Gospel Tangents Podcast

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Was Joseph Smith a Socialist? Oct 23, 2026

Show notes

Was Joseph Smith a socialist? Economist Mark Skousen was surprised—and more than a little irritated—when he discovered that a BYU economics professor had classified the founder of Mormonism as a utopian socialist. But when I challenged Mark about Joseph Smith’s economic teachings, his answer was more complicated than a simple yes or no.

https://youtu.be/J9AVMBliFvo

Don’t miss our other conversations with Mark Skousen: https://gospeltangents.com/people/mark-skousen

Gospel Tangents

In Part 3 of our four-part Gospel Tangents interview, Mark Skousen examines the economics of early Mormonism, including the law of consecration, the United Order, private property, and tithing. We also discuss Adam Smith, Karl Marx, John Maynard Keynes, and whether Joseph Smith’s economic experiments were closer to socialism or capitalism.

And Mark offers a surprising criticism of Joseph Smith’s plans for building Zion.

Was Joseph Smith a Socialist? Mark Skousen Responds

The question began with a poster at Brigham Young University.

Mark recalls that economist Val Lamson had created a chart showing different schools of economic thought. To Mark’s astonishment, Joseph Smith appeared among the utopian socialists.

Mark strongly objected.

However, he acknowledged that Joseph Smith briefly experimented with economic arrangements that could be described as utopian socialism.

Early Latter-day Saints sought to eliminate poverty and create a community in which members shared their resources. But according to Mark, Joseph Smith eventually moved toward an economic system that preserved private property and individual stewardship.

So where does Joseph Smith fit economically?

Mark suggests that communitarian may be a better description than socialist.

He points to the work of historian Leonard Arrington and argues that Joseph Smith wanted a cooperative religious society without eliminating individual responsibility.

But that raises another question.

If the early Saints were trying to build Zion, why didn’t their economic system last?

Why Did the United Order Fail?

One of the most interesting parts of our conversation concerns Mark’s explanation for the failure of the United Order.

Under early consecration arrangements, members contributed their property and received stewardships intended to meet their needs. Surplus resources were supposed to support the Church and assist others.

Mark argues that this arrangement created an economic problem.

If people were expected to contribute all their surplus, what incentive did they have to produce more than they needed?

He compares that arrangement to a 100% marginal tax rate.

Mark also notes that many early Church members were poor. There simply wasn’t enough surplus wealth to sustain the system as envisioned.

He contrasts these experiments with tithing, which allows individuals to retain most of their income while contributing a portion to the Church.

From Mark’s perspective, tithing creates a better balance between supporting a religious community and encouraging individual initiative.

Of course, historians and economists may disagree about whether incentives alone explain the difficulties of the United Order. But Mark’s interpretation raises important questions about the practical challenges of communal religious economies.

Was the United Order Really Socialism?

Mark also discusses a distinction emphasized by LDS leader Marion G. Romney: the United Order and socialism were not necessarily the same thing.

One important difference, according to Romney, involved private property and voluntary consecration.

Mark argues that Joseph Smith’s stewardship system preserved an important role for private ownership, even while encouraging members to devote their resources to the common good.

We also discuss the scriptural ideal of having no rich or poor among the people, as described in Fourth Nephi and the New Testament book of Acts.

Was Joseph Smith trying to establish an entirely new economic system?

Or was he adapting biblical principles to the practical needs of a growing religious community?

Mark believes Joseph Smith was searching for a middle ground.

Is Tithing a Form of Capitalism?

This may be the most surprising question of the interview.

When I asked whether tithing was an Adam Smith principle, Mark argued that it was much closer to Smith’s philosophy than to centralized economic planning.

His reasoning is straightforward.

Under tithing, members contribute 10% while retaining control over the rest of their resources. They can save, invest, establish businesses, support charitable causes, or make other financial decisions.

Mark believes that arrangement encourages productivity while still providing resources for shared religious purposes.

He contrasts it with a system in which Church leaders would need to evaluate each family’s finances, businesses, and economic decisions.

Imagine your bishop having to determine how much money you should earn, what investments you should make, or how your business should operate.

Mark argues that such a system would be impractical.

His conclusion is that tithing provides a more sustainable economic foundation than the early communal experiments.

Adam Smith, Keynes, and Marx: Three Competing Economic Visions

Before turning to Joseph Smith, I asked Mark to explain some basic differences between major economic schools.

Mark organizes economic history around three influential thinkers:

Adam Smith: Associated with markets, limited government, private enterprise, and economic liberty.
John Maynard Keynes: Associated with government intervention to manage economic downturns and broader macroeconomic policy.
Karl Marx: Associated with the critique of capitalism and the replacement of private ownership of productive resources.

Mark clearly favors Adam Smith’s approach.

But the comparison becomes especially interesting when applied to early Mormonism.

Joseph Smith encouraged generosity and cooperation, yet he also established individual stewardships and taught principles of personal responsibility.

Does that make him a socialist, a capitalist, or something else entirely?

Perhaps our modern political labels don’t fit the religious and economic experiments of the 1830s particularly well.

Mark Skousen Criticizes Joseph Smith’s City of Zion

Mark’s criticisms aren’t limited to the United Order.

We also discuss Joseph Smith’s proposed City of Zion, with its grid layout and central complex of twenty-four houses of the Lord.

