you stepping back into or trying to step back into an abusive situation? I had one friend who was a non-member asking me that. I had two things that I responded with. One was the problem is I've read the Book of Mormon. I know it's true. And so I believe that this is the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. And this is this isn't just a church I'm going to. This is actually my religion. It's not just a church I attend. It's it's my religion. I can't deny that I have this testimony and this knowledge that, hey, the Book of Mormon, it's the Word of God. It it testifies of the Bible and it's it's a second testament of Jesus Christ. And the things in there are true. So there's that, but then the issue of, oh my gosh, there's evil in there. Get out. Um, I agree that there is evil in there. Um, but the the best, the best analogy I can can use to explain is that it's kind of similar to our country, where I believe that similarly to how I know that, you know, the scriptures are true, um, I believe that the constitution is inspired of God. I love the freedom, the foundation of our country, but there is corruption in our government and there is evil in our government. There are leaders that are not seeking to serve God or maybe are working together to accomplish bad things. But just because there are dishonest politicians running our country or in power or grabbing power, I'm not gonna run and go move out of the country. Uh, because my country is so important to me, I I would I would try to fight for it. I'd try to clean it up. And in you're like, well, what can you do? Well, you know, it's by small and simple things, great things come to pass, but I would try to resolve the problems and try to, because I I think this country is a great place. And so similarly, I think the church, it's it's worth it to fight for it and to try to get these things addressed. There's a parable in the Doctrine Covenants that's similar to the parable that Jesus teaches in the Bible, where um the one in the Bible, Jesus is talking about um how he sets up a vineyard, and the Lord of the Vineyard, he sets up this nice vineyard. Yeah, but then the the people in charge, uh the husbandmen left in charge that he puts in charge end up um not listening to him and ultimately end up killing the Lord of the Vineyard's son, which, you know, represented the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. And um, and this vineyard represented the church, and these husbandmen left in charge of it represented the leaders or the stewards of the church that God gave authority uh to run his church. Anyway, um there is a similar parable in the Doctrine and Covenants that applies to our day and where similar things happen, where maybe maybe things went a little sideways in the vineyard and the evil one stepped in and evil made its way in. But the end of the parable, and this is what section 101, I believe, um, section 101, at the end of it, um, the Lord commands his servants to go get the vineyard back. And he said, It that vineyard is mine. I bought it with a price and go get it back. And so his servants start working little by little to take the vineyard back. And so I looking at that, I I to me for some reason that spoke where it's like, no, this is something I need to fight for. If if there are wrongs going on, I have a responsibility as a Christian to do everything in my power to um try to get it back and try to set things straight. And so that's the conclusion I've come to. At the same time, I am not judging people who have left. And I'm also, you know, I've heard people say, well, maybe um when God, God says get his vineyard back, or maybe, maybe it'll be under a different name, or maybe it'll be like um a group uh of outcasts out of the church. I uh, you know, and I don't know. I don't know the will of the Lord. Um, right now I am an outcast. I have been cast out, I am banned, and it's, you know, but I'm gonna try to change that um as best I can. And I appreciate this opportunity that you're giving us to speak up and kind of explain where we're coming from because we don't really get that opportunity in the Crazy Train series. It's more of just like a story of, hey, this happened, this happened, then we heard this, this is, you know, and we don't ever get to talk about uh we we don't really get to explain the why or these feelings kind of behind behind what we're doing. And it can be misunderstood, and it often like it can be misunderstood what our motives are and what our objectives are.

SPEAKER_02 33:21

Excellent point.

SPEAKER_06 33:24

I think that's yeah, did you want to say something about me?

SPEAKER_03 33:28

No, I just I actually wanted to go to the whole uh concept of of us being naive. Um because I think that's kind of expressly pointed out that how how naive we are, and we don't know anything, and we're just idiots that we haven't left the church and we're we've naive from the beginning. And I I'm like, yeah, that's true. We we were very naive from the very beginning. But the problem is everybody's naive to some degree. Everybody's different things. My wife and I had spent our lives preparing to be parents and to learn how to raise children and to do a good job as parents. I never in a million years thought I would need to know the intricacies of the criminal justice system.

SPEAKER_05 34:08

Even like even like like learning to be parents, though, you can't necessarily prepare for all the problems that you're gonna run into as a parent. There were so many times as a parent where I'm like, well, I have no idea how to handle this. And I would try different things, like um, and go, oh, yeah, that was really bad advice or that was uh stupid. I I shouldn't have done that. And, you know, I'll regret things that, you know, I'm like, wow, I didn't know that. I I regret, you know, that. But at the same time, it's like, well, it was a process. I I had to learn. And you learn a lot of times by making mistakes. Um, it's important to correct those mistakes, but there's no such thing as like a perfect, a perfect parent. But like he was saying, that, you know, that's we were preparing for certain things in our lives, but there were, yeah, there are things we didn't uh Yeah, I d never in a million years did I think I would have to know the intricacies of the criminal justice system or how CPS works, because I never thought that would be a problem because I'm not an abusive parent.

SPEAKER_03 35:12

Why would I be dealing with CPS? Uh, I didn't think I would have to be understand how the uh the how to spot and rectify uh police corruption. Uh again, these aren't things that I was prepared to deal with. Am I ignorant and naive about those things now? Nope. I would I want to point out that we were taken advantage of by a dishonest business partner.

SPEAKER_05 35:36

And he And we were pretty young when that happened.

SPEAKER_03 35:39

Almost destroyed us financially. Like it was we were really close to being homeless. Like really close to the case.

SPEAKER_04 35:46

I still can't believe that we we're still here. We're here.

