Shawn McCraney's Empty Challenges

Recently, as in the past 60 days, Shawn McCraney has intensified his attempts to get Scott Gordon, president of FAIR (the group which voluntarily, but unofficially, defends the LDS Church through publications of research and responses to public attacks on the LDS Church) to appear on his program.

First of all, FAIR does not engage in or sponsor public debates.  Scott Gordon does appear regularly on radio programs and the occasional TV spot to explain an LDS view over some issue.  Rarely will he appear with someone who is outright antagonistic towards the Church because it is the view of FAIR that such engagements do not help resolve problems. 

Last year, FAIR moved to create the Mormon Defense League, which it later redesignated Mormon Voices.  Its purpose is to respond to errors in the media.  They have excellent explanations of many of the controversial accusations which Shawn loves to throw down about the LDS faith.  Shawn, notably, never interacts with LDS points of view.  In fact, in one published interaction, he encouraged a caller to send him information on the archaeological evidence of the plurality of gods and the Divine Council, saying:

SHAWN: Email me and give me the proof texts and I will come back on the air and you can call again and I'll say, "This is what Walker said: 'it seems like the preponderance of scholarship supports what Joseph Smith knew before they came in.'" Give me the evidence. And we'll look at it, then we'll report again. 

Shawn privately wrote to Walker, the man who sent him the material that he would never even entertain discussing the material.  He concluded the email (which you can read in its entirety here) by writing: 

I am not an apologist, Walk. I am a guy who was LDS, is now Christian,and who shoots straight. You are not. Even worse, you are unfair. Andeven worse, you are insecure. Why on earth would I ever want to talkwith you about ANYTHING?

 Oh I don't know, maybe because you publicly said you would, Shawn?

This outcome is identical to the public professings by Shawn to be willing to interact with me on his program about LDS worship, or his public invitation to have me or other apologists on his show. 

I have gotten to know Scott Gordon fairly well over the course of more than a decade.  He is a good guy, polite, and understands that fighting rarely advances any position.  Mostly creates a spectacle.  He and the other FAIR founders did so to provide rational, reproducible answers to those who are interested.  If Shawn wanted to interact with FAIR or Mormon Voices, he could start by responding to the thousands of pages they have put out on the Internet, complete with references to authors expert in their fields, rather than just support from UTLM he constantly cites.  Until he treats serious defenders of the Church seriously, then he cannot expect them to lower themselves to his level.  It is not about class, which I feel Shawn lacks anyway.  But it is about equality of position.

Shawn does not represent Christianity.  In fact, numerous Christian pastors or defenders have denounced Shawn's orthodoxy as not representative of the "true" faith.

Shawn does not represent any institution which produces anything which could even remotely be called scholarly material.  FAIR at least has guys and women with initials like M.A., PhD and Professor after their name present and write seriously researched material.

Shawn claims he is not a scholar, yet he demands specific LDS scholars or leaders to appear on his show.

Lastly, Shawn has had standing offers from me (who is a member of FAIR but would appear on my own behalf) and other LDS apologists to come on the show to explain or defend LDS positions.

Shawn refuses.  Shawn will NOT interact with me, by phone, email or in person.  You saw how he responded to Walker. 

So please, Shawn, if you actually read this far into this post, stop being a hypocrite.  I represent my website (Answeringantimormons.com) which is at least as valid as the VAST sea of Christian doctrine you represent.  If you are unwilling to be made uncomfortable by someone who doesn't really care about your position in the stack of life, maybe you can understand why Scott doesn't feel much compulsion to validate your mostly uninformed views by coming on the show.

And please, stop saying you were a Mormon for 40 years.  While that may be chronologically true, your own book makes it clear that you only believed it for about 3 years, from 19-22 or so.  As you state repeatedly in your book, you started searching for "the truth" as you were walking off the flight upon returning from your mission.  You were doing drugs, womanizing and/or searching for alternative faiths (or no faith), according to my reading of your book, the rest of the time.  It sounds impressive, but you know you didn't pay attention for most of the first 20 years, and you were looking to leave  the last 17.  Not exactly the scholars path through the faith.

Gay Marriage--Chick Fil-a Follow-up

Yesterday was the national "Kiss in" protest of Chick Fil-a.  By all press accounts, it was a tremendous failure, especially in light of the millions of people who showed up to support Chick Fil-a on Wednesday's "Chick Fil-a Appreciation Day" hastily organized as a response to the Kiss In.

I wanted to point out that I had started my post about Gay Marriage a few months ago, and it just happened that I finally got it done this week.  I also wanted to reiterate my conclusion:  Gay Marriages, no big deal.  Gay couples with children, a very bad idea.

If heterosexual marriages ending in a single or maybe even a few divorces is bad for the children of those heterosexual parents, it is clearly bordering on ludicrous to think children in a Gay Marriage are going to be OK.  It starts with the kid being separated from one or both genetic parents, and then you are looking at a 95% probability of their experiencing at least one, and in all likelihood dozens, of failed "committed" relationships by the host parents.

So I think that is wrong.  In a heterosexual marriage there is a high percentage of those which fail, but it does not typically start with the child not connected to biological parents, and in the case of child adoption, the adopting parents are specifically screened to try to improve long term family stability.  In a gay marriage situation, they specifically ignore that circumstance to try to appeal to some misguided social need to cater to the confused familial desires of the vast majority of gay couples.

In one of the recent studies I drew from in my original article, criticism from the Gay community has been aimed at the study because the sample of Gay Couples in long term relationships was so low, they said it could potentially impact the statistical integrity of the study, and provided a distortion of the impact of Gay relationships on children.  The authors responded that they wanted more Gay couples in long term relationships with the same partners with children, but it was nearly impossible to find them.  One of the statistics I did not show was that most Gay parents who "come out" of a traditional marriage and identify themselves as being gay are opting out of being the custodial parents of their children, despite courts taking the position that their sexual orientation should not be considered in the assignment of child custody.  So that makes it hard to find gay couples, formed post-divorce, who have children.  Then finding gay couples with adopted children, considering the small percentage of gays in the general population to start with, is not simple.  Statistically, only about 8% of ALL gay couples in the USA have children living with them, and given that average gay relationships are around 2-years, and only about 15% of gay relationships will last 12 years or longer, finding long term committed gay partners with children is difficult.  To make this crystal clear, let's use real numbers.  It is estimated that there are about 6 million gay-lesbian people in the USA.  Of that, about 30% are cohabiting with another gay person, or about 1.8 million people.  Of those, about 8% have children living with them, or about 75,000 couples.  Of those, only about 15% have been together for 12 or more years, or 11,500 couples.  To include more than 100 of those couples in a study, as they did, is actually statistically HUGE.  It is also like trying to find a needle in the haystack, since finding 11,500 couples, or 23,000 people, scattered among 312,000,000 people is no simple task.

So back to my basic premise.  Gay marriage will be virtually unused.  In Sweden and the Netherlands, only about 2% of gay couples after more than 10 years of having the right to legal unions do so.  It really is too much hassle to marry just to divorce.

The impact on children in gay marriages is emotionally significant, though again, relatively few in numbers.  But we don't typically intentionally place children into painful environments just because someone is lonely or curious to see if they can do better than the statistical probabilities.

I think children have a right to a relationship with both biological parents, unless those parents are unworthy to be parents.  I think they then have a right to go to a home which will most closely approximate those types of relationships.  I think gay couples should only have children in their care if they come there by way of a formerly heterosexual marriage being dissolved by the "coming out" of one of the parents and the children and the surviving heterosexual parent agrees that it is not going to be harmful to the child, or, if the backlog of adoptable children is such that after analysis of the stability of a specific gay couple situation, such a home is deemed to be likely to have stability and be better than the environment the prospective child is leaving.  To just turn child adoption into a right of gay couples as if they were just like heterosexual couples is to literally ignore the elephant in the room.

Examples of Things Anti-Mormons "Know"

It is funny what things Anti-Mormons claim they "know" and can "prove". I will list two examples for illustration purposes. I could literally list hundreds of supposed "facts" which have been presented to me over the years, but I think two will illustrate adequately the need for caution when dealing with even supposed "scholars" among the anti-Mormon polemicists.

Recently a critic charged on this Blog that Joseph Smith (JS) had lifted the name "Cumorah" from a group of Indian Ocean islands. He also asserted that JS had actually spelled it Comora in the 1830 edition of the BoM in Mormon.

I have a photo-copy and electronic copy of the 1830 edition of the BoM. He was wrong, and I pointed it out. This person responded with the following :

""In the original BoM published edition, it is not Comora, it is Camorah."

It was spelled Comora, Bob."

So then I provided a link to the manuscript and the 1830 text as found on an anti-Mormon website. Then I asked him to at least admit he was wrong, since he had made such a big issue of it. His response was:

"You take that original copy of the BoM, that you say you have, and compare it to the official BoM today. You will see both minor and major changes, deletions, additions, etc. This doesn't bother you?...I mean, this is absurd! Your belief in this book is insane. I'm sorry."

Oh, well that is good. Nice apology for getting the facts wrong. Way to man up, whatever. But the point is this was supposed to be killer-evidence that JS was a fraud. So then a guy name Nathan tries to come to his rescue with the following:

"On the Comora/Camorah point, you are both right and you are both wrong. This debate is nothing new. It was spelled Camorah in the 1830 edition of the BoM, so Bob is right on that, but David is also right that Joseph Smith lifted the name, along with Moroni, from the Comoros Islands because in the 1800s, the island chain was spelled Camora. The fact that Joseph Smith got the names from these islands is what David was trying to point out."