Mark isn’t impressed with the uniformity of the design.

He argues that cities need individuality, variety, and a sense of personality rather than rigid planning.

I bring up David Hall’s NewVistas project, which attempted to develop a modern community inspired by Joseph Smith’s city-planning ideas in Vermont.

The discussion raises an intriguing issue: How much planning is necessary to build an ideal community, and when does planning become too restrictive?

It’s another example of Mark applying economic ideas to subjects that Latter-day Saints usually approach from a religious or historical perspective.

“Teach Them Correct Principles”

One of Mark’s favorite statements attributed to Joseph Smith is:

“I teach them correct principles, and they govern themselves.”

Mark sees this as a powerful expression of individual liberty.

In his interpretation, Joseph Smith wanted people to learn principles such as honesty, thrift, hard work, and responsibility—and then make their own decisions.

That approach fits Mark’s broader economic philosophy.

But it also raises an interesting historical question: How do we reconcile individual self-government with the collective responsibilities envisioned in the law of consecration?

The tension between personal freedom and communal obligation remains relevant to Latter-day Saint discussions of economics today.

What Can We Learn from Mormon Economic History?

Whether or not you agree with Mark Skousen’s conclusions, this conversation offers an unusual perspective on Joseph Smith’s economic experiments.

Rather than discussing the United Order only as a theological ideal, Mark examines the incentives, property arrangements, and practical difficulties involved.

He challenges the idea that Joseph Smith can be neatly classified as a socialist, explains why he believes tithing was more successful than communal consecration, and questions aspects of Joseph Smith’s plans for Zion.

It’s a provocative discussion at the intersection of Mormon history, economics, and theology.

Watch Part 3 of my four-part Gospel Tangents interview with Mark Skousen, and let me know what you think.

Questions for Discussion

Was Joseph Smith a socialist, a capitalist, or something that doesn’t fit either label?
Did the United Order fail because of economic incentives, or were other historical factors more important?
Does tithing represent a successful adaptation of the law of consecration?
Would Joseph Smith’s City of Zion have been a desirable place to live?
Can a religious community successfully balance private property with the goal of eliminating poverty?

I’d love to hear your perspective in the comments—especially if you think Mark’s economic interpretation overlooks important historical or theological considerations.

Don’t miss our other conversations with Mark Skousen: https://gospeltangents.com/people/mark-skousen

Gospel Tangents

0:00 Introduction: The Big Three in Economics
1:20 Adam Smith, Keynes and Marx
4:50 How BYU Economics Changed
5:49 Was Joseph Smith a Utopian Socialist?
7:17 Why the United Order Failed
9:34 Was Joseph Smith a Communitarian?
11:21 Stewardship and Correct Principles
13:58 Joseph Smith’s City of Zion
15:04 Is Tithing an Adam Smith Principle?
17:53 Church Welfare vs. Government Welfare

Was Eisenhower Soviet Agent? Mark Skousen Challenges Uncle Cleon (Mark Skousen 2 of 4) Oct 20, 2026

Show notes

Was Eisenhower Soviet agent? That extraordinary accusation came from John Birch Society founder Robert Welch, who believed President Dwight D. Eisenhower was secretly serving Communist interests. But economist Mark Skousen, nephew of the famous conservative author W. Cleon Skousen, thinks the accusation was outrageous.

https://youtu.be/5Hol7hUZExc

Don’t miss our other conversations with Mark Skousen: https://gospeltangents.com/people/mark-skousen

Gospel Tangents

Mark explains why he rejected the John Birch Society’s allegations, where he disagreed with his uncle, and how a surprising conversation about Adam Smith changed his understanding of economics.

We also revisit the controversial BYU spy ring, Ezra Taft Benson’s relationship with Ernest Wilkinson, and the importance of academic freedom.

Was Eisenhower Soviet Agent Secretly Helping the Communists?

During the Cold War, some American conservatives became convinced that President Eisenhower wasn’t doing enough to stop Soviet expansion.

Robert Welch, founder of the John Birch Society, went much further. In his book The Politician, he accused Eisenhower of being an agent of the Communist conspiracy.

Why would anyone make such an extraordinary claim?

Mark explains that Eisenhower repeatedly avoided direct confrontation with the Soviet Union, including during international crises such as the Hungarian Revolution. Critics interpreted his restraint as evidence that he was deliberately allowing communism to spread.

But Mark sees Eisenhower’s strategy differently.

He argues that Eisenhower understood the Soviet economic system was fundamentally flawed and believed it could eventually collapse without risking a nuclear war.

Rather than seeing Eisenhower as a traitor, Mark gives him high marks for his presidency.

Mark’s rejection of Welch’s accusation is particularly interesting because his uncle Cleon Skousen was closely associated with the same conservative political movement.

Uncle Cleon and the John Birch Society

W. Cleon Skousen became one of America’s best-known anti-communist authors through books such as The Naked Communist and The Naked Capitalist.

But how closely was he connected to the John Birch Society?

Mark explains that Cleon defended the organization and even wrote a pamphlet titled The Communist Attack on the John Birch Society.

However, Mark says Cleon never officially joined the organization and eventually experienced a falling-out with it.

Mark himself never became a member.