SPEAKER_03 35:50

But I want to point out that later on, shortly thereafter, when Gavin Fish shows up and is doing the same crap that John Huffman was pulling, we were like, hey, we know better. We're not ignorant anymore, we're not naive anymore. This guy is a fraud, and we're not gonna do it, have anything to do with him. And so we did learn and we continue to learn and we continue to get better, but man, the things I've had to learn, I never thought I needed to learn. I didn't realize how many things, aspects of society that I thought were over here that didn't really concern me, have invaded my home and I've had to deal with them. What's the great quote from Hoosiers? There's two types of stupid. There's the man who gets naked and goes outside and barks at the moon, and then there's the guy that does the same thing in your living room. The one you can ignore, the other you kind of have to deal with. That's where I am like, okay, so I got some crazy guy in my my house naked barking at the moon. I gotta deal with it. I never thought I would have to. I wasn't prepared for that, but here it is. That's the situation. So I just wanted to touch base on that, where the the whole idea of being naive, yeah, everybody is.

SPEAKER_05 36:59

Yeah. But as as the story goes along, we definitely evolve and um and and learn. It's just the progress of life. Like we went from being very young parents to, well, now we're old people. No, no, but but and and the thing is, is I'm sure there are things I'm still naive about that I still haven't learned. I my life isn't over. I'm gonna keep learning my whole life, and that's normal. Saying people are naive because you got taken advantage of the Well, that's victim shaming. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:32

Shouldn't we be upset about the people taking advantage? Yeah, and the people running the scams instead of the people who got scammed. Like that just seems Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 37:41

So a lot of times the focus seems to be on, oh, you guys were so stupid, and shame on you for being taken advantage of, but then there's no focus on the person actually committing the crime and how terrible. Hey, you go around destroying people's lives financially, and it's a pattern.

SPEAKER_03 38:02

Which is what John Huffman does.

SPEAKER_05 38:03

Trevor Burrus, Jr. Yeah. And not condemning that behavior, but instead condemning the people who were hurt by him. So it's kind of a flip-flopped sense of right and wrong.

SPEAKER_03 38:16

But there's also the f the the the concept of every victim is victimized twice, once by the perpetrator and then by the system that upheld the perpetrator. Like there's that idea. Um but I I wanted to go back to something you said a minute ago, that the the people were saying that why do we want to go to a church where we're not wanted?

SPEAKER_05 38:32

Aaron Powell Yeah. That was kind of a hurtful comment.

SPEAKER_03 38:34

Trevor Burrus, Jr.: It was a hurtful, but I want to point out like thanks for the reminder.

SPEAKER_05 38:39

No, exactly.

SPEAKER_03 38:40

Every time I read that, I'm like, oh, the the idea is why do you want to go to a church where you're not wanted? Well, first of all, I disagree with the sentiment. We are wanted. Jesus wants us there. This is his church. It's not the church of Alan Smith. It's not the church of Mark Bragg. It's not the church of Logan Shepherd. It's the church of Jesus Christ. Right. It's the church uh it's not the church of Curtin McConkie. I don't care if you think I shouldn't be there. I belong there. And I committed to Jesus when I was baptized that I would go and I would and I would meet with the saints and I would worship and I would serve in his church. And so this the the question, the the fundamentals of the question is flawed. Why would I want to go? Because that's where I belong.

SPEAKER_06 39:31

The reality is that all of us belong with Jesus if we choose him. So for for human beings to think that they get to decide whether or not Jesus wants you, that's really messed up. And that's how ecclesiastical is.

SPEAKER_03 39:47

So being pretend pretending that you're pretending you speak for God when you do not. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 39:53

Telling people they're unwanted. Holy cow. That is so damaging for church leaders to be communicating that to people that you are not wanted and I speak for God because that is not true. God does want you. He you are his, you are his children, and he wants you, and he wants you there, and he wants you back. Um, I I think of the parable of um the prodigal son, where you know, the father he sees his son from a long way off coming and he runs to him and he grabs him and and hugs him and welcomes him back. That's how God feels. And that illustrates how he feels about his children. That's how I feel about my children when, you know, if it when if they've gone off, I want nothing more than for them to come back. And so somebody, if somebody were to tell my daughter Tia or any of my children, your parents, they don't want you. They don't want you, I would be furious. And what a devastating lie. And to pretend you you're representing me. You know, and so I can only imagine how God feels where where people are being cast out, excommunicated, or banned and told, hey, you're not wanted here. And I know it's upsetting to God. And and quite frankly, I think that's why he wants us to speak up because he's upset.

SPEAKER_06 41:21

One of the most freeing things I learned after leaving was that God will never treat me the way that those people did. And so that's that was like, all right, then all I need to do is stick with Jesus because he always wants me. He always wants me.

SPEAKER_03 41:35

He does. But it's har it, Claire, it's hard to separate though, because you've been taught your whole life that these people speak for God. That you're taught that they speak to God. And so for them to come and say that God doesn't want you, it it's very hard to separate that and go, no, that's not true. And again, I think that's why so many of these people got hurt, even if they can't articulate it in the ex-Mormon community or those who have left the church uh where or or who not just our church, but other churches who have been hurt, I think it's hard for them to separate because they don't I don't even think they know that they have conflated God and man. And they are definitely not the same. And there are wonderful men and women on the earth who try to serve God, but they're wildly imperfect representations of him. But then for these individuals who maybe have less than pure motives to try to hurt people and cast them out, that's taking it to a whole other level of of nefariousness and it's it's not okay. And I agree, Anna. I I do think, to at least to some degree, that's why God said we need to speak up, because it's not okay.

SPEAKER_06 42:47

Well, and I think this is why a lot of the people that leave the LDS church, they leave God too. They don't see it's like you said, Fontaine, that's a really hard distinction to make because we've been taught that these leaders are the real deal. And so to separate the two, that's in in within my community, that was that's like the breaking point for everybody. If they're like, oh, I can separate the church as an institution or corporation and God. And then when I do that, they run straight to God because God wants you, he loves you, you're worthy in his sight. You get worthy through him. It's through his righteousness that we're worthy. And so that's true though. It's so true.