Well, again, we have so many assertions being substituted for facts. Bald assertion that JS "lifted the name". Really? You can prove that? Well, later he says no. Further, the maps where JS would have found the info were not found in North America, let alone Palmyra. And no one in Palmyra recalls the name Moroni or Cumorah, which are not exactly common names and would seem to be somewhat memorable, you think? But no students, teachers, neighbors, pastors or regional scholars chime in about these names.

So then we get a lady telling us that because JS is alleged to be a big fan of Captain Kidd and his treasure, he surely would know of Comoros, which is just like Cumorah, since Kidd went to the island while sailing. However, even LDS critic Ron Huggins acknowledges in his footnotes that an encyclopedia of pirates, though not available in Palmyra no doubt quite popular throughout the rest of frontier America, that out of dozens of citations of locations around the Comoros Island in material on Captain Kidd cited in the book, only once is Comoros ever even mentioned. But you better read the footnote, or else you will think Comoros actually is mentioned regularly. It wasn't. And we still have no evidence that JS ever encountered any book even mentioning it once.

So while they "know" JS copied this, they cannot "prove" any of it. Not in a courtroom sense, for sure, but not even in a reasonable sense of two folks talking. To go from Comoros to Cumorah is not completely impossible, if JS had known. But he didn't. The maps, the stories, the texts all require JS to go places and find people no one who was alive in 1820-1845 ever asserted happened.

This is called "presentism". Assuming everything you know today was known by people in the past. It is a serious logical fallacy. But when it supports your views, people dive into it all the time.

So much for knowing where Cumorah came from.

Fawn Brodie has a great thing she "knew" for sure. It had to do with JS having an overactive libido, and fathering children. Now, I have no doubt from the testimony of some of the wives of Joseph Smith that he had engaged in normal "husband-wife" relations with some of the women. I also think it is obvious from the record this was not typical. Certainly not with the youngest teenage wives, based on the testimony and circumstances of the marriages.

However, Fawn Brodie asserted that there was no doubt, based on photographic evidence, that JS was the father of Oliver Norman Buell.

No doubt, that is, except for the genetic tests which have proven it was impossible. Zero percent chance of JS being the genetic father of Buell.

In fact, out of the "giant" list of children asserted to potentially have been fathered by JS, (That is a bit of sarcasm, as the list is only 8 children. He had more with Emma alone than all of these asserted sexual hook-ups.), none have so far been proven to be JS offspring, though several have been scratched from the list. Josephine Lyons, who has the best "story" saying she was his child, is complicated because female-male genetic testing is tricky. But Ugo Prego, a geneticist at the Sorenson Genetics labs says we should have an answer in the next few years on that, as he has collected samples of 120 of her descendants.

In any case, Brodie also asserted that Moroni Pratt was JS child.

Wrong again. Genetically proven to be not related.

It must be great to know so many things which are simply not true.

So the next time you see some "scholarly" critic attack the foundational stories of Mormonism, remember they usually contain more guess than fact, and require huge doses of faith in their guesses.

Why Gay Marriage Doesn't Matter, Sort Of

I actually believe firmly that God grants us individually agency, which allows us to choose what we want to do.  That absolutely includes the right to live together and engage in a lifestyle of ones choosing.  The underlying supposition, therefore, is adequate agency development to be able to make an accountable choice.
Gay marriage, no big deal.  Children thrust into gay marriage:  A very big deal.

Debating gay marriage, by which I mean both homosexual men and women relationships, strictly from a moralistic perspective guarantees all sides fighting without any clarity.  So I have spent the last couple of months looking for statistical analysis from studies, and evaluating the quality of studies.

There is one particular website which has done nothing short of an amazing job assembling studies and statistics on this subject, and that is the Family Research Council, here.  Now they are of course committed to heterosexual marriage, so their editorial bent is that way.  But the list of studies they include is spectacular, and so worth discussing.

So let's start with Gay Marriage.

In a word, it will be a nearly totally unused institution.  "What?", you say.  Yes, Gays will almost never marry.  Like less than 5% of all Gay couples, at very most, will ever marry, and 90%+ will eventually be terminated.

Last week I was in New York, and as it happens July 24 was the one year anniversary of legalization of gay marriage in New York.  On TV they recounted how 860 or so couple got married that day.

Wait, in a city of 8.2 million people, only 860 wanted to celebrate the right to finally marry?  And in the year since then, about 8,000 marriage licenses were issued for gay marriage (though not all will be used of course).  So approximately 4.5% of the adult NYC population is said to be gay, or 272,000 people, at most 16,000 people are now participating in gay marriage.  Let's see, that means 5.9% of the adult population has opted to marry now that they have the right.  This is about 1/10 the rate of heterosexual adults.  Even more starkly, out of 6.2 million adults in NYC, only 16,000 are married gays, or .26% of the population.  Said another way, you would need to meet roughly 800 New York City residents to find a gay couple.

Why?  In a word, Gay sexual promiscuity is so huge that there is no basis for a trusting, socially contracted relationship.  So when you take the fact that homosexuals make up only about 2% of the USA population (though gay advocacy groups claim more like 3.5%), and only about 5% of that 2% will marry, then you are looking at somewhere around 0.1% of the US population would take advantage of Gay marry, or only 2 people in 2,000.  And only 2 people in 14,000 will be in a Gay marriage for longer than 7 years.

Even so, you will wind up with tons of books and media talking about how "normal" Gay relationships are compared to heterosexual marriages.  So let's briefly compare.

Roughly 98% of the population is NOT Gay.  Out of those 98%, by age 50 about 91% will be or have been married.  After 20 years of marriage, about 62% are still married.  Compare this to 5% of gay relationships.

62% vs 5%.  Why?

As mentioned above, fidelity in gay marriage is, practically speaking, an unknown virtue.

Traditional marriages on multiple studies show that approximately 80% of participants are exclusively loyal to their current spouse.

Gay couples report 4.5%

80% vs. 4.5%

Said another way, there is a better than 95% chance your spouse is going to cheat on you in a Gay marriage.  And the statistic is that the average "partnered" gay couple had EIGHT partners  EACH YEAR they were together.

This is consistent with the fact that an astounding 43% of gay men reported 500 or more sexual partners in their lifetime, and a staggering 28% have 1,000 or more partners!

Which of course leads to both violence and/ or dissolution of the relationship.

Violence, by the way, is twice as likely in Gay marriages.

So is the suicide rate.  Gay men are 6-times as likely to attempt suicide as heterosexual males, and Lesbians are twice as likely as straight females.

Being gay is just not a happy way to live.  If ever a group of people bore a name which is the exact opposite of reality, it is this group.

So I personally would not be against gay marriage simply because I think it is so easy to show it is useless and a largely unused "right".  In the Netherlands, which has had legalized gay marriage for many years, only 12% of gays reported being married.  So that represents the extreme high-end of where it could land.  That would be 12% of (at most) 3.5%, or a maximum of .42% of the adult population.  So go for it.

With one major exception.  What gay marriage does or is likely to do to children of gay relationships cannot be allowed without objection.  Anyone who thinks a child raised in a gay relationship is likely to have an equal experience of positive, affirmative development is simply delusional.  This is not to say that it is not possible for some gay relationships to produce healthy children, for some clearly do.  Or that some gay marriage relationships are not more nurturing than some heterosexual relationships.  Again, clearly, some are.

But this is not what is likely.

And for the record, single parenting by any sexual orientation produces children who are also significantly more likely to have more difficult childhoods or  lives in general than children from heterosexually married couples.

By definition, a child reared in a gay relationship is deprived of its natural relationship to one of its genetic parents, if not both.  Sometimes this is a better alternative than the standard family, to be certain.  But again, that is the exception.

A recent study showed that children of gay relationships are 3-times as likely as a teen to be confused about sexual preference identification.  Basically 90% of teens identify themselves as strongly heterosexual.  Among gay couple parents, only 70% of such teens identify themselves as strongly heterosexual.

Finally, let's talk basic civil rights of heterosexually-oriented couples in a "gay rights" world.  As has already been demonstrated in California and elsewhere, if a parent teaches their children that heterosexual marriage is the only appropriate way to marry, and their children repeat such "bigotry", they can and will be disciplined at school.  Free speech and freedom of religion are taken away from those who feel children should not be ripped away from their natural parents and raised in an unnatural environment.

It is not hard to understand why Abortion and gay rights work so hard together.  They both desensitize the public to caring about children.

So my vote is unequivocally to allow gay marriage.  And equally unequivocally to oppose any "right" to adopt or preferentially raise children in such marriages without a court determining in every instance that such a home is a better alternative to a single parent heterosexual parent of that child, the primary basis being the physical well being of the child being threatened if they remain with a heterosexual parent.

Children of gay relationships are six times more likely to wind up on welfare support of some kind because the likelihood of the relationship dissolving is so much greater.

Likewise, children being raffled off by sperm donors or surrogate mothers should in every instance be offered up to adoption to healthy heterosexual homes and not gay couples in marriages or unmarried relationships.

Frankly, I don't have a good answer to how to deal with children of  parents who suddenly "discover" or come out as gay. In such instances, the non-gay parent is really in the best position to determine what the best treatment of children should be.  The problem is that misguided individuals sympathetic to the gay individual or couples may enter into sham relationships to provide a child.  People are strange, and as shown by the rate of abortion acceptance, many don't care what is done to the life they create.