He believed the society’s accusations against Eisenhower went far beyond legitimate concerns about Communist infiltration.

This raises an intriguing question: How could two members of the same family, both committed to free-market economics and opposed to communism, reach such different conclusions?

The Naked Communist vs. The Naked Capitalist

Mark’s disagreements with Uncle Cleon extended beyond the John Birch Society.

He strongly admired The Naked Communist, believing it offered an important warning about the dangers of communism.

But he was much less impressed with The Naked Capitalist.

One reason was Cleon’s portrayal of powerful business figures such as David Rockefeller.

Mark had personally interviewed Rockefeller while working for Forbes and didn’t see him as the sinister figure portrayed in some anti-communist accounts.

Although Mark disagreed with Rockefeller’s support for larger government, he didn’t believe that made him part of a sinister conspiracy.

It’s a revealing distinction: Mark could appreciate his uncle’s contributions while rejecting some of his more controversial conclusions.

But there was another disagreement in which Uncle Cleon unexpectedly changed Mark’s mind.

Was Adam Smith Inspired by God?

While writing his history of economic thought, The Making of Modern Economics, Mark initially adopted economist Murray Rothbard’s critical interpretation of Adam Smith.

He wrote a chapter portraying Smith in a largely negative light.

Then he visited Uncle Cleon.

Mark handed him the chapter and asked whether he was on the right track.

Without even reading it, Cleon put his arm around Mark and told him that Adam Smith’s doctrine of the invisible hand was inspired by God.

Mark was stunned.

Whom should he believe—his respected professional mentor, Murray Rothbard, or his wise old Uncle Cleon?

Instead of simply accepting either opinion, Mark decided to investigate for himself.

He read all 1,000 pages of Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations.

And when he finished, he concluded that Uncle Cleon was right.

Mark rewrote his chapter, transformed the structure of his book, and ultimately dedicated it to Cleon.

It’s one of my favorite stories from the interview because it demonstrates how disagreement can lead to serious investigation and a genuine change of mind.

Ezra Taft Benson, Ernest Wilkinson, and the BYU Spy Ring

Our conversation also returns to a controversial episode from Mark’s student days at Brigham Young University.

During Ernest Wilkinson’s administration, students were recruited to monitor professors whose political and economic views concerned conservative university figures.

Mark discusses Wilkinson’s close relationship with Ezra Taft Benson and their connections with the Foundation for Economic Education.

Did Benson encourage the monitoring effort? Was Wilkinson responsible? And what did the students actually discover?

Mark discusses what he remembers, while acknowledging that he cannot establish exactly who initiated the effort.

He also reflects on his own participation.

Looking back, Mark believes the students were naive. He says he would not participate in such an effort today.

Interestingly, he doesn’t believe the episode resulted in professors being fired, although he acknowledges the controversy that followed when the monitoring became known.

Why Academic Freedom Matters

Perhaps the most unexpected part of the interview is Mark’s defense of intellectual diversity.

He recalls a conversation with Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman about whether free-market economists should dominate university economics departments.

Friedman opposed that approach, arguing that universities should expose students to competing viewpoints.

Mark agrees.

He discusses the importance of intellectual diversity at BYU and contrasts his experiences teaching at Columbia University and Chapman University.

For Mark, a university should be a place where students encounter ideas they disagree with—not merely a place where everyone reinforces the same worldview.

That principle also helps explain his complicated relationship with Uncle Cleon.

He admired his uncle without agreeing with him on everything.

Can We Admire Someone Without Agreeing with Everything They Say?

What makes this interview especially interesting is that Mark Skousen doesn’t fit neatly into the political categories we often use.

He can praise The Naked Communist while criticizing The Naked Capitalist.

He can admire Uncle Cleon while rejecting the John Birch Society’s accusations against Eisenhower.

And he can defend free-market economics while insisting that universities should welcome competing perspectives.

Perhaps the most important lesson is that intellectual independence requires more than disagreeing with our opponents. Sometimes it means questioning the people we admire most.

Watch Part 2 of our four-part Gospel Tangents interview with economist Mark Skousen to hear these stories in his own words.

What Do You Think?

Why do you think Robert Welch and other conservatives became suspicious of President Eisenhower?
Was Mark right to reject the John Birch Society’s accusations?
Do you find Cleon’s claim that Adam Smith’s invisible hand was inspired by God persuasive?
Should religious universities encourage professors to teach competing political and economic viewpoints?
Is it possible to admire someone deeply while rejecting some of their most important ideas?

Share your thoughts in the comments. I’d especially like to hear how you think we should evaluate controversial historical figures whose ideas continue to influence Latter-day Saints today.

