Jason : How Galileo and the Scientific Method Saved My Testimony

Using scientific discovery as a metaphor for our spiritual growth, Jason recounts what has helped him continue to nurture his faith when he found contradictions in models of how he’d seen the Gospel practiced.

Faith Is Not Blind: Welcome to the Faith Is Not Blind Podcast. I’m Eric d’Evegnée and I’m here today with Jason Rose. Welcome, Jason. We’d like to start out by having you introduce yourself a little bit. Just tell us a little bit about where you grew up, your background, and a little bit about your family.

Jason: So I grew up mostly in a little town in Idaho called Buhl, not too far from Twin Falls. But before that my family bounced around quite a bit. From the time I was about two-and-a-half until I was six, we lived in Los Angeles. My mom worked as a nurse and my dad was at a truck broker. My parents were kind of growing apart a little bit, and my mom actually went to go see a divorce lawyer and said she wanted to get a divorce and apparently the lawyer was a member of the Church. He was actually a Stake President, which my mom didn’t know. As she was describing why she wanted to get a divorce he said, “Well, l I know these two young men that could come and visit your family and  teach you, and I think it would really help.”  And so she agreed to have the missionaries come and teach my family.

The thing that I remember distinctly from that was just the feeling that I was so happy that the missionaries were there. I enjoyed them coming and teaching lessons. I was excited when they came over.

Faith Is Not Blind: And how old were you?

Jason: About 6 at this point.  

Faith Is Not Blind: So you’re about six. And where were you at this point?

Jason: We were still in LA. 

Faith Is Not Blind: And they came over and taught your family the Gospel.

Jason: Yes. And I remember distinctly walking around the school yard and reflecting on how happy I was and how much my family had changed in that period of time with missionaries there. My mom had been looking for a religion to raise us in and we had gone to other churches and tried other things, but this was different. And I definitely felt the difference and I was excited about that. I wasn’t old enough to get baptized at that point, but my mom got baptized and my older sister got baptized. My dad was less active and so he was reactivated. So a lot of unity came into our family and I felt like we had a focus and I really liked that.

It wasn’t too long after that that we moved to Buhl. So that change from a big city to rural Idaho was pretty hard and it was particularly hard on my mom because she’d always worked as a nurse. In small-town Idaho that was really an unusual thing for someone who is LDS to work outside the home. So here was this person that was very competent and had a lot to contribute to the ward, but whenever she went to Church, she had to deal with that negative stereotype that surrounded women who worked outside the home at the time. And so that just gradually kind of drove her away from the Church. So I think that was maybe the first difficult experience and in my life was dealing with the fact that not everybody in my family was not going to Church and kind of reconciling that.

Faith Is Not Blind: About how old were you when your mother started to not attend Church anymore? 

Jason: About 8.

Faith Is Not Blind: So in just a couple of years. How did that affect your testimony of the Gospel and of the Church?

Jason: I don’t think it affected my testimony. It was more like a problem that I felt I needed to overcome. My testimony kind of grew organically. So from that first experience with missionaries. You know, you just notice as you read the scriptures or as you learn things in school and you think, “That fits nicely with the Gospel.” And so those little things kind of accumulate and I felt like that’s how my testimony grew. I also had friends. When I was in fourth grade I met a friend who is still my friend today. And his parents were strong in the Gospel and kind of took me under their wing. So I had that experience. They would read the scriptures at night, so if I stayed over there–if I stayed for dinner–then after dinner we would read scriptures. Or I’d be there for Family Home Evening with them. And so I got to see that modeled. The other thing was that they were very open about discussing issues in the Church. It was okay to talk about, “This particular thing is not going well at Church, so maybe we could do this.” It was more open in terms of the Gospel dialogue they had because they were more mature in the Church. 

Faith Is Not Blind: So that sort of helped you along. Was it hard to see some of those things happening at a different house and then feel like, “Well, I wish this was happening at mine.”

Jason: I think I just enjoyed it. I was glad to see it. It was nice just to have that experience and kind of see, “Oh yeah. This is how this could work.”  And, you know, “That’s not how my family is and I wish it was.” But it made it okay for me.

Faith Is Not Blind: What about your sister? Aas she still going to Church with you?

Jason: No. She became a teenager and she stopped coming, and then my parents separated and so my dad stopped going to Church. So for a while there, I was kind of the only one that was going to Church. But my best friend and other friends that I had were all going on missions, so it still seemed natural for me to go. My parents were supportive of me. So it wasn’t that I ever faced real opposition at home. It’s just things weren’t, you know, textbook good. So that wasn’t a problem.

