As a member of the LDS church, I have been following a lot of the articles, blogs and commentary about my faith lately. I think its great that so many people are showing interest in finding out more about our beliefs, and I think that this article did a great job of treating those beliefs with respect.

The interesting thing, though, that I have noticed is how infrequently the central tenets of LDS doctrine are mentioned. Where is the mention of our belief in God, the father, His Son, Jesus Christ, and in the Holy Ghost? What about our focus on raising strong families based on the principles of the gospel of Jesus Christ? When I go to Church every Sunday, I'm taught to be kind and charitable to those around me, to respect the beliefs of others, and to become a contributing member of society.

It is true that the doctrines mentioned in this article form a part of a my beliefs, but without the proper context of the central tenets mentioned above, a reader's perception of my beliefs might be skewed. Even my belief that Joseph Smith was called as a prophet makes much more sense when one realizes that this was just a continuation of God's method for instructing His children (remember that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever?). That belief in modern prophets may seem odd unless one realizes that they do exactly what prophets have always done: teach and testify of Jesus Christ.

Joseph Smith said that all other doctrines are simply appendages to the doctrine of the atonement of Jesus Christ. I hope more people will recognize that Christ makes up the center of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

If anyone has any questions for me, you can email me at allgoodrd@gmail.com

The South Park guys tore apart Joseph Smith, but also made it clear that Mormons are very considerate and great people. The final message of the one episode pointing out where people can't look beyond history to see how people actually interact with each other is proof that outsiders are the truly ignorant ones, not the Mormons.

I thought that was a nice take on the whole issue.

I suppose that when most of us refer to the "central tenets" of a religion, we are thinking more of theology, religious doctrine, rather than values, lifestyles etc, and that seems to be the point of issue between the SBC and LDS -- as I cannot imagine the SBC being able to find significant fault otherwise.

As a non-Christian, I find the bitter inter-denominational disputes over what are, to me, abstract, theoretical issues (eg the exact nature of Jesus, etc) while largely ignoring the larger body of his reported teachings related to how we should deal with each other to be, at best, entertaining, and more often, depressing.

Shalom/Salaam/Pax/Peace

Thanks for the response! The truth is that I agree with you regarding the ridiculous nature of inter-denominational disputes. I think if all of us (Christian, Muslim, Jew, Agnostic, Atheist, etc.) could focus more on our similarities rather than our differences, we'd all be a lot better off.

The first step in doing that is to stop focusing on fringe doctrines and try to understand what really motivates an individual.

I, for one, enjoy talking to my friends and others about their core beliefs (including both theology and doctrine as well as their impact on social values and lifestyles), and I have found that it is quite possible for us to enjoy a good conversation without having to agree on every point of doctrine.

Don't know many LDS, as here in Missouri RLDS is more common, but what I notice about both is how much, in daily action, they remind me of Jews. There seems to be a priority on education, becoming businessmen, strong family, and community involvement.

do you believe that God was once a man and that men can become Gods? Do you believe that all other churches are wrong and that only the LDS church has the truth?

That would seem to be the real doctrines.

Those are good, fair questions, and they deserve a fair response. Just recently a professor of comparative religion commented that LDS doctrine is both quite simple and quite complicated. When someone takes the time to put all of those doctrines into context, they will see that they all fit very well together and that they are very fulfilling.

Unfortunately, there are many people who pull one or two doctrines out of context and hold them up as some sort of attack against the religion as a whole. So, Grahamy, or anybody else, if you are interested in seeing how certain things you may have heard about LDS doctrine fit into the larger theology, I would be more that happy to answer individual questions. I'm not an official representative of the Church or anything, but I could probably clear up some of the misconceptions, such as those noted above.

Just shoot me an email at allgoodrd@gmail.com

Now that's a politicians answer (or non answer) :-) Those are plain questions that can easily be answered yes or no. If those things are true Mormons should be honest about them. Romney would never answer those questions in public but he came here to France to tell people that. You are of course free to follow this religion but when you want to pass it off as christianity its normal that people will call you on it.

grahamy:

do you believe that God was once a man and that men can become Gods? Do you believe that all other churches are wrong and that only the LDS church has the truth? That would seem to be the real doctrines.

From the outside, I have to say that doesn't sound all that dissimilar to any other version of christianity...you know that whole Jesus was a man, but was god..it would therefore follow that clearly God can be a man and that man can be God. As for the specifics of that process, or where 'God' came from..well at least they give it a shot instead of 'well He just sorta is/always was'.