The lives of children matter, and though it may make a gay person feel bad to not be able to have the chance to be a parent, their life-styles and the long term impact of those choices on children raised in those environments trumps those feelings.  Children have a right to a life with both genetic parents, and barring that, to a life with two parents of both genders to grow up with the best possible life. I think we stop being empathetic of the gay couples to the detriment of children forced into those conditions.

This is a case where the doctrine of marriage for family is so obviously inspired and divine, and supported by the natural consequences of not living this principle make the choice fairly obvious.  Let people live as they will, but protect the innocent as much as possible.

Theology Driven Intentional Ignorance and James 5:19-20

I was speaking with several non-LDS Christians in downtown Salt Lake City who were attacking the LDS view that a person can lose their salvation. It happens when one intentionally walks away from their covenants, and decides to lead a life without God. Dallin Oaks gave a wonderful talk in 1998 entitled "Have You Been Saved?" which perfectly explains the LDS position, and compares it to the Born Again Christian perspective.

There are practically an endless number of verses which could be cited to show this is possible (Gal 5:4; Hebrews 10:26; 1 Tim 6:9-10).

I however discussed just one passage with these folks: James 5:19-20

¹⁹Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him;
²⁰Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins.

Oh my gosh, the gyrations people make to avoid the plain meaning of these two verses, it was fun to watch.

First, the word "err" means to "Wander". Coupled with the preposition "apo", from, in Greek grammar it means to wander from whatever the object of the phrase is, which is the starting point of origin. In this case, it is to wander from the truth to the non-truth.

The effect of wandering from the truth is death, says verse 20. Some commentators actually say this is in reference to a premature physical death! Right. The illogic of such a position is easy to demonstrate. But unless they make that assertion, James is providing explicit refutation of the doctrine of Eternal Security.

James refers to converting the one in "err" as saving a soul or life. Fine. But the word "convert" and "converteth" are both the same Greek word. It means to "turn back". So the context is that turning back one who has left the truth can save their soul/life.

The word "soul" is "psyche", and it can be translated as "life", but with a significant restriction in meaning. It means the vital force or energy which provides animation to our life. It is not the existence we have on earth. (See Bauer, BDAG, pg 1099, definition of "Psyche", number 2.d. which cites the specific verse in James 5:20, "as the seat and center of life that transcends the earthly.") Bauer further states that the "death" mentioned which the psyche suffers is a "2. death viewed transcendently in contrast to a living relationship with God, death extension of meaning 1." It then states: "a. of spiritual death, to which one is subject unless one lives out of the power of God's grace." It then cites James 5:20 by stating, "This death stands in the closest relation to sin: Romans 7:13b; James 1:15; 5:20;..." (bold in the original to set off Biblical verses).

So the position that this could be about a physical death is not sustainable from the text.

As a clincher, I left out one verse. James only uses the word 'psyche' one other time: James 1:21

²¹Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls.

Notice the exact same context as James 5:19-20. The only consistent and justifiable interpretation of James 1:21 is that the "soul" is "saved" in an ultimate salvation sense. James then ends by charging us with helping to save the souls of those who did first have the truth, but have gone astray.

This is solid, rational and reasonable interpretive reading of scripture. Once-saved, always saved types cannot agree with it because it conflicts with their theological perspective. As the one commentator I cited above who asserted the "death" suffered by those who wandered from the truth was due to living a dangerous life-style, they asserted:

Of course, there are some who suggest that eternal salvation from hell is in view here. That suggestion, however, flies in the face of clear Gospel teaching all through the Bible. The sole condition of eternal salvation is faith in Christ, not moral reformation.

The wanderer who is brought back to the truth avoids premature death (cf. 1 Cor 11:30;1 John 5:16-17).

I will leave it to the reader of this blog to look up the verses cited in supposed support of this view. The interesting issue is dismissing the clear, explicit teaching in James due to interpretive gymnastics base solely on theological pre-suppositions and bad exegesis.

One advantage of engaging critics on the street in a face to face manner is that if they are honest people, and many of them are, they eventually must concede they cannot find support for their "once saved, always saved" view in any plausible workaround of James 5:19-20. So it was. One lady named Diane kept saying that as a Mormon I was putting a burden on people by each of us having to take responsibility for our own salvation by being able to lose our salvation to bad behavior. So I asked her to explain what possible meaning James could have. Her answer: I don't know, but it doesn't mean what you say it does. After which, she left.

Another man simply said "I am not prepared to answer, I don't know."

If one's interpretation of scripture is based on their theology and not the actual meaning of the writings of scripture, whence came their theology?

Mormon doctrine of Grace and personal convenantal relationship with Christ is the only viable explanation for all verses of the Bible. When we discuss doctrine, Mormonism is the only answer because the scriptures are their source of theology.

Theology Trumps Salvation?

I spent Thursday evening speaking with some anti-Mormons at Temple Square in Salt Lake City. At one point a young fellow said to me that I just needed to accept Jesus and be assured of his Grace, through faith, and I could be saved. I told him I had already done so. He said I had not accepted the idea of only Jesus' grace to save me, and I said that was true, since the Bible and LDS scriptures make it clear that one must do certain things, such as be obedient (Hebres 5:8-9), endure to the end (Matt 10:22; Mark 13:13) and of course be baptized (John 3:5; Acts 2:38; Mark 16:16; Acts 22:16; Titus 3:5; 1 Pet 3:21).

Then he said "But you believe incorrectly about Jesus." I replied "What?" He said that because our theology of how God and Jesus relate to each other, then my understanding is not sufficient for salvation.

I replied that would mean all of the first and second century Christians were also not saved, since I believe what the Bible teaches about Jesus, and not the silly Trinity stuff. I said the early Christians had no idea what the Trinity was about, and if I am lost by his criteria, then so are they. I told him that theology is a luxury unneeded for salvation in the face of the scriptures.

What would you say?

Was there a First Vision?

Many times it is asserted that there is no contemporary evidence for the First Vision having occurred.  But it should not come as a surprise this is not true, as Richard Anderson published a beautiful, insightful and well documented article in BYU Studies in 1969 (9/3(1969):373-404), entitled Circumstantial Confirmation of the First Vision Through Reminiscences.

There are several things from this article and elsewhere which I will mention.
1.  In The Reflector, February 1831, they report a correspondent from 1830 talks about Oliver Cowdery's preaching in Ohio which affirms "Smith had seen God frequently and personally."
2.  Edward Stevenson reports he heard, around 1831, Joseph Smith preach about the First Vision.
3.  Lucy Mack Smith placed the timing of the First Vision after 1819 religious revivals, but prior to the 1823 death of Alvin.  She inserted Joseph Smith's narrative exactly as found in the History of the Church.  This means she has the correct timing, and perfectly endorses the timing of the First Vision found within the account itself.

These are obviously all post 1830.  Doesn't anyone remember something closer to 1820?

YES!
4.  Pomeroy Tucker, a vicious enemy of the LDS faith, was a childhood friend of Joseph Smith and the Smiths' from 1816 when they moved to Palmyra, until he left for work in 1820, returning in 1823.  In his 1867 history of Mormonism, he makes numerous statements which affirm something happens in 1820.  For example, he notes Joseph Smith, as a "youth", prayed "in the wilderness" and had his first vision.  He takes Orson Pratt's pamphlet on the First Vision as the guiding text, but adds several personal recollections to the text.  In other words, he accidentally, as an enemy, confirms it.
5. Orsamus Turner, who was another childhood friend of Joseph Smith, left Palmyra in either 1821 or 1822.  Among other things, he asserted in later writings there was no foundation to the idea that the Book of Mormon was copied from Spaulding.  But more importantly for our discussion, he recalls that Joseph attended a Methodist Camp Meeting down on Vienna Road (1819), and tended to them.  When combined with Tucker's statement that Joseph's "blasphemies" about God led him to withdraw from the Methodists around 1820, we have the main points of the First Vision confirmed.

Matt Brown noted that in the 1832 account of the First Vision, written by hand by Joseph Smith, Joseph notes that after God manifest his will do him, the Lord appeared.  This account was in Oliver Cowdery's possession when he wrote his 1834 account of the founding of the Church.  It seems obvious that the emphasis of Joseph Smith was on the restoration of the true church of God, not his personal vision.  We see something akin to this in Paul's writings.  Though we have three accounts of Jesus appearing to Paul, none of them are told to us by Paul.  They are reported by Luke in Acts, not in Paul's letters.  Paul focuses on doctrine and Church government.  He obviously told his story at least twice, based on Luke's account in Acts.  He surely told it more than that, as he is recognized by the Church as an Apostle.  But Paul's vision is never cited as authority or any purpose except to establish that Jesus overcame death.

So when people say things like there is no contemporary reports of the the First Vision, note the newspaper account, Lucy Smith's account, Pomeroy Tucker's account, and the fact that Joseph's entire family believed him, and stayed with the Church.  Let's compare:  The earliest accounts of the resurrection of Jesus were written 20 or 30 years after the Resurrection, and have many contradictions.  Thursday or Friday supper?  Etc.  Does that affect the reality of the Resurrection?  No.

So the First Vision evidence is excellent.  It did happen.  Even Joseph's critics acknowledged it.

Enjoy.

Mormons ARE Christians

"Mormons have another Jesus!" "Mormons' Jesus is not the Jesus of historical Christianity!" "Mormons are not Christian."

These are very typical slurs hurled at Mormons by anti-Mormons. They are slurs because they are not academic observations used to stimulate understanding. They are intended as insults to the closely held personal beliefs of millions of Mormons. I can actually agree with the first two statements, as they are true. But the history of Christianity is conclusive in showing Mormons are Christians.