Don’t miss our other conversations with Mark Skousen: https://gospeltangents.com/people/mark-skousen

Gospel Tangents

0:00 The Naked Communist vs. The Naked Capitalist
3:58 Adam Smith Inspired of God?
8:37 Ezra Taft Benson, Wilkinson and FEE
11:44 Why Mark Wasn’t a Bircher
12:02 Robert Welch and Eisenhower
14:16 Cleon and the John Birch Society
15:51 Political Diversity and Academic Freedom
20:02 Fallout from the BYU Spy Ring
21:18 Academic Freedom at Columbia and Chapman

Cleon Skousen’s Nephew: Surprising Story of BYU Troublemaker (Mark Skousen 1 of 4) Oct 17, 2026

Show notes

“Are you the famous Skousen?” Do they mean Cleon Skousen or Mark Skousen? Economist Mark Skousen has heard that question in nearly every ward he’s ever moved into. Usually the person means his uncle, W. Cleon Skousen, the FBI veteran, Salt Lake City police chief and best-selling author of The Naked Communist. When I first saw Mark at the John Whitmer Historical Association meetings, I had the same thought. Put a pair of glasses on him and the resemblance is striking. In Part 1 of my conversation with Mark, we talk about growing up a Skousen, and about his early years as a self-described troublemaker at BYU.

https://youtu.be/wQ4gJ9o5iIM

Don’t miss our other conversations with Mark Skousen: https://gospeltangents.com/people/mark-skousen

Gospel Tangents

Cleon Skousen or Mark?

Mark’s father, Leroy Skousen, lived a life that paralleled Cleon’s. Both were lawyers, FBI men and committed anti-communists who raised large families. When Leroy died of lung cancer at 46, Cleon became something like a father to Mark: he gave him a father’s blessing, visited the family’s home evenings in Provo, and later chose Mark as the only pallbearer from outside his immediate family.

Mark and his wife Jo Ann went on to compile There Were Giants in the Land: Episodes in the Life of W. Cleon Skousen from Cleon’s roughly 150 journals, letting Cleon tell his story in his own words. Mark also tells us he is consulting on historian Benjamin Park’s forthcoming biography of Cleon, and that Matthew Harris plans to include a surprisingly cordial meeting between Cleon and Hugh B. Brown in his upcoming book on Brown.

BYU Troublemaker

Mark arrived at BYU in the fall of 1965 planning to major in economics, raised on thrift, limited government and the books of Ludwig von Mises. What he found in his first class shocked him: Paul Samuelson’s Keynesian textbook, which taught that deficit spending was good policy during a recession and that thrift was not always a virtue. The supplementary reading was Robert Heilbroner’s The Worldly Philosophers. Mark didn’t stay quiet. He went on local radio to criticize how economics was being taught at “the Lord’s university,” then wrote an exposé for the Daily Universe. He still earned the highest grade in the class, though his professor admitted he had a hard time giving him that A.

We also talk about labels. Mark calls himself a liberal, though not in the way most Americans use the word, and explains why he’d rather discuss issues than sort people into camps. His example is a good one: Cleon and Salt Lake mayor J. Bracken Lee wanted to abolish the income tax, cut government spending and keep government out of the way, yet Lee fired Cleon as police chief and the two became bitter enemies. For Mark, that is what happens when labels end the conversation.

Part 1 is only the beginning. In Part 2, Mark explains where he and Uncle Cleon parted ways, from The Naked Communist to The Naked Capitalist, and tells the story of the day Cleon called Adam Smith’s invisible hand “inspired of God.” Part 3 turns to Mormon economics and the United Order, and Part 4 takes us inside the Daily Universe newsroom of the early 1970s. Members can watch the entire interview now at patreon.com/gospeltangents.

Listen to the full conversation wherever you get your podcasts.

Don’t miss our other conversations with Mark Skousen: https://gospeltangents.com/people/mark-skousen

Gospel Tangents

If you’re interested in using a clip, please send me an email.

0:00 Troublemaker at BYU
4:14 There Were Giants in the Land
6:58 Matt Harris and Hugh B. Brown
8:38 Pronouncing Cleon/Cleon at BYU
9:54 Keynesian Textbook at BYU
14:48 A 1966 Assignment/BYU Spy Ring
19:03 The Liberal Label
21:11 Cleon vs. J. Bracken Lee

Were Joseph & Hyrum’s Skulls Switched in 1928? (Patrick Bishop 2 of 2) Oct 08, 2026

Show notes

Were Joseph and Hyrum’s skulls switched (misidentified) in 1928? Patrick Bishop answers this mystery!

https://youtu.be/ZVoXwDdNbVk

Don’t miss our other conversations with Patrick: https://gospeltangents.com/people/patrick-bishop/

Gospel Tangents

Most of us assume the death mask is the closest thing we have to Joseph Smith’s real face. Just open the eyes, the thinking goes, and there he is. Patrick Bishop thought so too, until 25 years of research changed his mind. In Part 2 of our conversation, the producer of Brother Joseph Again makes a bold claim: the true gold standard for Joseph’s likeness isn’t the death mask at all. It’s his skull, and the skulls themselves may have been mixed up for nearly a century.

Joseph & Hyrum Skulls Switched?

When the Smith family graves were exhumed in 1928, nobody knew which body was which. Patrick believes the skulls were misidentified, and the evidence is the wound that killed Hyrum. Hyrum was shot in the face. In one skull, the entire facial structure has collapsed, which Patrick says is exactly what happens when a bullet ruptures the small bones of the face and the flesh later decays.

The other skull is nearly intact, missing only the upper jaw, and when the team overlaid the wound location, there was solid bone right where Hyrum’s injury should be. I’ve heard strong opinions on both sides of this. Lachlan Mackay has told me the skulls were mixed up; Curtis Weber once insisted they weren’t. Patrick says Curtis has since said publicly that his 2008 study was flawed, though Curtis hasn’t endorsed Patrick’s conclusions either.

