THAT’S NOT WHAT IT SAYS, VERSE 3. This is the third in the series of Sunstone symposium presentations in which Richard Russell looks at certain LDS scriptural “proof texts” that are used in ways that bear negatively on Mormon belief and practice. In this installment, he examines the claim that we must be worthy to receive inspiration, guidance, or truth from the Holy Spirit; confusion about what “light-mindedness” means; passages declaring that children’s sins fall upon the heads of their parents if the parents fail to teach their children the gospel; the suggestion that Church leaders cannot mislead us; “Moroni’s Promise” as a foolproof test of sincerity and key to the truth of the entire Restoration; and the idea that there are no second chances for those who receive a witness of the truthfulness of the Restoration and don’t convert.

RICHARD C. RUSSELL and RYAN WIMMER