BYU professors met with establishment congressman John Curtis to promote environmental issues, despite scientific, scriptural and prophetic teachings debunking the agenda.
Ben Abbott, a BYU assistant professor of ecosystem ecology said, “I hope that we can have a non-political discussion about the effects of climate change.”
This theme is reiterated again,
“The goal is to de-politicize climate change and to start taking care of our environment.” said Nick Huey, spokesperson for RepublicEN, a statist organization meant to deceive people into thinking they are for the perceived agenda of smaller government.
These completely disingenuous statements show the deception they are engaged in. The very nature of their visit, with an elected official to discuss political programs to further their agenda makes everything they are doing “political” by definition. What they mean is they want to give the perception that what they are doing is benign and universally supported, when it isn’t.
Zach Aanderud, a BYU associate professor of ecosystem ecology showed the real goal of their efforts when he stated, “If our severity of droughts become more frequent or the droughts themselves become more severe, it’s hard for us to recover in a changing world where we have less water and more people,”
This verbal linguistic tactic designed to plant ideas into people’s minds is common. This idea that a growing population is bad for the environment has been debunked by science, the scriptures and modern leaders. One of the most effective was by Democrat, Apostle and member of the First Presidency, James E. Faust when he taught,
“I next address the present-day challenge to the words of the Lord recorded in Genesis: ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.’ All my life I have heard the argument that the earth is overpopulated. Much controversy surrounded a 1994 United Nations International Conference on Population and Development held in Cairo, Egypt… (A)t the very center of the debate was the socially acceptable phrase ‘sustainable growth.’ This concept is becoming increasingly popular. How cleverly Satan masked his evil designs with that phrase.
Few voices in the developed nations cry out in the wilderness against this coined phrase, “sustainable growth.” In Forbes magazine a thoughtful editorial asserts that people are an asset, not a liability. It forthrightly declares as preposterous the broadly accepted premise that curbing population growth is essential for economic development. This editorial then states convincingly, ‘Free people don’t ‘exhaust’ resources. They create them.’
An article in U.S. News & World Report entitled ’10 Billion for Dinner, Please’ states that the earth is capable of producing food for a population of at least 80 billion, eight times the 10 billion expected to inhabit the earth by the year 2050. One study estimates that with improved scientific methods the earth could feed as many as 1,000 billion people. Those who argue for sustainable growth lack vision and faith. The Lord said, ‘For the earth is full, and there is enough and to spare.’ That settles the issue for me. It should settle the issue for all of us. The Lord has spoken.” (First Presidency Message, Liahona, November 1995)
Sadly, it is a growing trend at BYU for its professors to preach things condemned by the prophets. From condemning prophets specifically, to the institution lying about Joseph Smith’s position on key principles (calling him a socialist when he specifically opposed it), 
and more, it is essential that we be even more vigilant and not let our guard down even though “it’s the Lord’s university”. Unfortunately, the professors at the Lord’s university aren’t in line with the Lord.
Could you someone bake check the Faust quotes source? I can’t seem to find it. The 1995 ensign is a conf report so it can’t have a first presidency message like they typically did for home teaching. Lds tools app is. It giving me any results on search’s for key phrases within the quote either. Must be a bug.
https://www.lds.org/liahona/1995/11/serving-the-lord-and-resisting-the-devil?lang=eng
You quote for Elder Faust is September 1995.
https://www.lds.org/ensign/1995/09/serving-the-lord-and-resisting-the-devil?lang=eng
Thanks https://www.lds.org/liahona/1995/11/serving-the-lord-and-resisting-the-devil?lang=eng
So what do we do about it? False teachings need to be condemned without condemning the teacher. How?
They’ll scream, “You’re limiting free speech!”
Could the school’s president do something to curb these “professors”? Maybe cut off their funds?
Why can’t the teacher be called out?
Um, well you can just not send your children to BYU and try to convince others to do the same. I wouldn’t send my kids there for anything. It’s idiotic to think that just because you’re a Latter-Day Saint, you should go to BYU. Personally, I would kind of like to see and end to the church’s official sponsorship of BYU. None of this is new.