Then there’s the death mask. Patrick lists the problems: cotton stuffed in the nose, the chin tied up, the weight of the plaster, dehydrated eyes, and injuries Joseph received outside Carthage Jail, which eyewitnesses described in letters, journals and trial minutes. (He’s saving those details for the film.)

The most surprising piece of evidence comes from John Taylor, who knew Joseph well and was with him at the martyrdom. Taylor tried to use the death masks to make a true likeness of Joseph and Hyrum and concluded, “We failed.” Once the masks are matched to the skulls and a few millimeters are adjusted, Patrick says, the face begins to look remarkably like the daguerreotype.

Some of my favorite moments came when Patrick described the access his team received. The Church, which now owns the locket, let them film at Carthage Jail and the Mansion House, and the Community of Christ opened its archives, including Joseph’s sword, pocket watch and epaulets. Along the way, Patrick gained a new respect for Sutcliffe Maudsley, long dismissed as a caricature artist, whose work turned out to be surprisingly accurate.

Patrick is also candid about the case against him. John Hajicek, who provided the Maudsley image of Emma wearing a locket, remains a skeptic. We know Emma owned a locket and a daguerreotype of Joseph, both now lost. But between Joseph Smith III and Lois Smith Larsen there is a 110-year gap in which no one seems to mention this locket at all.

So, are the skulls switched? Is the man in the locket Joseph? Patrick has made the most thorough case I’ve seen, and I’m still weighing it. Over these two episodes we’ve gone from Emma’s verdict on the paintings, through provenance and the 1928 camera, to skulls, masks and skeptics. Now it’s your turn to decide. Brother Joseph Again opens in theaters Friday, October 9; Patrick says opening weekend decides how long it stays, so go see it. The companion book from Greg Kofford Books arrives in November.

Listen to the full conversation wherever you get your podcasts.

Don’t miss our other conversations with Patrick: https://gospeltangents.com/people/patrick-bishop/

Also, check out our previous conversation with Lach MacKay about the Joseph Smith photo: https://gospeltangents.com/2022/08/is-this-joseph-smith/

Gospel Tangents

Time Chapter
0:00 John Taylor on why the death masks fail
1:09 Is the death mask or the skull the gold standard?
1:54 Skulls Switched/misidentified in 1928
5:05 Hyrum’s missing face: what a bullet does to facial bones
8:22 You can’t just open the eyes of the death mask
12:28 Joseph’s sword, watch and epaulets — and Sutcliffe Maudsley’s accuracy
13:47 What celebrity death masks show about likeness
14:43 The Emma daguerreotype vs. the idealized 1842 painting
16:09 John Hajicek’s objections: a provenance gap of 110 years

Forensic Science Tests Only Known Joseph Smith Photo (Patrick Bishop 1 of 2) Oct 05, 2026

Show notes

Is this tiny locket the only known Joseph Smith photo? Patrick Bishop, producer of Brother Joseph Again, explains the forensic science behind it.

Where Are the Community of Christ Apostles? Oct 04, 2026

Show notes

Community of Christ apostles have undergone one of the biggest leadership shakeups in years. With a new prophet-president and major changes among the church’s top leadership, six vacancies opened in the Council of Twelve. Some apostles retired, while others moved into different leadership positions—and six new apostles stepped into the vacancies.

https://youtu.be/y5lKYsFEcnw

With a new prophet-president and major changes among the church’s top leadership, six vacancies opened in the Council of Twelve Apostles. Some apostles retired, while others moved into the First Presidency, Presiding Bishopric, and other leadership positions. That meant bringing six new people into the Council of Twelve. But that raises an interesting question:

What exactly Do Community of Christ apostles do?

Unlike the LDS Church, Community of Christ assigns apostles to geographic areas called apostolic fields. John Hamer explains how those fields work—and why the latest reorganization has produced some surprising assignments. Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand and other parts of the world are now grouped together in one enormous field, while the United States has been organized very differently. 1189-CoCLeaderChgs 1189-CoCLeaderChgs

And that’s only part of the story.

John and I also discuss changes involving the Presidents of Seventy and what is happening with the historic sites Community of Christ still owns following the transfer of the Kirtland Temple and other properties to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

This episode isn’t public on YouTube.

I’m releasing this conversation as a bonus episode exclusively for Gospel Tangents newsletter subscribers.

The newsletter is free. Subscribe and I’ll send you the secret link to watch the full interview:

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What happened to half of the Council of Twelve? Where are the new apostles assigned? And how does Community of Christ leadership actually work?

Subscribe free to get the secret link and watch the bonus episode.

