Mormons and Christianity

[Primula Baggins]

A couple of points on the Lutheran understanding of those parts of the creed:

It is small-C catholic, just meaning "universal."

"The communion of saints" in my church means all those who have died in the Christian faith. Although we refer to some saints in the other sense, they don't have a distinct status; I think it's just tradition (Saint Peter).

Lutherans have no regularly used rite of confession. so obviously we don't see that this section calls for that. (Buried in our various liturgical texts there is actually a formal rite of confession, for when a large group has gone astray and wants to make things right, or for private use if an individual feels the need to confess to a pastor, but I have never seen either one used.) We have only two sacraments, baptism and communion.

So even if different branches of Christianity use the same words, our understanding of them is not always the same.

[anthriel]

I remember as a small child, praying that prayer in church, wondering why we were pledging our belief in the Catholic church. I mean, I'm sure they're good people, but if we believe that they're so cool, why aren't we just Catholics?



And then our priest filled us in on the little "c" thingy.



I also was taught that the word could mean something a bit more nuanced than "universal" (although that is certainly the basis) but also something like "free of regional prejudice" or "true for all". Something like that.

But it has been a long time since I was a kid in that church. Could be I'm not remembering correctly!

[Primula Baggins]

See, my pastor the whole time I was growing up was my dad, and at a certain age every red-blooded girl stops listening to her dad. I have no memory of confirmation class when I was actually a student. What I do know comes from attending confirmation class with my own children (starting my third time through this academic year, though Mr. Prim had to cover it for quite a while there).

[Cerin]

Thank you, Prim!

I believe in the Holy Spirit,

Well, not really. Not as a seperate entity. Simply another aspect of God.

Thank you for elaborating, Alatar. I believe that's what this means. That you believe in this aspect of God.

the resurrection of the body,

I don't believe that the body is resurrected, only the soul. I certainly hope I don't end up hobbling round heaven on a Zimmerframe.

Hmmmm. I believe it is said that if there is no resurrection, Christ died in vain. The soul doesn't actually die, does it, just the body? So I think what you may be saying is that you believe the soul just goes on without the body?

[Alatar]

Thank you, Prim!

I believe in the Holy Spirit,

Well, not really. Not as a seperate entity. Simply another aspect of God.

Thank you for elaborating, Alatar. I believe that's what this means. That you believe in this aspect of God.

the resurrection of the body,

I don't believe that the body is resurrected, only the soul. I certainly hope I don't end up hobbling round heaven on a Zimmerframe.

Hmmmm. I believe it is said that if there is no resurrection, Christ died in vain. The soul doesn't actually die, does it, just the body? So I think what you may be saying is that you believe the soul just goes on without the body?

On the first point, its not quite that... I believe that what others call the "Holy Spirit" is a manifestation of God, but I don't believe in it as an entity. When people say "the Holy Spirit came upon him" I don't envision anything other than a sort of Divine inspiration. It's not like Christ, who I see as an actual manifestation of God as a seperate entity but part of the One. To me, what other call the Holy Spirit is simply God touching the mortal mind.

Regarding the second point, yeah, that's pretty much what I believe.

[TheEllipticalDisillusion]

Mormons don't condone polygamy contrary to popular belief. My mormon friend told me that sometime in the late 19th, early 20th century mormonism denounced polygamy, but it was accepted up until then for some particular reason. The popular polygamist who appears on Oprah and such (Something Green I think is his name) isn't allowed in any mormon temples despite the fact that he calls himself mormon.

[anthriel]

Well, it's just that the Mormon church has splintered, I think.

There ARE Mormons who believe in polygamy, and I believe they're called something like "Traditionals".

I flew into Las Vegas on September 20, 2001, and, as you can imagine, was met with huge delays getting through security. I ended up talking to a woman in line in front of me for four hours.

She was Mormon, and had had 11 children in 15 years. Her youngest was 3 months old... she was in shock because her husband had approached her the week before and told her he was bringing a "sister-wife" into the family, and that if she were obedient, she would accept it willingly and lovingly.

I kept up with her for a while, and learned that she divorced that guy, and remarried another Mormon man who had 9 children.

[vison]

The original Mormon teaching was that a man needed at least 3 wives to attain "heaven". It was not only condoned, but required.

There is a community of fundamentalist Mormons at Bountiful, British Columbia, where polygyny (the proper term for multiple wives) is the rule. This community is in constant and direct contact with several in the US and women are shipped from one to the other nearly every day.

Having read the Book of Mormon (albeit some years ago) I can tell you that polygyny is only one of their beliefs that made me raise my eyebrows.