I heard one goof-ball say "What if I say I am a Mormon, I just don't believe in Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon, the First Vision or the restoration of priesthood authority? That's the same as saying you are Christians."

It is if you are an idiot.

First, anti-Mormons don't get to define what a Christian is to anyone other than themselves. I seriously don't care if someone doesn't think I am a Christian. Second, I believe in the same foundational document, the Bible, as they do, but I interpret it according to my conscience, not theirs. Lastly, their definition of a Christian would exclude all of the people in the Bible, including Jesus. Academics, Jews and Mormons are unable to locate the doctrine of the Trinity in the Bible. It is a conclusion based on a philosophical perspective which is not Biblical. The Catholic Encyclopedia states it is nowhere in the Old Testament, and only inferred in the New Testament.

Drilling down, the LDS Articles of Faith grant the right to believe and worship to each person individually. So we expect to be excluded from other people's beliefs. And we define what it means to be LDS. But the Bible provides no definition of what a Christian is beyond one who believes in Jesus. There is no doctrinal litmus test. Bart Ehrman has written and taught extensively on the "Lost Christianities" which were divergent beliefs from what is now considered "orthodox" Christianity. They believed in some way in Jesus. The current "orthodox" Christianity is, from a historical standpoint, the result of fortunate circumstances and some lucky breaks in history. The Arian controversy, for example, could easily have resulted in a very different theology about Jesus, with Athanasian theology considered apostate.

We believe in Jesus, as described fully in the Bible. In fact I would assert we, as Mormons, believe more closely in the Biblical Jesus than any other people, as we understand the circumstances of Christ in the eternities and the context of the Bible. No later than February 1832 the clear description of man's destiny to become like God is revealed, and soon thereafter the Book of Abraham asserts this understanding of a Council of Gods was the background of the Bible. Sure enough, we get archaeological discoveries about 100 years later that show the people of the Bible DID know this was the background of the Bible. See Mark Smith's, "The Origins of Biblical Monotheism" or visit Micheal Heiser's website, and see how a devout Evangelical scholar presents the indisputable fact of history that Israel DID believe that God was among many gods.

Even more pointedly, early Christians believed and understood the teachings of the Bible to mean men could become gods. The earliest existing defense of the Christian faith was written by Justin Martyr around 140 AD. He notes Jesus is a "second god" after the creator of all things. He also notes our faith is that we will also become gods. What it meant to become a "god" gradually evolves, until we see Athanasius try to harmonize this belief with Trinitarianism by saying it is about fellowship with God and Jesus, not our own development.

But it is realistic to argue that Mormons are Christians, because we do believe what the Bible teaches about Jesus, not the stuff added over the centuries after the authors of the Bible had died.

Second, the Bible is the common document between anti-Mormon Christians and Mormon Christians. It is not the Book of Mormon, the First Vision or any other particular LDS belief. But let's consider the Catholics vs. Evangelicals. Are they both Christian? Today we would say yes, but historically the Catholic Church did not consider Evangelicals to be Christians for hundreds of years. They literally discriminated and killed each other. Protestants then really tried to get the Bible in the hands of commoners. This was a great thing, unless you were killed for trying to do so. This has many positive things, especially about personal spirituality.

But there are some negative things. Specifically in not understanding the context or content of the Bible. Or reading the Bible with a pre-existing prejudice from extra-Biblical teachers. Today we hear most Evangelicals argue it is by faith alone through grace alone that people are saved. But that simply ignores the plain teaching of the Bible that we do contribute to our salvation. God wants to save us, according to the Bible, but we have to follow him. Calvinists go further and say God has already decided who to save, which is the logical conclusion of Evangelical doctrine, and we are unable to do anything to become saved if we are not on God's pre-existing list.

I am routinely accused of hating the Bible because I discuss issues of textual criticism with people. I love the New Testament. I love truth even more. To fail to try to understand not just what the words mean, but what the original words were, is, in my opinion, not following Jesus' admonition that we demonstrate our love by keeping his word.

Finally, as I mentioned above, the Catholics defined the Protestants as non-Christians. It did not mean anything. Walter Martin did a great job of creating hatred of the "cults". Read early Christian history. They considered themselves a cult. They were initially Jews (followers of Abraham and Moses) who kept that faith and added to it Jesus and his teachings. They were called "Christians" because their Hebrew beliefs center on the interpretation added to it by Jesus, and the belief that Jesus was the son of God. Read John 10. This was blasphemy to the "orthodox" religion of the day, and they felt justified in stoning Jesus. Or beating the Apostles. Or killing Christians. Or, calling them names like "heretics". They eventually kicked them out of the synagogues, because they were different. The Christians considered themselves the children of Abraham, either by birth or adoption. They had the Old Testament, which they considered scripture, and they added to it new revelation. They were proud to be called Christians. Men like Paul still considered themselves Jews, regardless of the name calling, as well as Christians.

And so do we.

Mormons are Christians.

Final Shawn McCraney Post (for a while)

My last post about Shawn McCraney illustrated my view that Shawn never really intended to have me or other knowledgeable defenders of the LDS faith on his program, Heart of the Matter.

So yesterday I got a phone call from a friend who, with another friend, spoke with Shawn about his fear of dealing with Mormon scholars, and me in particular.

My friend said that when my name was brought up, his perception was Shawn became visibly angry, responded with a short curt remark about how dumb bringing me up was to do, and then said he chose to not have me on because I am not a "real" Mormon, I just have my own philosophy which I disguise as Mormonism.

"Wow", was all I could say. The absurdity of such a view about me, if the report is accurate (and I believe my friend to be care about details, so I think it is) is almost beyond words. My credentials as a believing Mormon far exceed anything Shawn can throw around about his supposed "40 years as a Mormon". Granted, I have only been a Mormon for 35 years, but those don't include any infancy/pre-teen years. And they include 33 years of very active belief, study and attendance.

Let me elaborate a bit more. I served a two year mission without being homesick a single day. I loved the work. I have been an elder's quorum president 4 times. I served over 5 years in a bishopric as an executive secretary. I served as a counselor in a stake mission presidency for two years. I have repeatedly served as a stake missionary. I am currently in a stake presidency as an assistant clerk. I am also a member of FAIR, an organization which specifically defends the LDS Church from critics by promoting research, which is easily viewed on the FAIR WIKI. In my opinion, the FAIR Wiki is simply the most outstanding religious apologetic database on the Internet, because it fearlessly addresses EVERY criticism of the LDS Church, cites the sources making the claims, and then provides research and links responding to the criticism, acknowledging when a conclusion is one of several theories (such as the location of Cumorah, for example) or a settled fact, as in the case of historical events. It is an amazing resource. And it is definitely "peer reviewed" for facts.

To think that I have taken a chameleon's skin to create my own religious view, outside mainstream LDS belief, is laughable. I am a conservative LDS defender, a believing Mormon who affirms the LDS Church as the only true Church on the face of the Earth in terms of authority and prophetic leadership.

It is my belief that Shawn is not afraid of me from an intellectual or debating standpoint. I believe he is afraid of what he becomes when he is out of control of a situation. People see that on his show constantly when someone calls in and stumps him, or makes a valid point. He gets loud, sarcastic, caustic. He tries to bully his way through the conversation. Listen to his chat with Van Hale. Set aside who was being rude to whom. Doesn't matter. Listen to the tone, responses, sarcasm.

Look back over the years to my specific interaction on air with Shawn. He consistently makes statements and promises to respond. Or like last time, he just re-affirms that he has banned me from calling in. Then he puts forward his crafted position, like this past June, where he wants to present himself to the world as the unafraid, unintimidated crusader against the false doctrines of Mormonism. He will let anyone on his show, not to debate, but to present their views and then review them with pinpoint insight and clarity. He specifically denied his own documented words by saying it is false that he would not allow people such as me to call into his program.

Well, those are my views. Shawn is a complicated person. But he is pretty easy to read, I think, as well. I believe he is a bully, and the last thing a bully wants is someone to step forward who is not able to be bullied or frightened by emotional manipulation.

So don't expect Shawn to have Dan Peterson, Michael Ash, Kerry Shirts, Van Hale or folks like me on the program. Ever. As my friend said, "Shawn hates you. You can see it in how he discusses you." For him to control his anger and sarcasm, I believe, would be impossible for him to manage. The funny thing is just about nobody watches his program. Seriously, nearly no one, relative to the potential audience, is watching. So even if he had a horrible showing, pretty much no one would know. Of course, it would be on disk forever, which may be his fear. Everyone could watch, and certainly it would make his claim of an "encyclopedic knowledge" of Mormonism would be shown for what it really is.

Anyway, I am done talking about Shawn. I never thought he would have me on his program, and it turns out I was right. Call it what you want, at least we Mormons do go talk with the folks who want to engage us about doctrine, history or whatever.

Shawn McCraney and the Challenge of Truth

I have previously written about a call I made to Shawn McCraney's television show, Heart of the Matter, on December 1, 2009, wherein Shawn accused me of lying to get on the air, yelled over the top of me, asked questions he refused to let me answer, and then hung up on me while remarking "this is why we don't allow you on the show, Bob." (55 minutes into the show.)

Apparently he received enough feedback from people about his chicken approach to dealing with LDS evidence, that June 15,2010 he announced (@ 5:10 into the show) that 2011 would be "the year of the guest", he would allow anyone on his show, including apologists "defenders of the faith", the LDS president, whomever, and that he would not debate the guest, but they would be allowed to present their view, and the entire hour would be devoted to reviewing the guest's views.