SPEAKER_03 43:27

Yes. The problem though is, and this is where it gets even more complicated, going back to a com comment that Hannah made earlier, is when you do have when you do have godly leaders and you associate them with God, and you're like, that's how it is. And then you get an ungodly leader who does horrible things. Well, you've already been conditioned to think that they speak for God, even though it's a different person because the previous leader was godly, and now you've got an ungodly leader doing these things, and you're like, oh man, they do speak for God. And it's this situation of when they're not held accountable. That all of a sudden you you one bad apple spoils the bunch. You think, oh, if one police officer does something bad, all cops are bad, one bishop does something bad, all bishops are bad, if there's not accountability and they're not corrected and it's damaging to the entire institution. And then you've got what people think is, I'm going to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I'm going to ditch the whole church and God and everything. And that never ends well.

SPEAKER_06 44:27

Yeah. It puts a sour taste in your mouth for the word leader. Like I know a lot of people in my place that they're like, I don't want to be a leader. I don't want to be a leader. But God actually needs true leaders, and true leaders position people to go out and be leaders of their own because there's still young people in this world that need help, weak people in this world that need help, sick people that need the job of a leader is to love people, to teach correct principles, to teach the truth. It's not because, oh, look at me, I'm so much better and I know everything better than you do. That's not the role of a leader. It's to go out and teach other people how to be leaders so that we can help the weak and the poor and the children. That's why we need leaders in this world. True religion. Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_03 45:07

And so who shall be the greatest among you shall be your servant. Like that's that's true leadership is serving. Somehow we've got this mentality of I'm better than you and I have to, and you have to obey me and do what I say. That's not leadership. That's just being a that's being bossy.

SPEAKER_06 45:27

Yeah. And so to have the heart of a servant is willing to get down in the trenches with people and work through their problems and their issues. And yeah, it's messy, but I want to be in the trenches with people because I think that's what Jesus did. He went and hung out with the least of these because he was in the trenches helping them solve their problems and healing them.

SPEAKER_05 45:45

And that's what we've been here tagline, Clarity Podcast in the trenches.

SPEAKER_03 45:51

In the trenches in the trenches. Down in the trenches. Down in the trenches with Jesus.

SPEAKER_06 45:55

Yes. So okay. So let's use this as an opportunity to transition here. Speaking of being in the trenches with people, so I want to talk about Caleb for a minute here.

SPEAKER_01 46:07

I was like, why does it matter? Why had I been trying so hard and fighting to get on a mission for this church? The top leaders, the ones that are supposed to be the closest to God and the most inspired, were condoning a lie.

SPEAKER_00 46:23

Then in late December, Caleb went to the temple in Provo. It was cold and dark, but the temple itself was lit up. Caleb stood outside for a few moments.

SPEAKER_01 46:35

I walked up to the front and and I knocked, but nobody answered. So I said a prayer and I told God I'm I'm choosing a different life now. I told him all the reasons I was giving up on my religion. I told him about how my bishop, Logan Shepard, had made false accusations against me in the eighth grade, telling my parents I had exposed myself in a youth trip in the snow. I thought, having a liar for a bishop, that's that's just a fluke. But then when I trusted Bishop Holt, he also went and lied, saying I had confessed to sexually assaulting Laura Brown when he knew that never happened. The Browns were also in the bishopric and they they were pretending to be these good, upright people. But they were lying and trying to hurt my entire family. And then the stake president and Elder Bragg. They were punishing my parents. They had released them from their callings, taken away their temple recommends, made sure they couldn't baptize my siblings, tried to get my younger brothers and sisters taken away from them. And now they made it so I couldn't serve a mission. It was so bizarre because these were leaders in my church and people I had trusted and And now they they had got the mission department to go along with it. And using lie detectors to determine if I should serve a mission instead of praying to God, and then they were convicting me and punishing me for a crime that had never occurred, it was just gossip. The last year my mom had assured me that the church had a system of handling these things and that it would all get resolved. And in the end, I would get to see a fair judge. That had not happened at all. If these were the people running God's church, I didn't want anything to do with it.

SPEAKER_00 48:23

It was Caleb's farewell prayer to his religion. It was his official goodbye.

SPEAKER_09 48:39

Bursting inside us we cannot contain your love will surely come find us like blazing.

SPEAKER_00 49:02

There was just one problem.

SPEAKER_01 49:17

What these people are doing is not my gospel. These people are not my gospel.

SPEAKER_06 49:27

So I want you guys to answer a couple questions that people do bring up. And the first one would be what if your son is guilty? And how how do you know that he didn't actually sexually assault Lara?

SPEAKER_03 49:38

That question is being presented, I think, by people who didn't actually watch the show.

SPEAKER_06 49:44

The whole thing, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 49:45

Because it in episode 18, we lay it out. It's it's very clear how we know without a doubt that what Caleb said was true, that he never sexually assaulted anybody, but was nothing other than a gentleman, always, but also that what Sandra Brown said was false. Obviously, we have Sandra's own rendition of what happened, meaning she she took an innocent tickling incident and twisted it to threaten my wife if she uh continued to support our son and breaking up with his girlfriend.

SPEAKER_05 50:22

Yeah, it would be similar to um if you were playing hide and go seek with somebody and you're like, well, you know, this could be perceived as as assault. Um I was having to hide from you. You were chasing after me.

SPEAKER_02 50:36

I was screaming.

SPEAKER_05 50:36

I was screaming. It's a ridiculous ridiculous, but but hey, if I take it out of context, it can be perceived.

SPEAKER_03 50:44

And if I tell people this is what happened.

SPEAKER_05 50:46

Yeah, and and leave out the part that, oh yeah, we were playing hide and go seeking.