The practice was generally but not completely discarded, true. I believe the "prophet" at the time (can't remember his name) had some revelation or another that god had changed the rules. In fact, it was discarded for reasons far more mundane: to enable the community of Mormons to fit in with the rest of modern American society.

[TheEllipticalDisillusion]

I didn't know why it was discarded, but I know, straight from a mormon's mouth, that it's a misconception most people have about mormons today.

[anthriel]

While I heard, straight from a Mormon's mouth, that she heard, straight from her husband's mouth, that if she were obedient to the prophet's teachings, she would submit to him having another wife.

I think it surprised her, just a little.

I can't resist a little feminist hurrah! that she decided to leave his butt for that...

So maybe it's one of those things that can be picked and chosen at will from the Mormon's doctrine? (In Christianity, we call these folks "salad bar Christians"...)

I do know that many modern day Mormons are embarrassed by this particular behaviour, because they want to look more mainstream, as vison suggests.

[Primula Baggins]

I was told by a Mormon friend that a Mormon who takes more than one wife is excommunicated. However, that's the stand of the "official" church; there are a lot of splinter churches that probably self-identify as Mormon.

[TheEllipticalDisillusion]

Prim is right, and that is what my friend told me: the official stance is that the mormon church discarded polygyny (thanks vison), but this doesn't stop individuals from claiming it to be their mormon doctrine. Like you said, Anthy, salad bar christians. The only difference with the mormons is that they refuse these mormons entry into the official temples.

[Ellienor]

Anyone read "under the banner of heaven" by Jon krakauer? This discusses the Mormon religion, its founding, its history, and its splinter groups that still advocate polygyny (called Mormon Fundamentalists).

Joseph Smith was apparently quite a con man, according to Jon Krakauer. He notes that Mormons are very into central authority, authority in general, and in secret-keeping. Yes, Mormon Fundamentalists are excommunicated from the Mormon temples, they are pretty strict about that, since polygamists give them a bad name (e.g., that guy and his wife who kidnapped Elizabeth Smart). But polygyny was part of their belief system for a long time, and was renounced in a message from God coincidently right when it was politically convenient for the Mormons.

There are many that believe that when (if?) the U.S. recognizes gay marriage, and expands the definition of marriage beyond between one man and one woman, that the Mormons will bring back plural marriage.

[TheEllipticalDisillusion]

There are many that believe that when (if?) the U.S. recognizes gay marriage, and expands the definition of marriage beyond between one man and one woman, that the Mormons will bring back plural marriage.

Who believes this?

At least the mormons got with the times, unlike the catholics who apologized to Galileo two, three hundred years after his death.

[Parmamaite]

Thanks for putting things straight TED
I'm quite shocked and sad at the amount of prejudices about mormonism poured out here by otherwise intelligent persons.

Mormons are strictly monogamous (except for some traditionalists who are excommunicated).

They operate with two kinds of marriage, a normal church-wedding, which works as our marriages does, it ends when one of the two dies, or in the unlikely event of a divorce. And then there's the temple-marriage, it is eternal, and cannot be dissolved, not even by death. It follows therefore that a person can only be married in the temple once.

I know a bit about it, since my aunt converted to mormonism about 20 years ago. She has always been a devout christian, and so she still is!

As for secret beliefs among the inner circle, that normal mormons don't know about it sounds like the plot of Dan Browns next book.

[truehobbit]

I think Anthy has it right.

This reminds me of the problem with Islam these days.
Each Muslim you ask tells you that there's nothing in the Koran to warrant killing unbelievers or setting down discrimination against women.
And yet, this is what happens in other Muslim communities, who I guess also think they are doing what their faith demands from them.
Or take the Mohammed-images discussion from a while ago: each Muslim I've heard who was asked swore that it was a severe violation of the law to make any image of the Prophet, and no amount of pointing to the fact that images of the Prophet made by and for faithful Muslims existed made any impression.

I can only conclude that there's a branch of Mormons who have rejected polygyny (as Prim said, at a noticeably convenient time) and another for whom this is the sacrosanct teaching of the real Mormon church.

[TheEllipticalDisillusion]

th, it's the same for christians who think it's acceptable to bomb abortion clinics. There will always be fringe aspects of any ideology. This doesn't mean that the fringe represent the mainstream or official stance of that ideology.

