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Candace Owens’s Latest Demagoguery Worries Me

Candace Owens’s Latest Demagoguery Worries Me

Last updated on: July 25, 2026 at 9:31 pm by Dan Peterson

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Candace Owens’s Latest Demagoguery Worries Me 2026-07-25T21:31:00-06:00 Dan Peterson

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The Sterling Memorial Library at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, where John Gee earned his doctorate (Wikimedia Commons public domain photo)

John Gee has published an essay at Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 69 (2026): 237-256. It’s entitled “Theology as Pretext”: Review of Ben Witherington III, Rethinking Biblical & Systematic Theology (Eugene, OR: Cascade Books, 2026), 232 pages, $39.00 hardback; and Ben Witherington III, The Problem with Evangelical Theology: Testing the Exegetical Foundations of Calvinism, Dispensationalism and Wesleyanism (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2005), 332 pages, $52.24 hardback.

Abstract: Ben Witherington outlines a method for interpreting the Bible that emphasizes studying the Bible in the original languages and in the original contexts without imposing foreign philosophies or frameworks and focuses on the ethical teachings of the Bible. He wishes to use this method to build a biblical and systematic theology. His method, however, undermines his project. In this, there are lessons for Latter-day Saints.

Additionally, the remarkable Kyler Rasmussen has contributed a review essay under the title of “Probing Our Culture with Problematic Data,” which appears at Interpreter: A Journal of Latter-day Saint Faith and Scholarship 69 (2026) : 257-288: Review of Jeff Strong, Torn: Why People We Love Are Leaving the Church and What We Can Learn from Them (Midway, UT: Coolstream Publishing, 2026). 300 pages. $21.95 (paperback).

Abstract: Torn provides a mountain of new data on disaffiliation from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, based on the author’s deeply personal research efforts. Those efforts allow him to present insights into how and why people report exiting the faith, and how loved ones can stay connected with those who turn away. But the picture he paints of disaffiliation trends and Church culture suffers from an overreliance on shaky data. His excellent pastoral prescriptions will be of value to faithful Saints, but those looking for a clear-eyed view of disaffiliation may need to turn elsewhere.

The most prominent symbol of Thanksgiving Point stands just to the west of I-i5. (Wikimedia Commons public domain image). The 2026 FAIR Conference will be held in early August at Thanksgiving Point.

Earlier today, I recorded a very brief voice-over behind the one-minute Interpreter Foundation promotional video that will be run occasionally during the upcoming FAIR Conference. Here is how the text goes:

The Interpreter Foundation fosters in-depth study of the scriptures, doctrines, and history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It does this through articles, books, conferences, podcasts, and films — including our ongoing Not by Bread Alone series about the Saints in Africa and Becoming Brigham. We welcome your interest and would appreciate your support.

An anti-semitic poster that was published in Nazi-occupied Poland in 1941. (Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

Reading through the many comments following Candace Owens’s very recent insinuations against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, I find myself not only disheartened but, frankly, more than a little bit worried. Most of the comments, thus far, don’t directly mention the Church or the Latter-day Saints, although many do. And almost all of them praise Ms. Owens for her supposed courage, her putative research, and her alleged commitment to the truth.

Only one credulous and unhinged fan of Candace Owens is required to carry out an assassination of a Church leader or a missionary or another murderous attack on a Latter-day Saint chapel in the manner of Grand Blanc, Michigan. Personally, I’m unable to believe that Ms. Owens is sincere. And, absent sincerity, I can only make sense of her as a cynical, unprincipled, and grossly irresponsible demagogue who doesn’t really care about the potential risks that her cagey but wild speculations will likely impose upon innocent people.

Here are a couple of Latter-day Saint responses to Ms. Owens on this topic:

Rise Zion: “Candace Owens Just Crossed a Dangerous Line With Her “Mormon Mafia” Theory… (This Goes Too Far)” (38 minutes)
Greg Matsen, The Cwic Show: “New! The Mormon Mafia, Candace Owens, and Israel” (10 minutes)

There are, I think, quite a few other responses beyond these two. But will any of them, or all of them combined, reach even a meaningful fraction of Candace Owens’s vast audience? Sadly, no. They won’t.

The Royal British Columbia Museum in Victoria (Wikimedia Commons public domain image)

One of the high points of our stay here in Victoria has been a visit, the other day, to the Royal BC Museum, which is within pleasant walking distance of the place where we’ve lodged when we come to British Columbia. While there, we caught two IMAX films:

Sea Otters: A Wild Family Adventure. This is a beautiful 2026 production, filmed along the wild western coast of Vancouver Island — Victoria is in the island’s southeast — that chronicles a year in the life of a first-time otter mother (“Bella,” in the movie) and her new pup (“Finn”). It also touches on the life-cycles of humpback whales and orcas or killer whales, as well as on the massive herring spawn that, in some places, turns Vancouver Island’s coastal waters white or turquoise between late February and late March. I was impressed by the dedication of otter mothers to their offspring for very nearly a full year.
Mysteries of Egypt. My wife says that we had seen this one before, and maybe we had. But I still enjoyed it. In fact, it made us both rather nostalgic for Egypt because so many of the locations shown in it are so very familiar to us. (I went to Egypt for the first time when I was twenty-five, lived there for the first four years of our marriage [eventually with our first-born son], and have returned to it more times than I can count.). The narrator is the late, great Omar Sharif, and there were many familiar names in the end credits (e.g., Reed Smoot, Scott Swofford, Kurt Bestor, and Sam Cardon, whose compositions have provided the scores for the Interpreter Foundation’s films).

The major current exhibit in the RBCM is entitled Ancient Egypt: Obsessed with Life. I really appreciate the title, because the common misconception about the ancient Egyptians is that they were obsessed with death, and in a morbid, macabre way. I understand where the notion comes from, because much of what we have from them is funerary in character. They knew that this life is brief, and so they built their homes out of transitory materials while they built their tombs and mortuary temples out of limestone and granite — which is why the former are mostly gone while the latter remain, spectacularly. And, of course, Hollywood horror films have reinforced the misunderstanding. But the Egyptians loved life, and they were taking the best measures they could to ensure that it would continue.

And any active Latter-day Saint visiting the exhibit would, I think, take special interest in a few details where the parallels to modern temple practices and concepts are virtually impossible to miss.’

Posted from Victoria, British Columbia, Canada

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