Ruthie Robertson is the recently fired instructor at BYU Idaho.  She made a face book post arguing against certain doctrines and policies of the church which employed her which resulted in her being fired – which should not be terribly surprising.  I would like to summarize her arguments to show why I disagree with them.

Her primary argument seems to be that the church is picking-and-choosing which hateful practices to follow from the Old Testament and which to ignore.  This argument highlights what I believe is clearly missing from whatever faith or testimony she thinks she has, which is that the church is lead by a prophet and apostles today.  There should be little question that the gospel of Jesus Christ has certain departures from the Law of Moses – particularly in practice.  What our teachings and practices should be currently is not based on picking-and-choosing from the Old Testament, but on the inspired leadership of those called as prophets, seers and revelators.   Her statement shows that she simply does not believe this.

She goes on to say that while the Book of Mormon does not mention homosexuality, it does condemn polygamy.  Yet she fails to mention that while the key chapter (Jacob 2), does condemn polygamy, it does leave the door open in verse 30 should God command otherwise.  This is picking-and-choosing.

She wraps up her manifesto by making an argument that our sins are part of who we are, and since God made us that way, it is not a sin.  This line of reasoning seems to take us to a conclusion that there is no such thing as sin.  The argument would go something like this:

P1:  God made us absolutely and is responsible for who we are.
P2:  Our sins are part of who we fundamentally are.
P3:  God is not a creator of sin

C1:  Nothing we do is a sin

My disagreement here is with both P1 and P2.  There is something about us (call it intelligence or what you will) that was not created nor made – not even by God.  So the fundamental part of who we are is necessary rather than contingent on God.  We are ultimately un-caused agents.  This then leads to a disagreement with P2 with regards to free will or agency.

Bottom line is that faithful members will believe that the church is lead by revelation rather than picking-and-choosing, and that we are all capable of choosing behaviors and repenting of sin.  Ruthie seems to be missing these parts.