He then also stated that "I [Shawn] am forever being accused on the Internet about, uh, refusing to allow informed Latter-day Saints to call in, they're always welcome, so here's their chance. They can be a guest for the full hour, and they can sit and talk. We invite any and all. And Again, this means atheists, polygamists, people who receive revelations, defenders of the faith, Book of Mormon supporters, testimony sharers, ..." "Write Shawn at..."

So I wrote Shawn on July 17, 2010 after a person on YouTube suggested I contact him. I told him I was available, and I offered a long list of potential topics. He responded:

Thank you for your willingness to appear on Heart of the Matter.

We will contact you in the coming months with a date for your consideration and topic. We will try and provide you with at least four months of preparation time, in case you need it. Speak with you soon. And thank you for your willingness to participate.

Heart of the Matter

And so, according to Shawn's word, I waited for contact about a specific date. And waited. And waited.

Nothing.

So I sent him a note last week, 6-months after he said he would contact me.

Shawn,
Have not heard from anyone in the 6 months since your original note. Just curious if this is still something you are considering, or if the program has opted to go a different direction. Either way, drop me a note.

Best Regards,

Bob

He promptly responded:

We've headed a new direction. Only had seven or eight really reputable
guests willing to come on the program - not enough to build a year on.
Thanks for being willing. God bless.
Shawn

Notice the change. No longer "anyone", but "reputable guests".

I think this is because he was afraid of what would happen. If you don't have too many guests, and instead get 8 scholars on the program who run circles around you, this does not show well. His experience with Van Hale shows what happens when serious logic thwarts his uninformed emotionalism. He gets mad, sarcastic and becomes aggressively offensive, in my opinion.

So I wrote back and said I could possibly help locate additional guests by speaking with my LDS defender friends, and if nothing else, I would be happy to go to dinner with Shawn. Shawn had no interest unless I was willing to convert to his satisfaction to a belief in his Jesus. I told him I already believed Jesus was the only way to salvation, so we could go eat. He replied he had no interest.

So just to be clear, Shawn's call screener had told me I couldn't get on the air. When I slipped through an apparently uninitiated call screener, I was accused of lying, and Shawn affirmed what the previous call screen had said, namely I was banned from being on the show.

Then he said on air everyone is allowed to call in. Really? He must have forgotten his own words.

Then he said he would have me on the show. Then he said he wouldn't.

My goodness. He changes positions faster than a president after a political shellacking.

Or is there more here? Sadly, no. I had told several people Shawn would never have people like me on his program, as the risk was too great for him to come off badly. He would rather have a few people find out he won't have Mormons on his show, than have everyone see "the fruits of a born again Mormon."

Immanuel and the Highest God

Reading Isaiah, the Messiah born to a virgin is "Immanuel", "God Among Us". I have often heard this as the proof that there is only one God in a Trinitarian sense. But it is really proof that there are more than one real God.

During Christmas season, everyone sings the beautiful hymns such as "Far, Far Away on Judeas Plain", and "Oh Come, All Ye Faithful", which both perpetuate a mistranslation of the King James Translation of the Bible which obscures who is whom.

We read in Luke 2:14 "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." To say this is a bad translation is to be kind. All modern translations of this verse follow, more or less, the more accurate translation found in the NIV:

"Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."

What gets lost in this is the intent of "in the highest". This, according to most commentators and several translations, has to do with "in the highest heaven" (NLT, God's Word Translation, Weymouth NT, among commentators Barnes, Clark, Gill and others).

The idea is fairly straight forward: Give glory (praise, honor)to the God who is in the highest heaven, and therefore superior to all other heavenly beings, AND on Earth, men blessed by God are given peace.

Since this angelic announcement takes place AFTER the birth of Christ, where does this put "Immanuel" in relation to "God in the Most High Heaven"?

Well, first of all, it essentially proves that God, as acknowledged by Jesus, is Jesus' superior: "The only true God" (John 17:3). It also shows the understanding was that while Jesus is divine, he is viewed as an "intermediate" God (Acts 17:18), where Jesus is described by Paul in such a way that the Greek philosophers characterize him as a "daimonion", a "strange god" who is atoning for man and being resurrected from the dead, which by definition is:

1 the divine power, deity, divinity
2 a spirit, a being inferior to God, superior to men (Thayer's Greek Lexicon)

The New Testament message of Christ's relationship to God the Father is clear: He is like him, fully a god, yet is a separate god who in essence reports to God: John 1:1-2; Phil 2:6; 1 Cor 8:6; Heb 1:3, 1:9; 2:7-13.

Jesus is the first born of many brethren (and sisters). He was the son of God, which he himself goes to pains to explain means that he is "inferior" to God (John 10:30-38.

The logical dilemma for Trinitarians is we see in the Bible something which is otherwise impossible: If Jesus is God, he keeps appearing next to himself, and even being in two places simultaneously, something logically impossible. Not in the sense of God being omniscient or omnipresent in some manner. We affirm that, even as we recognize we don't know how it is done.

No, it is much more direct: A thing cannot stand next to itself. Acts 7:55-56 is a verse I often site. Jesus is standing, physically, next to God, who is physically visible and present. Jesus sits to the right hand of God in around a dozen verses. Jesus affirms that his oneness with God is identical to that which the saints can similarly experience (John 17:21-24).

The most straightforward explanation is that God and his son are separate and distinct beings. I have gone to great pains to show that from the text of the Bible, there can be no doubt, even in Isaiah, that God was part of a pantheon of divine beings, who could and were rightly called "gods", and that God in Hebrew thought had a wife. It is largely the result of the painful gymnastics of the "unknowable mystery of the Trinity", a doctrine made up by men to try to force an explanation on the data showing multiple divine beings, to force it into their philosophical position that perfection could only be in "one god", and then selectively harvesting the statements in scripture indicating there is only one God, ignoring context, and ignoring clear statements about multiple, real gods found nearly everywhere in the Bible as well ("Confounded be all they that serve graven images, that boast themselves of idols: worship him, all ye gods." Ps 97:7).

Think about this next Christmas. The New Testament knew who they worshiped, the translators just don't like it.

Am I worthy?

48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.(Matt 5:48)

1 ¶ I therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation wherewith ye are called,(Eph 4:1)

4 Thou hast a few names even in Sardis which have not defiled their garments; and they shall walk with me in white: for they are worthy.(Rev 3:4)

Anti-Mormons will often describe the Gospel as declared by the LDS faith as being an "Impossible Gospel of Mormonism". They assert that Mormons must be essentially sinless to be worthy of salvation in the celestial kingdom. They make this assertion based on a highly selective and flawed reading of works by LDS authors such as Spencer W. Kimball's "The Miracle of Forgiveness", without any attempt to provide context or, for that matter, complete citations from within the work, or in the larger scheme, from official sources.

So let's break this down for a moment. The "perfect" spoken of in Matthew 5:48 is not about an inerrant, sinless type of existence. The word translated as "perfect" is better rendered "complete". Be complete as the Father is complete. This statement comes at the end of the Beatitudes, the nature of existence about which we should strive to be. None of the Beatitudes say "Don't ever sin", since such an admonition is patently impossible for a human. Instead, it encourages us to love, be kind, be forgiving and make peace with all people. The closest Jesus comes to saying "be sinless" is in noting the "pure in heart" shall see God (which, to state the obvious, means Jesus is not asserting he is God, or else it would have been fulfilled for those who are also NOT pure in heart). The word pure, "Katharos" (Gk) (like the word "cathartic"), means to be clean, innocent, unstained with the guilt of anything, having pure desires.

The state of "purity" is attained only through the Atonement of Christ through faith. One cannot be "pure in heart" if they have no desire to be pure in the Biblical sense, or they will not seek purity through Jesus.

We know this to be the case because Paul tell us to be pure, and even more significantly, John notes there are in fact "worthy" people in Sardis, who shall walk in white (symbol of purity) with Jesus. These are part of the series of comments about the various Churches, and at the end John notes that Jesus will make those that over come pillars in the Temple of God, never to go out again, with God's name written on their forehead. (Rev 3:12, 18-21).

Revelation 3 makes it clear that Jesus is the source of purity (Rev 3:18), but that we are in fact responsible for accepting him, retaining him and repenting as we make errors, which is how we are worthy (Rev 3:20; 3:10 and 3:19, respectively).

How are we worthy then? Not by unfailing exactness or never failing obedience, but by becoming complete. That means that when we are disobedient, we repent, but we try to stay clean. If perfection were the requirement for the LDS, as ascribed by its critics, then the LDS Church would have excised those "corrupt" passages of scripture which offer us, indeed command us, to repent. We would also have no need for talking the sacrament weekly, or "repent speedily"(D&C 65:13), one of some 75 direct admonitions in the D&C for people, in and out of the Church, to repent.

So be worthy. That means have the attitude of pure thoughts, eschew evil, and repent of your sins through the atonement of Jesus Christ, and therefore walk worthy of the high calling of salvation, walking in white with Jesus. How great is that opportunity given to mankind. How sad for those who think accepting Christ is only done with the mouth or heart, and not the feet (Romans 10:8-16) or by obedience.

Be perfect this Christmas.

Trying to Call Hateful Acts Love

I was at General Conference for the priesthood session downtown yesterday, and rather than fight with the anti's before hand, I saw Van Hale, and he suggested I visit the Church History Museum, which I did. They have some great items on exhibit.

