Tonight I received a message from a friend in Southern Utah inviting me to access some things written by said Mr. Nemelka. I went to Richard Packham's stuff to find out about him; and he [Nemelka] is definitely a piece of work! He has declared himself the reincarnation of Hyrum Smith, has 'translated' the lost 116 pages of the B of M, and has a radio series. He is incommunicado right now, as my friend tells me that he [Nemelka] is sequestered with the Three Nephites and John [the four 'resurrected' beings], being tutored for his next series of broadcasts.

How crazy is that? [How crazy is my friend?] Nonetheless, I would love to be a fly on the wall and hear what the four have to say! Any ideas?

Even the church leadership in Salt Lake seems embarrassed by him...

I could be wrong (long weekend), but I think one or two of his followers showed up here and raised some hell a few years ago... Or possibly it was some TBM's masquerading as his followers; I try to let things like that go...

Just more evidence of the harm the LDS religion can to to the psyche... It is humorous, but also tragic...

I am acquainted with a number of people who survived his manipulative antics over the years. It seems he has become worse. He is an ardent atheist, sociopath who puts on an incredible, charismatic presentation of love-thy-neighbor in person which causes the pure-in-heart to disbelieve that someone evil could present such a positive message. This is what makes him so dangerous. He is a full-blown criminal and pathological liar that targets Mormons because they have been raised to trust church leaders. He is neither insane, nor crazy - but it is suspected that in recent years he added his rhetoric about conversing with otherworld beings so that he can plead insanity when the law finds a way to hold him accountable for defrauding these people.

His inspiration was Mark Hoffman. Check out Nemelka's 1994 writings below - Chapter 3, 4th paragraph

http://chrisnemelka.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Reality-Quest-1.pdf

By the way, what is the contact information for that man who left his wife of 27 years? I'll bet an investigator I know would like to speak with him.

Thanks for posting this. I always assumed Nemelka was deluded, but this places him in an entirely different light. What a cynical, manipulative bastard.

Sociopaths delude themselves delude themselves into thinking they can get away with their exploitation of others...

There are definitely "harmless headcases" and the "other kind," but separating them is difficult. Months before the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping I recall seeing Mitchell walking the streets of Salt Lake, and he was something of a fixture there.

True. I suspect that Joseph Smith was a sociopath who convinced himself that he was doing God's work in his exploitation of other people.

Being an ardent atheist does not make one immoral or a sociopath -- if he really is atheist, his morality has nothing to do with it. Atheism only answers one question about people--do they believe in god?

I think his atheism was mentioned simply to show how cynical his "prophetic ministry" is.

up front about it. But people are too stupid to read anything they don't want to believe, and he knew that, apparently. I'm sorry, but this just makes me laugh.

They're the same kind of people who'll believe you if you tell them the word "gullible" is not in the dictionary.

He's completely honest about what he is doing, and quite intelligent. As sociopaths generally are.

I've never met Nemelka, but for some reason he reminds me of a Mormon version of John DeRuiter. :P

my cousin used to believe he was channeling Joseph Smith. His parents believed him and started telling everyone he was the new "prophet." Turns out he was mentally ill and eventually ended up in the hospital. Sounds like "Chris" has the same problem.

Yeah, I looked at his website and stuff on the internet a year or so back.

He's either a loony or a conman or both...

(later)
... OK, after googling him AND seeing his "Christ-like" photo and "prophetic" shirt, I'd be more inclined towards the conman theory.

It's whacky stuff, though, and very mormony ;-)

I worked with a couple of Chris Nemelka's brothers a number of years ago. At that time, he had left the mainstream of the LDS to become a polygamist. His brother told me that he merely did it for the "sex."

While the brother I worked for was a normal and great guy, there were definitely some odd elements in the family. Sounds like Chris has fallen off the deep end.

I loathe, absolutely loathe this man. A family freind of ours left his wife of 27 years and 5 kids to follow this moron--he absolved himself of all responsibility except to follow his own happiness no matter how it hurt others.

I hope Chris Nemelka burns in hell--except I don't believe in hell. Guess I'm in a pickle over that one!

Gosh, he sounds like, well you know, Joseph Smith!

He's the guy that "translated" the "sealed portion" of the BOM, right? I read some of it. He is actually pretty talented, so I think he falls into the conman category.

Like Joe Smith...

He was born before the Internet Age...

Note how L. Ron Hubbard had to couch his crapola in sci fi terms (and he was a failed science fiction writer, at least when compared with the luminaries of his era, Asimov, Clarke, Heinlein, Bradbury, and Vonnegut). And now Operation Clambake apologist Tom Cruise has to insist "it's only an auditing level." Okay, but then the entire cult operation is psychological and psychiatric malpractice.

I've concluded one element of Smith's success was the "frontier setting" where simple logistics prevented him from extensive contact with his followers. This allowed the mythology to achieve its "full power." Note that most of those who entered JS's "inner orbits" usually wound up disillusioned or expelled, even if it was only temporarily as was the case of the Pratt bropthers or some of the others).

I agree SLCabbie about the frontier aspect

Smith was very lucky.

Most of his flock seem to have been at least vaguely literate, so he had the medium to spread his nonsense, but the conjunction of literacy with the magical mindset and sheer credulity shown by early mormons was another stroke of luck for Smith, and one which literacy would soon cause to crack by dispelling ignorance.

Good luck for Smith, but bad luck for (at least parts of) the world

Good night to all from Paris where it's 11 pm

Tom

Wouldn't it be funny if he turned out to be a true prophet, and we ended up being like all the others who rejected the prophets because we were too stiffnecked to hear?

Lots of scriptural stories claim it has happened before.

Prophets + Criminals = Truth? Does this equation make sense to anyone? Not to me.

He comes right out and writes exactly where he is coming from and what he's doing, and people still fall for it!
People are idiots.
Yeah, he's a total sociopath, but all people would have to do is READ.

He's a good example of JS. The people who follow him are a good example of the type of people who followed JS. It's basically the same thing in a different time.

I really wish tbm's would turn their common sense that this guy is nuts and realize the same logic should be used on Joseph Smith. They really are alike.

Sithlord had lunch with an exmo coworker yesterday. This guy was telling sithlord about the large number of "prophets" who have revealed themselves. Nemelka is just one of them. I don't know how one could believe in any of these over another of them. To me they all seem more far fetched than TSCC.

twojedis Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Sithlord had lunch with an exmo coworker
> yesterday. This guy was telling sithlord about
> the large number of "prophets" who have revealed
> themselves. Nemelka is just one of them. I don't
> know how one could believe in any of these over
> another of them. To me they all seem more far
> fetched than TSCC.

See my listing of Mormon "prophets" after Joseph Smith:

http://packham.n4m.org/prophet2.htm

Awesome, thanks!!

I wrote a paper on Strang as a student at BYU for my church history class.

Chris's work is pretty impressive. It helps make the case that an unlikely guy (security guard Chris Nemelka or Joseph Smith treasure seeker) could have written the BofM.

I thought Chris's book explaining the temple endowment was pretty thought provoking and "inspired" ----- a lot seemed pretty good. The inspired version was less inspired but written to sound very similar to the BoM. I watched him on the Shawn McCraney show and he appeared to be pretty pathetic but Shawn had some dirt on him. Just shows anyone with an imagination can produce thousands of pages of scripture/writings.