SPEAKER_03 50:49

So we totally have Sandra Brown's own version of what actually happened, which was it was an innocent event and that she was going to use it to threaten, uh, threaten. So we have that. But then later in the episode, we break it down where my daughter Tia was sexually assaulted. And she had a complete breakdown. She she hated Jacob Richards. She was depressed, she was self-medicating, her personality changed, she was lashing out, she she went, she was running away from home, she she was a mess, which is the exact opposite of Laura Brown. She exhibited none of the symptoms of sexual assault.

SPEAKER_05 51:29

She there was no personality change, there was no uh hatred of Caleb met her fores, she wasn't like, no, you look at pictures of her from the year after, it's actually care of herself and Laura had the exact opposite reaction of someone who was sexually assaulted.

SPEAKER_03 51:45

She was actively trying to get back together with my son. And her mother was encouraging it. So if this horrible thing had happened, why are you encouraging this relationship to continue?

SPEAKER_05 51:57

And then we also have the recording of Sandra Brown when we go over to hey, let's let's talk about this. The first 45 minutes, she just went off. And it was all about how she was so mad that they broke up, that they weren't still together.

SPEAKER_03 52:13

Sandra was upset that they weren't together. Her daughter Laura was married and had a child. And Sandra was still angry that Caleb had broken up with her daughter. That's how messed up the story is. It's totally false what Sandra was saying. There was never sexual assault in any way, shape, or form. It was just a it was a lie. It was just a wonderful, beautiful, nasty lie by Sandra because she was angry. There's no other way to see it.

SPEAKER_05 52:45

And the fact that she was spreading all sorts of lies about our entire family. This was just one, it was like this revenge. I'm gonna just say bad things about them to get back at them. But when it came down to it, and and she had the opportunity to express what she was upset about, she was upset about the breakup.

SPEAKER_03 53:08

I think that's ambition.

SPEAKER_05 53:10

She was offended about the breakup.

SPEAKER_03 53:12

The mo the best evidence is from her own mouth.

SPEAKER_05 53:14

Yeah. If I had a daughter who was getting hurt by her boyfriend, I would be going, Thank goodness he's not here anymore. Thank goodness they're broken up and she's away from him.

SPEAKER_03 53:28

And instead, this mom, she was still Well, if it was really that bad though, I I would probably call the police or doctor.

SPEAKER_05 53:35

And she she told her husband she had talked to the bishop, and we had confirmed that was a lie. She hadn't, she wasn't actually concerned. Yeah, why would she? Yeah. Because it never happened. Because it never happened. And so everything she was saying, we followed through. We heard the report. We were like, okay, let's let's find out what's going on. And we followed through. We went and talked to the bishop, and we're like, hey, we understand Sandra Brown came and talked to you. No, she never had. The recordings are there. My husband very thoroughly talking to the bishop. And we also have the recording of Jared claiming that they had gone and reported this to the bishop. Not true. None of it was true. It was a fabrication.

SPEAKER_03 54:17

Sondra just wove a wonderful web of life.

SPEAKER_05 54:20

The concern also was, well, you know, he might be guilty, he might, but why wasn't he being treated fairly? Why? Um, because you look at the policy book. If somebody's in the church is accused of something like this, there are processes that are supposed to be followed. Um, he should have gotten a membership counsel. And we asked, we're like, okay, fine, at least give him the opportunity to defend himself. Give him the courtesy of that opportunity. And and the answer was no, we're not gonna do that. But we're gonna go ahead and treat him as if he's guilty. And ban him from serving. And there's been no court case. And civil. There's been no civil case. Civil or criminal case. And there's no civil charges, no conviction, there's been no church court. In fact, most of it, they hadn't even talked to our son, and they hadn't talked to Laura. And yet they had arrived at the conclusion he was guilty and they have treated him that way. And it's like, what happened to being fair? What happened to process? My request was, hey, please treat my son fairly.

unknown 55:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_06 55:29

I think that's the biggest issues with these cases. And I actually have had some similar experiences wrestling in court cases with friends that have been through similar things. And I think the biggest thing is that you've got to find out who's actually telling the truth. Cause that's when I was put in that place of like, I need to know, because it's a he said, she said thing. I need to know who's telling the truth. And it took a lot of conversation with both parties to figure it out because there were so many lies being spun.

SPEAKER_05 56:00

It's actually not in the show, but we actually emailed our stake president.

SPEAKER_03 56:05

Just gonna say this.

SPEAKER_05 56:06

And we said, you're saying this is a he said, she said situation. I want you to like get us all together and here are the questions you need to ask. And if you ask these questions and we laid it out exactly the order of questions he needed to ask, and I said, if you ask these questions to Laura, it will reveal the truth. And you will know this isn't a he said, she she said situation. It will be obvious to you who's telling the truth here. But it was never a he said, she said because nobody ever talked to Laura and her mom wouldn't let her mom wouldn't even let her husband talk to his own daughter about it. Because it was all because she she was like, okay, yes, I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_03 56:47

Let me be very clear. It was never a he said, she said situation. Never was.

unknown 56:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 56:53

Laura never accused Caleb of anything. It was all coming from Laura's mother.

SPEAKER_06 56:58

Yeah, the she said part was the mother, which is very interesting, very mind-blowing. But I think that her daughter was an adult Yeah, and married with a kid. That's really crazy. And I these people have their own personal agendas that they've got to destroy other people to make themselves look better. Yeah and it it's very wrong and it should not be happening. And the best way that you guys could respond to it is by telling the truth.

SPEAKER_03 57:27

What other option was there? Like it at some point you just have to go, this is what happened, because we can't get traction with the leaders, and we can't get and they're the ones dictating the narrative, which is one of the one of the comments, too, that people make is that, well, you're only telling your side of the story. I'm like, well, two thoughts on that.

SPEAKER_08 57:44

First of all, duh.

SPEAKER_03 57:45

Duh. But secondly, the other side of the story is already out there. They they've spread their side of the story. We're responding to the false accusations and the gossip. And so I think it's only, again, it's only fair that if they're if they can publicly lie about me, I should be able to publicly tell the truth. I don't have a problem with it.

