Most members of the Mormon religion have no idea that their church has a team of spies looking for potential troublemakers to silence them. No, I’m not talking about the Danites. Or your home teachers. Sorry, ministering brethren and sisteren. The group is called the Strengthening Church Members Committee.

The existence of the SCMC became known in 1991 after an internal memo issued by Glenn L. Pace was published referencing the committee. After attention was brought to the subject at Sunstone Symposium the following year regarding the purpose and existence of such a committee, and an article in the Salt Lake Tribune, church spokesman Don LeFevre confirmed the existence of the SCMC. According to LeFevre, the SCMC “receives complaints from church members about other members who have made statements that ‘conceivably could do harm to the church'”. Then it will “pass the information along to the person’s ecclesiastical leader.” He followed that with a familiar sounding phrase that has been used repeatedly the last few years: “the committee neither makes judgments nor imposes penalties,” and discipline is “entirely up to the discretion of the local leaders.”

This soon became national news, being picked up by newspapers outside Utah and in the New York Times. LeFevre further commented that the SCMC “provides local church leadership with information designed to help them counsel with members who, however well-meaning, may hinder the progress of the church through public criticism.”

On August 22, 1992 the first presidency issued a statement defending the SCMC from the criticism it was receiving, and said it was based on D&C 123 which states that the church should establish a committee for “gathering up a knowledge of all the facts, and sufferings and abuses put on church members, and the names of all persons that have had a hand in their oppressions”. There are many more cases of proven SCMC activities (see excommunication proceedings for John Dehlin, Bill Reel, Sam Young, etc.) but a first Presidency statement about it is enough for me. It exists.

The Mormon church claims to be the one and only church of God and Jesus Christ upon the face of the Earth that is directed by them. It is the only one with the correct teachings you must follow to successfully navigate God’s eternal plan to earn your own planet, a harem of wives, infinite spirit children, and exaltation as a god yourself in the Celestial Kingdom (provided you check off all the right boxes). Jesus Christ himself sits at the head of the church (unless you attend a sacrament meeting where you would be under the impression that Joseph Smith does, because you will only hear Jesus Christ’s name spoken in prayer) and speaks to his servants the humble prophets, apostles, seers, and revelators of this, the great and last dispensation of the fullness of times. Whatever that means.

Now, I don’t need to tell you that Jesus Christ is a God. He’s all-knowing, all-seeing. He knows when you are sleeping, he knows when you’re awake. He knows if you’ve been bad or good so be good for heaven’s sake. He doesn’t have time from running the whole universe to get involved in every little detail of the way his church is run on Earth, so he sends his buddy the Holy Ghost to communicate stuff for him. In Mormonism there’s a widely held belief called the “spirit of discernment”. That’s when the Holy Ghost whispers to you the truth of something you couldn’t possibly have known yourself, and you must rely on the invisible spirit to tell it to your feelings. Some are even promised this gift in their super special patriarchal blessings.

Here are a few questions to consider:

Why is a committee necessary to search books, journals, social media, etc to locate and snitch on apostates? Doesn’t Jesus already know who the apostates are?

Why wouldn’t Jesus just tell his friend the Holy Moley Ghost to whisper into the nervous system of a Bishop during a temple recommend interview that the guy across his desk is addicted to oxycodone, has a subscription to three porn sites, and frequently posts on Exmormon reddit how much he hates going to church and pretending to be Peter Priesthood?

If the church is lead by revelation, why is Jesus not revealing all these Judas Iscariots to the church leaders, you know, the seers that see stuff and the revelators that reveal stuff.

Here are a few of my thoughts on why Jesus wants the SCMC:

“Idle hands are the devil’s playground”. Surely there isn’t enough work to go around to keep people busy. I mean, the second coming is around the corner. The work is hastening. Those chapel restrooms aren’t going to clean themselves, and not at the convenient price of “free service” (slave labor). An unbreakable sealing chain linking the entire human family together back to Adam needs to happen or all of creation will be utterly wasted and for naught. Satan isn’t bound yet for his 1000 years of pooh-poohing and lamenting, he’s busy deceiving. Gotta keep people busy with callings so they don’t have time to use their own brain for too long.

Maybe Jesus isn’t all-knowing and needs the help of mortals to figure out who is destroying the church he has worked so damn hard at building these last 200 years.

Maybe Jesus knows who the apostates are that need to be weeded out, but he and the Holey Moley Ghost aren’t working well together right now because HG feels he’s not being compensated fairly for working around the clock. Now that they’re engaged in a labor dispute, Jesus can’t communicate to all the bishops individually through the HG about what’s really going on.

Maybe there is no revelation. The church has no other choice but to use a secret organization to spy on its members who have figured out there is no revelation, and silence them from alerting the rest of the herd.

The SCMC was allegedly started by Ezra Taft Benson in 1985. I like to imagine that ETB burst into a meeting with the Q12 an hour late, panting, out of breath. He says, “My Batphone to Jesus is out! He can’t tell me who all the evil apostates are! We have got to figure out WHAT is going ON. Any ideas?”

A slightly less bald Dallin H. Oaks slowly stands from his chair, still aspiring for the love and admiration of his peers, he hopes to continue to make a good first impression. He clears his throat and pries open his thin tightly pursed lips. “Danites,” he barks boldly across the table. “We reassemble the Danites. They will silence the Fawn Brodies of this dispensation with blood atonement. They will -”

ETB silences Dallin with a wave of his hand. “Frontier justice is over, we can’t slit the throats of our enemies anymore. I’m not going full Brigham just yet. What else?” Dallin sits hard in his chair, likely angry, but few can tell because his face always looks that way.

Rusty Nelson slithers out of his chair and to his feet, also new to the quorum and vying for respect. He gently taps his fingers together in front of his chest, nodding slowly, a smile cracking strangely across his face. “We form a committee. A real…secret committee.”

ETB waves his had again, “I said no Danites, Russ. Oaksy just said that. You don’t listen to anyone but yourself, do you? We’ve retired the Danites! Their jerseys are flying in the rafters of the tabernacle, for Joseph’s sake. We’re not pulling them down.”

Rusty bangs his fist on the table in indignation. “A true committee! Bureaucracy! Bylaws! We’ll assemble a team. They’ll spy on the saints and report back to us.”

“We already have home teachers, Russ, get to the point,” ETB sighs.

“New Danites for the 20th Century. We’ll silence our enemies through bureaucracy, processes, procedures.”

“Wait a second, Russ. I think I…yes. The spirit has whispered to me,” ETB rises now from his chair, and Rusty takes his seat. “We’ll form a committee to spy on the members and we’ll silence them through bureaucracy!”

Dallin raises his hand, “President, since blood atonement has been waived, is there anyway we can at the very least incorporate fear and shame into the execution of your plan?”

“I figured that was implied. Was that not implied?”

“Just clarifying. Continue.”

“We’ll call it the Strengthening Mormons Committee,” ETB announces triumphantly.

Rusty winces, and raises his hand. “President, may I suggest another name?”

“What would you name it?”

“Strengthening The Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints Committee.”

“Fine, I don’t care. Stenographer, please take the notes down to the New Committee Development Committee and have them begin preparations. It is well.”

“I will go down, President,” the stenographer responds. Oaks and Packer exchange a look and snicker.

The stenographer rushes downstairs to file the paperwork, and glances down at his paper. The name is too long. He shrugs, crosses it out, and scrawls hastily, “Strengthening Church Members Committee.”

I say these things in the name of reason, amen.