I then went to Priesthood in the Tabernacle, and spoke with a few folks afterwards, and went to my soccer game.

Nothing really remarkable. But I was struck by the hate speech of Lonnie and others, which they attempt to justify as Christian love for the lost, and a defense of the Christian faith.

So first, let's define the word "Defense". It means to protect. No one can misconstrue the difference between national defense, for example, and an act of war. Putting up walls around your castle did not mean you were marching on your enemies' castles. It is pure "future speak" to call war a defense.

No one can read my columns and say "Bob is anti-Catholic". Or anti-Protestant, or Anti-Evangelical. I would concede I border on anti-TULIP, simply because I write very pointedly of their differences to the LDS faith.

I am definitely "anti-anti", that is, I have no qualms engaging specific individuals arguments. I do not believe I engage in Ad Hominem attacks against the critics as a means of argumentation. To be specific, I don't say "Shawn McCraney is a liar about everything, so his arguments against the Church are obviously wrong." No, I describe his specific arguments, and show where they are wrong, and as with some writers I have engaged, I will point out things which I believe can be observed as so obviously in error, they are either lying or too ignorant to be taken seriously.

But even these conversations I attempt to do in a civil manner, as any viewing of my interactions with anti-Mormons on Youtube clearly illustrate.

So back to the unChristian protesters at Temple Square. What can we say about them? They have objects which in LDS religious settings are considered religiously important. Priesthood clothing articles, the Book of Mormon, pictures of LDS leaders or religious vignettes. And they mock them all.

Paul noted that a Pastor must have a good reputation with the non-believers (1Tim 3:7). Since Shawn McCraney, for example, claims to be a pastor, such a claim does not hold up to even basis scrutiny. Nor upon a deeper review, owing to his own public admission of having committed the physical act of adultery against his marriage, and his acknowledge ongoing issues around committing adultery in his heart. He can certainly be a disciple of Christ, but such actions, I believe, disqualify him to be a Pastor.

Lonnie Purciful likewise claims to be a pastor. REALLY! If Shawn McCraney is disqualified as a pastor, Lonnie is literally a thousand times worse. His attacks against LDS and non-LDS alike place him outside of Christianity. In fact, his approach is really one which defines him as the arbiter of the definition of what is "Truth". He rejects most other non-LDS Christians, and so has managed to marginalize his importance in the efforts at conversion away from any faith he attacks.

In other words, as rude, uncivil and mean-spirited as Lonnie and his group is, they do fulfill prophecy. They are they who believe no one can teach them anything, and are comfortable acting as the persecutors of the humble who simply love God and seek to live a life in conformity to the teachings of God.

We should love Lonnie, and thank him. Many, many people have joined the LDS Church because of people like Lonnie. Their persecution of the LDS faith provides the context for us to defend our faith. And people see the difference between sharing what you believe, and ignorantly attacking what you don't believe.

We should contend for the Faith. We should attack no other faith.

Joseph Smith asked which church he should join, and was told to join none, for they were all in error. Were that not the case, the Restoration would not be necessary. So too Jesus established His Church because the Jewish faith had gone astray. So back through time. That Jesus felt the Jews were people in error within his faith is clear from his continued attendance and involvement with the Jewish faith. Though the Jews eventually through the Christians out, the Christians still feel brotherhood to the Jews.

So to the LDS. We share a common heritage of faith. While we acknowledge our brothers to have significant errors because of their not having the light of prophetic leadership, we still view them as brothers and sisters in Christ. There was no Trinitarian test of faith to know Jesus of the Gospels and the Bible.

And like those early Christians, Mormons are rejected by those brothers, and persecuted for daring to point out where the primitive faith was corrupted and is now restored. There is no anti-Catholic or anti-Protestant "ministries" in the LDS Church. Period. It is a sign of which faith is true.

Likewise, the fact that "Christians" will defend Lonnie and Shawn and others as legitimate expressions of Christian outreaches, shows all of those groups to actually not be "Christian" by the simplest of definitions. They don't follow Christ's or the Biblical model of evangelizing those outside their faith. And they don't do it with respect and meekness (1Pet 3:15-16).

So we invite you to come learn of Christ with us. We reject the hateful speech, actions and evil spirit carried by such. The contrast between Good and Evil is obvious.

El Beth El, The Place Where Gods Appeared (Gen 35:7)

Apologies in advance for the length of this thing.

One of the most common assertions about the Hebrew faith by modern Christians and Jews is that the Bible is about a monotheistic faith delivered to Abraham.

When Mormons discuss that by revelation, God has explained that is not the case, but that the destiny of mankind is to follow in the footsteps of God (who has feet, Gen 3:8), and sit on his throne, by invitation and through overcoming the world (Rev 3:21), to rule and reign with God and Jesus, they are attacked as attempting to replace God and change the Faith to polytheism. Mormons don't believe they will ever replace God the Father, or no longer worship him as God.

But the obvious issue here is this creates a type of polytheism in Mormonism. Not that they worship multiple Gods, for in one sense there really is only one God, as the Shema of Deut 6:4 says. They are in complete harmony, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, but they are distinct beings who in simple terms share the same mind, that is they are in perfect union of thought because perfection in godhood leads to the same values and desires, and so they share the "mind of God" (Alma 36:4, D&C Official Declaration 1 comments, Moses 4:6, Rom 8:27), which is the holy Spirit, as taught in Lectures on Faith 5:2, which is sometimes twisted by critics to try to say there is some kind of binary godhead in the LDS faith, because the Spirit is described as the method of creating the "mind of god" between the Father and Son and Humankind as well, even though the lecture also states:

these three are one; or, in other words, these three constitute the great, matchless, governing and supreme, power over all things; by whom all things were created and made that were created and made, and these three constitute the Godhead, and are one;

going on to state of the relationship of man to the godhead:

...the Spirit of the Father, which Spirit is shed forth upon all who believe on his name and keep his commandments; and all those who keep his commandments shall grow up from grace to grace, and become heirs of the heavenly kingdom, and joint heirs with Jesus Christ; possessing the same mind, being transformed into the same image or likeness, even the express image of him who fills all in all; being filled with the fullness of his glory, and become one in him, even as the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are one.

Lectures on Faith were removed in 1921 from the D&C (effectively removing the "Doctrine" part, as historically that is what that part of the D&C referenced)because they really were essentially Sunday School lessons prepared for the early Church, and had never been officially endorsed as inspired writings. Their explanation of doctrines is in a style which can lead to some misunderstandings or nuanced differences in light of later revelations and official doctrinal statements by the Church, such as the somewhat ambiguous teaching about the nature of the Spirit, which can be read in two very different ways, and was clarified in D&C 130:22-23. Since the lectures were never accepted by the Church as "official" scripture, their removable was only mildly controversial within the Church, and is now seen as no more significant than the change of the topical guide or chapter headings.

Anyway, despite the critics of the LDS Church's contention that the idea of their being multiple real gods was a doctrinal evolution in the Church from the 1830's-40's, D&C 76, dating from Feb 1832, makes the existence of "gods",and the destiny of humanity to potentially become like God and gods themselves, explicit (D&C 76:58).

Starting in the 20th Century, the archaeological evidence began to bring to life the previously ignored textual evidence of the Hebrew faith being believers in the existence of multiple real gods, in a way similar to their Canaanite neighbors. The discovery of the Ugaritic texts from Syria in the late 1920's did not have significant impact on Biblical interpretation until they began receiving broad scholarly dissemination in the 1960's and beyond. Today the work of Raphael Patai and Mark Smith, as well as a host of other scholars including Michael Heiser (a non-LDS Christian who attends a Reformed church, and works for Logos Bible Software as their academic editor)and his extensive writings on the Divine Council make defense of "exclusive monotheism" untenable as the teaching of the original Hebrew religion.

The Place where Gods Appeared

Finally, we start to engage the scripture in Genesis 35:7. The King James Bible records:

7 And he built there an altar, and called the place Elbethel: because there God appeared unto him, when he fled from the face of his brother.

There are a couple of very interesting items within this verse. First, the name "Elbethel" actually means "God's house of God", because this was the place where God appeared to Jacob. Today we still say that the Temple is the "House of the Lord" and that God visits his holy temples, as he apparently has done throughout history.

But secondly, and even more significantly, is what the King James Version ignores. The word for "appeared", galah is translated as a singular. But in fact, it is a plural. Coupled as it is with "elohim", the correct and accurate translation should be "there gods appeared unto him".

This has many, many theological and historical implications.

First, because Moses uses "El" and "Elohim" in the statement about naming the place and the plurality of "El"s, it is not possible to contend (as Michael Heiser and other critics of the LDS Church often do) that there is an "ontological" difference between Elohim/Jehovah, and the other 'elohim'. (Ontological means "nature of existence", and is asserted to mean in its application to Elohim/Jehovah, that He is self-existent, but the other 'gods' are contingently existent, based on Elohim/Jehovah creating them). The assertion is that the other "elohim' are really more like angels than 'gods'. Moses' statement about what happened to Jacob makes such a contention impossible to maintain. Moses/Jacob lumps El into the same bucket as the other "elohim"/gods that appear to Jacob.e learn from this verse that the statements from Deut 32:8-9, Ps 82, Ps 95:3, Ps 97:7, 9; or Genesis 3:5, 22 do not discriminate about the nature of existence between "El/Elohim/Jehovah" and the other 'gods'.

This inevitably results in some unschooled critic shooting me a note about Isaiah 43:10 and saying "if god doesn't know of any other gods, Mormonism must be false."

