Examining the claims of Jonathan Neville and the Heartland movement

Saturday, April 8, 2023

The story of Neville-Neville Land, as told to Robert Boylan

Robert Boylan, who runs the blog and YouTube channel Scriptural Mormonism, graciously invited me to come on his video podcast and tell the story behind this blog. I took him up on the offer, and this was the result:
I harbor no illusions that this interview will satisfy the few but vociferous fanatics who recently have taken to attacking me and my character from a dark and execrable corner of the internet.

I trust, however, that honest people of good will—among whom I count many of my readers—will be interested in hearing how this blog began and why it exists in the first place.

As I mentioned in this interview, I tried to be accurate and fair when I described the beliefs and arguments of Jonathan Neville and others in the Heartland movement. If anything I said was inaccurate, please leave a comment below and offer a correction.

—Mike Parker [“Peter Pan”]
 

4 comments:

  1. Hi Mike,

    I try to learn from lots of people and perspectives. I was watching Robert Boylan interview you on YouTube. I wasn’t going to say or write anything but you asked viewers to comment if we saw anything that we perceive as attacking Jonathan personally and you’d look at it and perhaps make changes. That prompted me to respond on your blog because Robert doesn’t have comments turned on.

    First of all, I am a so-called ‘Heartlander.’ Of course, I do not know everything and try my best to be open to all valid information. For me, there seems to be a lot of Mesoamerican information that just doesn’t fit.

    When I saw ‘Neville-Neville Land’ in Robert's title, I wasn’t sure if it was referring to Jonathan Neville or not. I’ve never seen your blog before.

    The title of your blog is not polite at least, and a snide attack at worst. The title is clever but indicates you have come to the conclusion that Jonathan Neville is delusional or his research and conclusions are pure fantasy. Your subtitle ‘...the Heartland hoax’ is also implying intentional deceit. You may disagree but I don't think it is good to cast malice or bad intent on Rod Meldrum, Wayne May or anyone who embraces or leans toward the Heartland opinion. Wayne and Rod are clearly sincere and hold to the belief of divine authorization of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

    If you truly want to come off as a non attack website, you can get a respectful domain name and move the content. Tedious but doable.

    I am impressed with Jonathan Neville's background and accomplishments as an attorney, law enforcement and business. He uses legal burdens of proof to guide his conclusions. I don't ascribe perfection to him or anyone other than Jesus. He has stated many times that he is open to change.

    On the YouTube interview at around 1:7:30 minutes: "...he's either not aware of the implications of his arguments or he is aware of them but he's not stating them. And I don't know which one it is. And I'm not going to come out and say that he must, he's either stupid or evil, I'm not going to do that but that's...you know what's going on here?...I really don't know, I really don't know."

    With your body language, it seems that you think Jonathan is either stupid or evil. I know Jonathan is not stupid and there is no evidence whatsoever that he is evil. There has been a decades-long struggle in the historical department starting with Arrington, to change the historical narrative. There have been disagreements between various apostles. Are they stupid or evil?

    We are in the same camp believing in Jesus Christ. I think it is a good practice to withhold condemnation. I don’t condemn you if your opinion is different and hope you don’t condemn me for mine. I have great friends who disagree with me on things. There have been many disagreements with what people have said over the years. You know there are many topics that people and even the leadership have not agreed on without being stupid or evil.

    All the best.
    Greg McIver

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Greg: Thank you for your thoughtful comment. I genuinely appreciate it—so much that I felt it deserved a longer reply than can be made in this little comment box. Please see this new post for my response:

      https://www.nevillenevilleland.com/2023/04/response-thoughtful-comment-greg-mciver.html

      Delete
  2. I met someone who did try to think through the implications of the no stone in hat arguments. He said that President Nelson was doing what Samuel did when Israel wanted a king. It wasn't the right choice but Samuel relented anyway because that is what the people chose.

    The argument doesn't make any sense to me. I don't know anyone that is clamoring for a seer stone method of translation like Israel wanted a king. Nor would it make sense for the President Nelson to then lie or mislead the church because of that (absent) desire. But there is an argument floating out there that presents a third option between wrong or evil.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Samuel Principle is true, but thatʼs a bad example of it.

      Delete

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