Thanks. I am particularly concerned about the teaching of evolution as
fact. I know this is the norm at BYU, & I’m pretty sure at BYU-I, BYU-H,
etc. I thought about writing a letter to the wives of Gen. Authorities, but
I am losing enthusiasm for that idea. I am concerned because of Pew
Research that says millennials are leaving the Church primarily because of
disagreements w/ doctrine. I’m afraid students are encouraged to challenge
Gen. Authorities on this subject because Gen. Auth. are not scientists & are
only going on opinion. The biology dept. profs are “the experts.”
Does the church have a position on evolution? They’ve refuted pre-adamite theories, but I’m not aware of GA’s or the church being completely against evolutionary theories. Maybe God created through evolution…
We hope you’ll check out these two articles in answer to your question https://faithfulsaints.com/belief-in-evolution-no-belief-in-jesus-christ/
https://faithfulsaints.com/did-dinosaurs-die-before-the-fall-of-adam/
Since when is scholarship or the intellect greater than the mantle. “The mantle is far, far greater than the intellect” by Boyd K Packer
In 1910 three BYU professors were dismissed for trying to turn the school to evolution. I see no reason why we shouldn’t dismiss professors today that attempt to bring false doctrines to the school.
http://josephsmithfoundation.org/faqs/13-3-byu-professors-why-did-president-joseph-f-smith-dismiss-three-professors-from-brigham-young-university-for-teaching-organic-evolution/
The head of BYU believes in evolution so he won’t dismiss them.
First, what is the source of your photo listing Joseph Smith Jr. as a Utopian Socialist?
It is unfortunate that in these last days the wheat and tares must ripen side by side in church sponsored organizations. BYU is no exception. I say to parents, arm your student with the knowledge that they WILL be taught principles that are not inline with gospel teachings – from their professors, from guest speakers, and from administrators. This is now a fact.
As long as they know and accept this, they can filter through and use the Holy Spirit to discern truth from evil. There is no safe place in Zion where one can let down their reliance on the guidance of the Holy Ghost, and especially not at the Lord’s university.
That photo is displayed in the sociology department at BYU
The picture labeling Joseph Smith a “Utopian Socialist” really irks me. He specifically stated that he didn’t support Socialism and he saw it as the counterfeit to the Law of Consecration that it is. Not only did he see it, but many many other prophets after him also saw and pointed it out.
Smith couldn’t be a “socialist.” Socialism as a movement didn’t start in Europe until the mid 1840s. Utopian socialism, as stated in the picture above, is different from socialism per se. Again, fact checking may benefit your point of view.
1. Socialism was spreading across the US in the 1830’s. Joseph Smith went to a lecture on the topic and said he didn’t “believe the doctrine”. History of the Church 6:33
2. To say we didn’t fact check, is to fail in your fact checking. From what you’ve said, it actually looks like you need to do some “fact checking”
I took this picture. It is from the BYU economics department.
Shaun, here’s a quote from President Nelson about evolution:
“Through the ages, some without scriptural understanding have tried to explain our existence by pretentious words such as ex nihilo (out of nothing). Others have deduced that, because of certain similarities between different forms of life, there has been a natural selection of the species, or organic evolution from one form to another. Many of these people have concluded that the universe began as a “big bang” that eventually resulted in the creation of our planet and life upon it. To me, such theories are unbelievable!”
https://www.lds.org/ensign/1988/01/the-magnificence-of-man?lang=eng&_r=1
He’s spoken about this similarly in 4 subsequent General Conference talks as well.
Not only do BYU keep professors with questionable ideas on, but they also fire good ones. I am referring to what happened a few years back when Prof Steven Jones was put on leave for questioning the official 9/11 report. That did not sit well with me when there is so much hard evidence that confirms that these buildings were demolished intentionally rather than collapsing from airplane impact and fires.
I am one of the professors named in this post. Here is the material we shared with Representative Curtis and some comments on the meeting: https://benabbo.blogspot.com/2018/08/what-climate-change-means-for-utah.html
The teachings of the prophets are precious to me and I would love to know what aspect of what we shared was contrary to church teachings. Nothing that we discussed was contrary to the quotation from Elder Faust.