CES does have holes, its not perfect, its not meant to be. And I wish its author would remove some of the weaker and irrelevant arguments. What is is, however, is a jumping off point the user can consult to see what the potential issues are because the church has kept them mostly to completely hidden from its membership while demonizing sources that did draw attention to them, and then (in the online version) follow to primary sources, read them, and draw their own conclusions.
And I've read all the rebuttals, from fairmormon, from other apologists, from BYU scholars, etc., and the rebuttals to the rebuttals, and the rebuttals to those, and nothing comes even close to explaining all the central and fatal issues, and they all need to be explained. I spent 8 years looking for answers, and only found excuses, rationalizations, poor apologetics full of inconsistent standards of evidence and logical fallacies, special pleadings, and outright admissions that X or Y thing was actually true, in spite of being claimed to be false for decades upon decades.
There is no single, overarching theory that explains all the central and fatal issues of mormonism, except one - its another human invented religion like all the rest.
The apologetics to Mormonism are no different and no more convincing than the apologetics to Jehova's Witness, to Islam, to 7th Day Adventists, etc.
And most telling of all, the only people (per mormonism) who can receive the official answers by revelation, have completely abdicated giving any official real answers at all. And no, things like "we just can't know", "they were just people of their time", "we just can't know the origin of this doctrine" and the like are not answers. "Well maybe it was...." and "Its possible that...." and "What if...", these are not answers, they are guesses, nothing more. They are admissions that they don't actually have the answer, and nothing more.
Mormon leaders have ceased going on the record with anything that would be claimed a revealed, restored and unchanging truth that might later be testable, because they know that on almost everything the church has made claims about that ended up being testable (age of the earth, universal flood, oriign of languages, literal adam and eve 6k years ago, reality of the book of abraham, origins of north american first peoples, lgbt being a choice, etc etc etc) they have been shown to be wrong, and in many cases admitted they were wrong, in spite of claiming for decades to centuries via prophetic assurance that they were right. Mormonism and its claims, like those of most religions, are in a constant state of retreat as observation and the scientific method debunks them one after the next.
I appreicate your willingness to engage the issues, but like I said, I spent 8 years doing so, and directly engaging countless people, countless sources (especially primary sources) and the like, and I found the answer - its simply another human invented religion, like the rest. I'm sure you find mormon apologetics suffiient, as do JW's and theirs, and Islam and their apologetics, but they just don't hold up under scrutiny/peer review/real world observation, sorry.
If you'd like to choose just 1 issue, I would be happy to discuss. But not a whole list, and not a link of what somebody else suggest you ask. Just 1 single topic and I'm happy to discuss it.
Mormon apologetics only 'work' in isolation of the rest, and without talking about the effects they have on other apologetics for other topics.
Again, perhpas mormon apologetics are enough for you, just as JW apologetics are enough to convince JW's their religion is true, but both fall woefully short for me.
I appreciate the offer, but I have no need to discuss them after 8 years of intently doing so. I no longer have questions about mormonism and, barring any new evidence, am quite sure it is false, much the same way you don't have doubts about Jehova's Witness and are confident it is false.
CES does have holes, its not perfect, its not meant to be. And I wish its author would remove some of the weaker and irrelevant arguments. What is is, however, is a jumping off point the user can consult to see what the potential issues are because the church has kept them mostly to completely hidden from its membership while demonizing sources that did draw attention to them, and then (in the online version) follow to primary sources, read them, and draw their own conclusions.
And I've read all the rebuttals, from fairmormon, from other apologists, from BYU scholars, etc., and the rebuttals to the rebuttals, and the rebuttals to those, and nothing comes even close to explaining all the central and fatal issues, and they all need to be explained. I spent 8 years looking for answers, and only found excuses, rationalizations, poor apologetics full of inconsistent standards of evidence and logical fallacies, special pleadings, and outright admissions that X or Y thing was actually true, in spite of being claimed to be false for decades upon decades.
There is no single, overarching theory that explains all the central and fatal issues of mormonism, except one - its another human invented religion like all the rest.
The apologetics to Mormonism are no different and no more convincing than the apologetics to Jehova's Witness, to Islam, to 7th Day Adventists, etc.
And most telling of all, the only people (per mormonism) who can receive the official answers by revelation, have completely abdicated giving any official real answers at all. And no, things like "we just can't know", "they were just people of their time", "we just can't know the origin of this doctrine" and the like are not answers. "Well maybe it was...." and "Its possible that...." and "What if...", these are not answers, they are guesses, nothing more. They are admissions that they don't actually have the answer, and nothing more.
Mormon leaders have ceased going on the record with anything that would be claimed a revealed, restored and unchanging truth that might later be testable, because they know that on almost everything the church has made claims about that ended up being testable (age of the earth, universal flood, oriign of languages, literal adam and eve 6k years ago, reality of the book of abraham, origins of north american first peoples, lgbt being a choice, etc etc etc) they have been shown to be wrong, and in many cases admitted they were wrong, in spite of claiming for decades to centuries via prophetic assurance that they were right. Mormonism and its claims, like those of most religions, are in a constant state of retreat as observation and the scientific method debunks them one after the next.
I appreicate your willingness to engage the issues, but like I said, I spent 8 years doing so, and directly engaging countless people, countless sources (especially primary sources) and the like, and I found the answer - its simply another human invented religion, like the rest. I'm sure you find mormon apologetics suffiient, as do JW's and theirs, and Islam and their apologetics, but they just don't hold up under scrutiny/peer review/real world observation, sorry.
If you'd like to choose just 1 issue, I would be happy to discuss. But not a whole list, and not a link of what somebody else suggest you ask. Just 1 single topic and I'm happy to discuss it.
I've been around the block more than a few times.
Mormon apologetics only 'work' in isolation of the rest, and without talking about the effects they have on other apologetics for other topics.
Again, perhpas mormon apologetics are enough for you, just as JW apologetics are enough to convince JW's their religion is true, but both fall woefully short for me.
I appreciate the offer, but I have no need to discuss them after 8 years of intently doing so. I no longer have questions about mormonism and, barring any new evidence, am quite sure it is false, much the same way you don't have doubts about Jehova's Witness and are confident it is false.
Thank you and have a great night.