Why I think Mitt Romney is running for President.

[grantcart]

38. You wouldn't have heard the term 'bridges' unless you talked with me

I used that term to express to non Mormons how Mormons see the particular importance of their early leaders.

The identification of Heber J Grant as an important figure is not for us a matter of pride and we are stunned that he is seen as such a venerable figure, and many older Mormons have told me through the years that they consider him just below Brigham Young in their estimation of Mormon leaders (which I find ironic because of Young's involvement in the circumstances around the Meadow Mountain Massacre should be a matter of shame and not pride).

You are the naive one in Church history.

I did graduate work at Princeton Theological Seminary and know its history very well.

Mormons are "What befuddlbefuddled by "how other Christians can claim we are not followers of Christ" because their understanding of Church history is non-existent and their use of the Bible infantile. Mormons don't have professionally trained clergy and it is in the training of clergy that you learn that words matter. 'Christian' and 'followers of Christ' are two completely different things with explicit understandings. Mormons, or anyone, who claim to be inspired by the teachings of the 'Christ' can be considered followers of Christ.

1) The historical understanding of the word 'Christian'.

In the four centuries after the death of Jesus there was considerable confusion over what the future entailed. As Paul writes in many epistles many thought that the end of the world was near and that they need not prepare for a long future. Eventually the oral sayings were written down and used to interpet the events of Jesus life in Mark, Matthew, Luke and one other lost document. Other books were written like the Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Mary and the Gospel of Philip. Literally dozens of 'gospels' were written about Jesus at about the same time.

Different schools of thought developed and they were based on two competing Christologies, the Trinitarians, and the Gnostics. These two schools competed for acceptance. Most 'followers of Christ' at the time found comfort in the Christology found in the Apostles Creed. Ultimately a line was drawn in the sand when a Council of Bishops gathered in 325 in Nicene, Bythnia (modern Turkey) and agreed on what has become the orthodox interpretation of the Holy Trinity in the Nicene Creed.

Supporters of the minority position were convinced or eventually wore down until there were only two Bishops that did not agree and eventually they too accepted the Nicene position.

The Emperor then enforced this decision and any who did not accept the Nicene Creed were excommunicated from the Church. Those that accepted the Nicene Creed were the orthodox Christians and those that did not were Gnostic Christians who eventually faded away.

So from 325 the word Christian has meant those that accept the specifically defined Christology and Holy Trinity that was universally accepted at that time. From that branch the Christian Church based on the Apostles Creed and defined in the Nicene Creed has diversified as follows;



Ninety-Five percent of the 'followers of Christ' in the world follow this understanding of orthodox Christianity by agreeing on a Christology that has been well established and universally agreed upon for 1700 years. Mormons have a completely different Christology that was 'discovered' in upstate New York in 1823 along with golden plates as well as other artifacts, including a breastplate and a set of silver spectacles with lenses composed of seer stones . Unfortunately while these important artifacts are no longer with us Smith's inventive Christology still is.

Here is an LDS writer who explains the divergence well from their point of view

http://lehislibrary.wordpress.com/2009/09/18/lds-christology-trinitarian-christology-a-comparison/

LDS of course disagree with that idea. We instead envision God and man to be the same essential “order of being.” We are two of the same species, but on different ends of a spectrum or continuum of maturity and glory.

Mormons believe that God was once a man just like us, Christians do not:

Joseph Smith apparently wanted to set his followers straight when he proclaimed the following at the Mormon Church's General Conference in April, 1844:

I am going to tell you how God came to be God. We have imagined and supposed that God was God from all eternity. I will refute that idea, and take away the veil, so that you may see. … It is the first principle of the Gospel to know for a certainty the character of God and to know...that he was once a man like us.... (“King Follett Discourse,” Journal of Discourses 6:3-4, also in Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, 345-346, and History of the Church, vol. 6, 305-307, emphasis added)

Joseph Smith completely renounced the fundamental Christian understanding of who God is, what man is and who Christ is.

They may or may not be followers of Christ. They, like the Gnostics, Adoptionist, Arianists, Psilathropost, Modalists, Docetists, and dozens of others don't follow the Christology that the Christian Church carefully defined 1700 years ago.

To use the word 'Christian' to mean every group that holds Jesus to be the Christ then the word would really have little meaning. For example Bahai believe the following about Jesus;

The Baha'i Faith upholds all claims of Jesus Christ as to His Station, and His Revelation. The Baha'i Writings are filled with references to the words of Jesus and praise of Him. In His time, His Holiness Christ was the greatest Messenger of God yet to have walked the earth. Baha'is believe that the promises of Jesus, as well as those of all the other religions are fulfilled in the Baha'i Faith. For more detail see the following question. Top

The only reason that Mormons are befuddled about why they aren't considered as 'Christians' by the rest of Christianity is that they don't understand the history of the Church and how radical their own peculiar Christology is.


2) Biblical Basis for Christian scepticism of things like 'Mormonism'.

37And Jesus uttered a loud cry, and breathed out His life.

38And the curtain [of the Holy of Holies] of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.

39And when the centurion who stood facing Him saw Him expire this way, he said, [k]Really, this Man was God's Son!

Mark has spent his entire Gospel rushing to this point. It is the reason that he wrote the Gospel. Mark is setting an epistomological stage and he makes his point with two contrasting metaphors.

When Christ dies on the Christ all is revealed (in Mark's mind). He puts these two images together because he has an important point to make. For the Jew the essence of YHWH resided in the Holy of Holies where the High Priest would go once a year to commune.

Now, Mark is saying, history has brought the death of Jesus to the world stage. Both the Jew and the Roman (and everyone else) can look and see this was the Son of God. There will be no more secret revelations or anyone cut off from approaching Christ, even the Centurion who was part of the guard that enforced his murder is now able to see the truth.

This is the Biblical reason why Christianity has, for 2100 years walked by new revelations of Christianity, whether they be Joseph Smith or Rev. Moon.

I hope that you are a little less befuddled why Christians insist on a clear definition of terms between Christians and Mormons and other Christ oriented sects.