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There have been several attempts over the years to categorize Mormon “belief-styles”: Orthodox Mormon versus Liberal Mormon, Iron Rod Mormon versus Liahona Mormon, and so on. In the online world of LDS blogs commonly called “the Bloggernacle”, Mormons are often categorized as being TBMs (True Believing Mormons) or NOMs (New Order Mormons).
One evening when my wife and I had the opportunity to reflect on the timeless story of Adam and Eve, it struck me that their different responses to God’s commandments, and to Lucifer’s “temptation”, perfectly exemplified the different mindsets of TBMs and NOMs, and symbolically portrayed the age-old struggle between Orthodox and Liberal in any faith. And as I meditated on their dramatic dialog with Lucifer, with each other, and with God, it donned on me that Adam and Eve were the perfect TBM-NOM couple.
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One of the most important doctrinal points of the LDS Church is the power of choice, called agency or free agency in the Church. In many ways, the entire Plan of Salvation hinges on the power of choice.
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In an ideal world, we would like everyone to be members of the church (actually, this is just a generalization that I’m going to write just so I can have an introduction to this article). Ideally, we’d like them to be faithful members of the church who sustain the prophet, live great lives, enjoy their lives and find purpose with their lives that match up with the Gospel. In an ideal world.
Unfortunately, Liebniz was a little off the mark. We live in a good world (again, if you disagree, please just go with this one so I can have a snappy article)…but not the best of all possible worlds. So, now, we have to play a game of compromise. If you couldn’t have someone get everything and more from the church, what one thing would you want anyone to get from the church instead?
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What do you want your funeral to be like? Do you care or do you figure you’ll be dead anyway? How do you feel about burial vs. cremation? Are you an organ donor? Continue reading…
I was reading BCC the other day, and I came across this post that just seemed like this tremendous threat to me. I know John C had nothing in mind and really, I’m just writing this for the melodrama, but as an ex-mormon atheist, it seemed to hit close to home. John just had it out for those militant atheists, but I guess they do enough to deserve some of it.
I wanted to make a qualification and…perhaps…a defense…of what he lambastes as a “consumer model” of religion…especially since recently on my blog, I’ve been talking about the need to find one’s philosophical “fit” (and others have written about similar issues).
Part of me wants to summarize John’s main points. The other part (perhaps that militant atheist one) wants me to tell you all to not be lazy and read that BCC post (the first link — it’s good) [partially because I'll probably botch things up in a summary and partially because I will make this post too long if I summarize here.] Continue reading…
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The church has a history of high level leaders making sweeping pronouncements that are later deemed incorrect, speculative, or unauthorized, yet in each case, church leaders are reluctant to make public correction of those presumptions. This tolerance sometimes results in dogmatic voices flourishing, drowning out those same tolerant voices that have graciously granted them access to the open mic. Continue reading…
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I have long avoided talking about polygamy on my blog. It is a source of tremendous discomfort for me, but it keeps coming up, so I want to give my impressions about this early practice in Mormonism, as well as my beliefs and reconciliations.
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[Please pardon the personal nature of this post, but I want to take the opportunity to write this personally.]
For the past two years (almost), I have been an active blogger – to say the least. (*grin*) Actually, to be more precise, I have been a VERY active blogger. OK, that is an understatement.
That has changed over the last three weeks. Continue reading…
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This post was inspired by David Stout’s series of posts on LDS Worship, Part II and Part III as well as HawkGrrrl’s post entitled “More Christ at Church.”
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Often people have a hard time with intimacy (intimacy = “into me see”) because they feel vulnerable. They would rather deal with ideas than people, and they don’t want others to see who they are. They might feel insecure or care what others think of them. People who feel this way wear what we call social masks to hide who they are and present a facade instead of their true self to others. And sometimes, the mask people wear is the church. Continue reading…
Since I have lived in Colorado Springs (almost 6 years), I have witnessed a phenomena at Church I hadn’t experienced before while living in San Jose. Ward Sp
lits and Stake realignments.