Oh that one need never do research, our prejudices would be so much easier to maintain.

It turns out that no one who has actually studied the cultural context of the Hebrew people in light of the Ugaritic texts and other archaeological finds from Israel believe the verse is about anything other than idols or the superiority of Jehovah to the other real gods which cannot save us. Scholars point out Isaiah references the Divine Council himself, and so he is not saying there are no other real gods. He is saying men can make no real gods. He is also not addressing what God holds in store for humanity.

If we stick to the strict language applied to the verses like Isaiah 43:10 invoked by LDS critics stretching for proof of this being a statement against the existence of other real gods, then we must concede that God notes that there was also a time before his own creation.

Of course the answer by the critics is essentially "don't stick my sacred cow with your interpretation". Well, why don't we read this like those folks of Isaiah's day would have read it. But to do so gets you into Mark Smith's or Michael Heisers, or similar experts, who flatly deny the verses are making any claim about the existence of other real gods. Here are a few examples:

In briefest terms, the statements in the canonical text (poetic or otherwise) inform the reader that, for the biblical writer, Yahweh was an אלהים [elohim] , but no other [elohim]אלהים was Yahweh—and never was nor could be. This notion allows for the existence of other אלהים [elohim] and is more precise than the terms “polytheism” and “henotheism.” It is also more accurate than “monotheism,” though it preserves the element of that conception that is most important to traditional Judaism and Christianity: Yahweh’s solitary “otherness” with respect to all that is, in heaven and in earth.

But on what grounds can this description be derived? The elements of the text that allow this approach have been copiously documented in the scholarly literature. As Isaiah 43:10 and 44:6-8 affirm, the canonical writers assume that their God was uncreated and always existed, and that the other gods were subsequent. This alone points to intrinsic superiority to and distinction from all the other gods.[Michael Heiser, Monotheism, Polytheism, Monolatry, or Henotheism? Toward an Assessment of Divine Plurality in the Hebrew Bible, pg 23

Reading Heiser, one is struck by his insightful reading, yet difficult balancing act, as he tries to harmonize a traditional doctrine of Trinitarianism with his research results. Traditional Christianity doesn't believe there were any additional divine beings, period. They call it "exclusive monotheism". Heiser is essentially saying to traditional Christians, "Don't get hung up on the words, look at the faith and not the labels of the early Christians and Jews." Of course, his belief that there can be any additional real gods, regardless of their inferiority to to Jehovah or not, is unacceptable to almost all unschooled traditional Christians, and requires a change of view by them. While his position is not as radical as Mormonism is to traditional Christianity, it is not traditional Christianity.

Finally, while I have the highest respect for Heiser's work, I think he is straining to try to retain his faith. As Genesis 35:7 shows, the Hebrews did not feel a need to differentiate between the types of "Elohim". His method of differentiating between the types of Elohim and Jehovah boils down in his writing to placing his entire emphasis on a two verses, Neh 9:6, and Ps 33:6, which say that God "made" (Heb. "asah" Strongs 6213, to make from existing material, BDB pp 793-5)the hosts of heaven.

Heiser's argument is that because Jehovah "made" the host of heaven, which are 'gods'/elohim, he has a different type of existence than those elohim he has created. That assumes that the cycle or process of creating 'elohim' starts with Jehovah. Such an assertion is absent from the Bible. Jehovah/God is concerned about our existence. There is not Biblical conversation about the "time", as it were, before Jehovah organized this planet. From Everlasting, from all eternity, is a very long time. Especially when it passes without comment.

Moreover, Heiser's argument by necessity relegates Jesus to a position of 'ontological inferiority' to Jehovah, since Hebrews 2:6-18 and Hebrews 12:9 make it clear that the Father made the spirits of all men and Jesus too. Instead of demoting man to an inferior existence, as is the case with traditional Christianity, the Bible in fact elevates man kind to a quality equal to God's, though we are beneath him.

Acts 17:29
29 Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device.

Heb 2:9 But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man.
10 ¶ For it became him, for whom [are] all things, and by whom [are] all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings.
11 For both he that sanctifieth and they who are sanctified [are] all of one: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them brethren,
12 Saying, I will declare thy name unto my brethren, in the midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee.
13 And again, I will put my trust in him. And again, Behold I and the children which God hath given me.
14 ¶ Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil;
15 And deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.
16 For verily he took not on [him the nature of] angels; but he took on [him] the seed of Abraham.
17 Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto [his] brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things [pertaining] to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people.

The Bible may differentiate in how gods came to be gods, but it never approaches the idea that any god's existence is inferior in terms of its capability or existence compared to Jehovah. Throughout the Old Testament, Jesus is Jehovah, or the mouth piece of the Father, so the role of Jesus in the OT is sometimes hard to detect. But we do see that in the NT, according to Heiser's criteria, Jesus would be an inferior God.

Yet I believe the reason Jacob states that Gods appeared to him at ElBethEl is because he saw two Gods, the Father and the Son. The Biblical text explicitly supports that he did see two real Gods. That makes the faith of the Bible similar to the faith of the LDS Church.

Sorry for the length of this blog post, but the concepts require a lot of interaction with the arguments of critics to really show that the faith of the LDS is in fact Biblical and defendable.

Jesus: Not Really The Son of God?

Mormons are regularly said to have "another Jesus" than the traditional Jesus of Christianity. I don't find that offensive, even though it is said in the context to attack our beliefs as unBiblical.

But this is a case of "Please don't look too close at our Jesus" by the attackers.

Trinitarian Jesus is not really the son of God, in any meaningful sense of the word "son". Nor is there really a "father".

A son, in the context of a dictionary definition, is:

1. a : a human male offspring especially of human beings
b : a male adopted child
c : a human male descendant

2 capitalized : the second person of the Trinity

3 : a person closely associated with or deriving from a formative agent (as a nation, school, or race) (Webster Online).

The first thing you note is that the second person of the Trinity is not a human male offspring, a male adopted child, or a human male descendant. He is something else.

So they made up a category: A name. Unconnected to anything which could mean an actual relationship.

A typical definition of the trinity follows along these lines:

The three Biblical doctrines that flow directly into the river that is the Trinity are as follows:

1) There is one and only one God, eternal, immutable.

2) There are three eternal Persons described in Scripture - the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. These Persons are never identified with one another - that is, they are carefully differentiated as Persons.

3) The Father, the Son, and the Spirit, are identified as being fully deity---that is, the Bible teaches the Deity of Christ and the Deity of the Holy Spirit. [Alpha & Omega Ministries]

The three persons are not "generated" by any one of the other persons of the Trinity, otherwise there would be a time when "the Father" would cease to be "the Father", because without a son, there can be no father. Arianism was the idea that the Son was a created being. That was the first great heresy of Christian doctrine, and required the Council of Nicea to resolve. This also led to the doctrine of the "two natures" of Jesus, to explain why he could appear to be human and yet be fully God as well. The "filioque" also came out of this, the idea that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, instead of just the Father. The filioque doctrine is largely responsible for the split between the Eastern and Latin Churches in 1054 AD.

For Mormons, God is literally their Father, as he is the father of spirits (Hebrews 12:9), the creator of their pre-existent spirit (Eccl 12:7). Jesus is their brother (Hebrews 2:9-14), the son of God in a literal sense as well.

And let's not forget that Mormons believe we are the "offspring of God", the "genos" of God, springing from the same family line (Acts 17:29).

When John 1:12 tells us we can become the sons of God through accepting him. This, in the context, is the ability to return to God and see him, as John 1:18 notes, having been born IN THIS LIFE of God. So note that Acts, Hebrews and Ecclesiastes are talking about our birth BEFORE this life, John is talking about faith working to salvation in this life and in the future.

Jesus himself notes his deference to the superior position of God to him in that he notes in John 10 that the titles of "god" as used in scripture is actually superior to his title as "son of god" (John 10:33-36), though he was a son before his earthly birth.

So scripture says Jesus and humanity are all sons. It notes he had a superior pre-existence, was always a god himself. So how does a being who was always God,refer to another being as "the only true God"?

Jesus can only be a son if there is something about his relationship that makes him a male offspring or descendant of the father in the same way we are. Otherwise Hebrews 2 is meaningless. So too Hebrews 12.

The false doctrine of monolatry, of not understanding the henotheistic nature of there being multiple real gods has led to the false doctrine of the Trinity. The Father in the Trinity didn't really father anyone or anything related to Jesus. He is co-eternal with Jesus in the relationship of Father-Son. The title 'father' in fact implies existence prior to the son. It is simple word games to say the Father and the Son must be co-existent because the titles would be incorrect. Yet a father provides the source DNA in humans before the child exists.

What does the "Father" in Trinitarian thought provide the "Son" which is essential to his creation as a son?

Nothing. Because the Trinity is one god expressed as three persons, the roles of the Father and the Son may as well have been selected by slot machine. Nothing is unique about the Father or the Son that could not have been reversed prior to the Son's mortal incarnation. It is simply a role of respect: The Son respects the Father in Trinitarianism. He may have lost at "Rock, Paper, Scissors", and therefore is obligated to respect him. But there is nothing unique about the Father's being which could not be entirely demonstrated in the Son's being. Now the holy Spirit, he proceeds from the Father and (for some) the Son, so he is different. So too, the Son is "generated" from the Father, yet in Trinitarian theology the Father cannot be divided from the Son, since they come from the one essence of God, which they mutually share. Yeah, sure this is all the truth about God.