SPEAKER_06 58:06

Because it's not private anymore, they made it public. Okay, so can you guys address um why didn't Caleb just agree to take the lie detector test? I know that's a common question. What's up with that?

SPEAKER_03 58:16

Aaron Powell That's coming from people who are sympathetic to Caleb because they they hear his story and they're like, oh my gosh, this poor kid. Dude, just go ahead and take it. Do whatever you need to do to get on a mission. I'm like, well I don't know that I agree with that mentality. First of all, it'll backfire. It's one of these no-win situations. So they were requiring him to do, it wasn't just a lie detector, it was an SBRA, which is a sexual behavior risk assessment. That is reserved for people who have been convicted of sexual misconduct. My son has never been convicted or even formally accused of sexual misconduct. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_06 59:00

So by saying yes to doing that, he essentially would be saying, Yes, I'm guilty.

SPEAKER_03 59:05

That's the first problem. But let's just say, for sake of argument, that he says, okay, I'm gonna go through this process. And he was encouraged to do this, by the way, which strikes me as bizarre by his church leaders. Go ahead and go through the process, which, like you said, will automatically mark him as guilty. But what happens if he fails? What if he doesn't pass the lie detector test? Because a lie detector test doesn't actually detect lies. It's a big fallacy. It's been proven, it's not reliable. People who have it, people who are hardened criminals, who have no morals, pass them like that. Because it doesn't measure your ability to lie, it measures your reaction to lies.

SPEAKER_05 59:46

My daughter had a bishop who uh worked for the FBI, and for the FBI, they they have to be able to pass like lie detector tests. And her bishop was explaining to her that he actually had a lot of trouble passing lie detector tests. It's a well-known fact.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:03

It's not because he was a liar.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:05

That that the more uh, for example, more religious, the more like higher values and standards you have, the harder it is for you to pass the test because you're like, oh, have you ever viewed pornography? And you're like, well, there, you know, I saw that one um, you know, sign on the on the billboard. And and and it you like pause and you're like analyzing your and all of a sudden it's showing up on the lie detector test that you're wavering. That you're wavering because you're analyzing your behavior or whatever. And so um he was the one that explained, oh yeah, it the more hardened you are, the less of a conscious you conscience you have, the more likely you are to pass it falsely. I remember uh watching uh the show Forensic Files. I remember watching an episode where this lady's daughter disappeared and they couldn't find her body. They couldn't find her. And so they brought the mom in and she consented to take the lie detector test. And she was saying she didn't have any idea what had happened. The mom did not pass the lie detector test. So they're thinking the mom's guilty, but later they found the person who had murdered the little girl, and they found her body and all that. The thing was is the mom was being asked questions about her daughter who had just been kidnapped, asking if she had participated in it. And it was giving the mom stress. The questions themselves were stressing the mom out, and so she did not pass the lie detector test. So what's interesting about the SBRA is they kind of went over some of the questions that would be asked, and the questions themselves are stressful and um would be likely to trigger stress reactions. And so there is a certain percentage or risk that you would not pass a test, and the more stressful the questions, the more likely you you would get a false results from a lie detector test. And so if that were to happen, that would destroy him. It's a huge risk. It's not, I I forget it was like 60% of the time it's accurate and 40%, even if it was 10% that it's wrong. That's actually a huge risk that you're taking by putting your future in the hands of uh the results of a lie detector test. And so we're like, no, uh, my son wanted to go ahead and do it. He's like, hey, I want to serve a mission. I want to go ahead and do this. And we said, no, do not do that. That's a risk. But the problem was is he's like, Mom and dad, if I don't do this, it makes me look like I'm hiding something and I'm guilty. And so it was like, if he did it, it would appear like he was had admitted he had done something awful because of what SBRAs are normally used for. And there was a risk he could get a false like conviction basically from it. Then on the other hand, if he didn't do it, he was also convicted.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:04

Yeah, it was it was little in no-win situation.

SPEAKER_05 1:03:06

It's a no-win situation. And so at that point, I had written a letter to Elder Oaks, and the letter got through because the secretary told me how to get the letter through. And uh say, and it was just about these lie detector tests. And he apparently told the mission guy over the mission department, handled this situation. And all the guy did was write us a letter saying, hey, the church will pay the$350 for you so he can take this. Okay, let me know if you have any questions, but gave us no way to reach him. And at that point, Mark Mark Bragg and our state president had made it so that we weren't able to call church headquarters. And so there was no there was no way for us to contact and reach out to this guy.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:52

It was a no-win no-win situation. If he doesn't do it, he's hiding something. But if he does do the SBRA and the lie detector test and all that, there's only two possible outcomes. Either he passes or he fails. If he passes, he's still uh it's still on his record that he took it, meaning he's already guilty. It's like, it's like my favorite was it's basically go ahead and go to jail to prove your innocence. That makes no sense. But then the worst case scenario would be he doesn't pass for whatever reason, as we discussed. You know, he because a lie detector is nothing more than a stress detector, and he does have morals and values, and he I think in all likelihood, there's a there's a decent chance that he would fail the lie detector test. And then what? Now he's clearly convicted of something that he never did. There there's no there's no scenario in completing the SBRA that would be beneficial to my son. In addition, I want to point out that this was not conducted by the church. This is conducted by a county employee. So now it's public record and church record that he's done this thing.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:00

That he's completed an SBRA, which for anybody looking at it, they would assume it was because he had conf been convicted of something bad. So that was why we gave him that advice of don't do it. Don't do it. Don't do it. Instead, we're reaching out to the upper authorities saying, Hey, what are you doing with this SBRA thing? It was supposed to be uh a merciful way for people who had been guilty and convicted of crimes. It was supposed to be a merciful way to give them a second opportunity to to maybe still serve a mission. And it that's not what it was being used for. Um It was being used as a punishment. It was a misuse of the SBRA.

