http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/07/us/mormon-videos-leaked.html 2016-10-06 23:33:36 Leaked Videos Pull Back Curtain on Mormon Leadership Footage of briefings to the second-highest leadership body revealed the clubby exchanges between the Mormon Church and Mormon politicians. === In this era of leaks and hacks, secrets have been stolen from organizations as varied as the Democratic Party, the Vatican, Sony Pictures and Yahoo. Now comes “Mormon Leaks,” a breach of the inner sanctum of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that has provided a rare glimpse into the workings of the church’s leadership and its cozy relationship with Mormons in politics. Fifteen videos were posted Unlike other hacks in which WikiLeaks was the culprit, this leak of videos from church headquarters in Salt Lake City is the work of disaffected Mormons who found one another online, in a Reddit The videos reveal clubby exchanges between the leaders, most of whom belong to the church’s “If that succeeds, there will be an opportunity to begin building the church in the Middle East, which is a deeply troubled place,” said Mr. Smith, who at the time had recently lost a re-election campaign after two terms in the Senate. He also told the apostles that Iran was close to having enough fissile material to create a nuclear bomb, information he said “may be classified.” He volunteered that he had persuaded the Indian ambassador to give visas to 200 Mormon missionaries, and pushed government officials in Spain, Italy, Belgium and Russia to give missionaries greater access. Mr. Smith, now president and chief executive of the National Association of Broadcasters, declined to comment, but said through a spokesman that nothing he told the apostles was classified information. In “If they think we will move on these issues, they do not know us,” said Boyd K. Packer, who was then the president of the Quorum, and Mr. Leavitt said on Wednesday that he was not troubled by the content of the leaked videos. “However, I think we all should all be troubled by the surreptitious nature” of the leak, he said. The conduit — but not the source — for the leaked videos was Ryan McKnight, a former church member who uses the handle “ Mr. McKnight said that people had been sending him documents since last year, when he became known for having had a role in leaking a Mr. McKnight said he has “literally no clue” about the identity, or even the gender, of the person with the videos. He said the leaker contacted him through Reddit and asked him to post links to the videos on Sunday morning — while the church was holding its biannual General Conference meetings in Salt Lake City. Mr. McKnight said that the source did not want to post the material in order to avoid being tracked. Mr. McKnight posted them on a YouTube channel he called He said that when he tried to contact the source by email later on Sunday, the email address he had used before was no longer functioning. The videos are of briefings held from 2007 to 2012, and were recorded so those who missed the meetings could watch the proceedings later, said Eric Hawkins, the church’s director of media relations. “Presentations are routinely received from various religious, political and subject matter experts on a variety of topics. The purpose is to understand issues that may face the church,” Mr. Hawkins said in a statement. “This is an informational forum, not a decision-making body.” The videos have Scholars and political advisers said in interviews this week that Mormon politicians advocated in ways no different from many Protestant, Catholic and Jewish politicians. “Nothing in this videotape is any different from what I’ve heard in the past from other senators who were Irish Catholic, Protestant or other religions,” said Jim Manley who served as an aide to Senator Edward M. Kennedy, a Catholic who died in 2009, and Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, a Mormon. There were 16 Mormons in the 114th Congress sworn in in January 2015 — about 3 percent of the membership, according to the Several scholars of Mormonism said that if the videos had surfaced when Mr. Romney was running for president, they would have had a significant effect, but not now. “Mormonism has a reputation for secrecy and political power. I think these tapes probably fit that story, and explains the delight that people are taking in their leakage,” said Kathleen Flake, a professor of American religious history, who holds a chair in Mormon studies at the University of Virginia and wrote a