A Record Shall Be Kept: Understanding and Defending the History of the Church

by Jared Riddick, Sarah N. Allen (Editor), Trevor Holyoak

This volume brings together a distinctive group of Latter-day Saint scholars who participated in FAIR’s 2024 virtual conference, Understanding and Defending the History of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Their essays explore a wide range of historical, theological, and cultural topics—from spiritual gifts in the early Church to questions of violence on the nineteenth-century frontier, from debates over scripture and translation to interpretations of prophecy and the Anthon manuscript. Written by “disciple-scholars” whose careers often lie outside the academy but who have dedicated their lives to the study of the Restoration, these proceedings exemplify an unapologetically faithful yet intellectually rigorous approach to the past. The collection offers fresh insights for students, researchers, and lay readers alike, and highlights the ongoing vitality of Latter-day Saint apologetic thought.


Matthew S. McBride
T. Benjamin Spackman
Paul Bryner
Spencer Kraus
Sarah N. Allen
Brian C. Hales
John S. Thompson
Craig L. Foster
Allen Hansen
Stephen O. Smoot
Christopher James Blythe

320 pages, Paperback

Published October 24, 2025