Faith Is Not Blind: So you went and served a mission in St Louis. How did that experience help to grow your testimony?

Jason: When I got there I was really disappointed to get a call stateside. And the reason was because I felt like if I could speak a different language, I could be outside of myself. And that would somehow be a protection to me. I could have a division between me inside of myself and me as a missionary. So if people were rejecting me in another language maybe that would be okay. So when I got my call stateside, I was like, “Oh, that was really not expected.” My other friends went to Costa Rica or the Dominican Republic. My best friend’s Dad had been the president of the Spanish Branch and I could speak Spanish and I thought, “Surely I’ll go Spanish speaking like everybody else.” So that was a big surprise to go to St. Louis and then I felt a little more naked. I was like, “Okay. These are people that I can communicate very well and with,” so there was no separation there. 

In my mission we had this program where you had to carry around a clipboard and you had to pretend as though you were taking a survey. It was very prescribed. And when you went to Zone Conference, the assistant to the President would say, “You have to open the screen door and put your foot inside it.” And that was a little bit forward, especially if you’re a very shy person like me. And then you had to knock exactly seven times. And then you had to say, “Hi, we’re in the neighborhood taking a survey and we wondered if you have time to answer just a few questions for us.” So that pretense that you were taking a survey would kind of get people to think, “Okay, this isn’t a vacuum cleaner salesman. They’re just taking a survey.” And then if you saw bicycles in the yard, you asked about the importance of family. Or if it looked more like a bachelor pad then you’d ask, “What’s the purpose of life?” And you’d try and get the conversation going from there and invite yourself  for a little message. But that pretense of doing a survey was very difficult for me because it felt dishonest. And because it felt dishonest, I was like, “Wow. This is different.” I didn’t expect the Church to support something that was dishonest like that, and so it kind of shook me a little bit. And instead of being shaken in an environment where I still had people around me who I could talk to or that would understand, now I was in this environment where the majority were not Mormons. Where I grew up, it was not the majority, but it was probably minority-majority–like 25% or so. But I always had a good core of people around me that I could ask. And this kind of shook me.

Faith Is Not Blind: And to have missionaries your age who might not recognize the question that you have. They might just see it simply as a yes or no type issue, right? Are you obedient or not? But for you, it became an issue of Integrity. So you have support from home. Your family is really supportive, but maybe you didn’t feel like you could reach out to them in the way that you could with some of the other friends that you had. And so how did you work through that? 