Since Jesus is generated in a way which does not come from either creation or produce existence, being a "Son" is truly the most meaningless use of a word which had, prior to the development of the doctrine of the Trinity, a clear and universally understood meaning. Do we really think all the New Testament authors decided to play word games, and ignore the clear meaning of the word, especially when Paul uses the concept of "heir" in Romans 8 to say our inheritance is identical to that of Jesus', that we are "joint heirs"?

It is true that Mormons have another Jesus. We have Jesus the Son of God, the Biblical Jesus.

We are not confused.

Myths and Stories

Mormons and non-Mormons, and yes anti-Mormons, all have their favorite 'true' stories they love to tell. Unfortunately, because history is a complex tapestry of events, and requires some form of editing to tell the story, we find the regular accusation of one side or the other "lying" or "deceiving" to get their story out with their spin.

I try to deal with the problem by reading both sides of an issue in attempting to make a decision about what history might actually have been. If you look at my personal library, I probably by a ratio of three or four to one own non-LDS books, and I probably own about 1/2 as many anti-Mormon books as Mormon-authored books, the vast majority of my library consisting of non-LDS scholarly works.

So let's discuss a few issues which are commonly discussed using the ever authoritative "everybody knows" author.

1. Wes Walters proved there was no revival in 1820, therefore Joseph Smith lied about the First Vision.
False. The Rev. Wesley Walters is most famous for finding, and then stealing, a document he said showed Joseph Smith was convicted of "glass looking". He only returned the document when he was threatened with charges for the unlawful removal of the document. In any event, subsequent analysis has shown that according to the fees in place for a constable and justice of the peace, Joseph Smith was only charged, but was found not guilty.

In any event, prior to finding this document, a 1967 article about revivals in the Palmyra area put Walters on the anti-Mormon historian map. He asserted there was no record of a revival in the Palmyra area in 1820. This led to frantic activity by LDS scholars to verify his assertion, and see if evidence to the contrary existed. Walters took the position that he was an unbiased and open seeker of truth, and that he simply had a heart for the deceived Mormon people. That was his position until irrefutable proof of the existence of not just revivals in Palmyra was discovered, but that there were in fact huge numbers of converts in the period from 1817-1820 (See Backman's, "The First Vision", Chapters 3-5 and appendices P & Q, and D. Michael Quinn's 2006 article (hard to find now on the Internet, but I have a copy)"Joseph Smith's Experience of a Methodist 'Camp Meeting' in 1820", wherein he points out that they told Walters about the camp meetings in the Palmyra area back in 1969, and he thereafter refused to engage the LDS scholarly community, and essentially played to the sympathetic, uninformed and trusting anti-LDS community. He lied about the existence of any evidence in a 1980 article, and never came clean before his 1990 death. I must point out the irony of a man who attacks Joseph Smith for making up events and deceiving people who himself consciously stole documents from government offices and outright lies about the very existence of sources after previously acknowledging them in his writings.

So we have documented revivals in the Palmyra-Manchester area from 1817 through 1820 by non-LDS sources. The assertion that Joseph got confused about 1824 revivals has no merit. Joseph's story of heavy religious activity in the Palmyra area is confirmed.

2. Joseph Smith used a curtain to separate himself from his scribes during the translation of the Book of Mormon.
Answer: Mostly false. There was a very brief period of a few days during the time Joseph was translating with Martin Harris when they put up a curtain. But this was the exception. They did put a curtain over the front door to the house to get people to not look in just passing by, but everyone in the house could see what was going on, if they cared to look.

The translation process really is divided into two parts. During the early translation time, before the 116 pages were lost, Joseph would wear the breast plate with the silver glass bow attached at the shoulder, containing the translators.

After the plates were returned following the loss of the pages, Joseph used the Seer Stone exclusively in the hat with a small hole for light. Apparently the silver bow was uncomfortable to wear. Joseph had confidence in the seer stone based on his earlier experiences, so I am sure after prayerful consideration, he made the change.

Interestingly, translation was always a wide open process in the home of wherever he was translating. Everyone saw what was happening. Thus Emma noted in an interview with her son that it was impossible for Joseph to have any books or manuscripts to copy from, since he was in plain view and she would have seen them. This is devastating news to anti-Mormons, who envision Joseph behind a curtain reading the Isaiah passages directly from the Bible, changing the occasional word. (Did I mention there was no Bible in the home when the Isaiah passages were translated? True. Makes it hard to read from a book which isn't there.)

So what of the plates being seen by everyone? Well, it turns out that Joseph never looks at the bare plates during translation. They are in a box or a large bag while sitting on the table or nearby. In at least one instance, he translated using the Seer stone while the plates were not in the house at all. This is not really shocking when seen in the context that the translation was achieved by the "gift and power of God", and not by human intelligence. Joseph is having the translation communicated to him via divine means.

Why do we have those classic pictures in Ward libraries showing Joseph with his finger on the plates, sometimes with Oliver seeing the plates, and not Urim and Thummim or Seer stone? I am not really sure. I have looked at this from a historical perspective, and it seems that starting early in the 20th Century, discussion of the mechanics of the translation virtually ceased, as use of the Book of Mormon in public preaching also was reduced. In the second half of the 20th Century there was a huge push in missionary work and reading the Book of Mormon. At that point artists offered up psuedo-realistic artwork which lacked accurate detail. The correct discussion of the process has been discussed in official LDS sources, but institutional inertia being what it is, I suspect nobody wants to take responsibility inside the Curriculum department to change.

3. Danites enforced Joseph and Brigham's dictates.
False. In fact the opposite. Initially the Danites were a more or less positive civic service organization to help the Saints. But when they turned sinister, Joseph separated them from the Church.

Related topic is people were killed or afraid of death by the Danites.
False, at least as related to Church doctrine and apostasy. Thousands left the Church for various reasons in the 1800's. Not a single assassination is tied to the Church leaders by any credible, verifiable source. When I hear this charge, I always ask for the name of someone among these masses. There is always dumb silence, or they name one or two events which have no link to Brigham Young or Joseph Smith. Name names, if you have a case, prove it.

4. Mormons are ignorant of their doctrines.
Yes and No. I know very few theologians in the Church. Most study for their own spiritual growth. In fact, a PEW survey showed Mormons study the Bible more than any other denomination's adherents. (So if Mormons are ignorant, what word do you use for those who study even less?) Most can tell you what they believe, which in my experience is pretty close to official doctrine. Most cannot tell you at any depth about controversial historical issues. And why should they? I literally have never met a non-ministerial person who even understands the issues around Biblical textual transmission and errors. I am certainly no expert, but I am informed. Most swallow what their pastor told them, and go no further. Which, I think, is generally good enough. The Bible is not true because of perfect transmission. It is true because the Spirit can testify of its truth. Just like the Book of Mormon, as the D&C says.

5. The Church is money driven.
No more so than Malachi is money driven. Financial issues drive the ability of an organization to impact the lives of believers and non-believers alike. The Church expects members to be willing to pay tithing because we all obligated to help move the ministry forward. The Church does much good with what it has. Considering it is about 1/70th the size of the Catholic Church, and makes more money than any other Church, I think that is a statement to the commitment of members, who live in the real world and not cult-like compounds attempting to control the members exposure to the world, it is even more remarkable.

6. Brigham Young ordered the Mountain Meadows Massacre.
Answer: No. In fact, emphatically no. We have a copy of his memo saying to let them pass. His secretary took the original ink note he composed, wetted it with water, then pressed it against another sheet of paper to get an exact, mirror image duplicate of the note. (This was standard procedure of all 1st presidency correspondence.) He said to let them pass. Assertions of him wanting to let the Indians kill the Fancher party are likewise complete distortions of history. He certainly was OK with the Indians harrassing all non-LDS wagon parties, striving for some degree of isolation at one point in time. But there is never any OK given to kill anyone. Ever. If that were not the case, the Cedar City Stake President and leader of the local militia, Isaac Haight, would not have reportedly been quoted as saying, after ordering the attack, upon receiving the note from Pres. Young, "Too late, too late," and then began to cry. In other words, he made the decision, not BY.

7. The Church is not growing.
Well, not really true. You can do the math on the number of wards being created year over year, and that is the most accurate measure of active membership. The rate of adding wards is slowing, true. But it is growing. Now I think growth means absolutely nothing in terms of whether an organization is true or false. But expansion throughout the world is one of the signs of the times, and so is important in that way. And also the fact that there were prophecies about temples to dot the world is also important. That growth is occurring is not seriously questionable. The Church does not waste money. It won't build buildings, add ward units, etc., if there is no growth. Since 1999, there are 300 new stakes (2,542 vs. 2,865) and about 3 million members. There are over 2,700 new wards and branches (25,793 vs. 28,424. So if an average ward has 150 active members, then you are talking around 1/2 million new active members. Which is not a great retention rate, to be sure, but it is certainly growth. But it also doesn't speak to the issue of allowing wards to backfill more. I know our activity rate is above 50% in my area. But is there only 4.5 million active members worldwide? Official and anecdotal evidence would seem to be contrary to that.

8. Mormons "earn" salvation.
No. If that were the case, there would be no doctrine of the Atonement. Man DOES have a role in his salvation, but it is simply false to think that a Mormon believes he can get to heaven without Jesus' help. I think it is like driving a car up a steep hill. Jesus is the car and the gas. But we still need to get in the car, turn it on and drive. Too many "Christians" think they just need to know the car is there, and don't have to get on board.

Enough for today. Drop me a note if you have additional items.
Thanks,
Bob