SPEAKER_06 1:05:45

So after all of these things that you guys have been through with Caleb and with Tia, how can we as adults, parents, leaders, all of us as adults, should be protecting the youth and the children? Okay, if it happened to your kids. Happen to my kid. We should all be protecting the youth and children. Okay. How can we do that and set our kids up for success in a world that essentially, I mean, this is a situation that set Caleb up for failure from the very beginning. How do we best help our kids in such a broken world?

SPEAKER_05 1:06:16

There's only one thing you can do. As a parent, you have no idea what challenges your kids are going to face. Like a lot of times you go through life and you're like, oh, I never in a million years expected this or expected that. It's like it's full of surprises.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:34

Well, no, how about just the advent of cell phones? That was when our kids were very young. The cell phone, the smartphone, uh we're now looking back as a society going, oh, maybe those weren't the best. But at the time, it was like, how dare you not give your kids a smartphone? You're abusive for not giving them one. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:06:50

And how dare you take it away from them? Yeah. So now, yeah, there was an article in the Wall Street Journal yesterday about how there's a new trend where parents are giving their kids old-fashioned phones at the landline and going, here's a phone for you. You wanted a phone for your birthday. I got you one.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:07

So but to her point, like you don't know what challenges are going through.

SPEAKER_05 1:07:11

You have no idea. You have no idea. And the only thing you can rely on is Jesus Christ. And so you gotta build, make make him your rock and make him your foundation because he can help you through whatever situations you're in, and he can be with you no matter where you're at.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:32

And that's actually the only thing you can rely on, is that and along those lines, I I think the story of Joseph of Egypt is particularly pertinent to pretty much everybody, um, but especially Christians, where I don't know what he was thinking when he was in the pit. And his brothers were thinking about, well, should we kill him? I'm wondering, I don't know what he was thinking when he was staying at Potiphar's place. And I don't know what he was thinking when he was later in prison. But I do think Jesus was with him every step of the way and helping prepare him for his ultimate mission. And so that when the problem was resolved, and he this by the way, he he was sold into slavery when he was 17, didn't get out of prison until he was thirty. So it's a thirteen years that God was preparing him to be second in command only to Pharaoh and to do the amazing job that he did once he was put into a position of power. And I think for us that that should be our our goal is to make sure that we're very close to in relying on Jesus, even when we're in prison or even when we are in the pit, that that He's there, He's there with us and He He can strengthen us and teach us the things that we need to learn so that if and when, and I'm not saying it does, but if and when things do turn around, we're ready for the mission that He's prepared us to accomplish.

SPEAKER_06 1:09:05

I love that. Fontaine, you mentioned um about defending your children. Can you touch on that as well?

SPEAKER_03 1:09:11

Yeah, I mean, I I I don't know that it's uh clear. And if you watch the documentary series, my wife and I were talking about this the other day, and we're like in essence, everything that we've gone through has been to protect our children. Going back to the guy with the the cell phones who was get handing out cell phones and tracking them, or to uh our daughter being uh assaulted by by a boy at church, or the troubled kid from primary, um, or Logan Shepherd spreading falsehoods about our daughter, or or my daughter being groomed by the the Jerry Gl the neighbor Jerry Glass, or my son being taken advantage of by by Sandra Brown or being lied about by the Bishop Bruce Holt or Alan Smith. Like everything we've gone through has been to try to protect our children. And for me, going back to the whole naive concept, I guess I never thought that one of the biggest challenges of protecting my children would be coming from within my own church.

SPEAKER_06 1:10:16

Yeah. I think when you protect your children and you defend your children, it then empowers them when they go on to be adults to protect and defend themselves because that's what my parents did for me. They protected me against these people that were spreading lies about me, that were treating me like dirt. And then as an adult, when I saw people lying to me and treating me like dirt, it gave me the courage to stand up and say, No, you're not allowed to treat me that way. And that saved me from a bad marriage. It saved me from um hurtful friendships, it saved me from more gossip and slander because I am allowed to say, no, you can't do that to me because my parents did that for me first. And so the the hands-off approach to parenting, throw it away, people, okay? When your kid's 16, they still need you. They're yeah, they're getting closer to adulthood, but they still need you. Throw away the hands-off approach. My parents saved my butt many times in my 20s.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:12

So I was gonna say, I'm I'm on the phone. I'm on the phone almost every day with at least one of my kids who have already left home who are in their 20s. So yes, it um parenting never stops.

SPEAKER_05 1:11:22

Yeah, but like uh protecting your children, like defending your children. Yeah, I will protect and defend my children. Um, but there have been times in my life where that uh protecting my children was having them go apologize for something they'd done wrong.

SPEAKER_06 1:11:38

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 1:11:39

Um, because that is me protecting my child, helping them become good people. And and so I'm not advocating that, hey, no matter what your kids do, you know, protect them, even when they're wrong. When I was on the phone initially with Bruce Holt, the the time when he was like, hey, uh, you better drop this thing with the Browns because I know bad things, uh, yada yada, that conversation, in that conversation, he was suggesting that he was sweeping things under the rug and it it was somehow a favor. I'm trying to remember exactly what I said to him, but it was along the lines of look, sweeping stuff under the rug isn't doing uh me a favor. If my son had done something wrong, which I happen to know he didn't in this in this situation, I happen to know he didn't. Um, but if he had done something wrong, you're not doing that, wouldn't be doing him a favor to sweep it under the rug. I would want him to repent. I would want him to make it right. But then sweeping it on the rug when he's just being hurt by gossip or whatever, you're not doing him a favor either. But and when I'm saying protecting and defending my kids in what's right. In what's right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:56

I think that's a good thing. Well, no, going back to the it helping them repent and confess and forsake is part of protecting me.

