Growing up in a fairly liberal Orange County town I was exposed to differing cultures and religions. Hindu, Jewish, Jehovah’s Witness, Church of Religious Science, and Alternative Spiritualities. I remember a girl who was Hindu who wore different types of clothes than the other girls. The inner dialog:
She is Hindu.
She wears the clothes of her religion.
I’ve learned something about Hinduism.
Are Mormons really more persecuted than other faiths or do Mormons just perceive that because the criticism is aimed at us? Are there as many anti-[insert religion here] as there are anti-Mormons? I decided to take a very cursory, unscientific, yet interesting look at this question. Continue reading…
Mention the word “Trinity” to a group of Mormons and the response you’ll get probably will be “I don’t believe that false doctrine of Satan!” [1] Mormons often even feel more kinship with religions like the Jehovah’s Witnesses, who also reject the Trinity doctrine, than we do with orthodox Christians on this topic. But do we Mormons even understand what the doctrine of Trinity really is? Continue reading…
Several posts ago, I wrote about the morality of other Christians referring to Mormons as non-Christian without explaining their non-standard use of the word “Christian.” Far from claiming that they should call us “Christians” I suggested how they could morally call us “non-Christians” without misrepresenting our beliefs.
That article was actually a heavily modified letter I had written to an Evangelical in defense of Jehovah’s Witnesses, not Mormons. In retrospect it was a mistake for me to change it to be a defense of Mormons because it brought the subject matter too close to home and, I suspect, caused people to miss my point. This new article is also a letter to a Protestant friend in defense of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. This time I’m going to learn from my mistakes and just leave it as a defense of Jehovah’s Witnesses. It should be obvious how this topic relates to Mormonism. Continue reading…
For a religious community that is often misunderstood and sometimes maligned or mocked, we don’t learn much from our experience. I can’t tell you how often I hear underhanded remarks about other religious groups. Its not a common topic of conversation, but when the subject turns to Jehovah’s Witnesses, and in almost any setting, you are bound to hear jokes. Like Mormons, the faithful really do stick out in a crowd. With my background in having studied with them, I thought it might be fun to examine the “peculiar” similarities between Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses. We may be more alike than you think. Continue reading…
