The Crucible of Doubt: Reflections on the Quest for Faith

by Terryl L. Givens

Trials of faith seldom arise from core Mormon beliefs; few struggle with commitment because their God is too benevolent, His plan too generous, the heaven we anticipate too rich in relationships and love. Doctrines, however, no matter how pure, do not exist in a vacuum. We encounter them through teachings, programs, manuals, personal interactions, and institutional forms and practices. And in the process, we occasionally find the pure gospel entangled with unfortunate ideas, pharisaical behavior, legalistic thinking, judgmentalism, and rules based more on tradition than inspiration. Those, of course, are the fruits of culture—a primarily western American Mormon culture almost two centuries in the making. They are not the gospel itself. But the complaint that culture, not the gospel, is the problem, is not entirely satisfactory. Our experience of the gospel is inescapably mediated by, conditioned by, culture.