Mormons are not Christians

One of the things I tell my research students on an almost weekly basis is that they need to define their terms. The recent fight over whether or not Mormons are Christians is a classic case in point.

Christian denominations insist that Mormons are not Christians. Mormons insist that they are. That is due to a fundamental disagreement over what we mean when we use the term Christian. Mormons as a group don't understand why people can't figure out that we are Christian. Our church is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  Look, we say, it's right there in the name. We accept Christ as our Savior. We believe in the virgin birth, His death on the Cross and the Resurrection. We believe He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No man cometh unto the Father except through Him.  Where is the confusion coming from, we wonder.

But as essential as that all is to being a Christian, my understanding of what is entailed in the term Christian as used by other denominations goes far beyond those doctrinal issues. It requires a belief in a creedal history that Mormons do not have.

We can share most of the Apostles creed in common with mainstream Christianity. We don't believe that Christ descended into hell while he was dead, because we don't believe in hell the way that most Christians do. Rather, we believe that during the three days between his death and resurrection, Christ organized missionary efforts amongst the righteous dead to send his message to those who died without a knowledge of Christ. We also don't really believe in the Catholic/Christian church. The Nicene and Athanasian Creeds head further into unshared water.

We don't believe in the Trinity.
We don't believe in predestination.
We don't believe that most people are going to end up in hell.
We don't believe that man is, by nature, fallen.

What do we believe?

We believe that we are literally spirit children of God the Father, that we lived with Him in heaven before we were born, and that we all chose to come to earth to further our spiritual progression.

We believe that Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost are three distinct personages. 

We believe that the Fall caused death to come to this world, and that as mortals we are subjected to weakness and temptation because of our existence in a fallen world and at the hands of Satan and his followers. We believe that only through the Atonement of Christ can we be saved, both from the effects of death and sin.

We believe that through the Atonement of Christ, all mankind may be saved.

We believe that through the Atonement, not only can we be forgiven, but we can be perfected, long after this life is over. Yes, we believe that the biblical wording that "ye are gods" is actually descriptive. We can become like unto God, through probably millions of years of participation in the redemptive process of the Atonement.

We believe that families can be eternal. We believe that through ordinances available in the temple, families can continue forever.

To try and gloss over the magnitude of the differences between Mormonism and mainstream Christianity I think is both intellectually dishonest and demeans the belief systems of those who do not share our doctrine. To try and elide those differences as just minor points of disagreement is to try and ignore ideas that are so central to the spiritual life of millions of people that wars have literally been fought over these concepts.

So you know what I say? I say stop worrying about whether or not we are Christians. Christ Himself said that not everybody who says unto him, Lord, Lord will be saved.  Focus on living a Christlike life. Focus on living the gospel of Christ as you understand. Love one another. Love God above all and love your neighbor as yourself.

And fellow Mormons, stop downplaying what makes us distinctive so that we can fit in with everyone else. We are weird. We are a peculiar people. What we believe is different - amazingly, remarkably, eternally different - but that is why it is necessary. If Heavenly Father could have accomplished what he needed with the churches that were currently on the Earth, He wouldn't have had a restoration. There would have been no need for Joseph Smith, or the Book of Mormon, or temples or anything else that makes us stand out. If that makes us a cult in the worlds' eyes, so be it. I'm not particularly interested in what the world thinks of me, anyway.

Think about it this way: We believe all the people claiming the title Christian and refusing to apply it to us are apostate. So why are we so eager to fit in with them in the first place?

So stand tall, fellow Mormons. Embrace your inner Christian, come to terms with your peculiar divine nature, and let your freak flag fly.


Disclaimer: This is just my own beliefs and should not be interpreted as an official statement of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Palaces and Mirrors

Today is just one of those days where the planets are aligned just so and the world is in harmony or whatever you want to call it.

Today was the day that Heavenly Father knocked down a wall. Everything that has been put in my path over the last week, everything I've read, all the things we talked about at church, even the hymns, combined into one big spiritual battering ram.

CS Lewis in Mere Christianity says:

Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.

This part often gets quoted in church, but I find the part that follows even more interesting. Lewis says that God

will make the feeblest and filthiest of us into a god or a goddess, a dazzling, radiant, immortal creature, pulsating all through with such energy and joy and wisdom and love as we cannot now imagine, a bright stainless mirror which reflects back to God perfectly…His own boundless power and delight and goodness.

I find this second section even more important than the first because it focuses on what is truly important. The first quote says that God is going to make of us a palace. That sounds like we should go along with the process because we will be made greater because of it.  It feels to me like using the Gospel as some sort of self-help plan, to glorify ourselves, rather than our Father which is in Heaven.

The second section is where I find the true challenge to the Christian soul. Are you willing to have yourself be completely eradicated in the process of perfection? We need to become "a bright stainless mirror" so we can reflect back to God "power and delight and goodness." Are we willing to lose ourselves to become like God?

I find I have two contradictory responses to that challenge. First, is the disbelief that God can make me perfect. Me, for my sins are so special and my flaws so immense that they challenge even the capacity of the Almighty to overcome. My, what pride, masked with a facade of self-loathing.

My other response is to not want to give up who I am, because I like who I am. My husband once told me that sacrifice is giving up something good for something better, before we know what the better is. How could being like God not be better than what I am now? It has to be.

And yet, I am reluctant. I am scared of that surrender. Of what it might cost. Of what might be required of me. But I have to remember that I am not God. And I am not called to be God. I am called to be a mirror of God, so that others can see Him when they look at me. What a relief to not be God. To not have to be in control. To not be required to fix things or save people or have all the answers.

God calls me to love. Love others as Christ would love them. Love others as I would love myself. Through some transitive property that I haven't thought about since ninth grade geometry, that means I have to love myself as Christ loves me, with a full awareness of my imperfections, but with no judgment, merely a call to improve.

Love is the answer. It is always the answer. Love is at the center of all things.