Jason: I think the mistake I made was that I could have just told my Mission President what I was struggling with, but I was afraid because of all the training that we had around how this was inspired and if you didn’t follow this particular program you wouldn’t be successful in obedience was the key right and so if you rub it into this this requirement to live and then you’ll be successful and if not in so that’s her to answer the question for me and I think that I would have told the mission president I’m really struggling with this and here’s why I was not brave enough to do that and then instead I started to question my own testimony and one thing that didn’t help was the ban on books so you weren’t allowed to have any books in your mission other than everything the Mission Library so I started to look for look for ways to to get reading material my became a a mail order book customer I was ordering books and keep it under my pillow and I could read when my companion was in the shower and I’m such a library I feel we would stop in and I would you know you know see what’s up with what things there were on topics of scriptures and and Mormonism and things like that you can get into things that are kind of not very supportive so I remember me to pulling out the Encyclopedia Britannica and reading about Mormonism in there was a complete description of the the temple ceremony in there that’s quite disrespectful of Joseph Smith and pointed out some things that I hadn’t known about in and its history and I remember this being really shaken to the core by then that with this issue it’s a question of integrity and that’s a really hard one because you feel that you know to your core minutes at just really internal and and so how did how did that reading help you or how did it shape you well I think that’s what I was started ordering books from the oven and reading the oven and collecting sweating Old Testament pseudepigrapha large library but what really made it would really make a difference for me was served an award and it was there was a man they were called companionships of missionaries in this word and then there was an older couple and so they had they just they just had an apartment and got to interact with them and you know they just it was interesting what they did because they just lived in this big lived in this Ward and they just found ways to lift and serve other people so I just gradually building on this Ward and they would go out track thing and things in one time we were out there we’re at their home and and found out that Elder Hanks had a love of Hugh Nibley books which I also have been enjoying and stuff poke a shared that thing and I sent you know this tracking program but what do you do when you go out trash he’s like Oh you mean the survey I don’t do that that’s dishonest and that was actually like that just flipped a life for me that yeah oh you can have you know you can have an opinion of your own you can you can you know you can let you can live with that that dissonance between you know what your mission President telling you to do in the end and I think that’s only fair really I think getting another one of my mistakes was too was to imagine that my mission president was was perfect or you know that did he couldn’t make a mistake or you know that this probably wasn’t very effective program it maybe if I had asked if I would have gotten over gotten over this problem much sooner but made it just made it a tiny search nearest that revelation of the you know you can live with that you know either present is perfect or he’s not and you know that the church is perfect or it’s not it was you know it was important so I think it’s important to see that in you know if it’s one thing I think when you know when you’re young person and you know you have a question like that it’s one thing sort of search drouin to look through books and and other things try to find that information I think that’s good and that’s part of the process but in addition to that I think it’s it’s a great thing to see a mentor to see somebody who knows something and you go oh yes someone just spoke of thought I’ve had that I felt like I couldn’t Express near and I think seeing that just a levy at some of the things iety of having that question and asking the question why am I different and then be able to see somebody you know I wouldn’t do that that’s the song Yeah that’s true in and then you know and before that time I realized I was struggling with my testimony and because of that right when I talk to my mission present testimony and he was as I will lean on mine and fake it till you make it hotter than of course that that dishonesty there it was really hard for me to deal with and I remember like trying to sneak into the Overflow away from the gym so I could kneel down and pray and try to have some meaningful meaningful you know Angel appearance or something that would that would switch this thing and the realization that I and then I came to as you know you’ve known since you were six is this church was true you’ve you’ve had that feeling in your heart and it’s it’s it would kind of be disrespectful of that for her heavenly father to send more witness then what you can already recall and you know what you would you look kind of take away from that witness and that witness has been very strong for me you know ever since just when I reflect on that and you know how did this begin yes and then I can think about things that have strengthened me as I’ve gone away gone along and good friends and then things that have the hell on to me you know they’ve helped me and I kind of live with that dissonance a little bit because I see it I study Physics and gradually just heard of migrated to mathematics but when when you heard of clothes this week that was some the most important phrase in in science isn’t Eureka it’s over that’s funny when you see something that’s not quite what you expected to see if that’s actually going to lead to that you know that’s going to lead to discovery of something new that you’re like all that didn’t fit what my model was for for the world what is Elder Haven would describe it you know that’s gap between reality and the idea was actually where where where discoveries are made and example might be relativity right so according to relativity light would have to be moving through some some medium and since sometimes it would be going as the Earth moves around soon as it will be going with the current isn’t that would be going against the current so it’d be faster or slower and you should be able to measure that and so that the experiment was designed to to be able to to measure speed of light in different directions and it turned out it was the same in all directions so that’s funny that’s not that’s not what I expected to see that’s not what’s described by Newtonian mechanics and that led to the discovery of special relativity so and that that happens over and over at science there’s no we were so excited when when data fits the model but then then you discover when you look closely I hope it doesn’t quite fit the model there’s a difference I didn’t expect that and and that’s led to you no refined or tomorrow if I think the important thing to keep in mind is that just because you know you had a model that was working and then you realized oh wait but it doesn’t describe in this particular scenario that doesn’t mean the whole model goes away right I mean we still teach Newtonian mechanics because it works in so many of our everyday situations but when things start travelling really faster are really massive then it breaks down and that’s when we have to go to to relativity to describe those things so you have to have a you get a more refined model but but the simpler model is always a special case of that Maura find model and I think if we get everything about our testimony revision of the Gospel we can start you know if we start with a pretty simple picture and then we still And then we see how there’s there’s a gap here so that’s just something else to learn about Philly and then we can not not have to have it be perfect or worried that the whole model will go away or now be useless because you discovered one little you know counterexample at 1 to look at that was missing to see something again right way to revise means to see it again it’s over with an essay entirely what we’re doing is going to work with what’s in there then so what is suggesting is there are parts of the essay that need to be working and it’s not see before I think you used to wear model yeah I realize the model needs to be expanded and pray talks about that in in pedagogy as well the expectation failure that that’s that’s really growth can occur is when what we expect what we predict to have happen doesn’t have but that’s it what you’re talking about with your parents on your mission I mean mail ordering books and and you don’t worry about being an authentic or being disobedient I mean that’s a real to real challenge to have to do that so so what am I questions is and I love how you described that using physics and it’s a really great metaphor but how do you pass that on to like your children or to students yeah but I really enjoyed what elder sister Haven had to say I think giving them that vision of theirs you know their stage 1 and their stage 2 and stage 3 or moving from being an optimist to being a pessimist to being and improve her and I think the most important thing is to be honest about you know where that is and help people to find resources that will help them.