Chapters

0:00 Introduction
0:49 A New Community of Christ President
1:34 Six New Apostles
2:31 What Does a Community of Christ Apostle Do?
6:17 Presidents of Seventy & Missionary Work
7:44 What Happened to Community of Christ Historic Sites?
8:28 Plano & the Reorganized Church
11:21 Joseph Smith III’s Nauvoo Home

Mormon Virtual Temples: Reformed Mormons & Home Endowments (John Hamer 5 of 6) Oct 02, 2026

Show notes

When a Temple Isn’t a Building at All/Virtual Temples

What if you could do a virtual temples at home? Not every branch of the Restoration wanted a temple, and the groups covered in this closing conversation show just how far the idea could stretch — from outright rejection to a virtual temple.

https://youtu.be/PEd9KOTjY8U

Don’t miss our other conversations with John: https://gospeltangents.com/people/john-hamer/

Gospel Tangents

Bickertonites: No Interest at All

The Bickertonites are the clearest case of a group opting out of the temple tradition entirely. The church traces back to William Bickerton, the last apostle called by Sidney Rigdon before Rigdon’s own short-lived organization collapsed. In the chaotic years after Joseph Smith’s death, it wasn’t unusual for a small branch to drift between competing claimants depending on which traveling minister made the most persuasive case, and Bickerton’s group briefly aligned with Brigham Young’s church before Young’s 1852 public acknowledgment of polygamy, after decades of official denial, ended that association for good. Bickerton reorganized his branch independently, and it grew into a church centered on working-class, heavily Italian American communities in Pittsburgh and Detroit. Unlike nearly every other group in this series, the Bickertonites never built toward a temple, an endowment house, or even a symbolic room — the concept simply wasn’t part of their theology.

Virtual Temples That Exist Online

The more striking development is what happens when the idea of a temple gets detached from any building whatsoever. Several small, independent groups are now performing temple ordinances — the core ritual function a temple exists to serve — without a physical structure at all.

David Ferriman runs what’s effectively a Zoom-based ministry: he and his wife hold their own priesthood offices (he describes a Melchizedek priesthood, she a “Magdalene priesthood,” alongside Aaronic and “Miriam” priesthoods), and they perform temple ordinances, sealings, and other ritual work over video call, for a membership defined more by openness than by orthodoxy — same-sex sealings, plural sealings, and alternate scripture are all accommodated. He eventually wants to build a physical temple.

The Reformed Mormon movement, associated with Rob Lauer and Evan Sharley (both former members of John Hamer’s own Toronto congregation), goes a step further by removing hierarchy almost entirely. Rather than ordained clergy performing ordinances, the movement publishes something like a handbook that lets individuals set up their own home endowment — a framework rather than an institution, closer to open-source religion than to a church with a temple at its center.

A third group, the True Latter Day Saints, took a more traditional approach to the same idea: like the Cutlerites’ building in Manti, Iowa, they repurposed the upper floor of their own “red brick store” (in Manti, Utah, this time) as an endowment space — proof that the 19th-century pattern of a consecrated room above an ordinary building hasn’t disappeared, even as other groups move the same function onto the internet. And the Nielsen-Naylor congregation in Bluffdale, Utah — a group that split off from Centennial Park, itself a split from the FLDS — reportedly has early-stage plans for an actual temple building, suggesting the physical-building impulse hasn’t vanished even among the newest offshoots.

What Ties It Together

Across these cases, the throughline is that a “temple” was never really defined by its walls. For the Bickertonites, the ordinance tradition simply didn’t matter enough to carry forward. For the internet-era groups, the ordinances matter enormously — enough to perform them without a building, over a screen, or in someone’s living room. Hamer’s parting advice to any group considering a temple of its own is to plan deliberately, the way the Missouri fundamentalist group featured earlier in this series did, rather than building something modest and later outgrowing it. Across the full series, the idea of a temple has traveled from Kirtland and Nauvoo through pyramids and domed ceilings, Cutlerite endowment rooms, Strang’s unbuilt fortress temple, and finally here — to a ceremony performed entirely online.

Listen to the full conversation wherever you get your podcasts.

Don’t miss our other conversations with John: https://gospeltangents.com/people/john-hamer/

Gospel Tangents

CHAPTERS
0:00 The Bickertonites: Sidney Rigdon’s Last Apostle
4:01 Brigham Young’s 1852 Polygamy Announcement & Bickerton’s Break
5:16 Why the Bickertonites Never Cared About Temples
6:53 Norway, Illinois: A Temple Platted for the Norwegian Saints
8:29 The Town Converts to Strangism Almost Overnight
10:10 Modern Groups: Reformed Mormon Church & Christian Fellowship
11:42 The Reformed Mormon Movement: Rob Lauer & Evan Sharley
13:34 True Latter Day Saints & the Manti, Utah Red Brick Store
14:22 Nielsen-Naylor: Bluffdale & Malad, Idaho Temple Plans
15:43 John’s Closing Advice: Plan Ahead Like the Missouri Group

Meet the Mormon King Nobody Talks About (John Hamer 4 of 6) Sep 29, 2026

Show notes

James Strang is one of the strangest turns in Restoration history, including being crowned as a Mormon King. Historian John Hamer opens part four of this series by explaining just how unexpected his rise was.

https://youtu.be/eUVN58NugEg

Don’t miss our other conversations with John: https://gospeltangents.com/people/john-hamer/

Gospel Tangents

Almost as soon as Joseph Smith died, and right after Sidney Rigdon’s own short-lived church fizzled out, Strang emerged as an incredibly successful rival to Brigham Young. Strang gathered a following at Voree, Wisconsin, and John traces how his church took shape there. Strang was a firm opponent of polygamy, so as he built his movement he began unwinding some of Nauvoo’s newer practices while holding on to others. Baptism for the dead, which had been performed on the banks of the Mississippi, continued at Voree: Strang set apart a stretch of the White River, a small creek running through the community, and held a ceremony dedicating land there for a temple.