SPEAKER_05 1:13:04

Yeah. And and I've I've done that as a parent. We don't it's we don't hold our leaders to a different standard. It's not in the story. It's not it like everything I've done as a parent is in the story, but my kids will tell you, yeah, well, when I did this wrong or that wrong, boy, my mom took me immediately to go apologize and and stuff like that. I'm not uh so I don't want to communicate that I believe that, oh no, I'm gonna defend my kid no matter what they do. Hey, if you've done wrong, I think it's important for you to set it straight because I love you and I want I want you to have that spirit in your life and and that's part of protecting them.

SPEAKER_06 1:13:41

I love that because we can't coddle our kids in their sins either. You can't do that. There's a balance there. Yeah. So I love that you bring that up. So, guys, I just want to close this episode by share with us kind of share us, share with us a little bit about healing from Jesus Christ as you've walked through all of this. I I can see in your hearts that Jesus has been with you every step of the way. And so describe to us what what that healing, and I know there's more healing to come, but what has what's the emotional toll been on you and what's the healing looked like? Well, we've aged about 20 years in the last year.

SPEAKER_05 1:14:20

I feel it's true. I've I wake up, like I go to bed going, gosh, what's going on? I wake up going, gosh, what's going on? Um emotional toll.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:33

I do want to point out, though, something along those lines, though, is after the court case, and I think it's in the show, but my mind was just spinning. I could not get everything out of my head from uh my daughter running away to being uh uh abducted by the neighbor to the thing at the altercation at the park, to the police arresting me to being in jail, to then going through court and somehow being wrongfully convicted. I it just it kept spinning around in my head. And it was and that went on for years. It wasn't days, weeks, or months. It this went on for years. It wasn't until we were able to express and communicate what had happened that that those images stopped spinning around in my head. I I didn't have peace until I was actually able to express what happened and to tell it and to show my experience.

SPEAKER_05 1:15:25

And so it's it's funny. Once I was able to feel understood, like you can you can judge how you want. You're like, oh, you guys are stupid, you did the wrong thing, whatever. But I've I've been able to express what happened and where I'm coming from. I I was able to basically let it rest. And now it's funny, like before it was just like always in my mind and trying to like going through the situation and going through the situation and finally being able to express it. Uh it's like, okay, I I I was able to do that. I was able to be understood. I was able to do that. And and so it's funny because now if you ask me, oh, what happened at this part, I'm like, oh, I'd have to go back and watch the series. Whereas before it was like, and then this happened, and then that happened.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:14

Okay, but your mind was able to finally. To answer your question, uh so being banned from church has been a very strange experience. Going through everything we've gone through has been very strange. And the most the current chapter of being banned from church is also very strange. And I'm wondering, you know, when this crazy train is going to end. But one aspect has been we have had to deconstruct our faith. Where we've had to go, okay, what is it that we actually believe? And where do we get those beliefs? And for me, uh when I was about 16 years old, Claire, I read the Bible for the first time. And I got about halfway through the book of John, and I'm like, oh my gosh, this is true. I it just hit me like a ton of bricks. This guy, Jesus, I don't claim to understand him, but that's who I want to be like. And that was it for me. That was the foundation of my relationship with God was reading the New Testament. And I I had read Matthew, Mark, and Luke, and I was halfway through John and it just overwhelmingly, convinced this is true. And then later other scriptures came along, and I read the Book of Mormon, I'm like, oh, this is true too. In the Old Testament, as goofy and as weird as that is, there's a lot of great stuff in there. I'm like, okay, that's that's true too. And and then, of course, there's some wonderful principles in the Doctrine of Covenants. I'm like, okay, that's true too. But go but for my wife, she didn't have the same experience I did growing up. I come from a broken home. I kind of had to figure out what I believed from a very early age. My wife grew up in the church and a lot of her belief system, she she believed the Bible, she believed the Book of Mormon, but she also believed in the church programs and the church and the leaders. And her loyalty or her uh for lack of a better term, her testimony was kind of split between the church and the gospel of Jesus Christ. And when the church was taken away, she kind of felt like half her foundation got taken away as well. And we joke, it's like she was half cheeking it, you know. She was sitting on this chair and half of it's gone, and then she's just out there flapping in the breeze, where she's like, I what do I do? How do I how do I rebuild this foundation? And we were talking about it, and I'm like, I I think we just need to read the New Testament together. And so we did. We started a thorough study of the words and the teachings in the life of Jesus.

SPEAKER_05 1:18:52

And all I could as we were two weeks into it, and I started realizing that Jesus was pretty awesome. And um, I said to my husband, I'm like, I've been a member of the church my entire life. How is this possible that I didn't know Jesus? How is this possible? And and so I was like, my testimony, my foundation, like it's it's crumbling right now. Um, but it's crumbling because I built it on something other than Jesus. And I built it on things that were fallible anyway, and and you have to make sure Jesus Christ is the rock. And I'm like, how did I go all these years claiming to be a Christian, but not actually know who Jesus was? And so it's been a very interesting year for me, where just like looking at the gospel in a completely different way and um making that the priority, making that the foundation, comparing everything back to what he asked. And um, and oddly, that is a revolutionary idea within within the church, uh, within the gospel of Jesus Christ is to make Jesus Christ the foundation and and to compare everything back to his word and to judge whether or not things being taught are right or wrong by comparing it to what Jesus asked. That's what I believe the right thing to do is to put him, put him first. So um, by getting kicked out of church, I think I became a Christian.

SPEAKER_06 1:20:34

So I love that so much.

