Those are three of the most popular “reasons” that current members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints tend to use to explain why an increasing number of people are leaving the church or losing their faith.
As I’ve explained before, these explanations did not hold up in the nationally representative Next Mormons Survey, which showed that former Latter-day Saints cited other reasons, including the sense that the church was a judgmental place and they could not trust its leaders to tell the truth about controversial or historical issues.
The offended/sin/lazy justifications also don’t hold up in a new study released this week from David Ostler and discussed in his book, “Bridges: Ministering to Those Who Question.