My church is right, everyone else is wrong is again the reason there are all these various denominations within Christianity isn't it? The RCC thinks it's their version, the Baptists think it's their version, Jehovah's Witnesses have theirs, Protestants, etc... Hell, on a more global level you have the same thing between almost all religions..each says they are right.

Those are plain questions that can easily be answered yes or no.

They are. So let's answer them first from a mainstream protestant perspective:

1. Do you believe that God was once a man and that men can become Gods?

Trinitarian protestants obviously do - as they would be the first to tell you that "God" became a man, named Jesus - a man who then became "God". In that they also believe they are "immortal", majority protestants and all christian sects believe themsleves to be just like "God". Moreover, many trinitarians will cite John 10:30 to prove that Jesus was God[e.g., being 'one' with God] - assuming value in their proof text, the same authors words in John 17 must equally apply, "in order that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in union with me and I am in union with you, that they also may be in union with us, in order that the world may believe that you sent me forth. Also, I have given them the glory that you have given me, in order that they may be one just as we are one." - if Jesus claim to be one with God proves he was God, then all Christians in claiming that they are being one with both Jesus and God - are making claim in fact to be God or gods, as well.

So how is the LDS version any different ?

2. Do you believe that all other churches are wrong and that only the LDS church has the truth?

Do protestant churches not believe that the LDS is wrong and that only the protestant organizations "has the truth"?

So how is the LDS any different from any other religious organization? After all, how many religious people do you know, be they Catholic, Protestant, Taoist, Buddhist, Muslim, et al, believe their religious tenets to be absolutely false, yet stay with them anyway? All of these, at one time or another, if not still, believe they "have the truth".

Don't you believe that churches that teach things contrary to what you believe are incorrect? If you believe anything then you inevitably hold that people who believe differently are wrong and you are right. So yes, we believe our beliefs are true and we believe that beliefs that are contrary to our beliefs are untrue. So do you. So does anybody who believes anything.

Do we believe that all other churches are bad? Absolutely not? Do we believe that all of the beliefs of other churches are untrue? Absolutely not. We believe that there is truth and goodness in many different religions.

Our beliefs about many things, including the nature of God and the potential of man, are different from those of Protestants and Catholics. That's why we're not Protestants or Catholics.

I thought the turnaround by the Mormon kid at the end was really funny, and it was a real surprise after the episode sorta tore into Joseph Smith.

. . . although, for salvation-through-grace mainstream Protestants, the "appendages" are awfully important.

My wife is an ex-Mormon; I'm a former Catholic. We're both currently Nichiren Buddhists. To us, Christ--insofar as he can be shown to have lived--is one of many bodhisattva who appear throughout history. I suppose Joseph Smith might have been one (certainly, if I can posit that Giordano Bruno, William Blake, and even the Marquis de Sade were all great teachers of the Mystic Law, it would be downright stingy of me to deny Smith the honor).

Anyway, good post. If hell doesn't await those who failed to believe the right things, then what really matters is not what a religion says, but what it does: how it spurs you to behave, to live, to give of yourself. And if hell does await we, who are both equally apostate to the Calvinist (or quasi-Calvinist) doctrinaire who suggests we are doomed for our poor soteriology, well . . . them's the breaks, I guess. I did what I could (indeed, more than could be reasonably expected) with what I had.

Anyway, good post.

I think there is a basic misunderstanding about evangelicals here. To answer your question and some similar ones that follow. NO. Evangelicals do not think that they are right and others wrong. The baptists dont think that they have the truth, the charismatics dont think that they have the truth etc They believe that the BIBLE has the truth and they recognise that there are many other groups, different styles, different inderstandings of some things but we all recognise the same simple truths in the bible. There are four groups in "christianity" 1. Liberal groups say truth can be determined by experience. 2. Catholic church says that truth rests in the teachings of their church. 3. Cults like mormons, Jehovah Witnesses. Christian scientists who claim to follow the bible but have new books by which to interpret it. They will ignore the bible, history and follow a "burning feeling"in their chest 4. Evangelicals made up of thousands of groups who follow the bible as the authority. I lead a church here in France and speak in many in the US, but I don't claim that my church has the truth. That is the action of a cult or a sect. The bible is the truth. Feel free to come back to me on that Graham