ETA: here is some info on mormons and polygyny. POLYGYNY IN THE MORMON MOVEMENT: Polygyny during the 19th century

Polygamy - Frequently Asked Questions

[truehobbit]

But we don't know who's the minority here, do we?
There's one branch who claims to be the official church and who teaches one thing. And there's a branch who obviously doesn't believe in the teachings of the branch that calls themselves the official church (and I doubt that, given that belief, they even recognise this other branch as the official church) and teaches something different.
We know that you have a friend who's a member of that first branch and that Parma has an aunt who's a member of the first branch, too.
We know that Anthy met a woman whose husband was a member of the second branch and that vison knows of a Canadian community that belongs to the second branch, too.
So, for me, so far the picture isn't clear at all as to which group is the fringe and which is the main branch. (Or, if indeed the minority is so small as to be only a fringe group, or it it's not rather a sizeable minority to compete with the majority.)

ETA: thanks for the links, TED - I must say, they quite confirm my assessment of the situation.
It is a basic tenement of Mormon faith even today to be polygynous and the branches of Mormonism that keep practising it against the law and the decision of the first branch consider themselves the truly faithful.

Edit again: sorry, couldn't help myself - from the absalom-website in TED's second link: ahem!

[Parmamaite]

Taken from TED's link:

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) is by far the largest denomination in the Mormon movement. They regard themselves as the only true Mormon church. They regard the term "Fundamentalist Mormon" as a contradiction in terms.

And:

There is an estimated 6,000 to 11,000 thousand members of the FLDS in the U.S. The group also has a single colony of about 1,000 members in Canada. Together, they form a significant percentage of the estimated 30,000 Mormon polygynists in Utah, and the estimated 60,000 in the U.S. 2 They call themselves "Ooriginal Mormons" or "Fundamentalist Mormons."

From Wikipedia:

When the leaders of the Church proclaimed that God had revealed to them that the practice of plural marriage was to be discontinued (October 6, 1890), however, there were a number of families who left The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and continued to practice plural marriage outside the church in scattered and usually isolated communities. While these smaller groups have a membership in the thousands, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints now claims a world-wide membership of over 12 million [1], but due to heavy media focus on these fractional bodies, misidentification of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints with these polygamous groups is not uncommon.

And lastly a quote from the current precident of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints:

"If any of our members are found to be practicing plural marriage, they are excommunicated, the most serious penalty the Church can impose. Not only are those so involved in direct violation of the civil law, they are in violation of the law of this Church."

My emphasis.

[truehobbit]

Taken from TED's link:

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS) is by far the largest denomination in the Mormon movement. They regard themselves as the only true Mormon church. They regard the term "Fundamentalist Mormon" as a contradiction in terms.

So, one branch doesn't recognise the validity of another branch - not very surprising in rivalling religious groups, I think.

Together, they form a significant percentage of the estimated 30,000 Mormon polygynists in Utah, and the estimated 60,000 in the U.S. 2

I think that's a very sizeable minority.

From religioustolerance.org:

Women living under Muslim laws (WLUML) reported that: "...in Colorado City on the Arizona-Utah border, Police Chief Sam Roundy told a Denver Post reporter that the practice of polygamy among the city's police was 'none of your business...it's a religion and we have the freedom to do that.' When asked about his department's failure to interview a 16-year-old girl whose mother had reported she was taken to Canada for marriage to a 39 year old man, he responded 'I didn't feel I had to talk with her.....I'm not going to mess with it. The state hasn't taken it upon themselves to prosecute. Why should we ?' (Mar. 4, 2001).
<snip>

2006-MAY-17: Warren Jeffs has been placed on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List along with Osama bin Laden. He is accused of arranging marriages between underage girls and older men, of sexual abuse, and of being an accomplice to statutory rape.

These may be occurrences in a fringe group, but I have trouble reconciling the outrage against a whole church because of child-abuse among a minority of priests with the downplaying of the sort of practice described here.

And, to illustrate the mindset of the Fundamentalists, and how they view the "official" LDS (from the absalom site):

that 35% of Utah's population think that polygamists should not be prosecuted. Many of the folks in Utah are descendants of polygamists, and don't care to heap the same type of intolerant abuse on their neighbors that the early Mormon people were subjected to. In addition, the laws that were written against polygamy are basically laws against consensual sensuality, which cannot be prosecuted in today's legal climate.
<snip>
So for the time being, the largest Mormon sect, the LDS church, has decided it is more important to live the laws of the land than those of God. Other Mormon faiths have made a different choice in the matter, and practice polygamy in defiance of the unjust laws of the land.

Currently reading around in the religious tolerance site, to find out what Mormons actually believe, because from two half sentences just read, I'd definitely say they are not really Christians.
(The Catholic church, btw, regards them as a Christian sect.)