SPEAKER_05 1:20:37

My husband was already there. So, you know, um, and it's funny, there was some podcaster, and she was ex-Mormon podcaster, and she was like, Oh, Hannah's like a believer, but I don't know about her husband. And she got it completely backwards. My husband actually had a firmer testimony than I did because I had built mine on shaky, shaky things. And so I'm I'm the one that had to go through more of a conversion process. Um, whereas he had already been through nonsense, and so he had already figured out where his foundation was. But for me, I had to, I've I've been having to find it and I've been having to rebuild a a new testimony. Oddly, I am so grateful that that I've gone through these things because I don't think I would have gotten to the point of going, okay, what is this about? Like actually, I hope I'm not like one of those hard-hearted people that has to like go through this again.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:38

Let's not. Anyway, um But to her point, we we we had to recon deconstruct our faith. Um we had we retreated to the New Testament, and we realized that we can't rely on other people to tell us who Jesus is. I think that's a colossal mistake. Go to the source, find out for yourself, read his words. And we've been strive striving to do that, and I think we're gonna do that well from here on out. Well, having the rug pulled out from under you, it took a while to catch catch your breath, you know, get get your footing. But then once we realized, okay, this is the foundation we need to build or rebuild or reestablish, it's it's been kind of amazing.

SPEAKER_05 1:22:21

I was like to the point where I I the reason he started reading with me is because I I had come to him and I said, Hey, I don't want to pray anymore. I don't want to read my scriptures anymore. I've I've I've read my scriptures in like my whole life. I don't I don't want to anymore. I'm I'm I don't like God. I couldn't separate the two. I couldn't separate being told by my leaders this thing and not thinking that that's what God taught of me. And so so yeah, like turning and and reading, reading the life of Jesus. Uh, that's been the lifesaver. And in the end, I'm like, wow, I'm so glad I went through this because I wouldn't have ever known Jesus and had my eyes open to who he was and if if this hadn't happened.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:11

So but I also want to point something else out was kind of a a byproduct of that, is it's also changed what we teach our kids and how we teach our kids. And so some people have actually asked, well, what do you what are your kids getting out of this? And I'm thinking they're getting a lot, and I I can't think of a better education for my kids than to see the a huge difference between what God wants and what men want. And the the separation between who Jesus is versus what so-called leaders or representatives of him, how they are not the same, and how the gospel and the church sometimes deviate and and separate. If there's any confusion on that, I think Jesus made it abundantly clear that the church and Christianity are not the same. But Claire, we're still working through it. We're we're still trying to make sure we got our foundation set because and and trying to make sure that our kids had that foundation. And I I do worry that some of my older kids maybe got the wrong message. And so we're trying to scramble, going, okay, back up. Let's go back to make sure, hey, are you guys reading the New Testament? Let's go make sure you study the words and teachings of Jesus. Go to the source, make that your foundation.

SPEAKER_05 1:24:31

I mean, I'm sure if my older daughter is ever like hears this or watches this, she's gonna be like, You told me this. Hey, you are our guinea pig, honey. So sorry.

SPEAKER_06 1:24:44

All our mistakes, we tried them out on you. And that goes back to life is an experience and we're all living the experience, and we're not gonna do it all perfectly the first time. Yeah. Well, it sounds to me like you guys have been able to find some rest in the Lord on your journey, which has been needed. And I know there's a lot more rest that you're looking for, and I believe that God will bring that to you. And I also feel like I love the story of the children of Israel because you guys are in a situation where the leaders put you in a bondage situation, and I feel like what's happening is you're entering into the wilderness. So welcome to the wilderness. We're glad you're here. And we're getting out of the wilderness.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:27

40 years, yeah. 40 years.

SPEAKER_06 1:25:30

We're getting out of Egypt. You gotta get out of Egypt, and then you have the wilderness, and then the promise. Oh god. Yeah. We're gonna end on that note.

SPEAKER_03 1:25:44

Yeah, it'll be 90.

SPEAKER_06 1:25:48

I'm dying for the day that we get to enter the promised land, and I am so excited, and then I don't know what that looks like, but I think that the wilderness is where we're at right now.

SPEAKER_05 1:25:57

Wait, wait, wait. We'll give you a new comparison. How about when Alma took the people? There you go.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:04

The land of Halam.

SPEAKER_05 1:26:05

And then the land of pure waters, was it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then the bad guys took over and they were in slavery. And then one day the Lord said, good enough. I'm gonna deliver you today.

SPEAKER_06 1:26:19

That would be wonderful. Maybe we could be that group. That would be wonderful. I think we're all we're all waiting to see what that looks like. And I you guys are just on that journey of seeking too. And the Lord will continue to teach you more and more. So how do you find clarity in your life after all this? How do you find clarity?

SPEAKER_03 1:26:37

Um, we're dear in the headlights right now, Claire. We're just kind of we we I I know we it probably comes across that way too, that we're just we were on a podcast last year uh with Steve Pinecker, and I I think we were just we were still in shock at that point. We're a year and a half removed, and we're still kind of in shock as to what had happened. I Claire, I'm still in shock at what happened, the altercation at the park. I'm like it's still I I've processed it, but it's still unbelievable to me that that happened. And so I I don't know how do we find clarity. I I think we're we're in the middle of the the wilderness, we're in the middle of the war, we're in the we're in prison with Joseph of Egypt. I I uh looking around, you know, when is this gonna end or if it's gonna end or how it will end? Um my wife mentioned, you know, it kind of feels like we're in the middle of this mystery novel where the where we're reading it and going, wait, how what's gonna happen? What oh, here's a clue, but how's that gonna play out later? And what what new information are we gonna find? I we hope to solve the mystery soon. Um, but I and I uh quite frankly, I think we've just discovered some pretty big pieces. Um, and I'm I'm hopeful that there will be some resolution and that we won't be in the wilderness for 40 years. And we're working towards that. But how do we find clarity? I think the only way, as my wife said so eloquently, is the only way to find clarity is through Jesus. There is no other way.

SPEAKER_06 1:28:13

And I think you guys have illustrated that all throughout your all throughout what you've shared, is that Jesus has got to be our core and our center. And he'll lead you, he'll lead you into your next step. And it's okay that you don't have figured out you're in the trenches right now. And I have thoroughly enjoyed sitting in the trenches with you. So and there will be other people that you need to sit in their trenches with them too. So thank you guys for coming on the podcast and sharing your story. It's been a pleasure. Thanks for having us.