That temple never left the drawing board, but the plan was ambitious. Strang published a floor plan in the church newspaper, and John describes a design more elaborate than a simple meeting house, with ceremonial spaces suited to the rituals he was reviving. It’s a striking detail: a rival prophet in rural Wisconsin sketching out a temple of his own within a few years of Nauvoo’s fall.

Mormon King

The conversation turns to two of Strang’s most colorful episodes. The first is a family rupture. William Smith, Joseph Smith’s brother, joined Strang’s movement, but he was secretly practicing polygamy, the very thing Strang had built his church in opposition to. When Strang found out, he expelled him. The second is Strang’s coronation. George J. Adams, whom John describes as very theatrical, is the one who staged the ceremony that saw Strang crowned king, an image that has followed the Strangites ever since. John connects the ritual back to the Council of Fifty, which had already set Strang and others apart with titles like prophet, priest, and king before the coronation made it official and public.

Rick and John also weigh whether Strang’s community had anything like a full endowment. John’s answer is careful: they performed ordinances, and Strang cared about them as much as anyone, but John doesn’t think Voree had a dedicated endowment house in the way other groups did. The temple plan on the White River was the closest they came, and it was never built.

The Strangite movement didn’t last. Strang’s assassination in 1856 ended the kingdom at Voree and later on Beaver Island, and most of his followers scattered to other branches of the Restoration, including, in some cases, to the group that would become Community of Christ. But for a few remarkable years, Strang ran a rival Mormon kingdom complete with a crowned king, a dedicated baptismal creek, and unbuilt plans for a temple of its own.

Part 5 picks up with the groups that came after: the Bickertonites, who wanted nothing to do with temples at all, and a small Norwegian settlement in Illinois that Brigham Young himself once planned to build a temple in, before nearly the whole town turned Strangite overnight.

Listen to the full conversation wherever you get your podcasts.

Chapters

1:13 James Strang’s Unexpected Rise at Voree

4:20 Baptism for the Dead in the Voree Creek

6:21 George J. Adams Stages Strang’s Coronation

7:19 Strangite Endowments Without a Temple Building

7:37 Law of Adoption: Sealings Into Noble Households (continued into the 1960s)

11:23 What Happens When a Temple Is Never Finished

12:01 William Smith Expelled for Secret Polygamy

13:10 Did Polygamy Survive Strang? The Kansas Strangites

Don’t miss our other conversations with John: https://gospeltangents.com/people/john-hamer/

Gospel Tangents

Inside Cutlerite Church: Where Nauvoo Endowment Survives (John Hamer 3 of 6) Sep 26, 2026

Show notes

What happened to the Nauvoo Endowment after Joseph Smith’s death? What happens to a temple idea when a group won’t follow Brigham Young west? In this third conversation of the series, historian John Hamer and host Rick Bennett follow two small groups that carried the Nauvoo endowment in their own directions: one that kept it alive in a room above a church, and one that took it to Texas.

https://youtu.be/M-I9WmPsu7w

Don’t miss our other conversations with John: https://gospeltangents.com/people/john-hamer/

Gospel Tangents

Cutlerite Version of Nauvoo Endowment

John starts with Alpheus Cutler, one of the chief builders of the Nauvoo Temple and a member of the Council of Fifty. When Brigham Young chose the Salt Lake valley, Cutler felt the Council had given him a special mission to lead the saints to Jackson County instead, and he stayed behind. The break produced the Cutlerites. At first they practiced polygamy like Brigham Young’s followers, but then decided it was a terrible mistake and broke apart the plural families, which John calls amazing and hard to do. Modern Cutlerites, he says, have written that chapter out of their history. What they kept was the Nauvoo endowment.

At their headquarters in Manti, Iowa, the Cutlerites set apart an upper story that John calls an endowment house, modeled on Joseph Smith’s Red Brick Store, where the endowment was first given. When they moved north, they built a two-story building the same way, with a church on the bottom floor and an endowment room above, and they did it again when part of the group regathered in Jackson County. By the time missionaries from the Reorganization arrived, about half of the Cutlerites had joined them, and John notes there are no descendants of Cutler in the Cutlerite church but plenty in Community of Christ. That makes the Cutlerites, he says, the only group outside the Brigham Young-descended churches that still keeps a Nauvoo-era endowment, which is why more people want to study them than there are Cutlerites. Rick, who has interviewed them, says only a handful remain

Nauvoo Endowment in Texas!

Then the conversation turns to Texas. Lyman Wight was an apostle who had led Zion’s Camp and sat on the Council of Fifty, which gave him an ambassadorial role with the Republic of Texas as a possible safe haven for the saints. When Brigham Young went west, Wight decided to finish the Texas plan. John says Brigham Young’s answer was that every king in the Council of Fifty had the right to build his own kingdom, as long as he didn’t take anyone from Nauvoo. Wight gathered people from the pineries of Wisconsin and founded several relatively successful colonies.

