Spencer McBride was walking across campus with his doctoral advisor in Baton Rouge, following a class in religious history, when his advisor said, “Spencer, you’re a smart guy, but can you really believe all these stories of visions and angels and gold plates?”

“You know, Dr. Burstein, yeah, I do,” McBride said.

When his advisor asked him how, the doctoral student explained that in addition to things known because of more conventional evidence, there are other things believed because of “spiritual experiences — and those are in the realm of faith.”

“And I believe that the two are not mutually exclusive.”

McBride, who is now the senior managing historian with the History Department of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, joined two others with the Church History Department,

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