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We are all familiar with this phenomenon. You’re listening to a song you’ve heard many times, and you think you know the lyrics, but you don’t really. And often our mistaken lyrics radically change the meaning of the song. Continue reading…
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So over at T&S they’ve been having this discussion about the recent media report about the majority of America’s drifiting faith issues. And I know, you’re about to say, “Dude, this isn’t T&S. We do things differently at Mormon Matters,” and I understand. And while I discussed this a bit at my blog, I most definitely know we do things differently here than there. So I wanted to try to approach the subject differently here and add some value (well…perhaps I won’t be so successful at this latter endeavor.) Continue reading…
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The mission of the church is to bring people to Christ (it is not the tri-fold mission of proclaim the gospel, perfect the saints and redeem the dead). Yet many members feel that the focus on Christ is missing in our weekly worship. So, what’s the best way to bring Christ back to the center of our Sundays? Continue reading…
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This article by a guest blogger originally appeared at Gospel Doctrine Underground. We want to thank the author for allowing us to re-post it here.
The Law of Consecration offers a lot of interesting discussion topics and ideas. To me, a political junkie, one of the most interesting concepts tied up in consecration is the idea of equality. The Book of Mormon has some interesting passages regarding equality; I cannot help thinking that they got Joseph thinking about economics and righteousness. Or, the impact of temporal things upon righteousness, anyway. So, when the Lord gives the newly organized Church his Law, equality is a big issue. Continue reading…
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There is a strange parable in D&C 88 about workers digging in a field and their boss giving them the joy of his countenance for an hour during their shift. Read on to weigh in what you think this means. Continue reading…
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Recently, a veritable Icon of the Bloggernacle, who for purposes of anonymity we shall call “Aloysius Miller”, published a post stating: “I don’t see the church as an exclusive conduit to God,” and “I reject the claims that the church is a sole avenue to God.” Aloysius further stated: “I realize that those claims are a standard part of Mormon theology, and so my rejection of them makes me heterodox in that sense.”
Aloysius’ proclamation of self-declared hetrodoxy made me ask myself: Is he really at odds with Church doctrine in rejecting the notion that the LDS Church is “an exclusive conduit to God”? In other words, does the LDS Church even claim to be “an exclusive conduit to God”? Continue reading…
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David Stout is a Disciples of Christ minister. This is the third and final installment of his insightful commentary on LDS Sacrament Meeting Worship. To provide proper context for this final installment, we are including a couple of paragraphs from the end of the last installment. We want to thank David for his contributions here at Mormon Matters; it has been enlightening and well-considered.
Now again I want to underscore the fact that I write as a non-Mormon, and I recognize the fact that there must be something about the sacrament meeting that does work and that the current missionary strategy has proven quite effective. Consequently, it could be very well argued that there is no point messing with success – and I would not object in the least if you, the reader, took that position.
But I would humbly suggest that maybe the broader vision of David McKay, the insights and success of Gladys Knight and her gospel choir, and the early roots of the LDS Church itself might raise some heretofore unconsidered possibilities for reaching more people from different backgrounds. I would also suggest that these same possibilities for more effective mission might also bring the sacrament meeting and the principle of ongoing revelation into greater practical coherence. Continue reading…
Not too long ago, I sat through an Elders Quorum lesson about the First Vision. The teacher, who I like and who generally does a good job, was leading a paint-by-numbers sort of discussion (Q: “What do we learn from The First Vision”; A: “God has a body”). As usual for this topic, the lesson had its share of omissions (no mention of the other accounts) and historical missteps (”No one else in 1820 believed that God and Christ were separate beings”). All in all, it was a fairly typical meeting and, to be honest, I was zoning out.
But then, quite unexpectedly, the lesson took a decidedly more interesting turn. The instructor focused on one seemingly minor detail of Joseph’s account that, despite having read it dozens of times, came as a surprise to me: “He again forbade me to join with any of them; and many other things did he say unto me, which I cannot write at this time.” (JS-H 1:20).
To be honest, I had totally forgotten about Joseph’s private conversation with God. Of course, the notion of God forbidding his prophets from writing down something he has told or shown them is not new. But what makes this 15-word passage (which is not mentioned again in the History) particularly interesting is that Joseph never was shy about sharing what he felt had been revealed to him. Furthermore, as far as I know, he never revealed what “other things” God had told him during that experience.
The teacher then posed a question, which I now present for your consideration: what unwritten things do you think God said to Joseph at that moment?
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