Rick notes that the Wightites built the first temple west of the Mississippi, thirty years before St. George. John agrees they called it a temple but thinks of it more as an endowment house, a space in a church building set apart for rituals, and one that predates the others. Rick adds that historian Mel Johnson says it wasn’t closed to outsiders, and John suggests the closed-door tradition grew out of the conflict in Utah, while Texans welcomed the colony. The Wightites faded after Joseph Smith III came forward, and their descendants are now in Community of Christ. John adds that Wight’s journal was held at the Herald’s headquarters until the building burned, and Rick recalls that the RLDS Church suppressed temple records because of polygamy.

Together with parts 1 and 2, these stories show how far the temple idea traveled from Kirtland and Nauvoo, and part 3 shows that a temple can be a room upstairs. Next, in part 4, John turns to James Strang, the Strangites, and their fortress temple plans at Voree. Don’t forget to check out John’s book!

Listen to the full conversation wherever you get your podcasts.

Don’t miss our other conversations with John: https://gospeltangents.com/people/john-hamer/

Gospel Tangents

Chapters

0:43 Alpheus Cutler: Nauvoo Temple Builder & Council of Fifty
2:39 Cutlerites Drop Polygamy, Keep the Nauvoo Endowment
6:41 Church Below, Endowment Room Above: The Cutlerite Pattern
8:01 Only Cutlerites Kept a Nauvoo-Era Endowment — & Few Are Left
9:21 Lyman Wight: Zion’s Camp Captain & Council of Fifty
11:16 The Republic of Texas & the Council of Fifty’s Plan
13:11 The First Temple West of the Mississippi? Dedicated 1849
14:30 Was the Wightite Temple Open to Outsiders?
17:54 Wightites Rejoin: Suppressed Records & Lyman Wight’s Journal

Fundamentalist Mormon Temples: Amazing Nevada, Missouri & AUB (John Hamer 2 of 6) Sep 23, 2026

Show notes

We’re moving beyond LDS Temples and looking at Fundamentalist Mormon temples. Nauvoo gave Latter-day Saints a temple built around Old Testament ordinances, and then the pioneers left it behind. In this second conversation of the series, historian John Hamer and host Rick Bennett follow that inheritance west to Utah, where an Endowment House filled the gap until a real temple could be finished, and then to the more surprising places it landed: the temples of Mormon fundamentalist groups, including a pyramid in the Utah desert.

https://youtu.be/BGKMtxTGSQQ

John explains that the Endowment House, built on Temple Square, was a temporary but sacred place where the ordinances could be performed while the Salt Lake Temple took decades to complete. He suggests the wait was partly because the builders were aiming at something extraordinary for pioneers. We pause over a small mystery, whether the Endowment House had a baptismal font, before turning to the fundamentalist groups, who have built temples all over the place. John understands that the Apostolic United Brethren have an Endowment House in Draper and a temple in Mexico. The FLDS built a temple at the Yearning for Zion Ranch in Texas, though the church no longer holds it. John, an admitted architecture enthusiast, wants every group to have the nicest-looking temple it can, and confesses he was disappointed by how that one turned out.

Fundamentalist Mormon Temples

Then comes the pyramid. Rick describes a pyramid-shaped temple built by Christ’s Church near Modena, Utah, a place the group calls Paquin. Someone even gave him a 3D-printed model of it, and he told them it should be the church’s icon, since who else has a pyramid temple? After it was vandalized and closed, the church moved its temple work to a second temple in Nevada, about thirty miles from Tonopah down dirt roads. Rick, who visited and stayed with members of the church, says the outside is not pretty, but the inside is beautiful.

The most striking temple may be the one built by a Missouri fundamentalist group. Rick visited the week before its dedication and, after helping install mirrors and curtains, was jokingly told he was now a temple worker. The rooms, creation, garden, terrestrial, and celestial, are covered in murals, and the celestial room’s dome is painted as a daytime sky that becomes an accurate night sky, with fiber-optic stars, when the lights go out. John says this is exactly the kind of thought he wishes every group put into its temple. Any independent fundamentalist group can worship there by appointment, yet many will not. That leads to the 1978 priesthood revelation, which many fundamentalists saw as another sign of LDS apostasy, and to the question of Black members: Rick says the Missouri group is the only one that welcomes them.

Across all these buildings, John draws a simple conclusion. Most of them are familiar to LDS eyes, built on the Nauvoo model, and groups without a temple set aside what amounts to an Endowment House, a consecrated room where ordinances can be performed. Part 1 traced the temple idea from the Bible through Kirtland to Nauvoo. Part 2 shows how the Nauvoo version spread among the fundamentalists. Next, in part 3, John turns to two groups that broke from Brigham Young, the Cutlerites and Lyman Wight’s Wightites.

Don’t foget to check out John’s book, Scattering of the Saints.

Chapters

1:40 The Salt Lake Endowment House
2:04 Did the Endowment House Have a Baptismal Font?
5:44 Fundamentalist Temples Beyond the Brighamites
6:30 FLDS Temple at Yearning for Zion Ranch
8:13 Christ’s Church & the Pyramid Temple in Modena (Paquin), Utah
9:26 Nevada Temple: Plain Outside, Beautiful Inside
10:57 Missouri Temple: Murals, Creation Room & the Holy of Holies
12:46 The Dome of Stars, in Full
14:30 The 1978 Priesthood Revelation & Fundamentalist Temples
17:14 Only the Missouri Group Welcomes Black Members
17:52 Endowment Houses: Groups Without a Temple

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