If Faulk’s intent was to persuade his wife, who never read the letter, why would he make a public website, and why would he make hundreds of revisions to it over time?
Did he really think, that if he polished up the writing and added more pictures then his wife would read it?
Not likely.
The reason he put all that effort into writing his “letter” wasn’t really for his wife. His real goal was to persuade others to lose their faith. When someone is doubting, when they feel lost or confused, they naturally look for people who feel the same way. They want community. They don’t want to be alone in their doubts. Somehow this empowers them and helps justify the loss they feel deep inside from their loss of having the spirit with them as well as the community that comes from the church.
That is why A Letter For My Wife is built to attract others. It isn’t a private letter. It is a public platform designed to gather an audience of people who are questioning their beliefs. When someone is hurting or struggling, it is easy to influence them by giving them a story that sounds compassionate and relatable. It creates the feeling of, “See, I’m not the only one,” which makes the arguments more convincing even when the claims are misleading, un-true, and taken out of context.
In the end, the “letter” functions less like a message to a spouse and more like a proselyting tool for disbelief. It is written to pull people in, build emotional trust, and lead them to the same conclusions he reached. That is the real purpose behind it.
Changes to Letter For My Wife
I asked ChatGPT to compare the original 2017 Letter to the current 2025 online letter, and these are the differences it concluded:
The modern online version of Letter for My Wife is not the same document Thomas Faulk originally wrote in 2017. The first edition was a raw, —filled with repetition, uncertainty, emotional reactions, and personal appeals directed specifically to his wife. The updated version has been reworked into something entirely different: a polished, curated, public-facing deconstruction guide designed to persuade questioning members, not communicate honestly with a spouse.
Across its chapters, emotional vulnerability is removed, arguments are rewritten for clarity and strength, errors are quietly corrected, and new framing language is added to position the letter as a calm, authoritative “resource.” Personal doubts are replaced with confident conclusions, and marital context gives way to broad messaging aimed at a general audience. The result is not a private letter that failed its purpose—it is a repackaged anti-faith publication crafted to influence believing Latter-day Saints.
Overall Framing Changes
- Reframed from a private letter to his wife into a public “resource” for readers.
- Added statements claiming the letter has helped “thousands.”
- Added description of posting to Reddit and eventually building a website.
- Added narrative that ward leaders “advised his wife not to read it.”
- Removed emotional volatility and replaced it with a calm, polished tone.
- Removed the sense that the project was accidental or unplanned.
Tone and Voice Adjustments
- Removed admissions of confusion, shock, and emotional distress.
- Removed references to having “a terrible memory.”
- Removed repetitive segments where he describes “discrepancies” and surprise.
- Replaced personal reactions with confident, objective-sounding statements.
- Added presentational language (“Readers appreciate…”, “This section explains…”).
- Rewrote transitions to make arguments appear smoother and more professional.
Content Revisions Inside Chapters
- Reordered or retitled some chapter headings.
- Removed redundant or emotionally charged paragraphs.
- Quietly corrected or replaced sources that were weak or inaccurate.
- Softened or rephrased claims that were too easily debunked.
- Adjusted timelines or context descriptions to sound more authoritative.
- Added summary statements not present in the PDF.
Evidence and Citation Changes
- Replaced several poor-quality images with cleaner screenshots.
- Added additional citations in places the original had none.
- Updated outdated links or replaced them with screenshots.
- Removed image clutter or messy extracts from the PDF version.
- Streamlined long blocks of quoted text into cleaner, curated sections.
Narrative and Structural Changes
- Added introductory commentary above the “About Me” section (not in 2017 PDF).
- Removed the original ending, which was personal and directed to his wife.
- Replaced it with a generalized ending meant for “truth seekers” and public readers.
- Removed the original framing that the list grew because he “didn’t want to forget things.”
- Replaced it with claims of “months and months of research.”
- Cleaned up rough grammar, typos, and inconsistent punctuation from the PDF.
Motivational and Emotional Changes
- Removed expressions of fear, confusion, or distress while discovering issues.
- Removed statements showing his discovery process was chaotic or accidental.
- Modern version presents a confident, steady researcher—not a distressed husband.
- New framing avoids showing that the letter’s entire purpose (convincing his wife) failed.
Changes That Strengthen Salesmanship/Branding
- Added marketing language: “valuable resource,” “faith journeys,” “truth seekers.”
- Added promotional tone about readers appreciating the format and sources.
- Added commentary about updating links, as if maintaining a mature project.
- Removed narrative elements that contradicted the new, polished author persona.
Condemning the Church for What He Did Himself
Thomas Faulk—or whoever now manages his site—has made major revisions to Letter for My Wife to make it appear more polished, persuasive, and authoritative. The emotional volatility, sarcasm, bitterness, and weak arguments found in the original 2017 PDF were replaced with a calmer tone, softened language, updated research claims, and cleaner structure. The result is a modern website that feels like a “legitimate” historical resource instead of what it originally was: a private, frustrated document written in the middle of a personal faith crisis.
As someone who has built dozens of websites and written thousands of articles, I understand perfectly why someone would revise content over time. Refining arguments, improving clarity, correcting mistakes, updating data, reorganizing material—all of this is normal. It’s what every serious writer, researcher, or institution does as understanding develops and better information becomes available.
But here’s the irony— these normal, reasonable processes are the very things Faulk condemns the Church for doing. The same man who quietly revised and softened his own document uses “changes,” “updates,” and “clarifications” as evidence of dishonesty from the church when it comes to:
- The First Vision accounts,
- The development of plural marriage,
- Priesthood and Race,
- The Word of Wisdom,
- The Book of Abraham,
- DNA research, and
- Scientific discussions in Church materials.
He argues that development equals deception.
He argues that refinement equals inconsistency.
He argues that clarification equals cover-up.
Yet he does all three—openly, repeatedly, and without acknowledgment—in his own letter.
When Faulk revises his work, it’s framed as “improvement.”
When the Church does the same thing, he calls it “proof” that the whole thing is false.
That double standard matters. It exposes that the argument isn’t about history at all. It’s about interpretation—and in many cases, about manipulating interpretation. The modern Letter for My Wife is not the document he wrote in 2017. It’s filtered, refined, edited, and restructured to persuade believing Latter-day Saints that its conclusions are inevitable and its methods reliable.
He condemns the Church for doing the very thing he depended on to make his own letter look credible.