Six Easy Steps to Becoming an Expert Mormon Apologist

File under: Satire

1. Don't read the Bible. It is a dead book, meaningless and incomprehensible. Anti-mormons cannot even agree amongst themselves what it means, so why bother to study it. Argue they cannot use the Bible as a proof text until they can agree on what it means. Use varying readings on John 4:24 to prove your point, and then don't bother to ever read the book again. Its damaged goods, the Joseph Smith-Translation proves that.

2. Study original sources. Then you can scoff at the ignorance of anti-mormons who dare to criticize texts they know little or nothing about. Mock them openly for daring to quote troublesome and seemingly strange passages from Journal of Discourses, because they are ignorant of historical, textual, spiritual, and whatever other context you can fabricate.

3. FARMS thoughts=your thoughts. Rely on the incredibly robust arguments and utter objectivity of the mighty apologetic powerhouse that is FARMS. Read everything they ever published, commit it to memory, then voila, you can rapidly disarm your foes with a high speed onslaught of punishing arguments they cannot respond to.

4. Stay current. Read all of the latest apologetics material put out on all the websites: FAIR, SHIELDS, etc. Then you can quickly counter any arguments put forward with astonishing speed, feigning broad-based knowledge when in fact you only know the latest current events. Read the Ensign every month too, only so if you are questioned on how faithful you are you can hold that up as proof of your fidelity.

5. Consult outside sources. Talk to Mormons who know a lot about other religions and read books written by Mormons who know a lot about other religions. That way you will be totally plugged into what they believe and can quickly hamstring their beliefs.

6. Ignore hypocrisy. Forget about that "turn the other cheek" stuff and "love thy neighbor" thing. This is Jude 1:3 time. These people are attacking us, we have to defend ourselves with the sword of truth, right?

And, one later add on...

7. Read up on chiasmus and other forms of Hebrew literary devices. The more obscure and nonsensical the better, that will it will be impossible for anti-mormons to respond intelligently to them, because they make no sense in the first place and are not worthy of any serious discussion from an apologetic point of view. You will have your foe effectively unarmed in this type of combat, because they will have no idea what you are talking about.