UPDATE: Welcome visitors from Times and Seasons, By Common Consent, and Segullah. Here are a few other posts you might find interesting: “The Stranger That Dwelleth Among You,” The Real Mitt?, At the Intersection of Faith and Politics, Joseph Smith for President, 1844. Enjoy your time here and please come back!

In the wake of President Gordon B. Hinckley’s death, an amazing quote by Boyd K. Packer has been making the rounds on the internet. It goes something like this:

You were generals in the War in Heaven and one day when you are in the spirit world, you will be enthralled by those you are associated with. You will ask someone in which time period they lived and you might hear, “I was with Moses when he parted the Red Sea,” or “I helped built the pyramids’” or “I fought with Captain Moroni.” And as you are standing there in amazement, someone will turn to you and ask you which of the prophets’ time did you live in? And when you say “Gordon B. Hinckley” a hush will fall over every hall and corridor in Heaven, and all in attendance will bow at your presence. You were held back six thousand years because you were the most talented, most obedient, most courageous, and most righteous.

Amazing, eh?

The only problem: Boyd K. Packer never said it. The only time any Church authority has ever repeated the quote, it seems, is to refute it.

The first time I heard that “quote,” it was attributed to Bruce R. McConkie, and mentioned Spencer W. Kimball as the prophet whose time the subject lived in. I admit that I believed it, or wanted to believe it. After all, who wouldn’t want to think of themselves as among the most talented and righteous of all of God’s children?

My belief in the statement began to wane, however, when I heard it attributed to both Henry B. Erying and Boyd K. Packer. Shortly after I returned home from my mission, a short statement by President Packer ran in the Church News refuting the statement.

I do not doubt that most of the propagators of this mythical quote had anything other than the best intentions in repeating it. Nevertheless, I’m amazed at the persistence of such falsehoods among the LDS people. I often wonder if the propensity to accept religiously-themed urban legends among Latter Day Saints is greater than it is among the general population. I mean, who hasn’t heard the tale of the sister missionaries protected from a rapist by three hulking angels? Our pioneer ancestors had their own folklore - the ever persistent “Three Nephites story.”

Why do we do this? I think that maybe, just maybe, it is an expression of our longing for proof of our specialness and uniqueness. As Latter Day Saints, we claim to be a unique people: the people to whom God has entrusted the care of his “one and only true church;” the only people to whom God has revealed the Priesthood and temple ordinances.

I don’t think this tendency is unique to Mormons. Other religions have their tales of miraculous healing or speaking in tongues (as we do, of course). Whether or not these stories are true, their spread illustrates, to me at least, the need we all have to feel that we are members of an elect group; that we are indeed, God’s chosen people.

I love the stories that spread among our people; even the completely-fabricated ones. My hope, however, is that we’ll spend more time trying to actually be God’s chosen people, and less time believing we are because so-and-so once said we are.