Its hard to think of converting because I am really strong in my faith and have been raised in a Christain home. But I am seeking the truth, even if it means leaving everything I know. The doctrine is complicated and the decision tiresome but you guys definately bring fresh perspectives in a non-bible bashing way.

My hat is off to you all.

“Muhammad is not the father of any of your men, but he is the Messenger of Allah and the Last of the prophets; and Allah is cognizant of all things.” (033.040.)

Therefor, Muslims must reject the Book of Mormon.

The “Christians” do not have the Bible to back up their claims that it would be the final word from God, for I have found nothing in the Bible that suggests that it is the final word of God. In-fact, the Bible states plainly that more prophecy will be given.

Examples:

Revelation 10:11
11 And he said unto me, Thou must prophesy again before
many peoples, and nations, and tongues, and kings.

Revelation 11:3
3 And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they
shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and threescore days,
clothed in sackcloth.

The following is a list of some of the book mentioned in the Bible:

Book of Jasher
Joshua 10:13, 2 Samuel 1:18
Manner of the Kingdom
1 Samuel 10:25
Book of Nathan the Prophet
1 Chronicles 29:29, 2 Chronicles 9:29
Book of Gad the Seer
1 Chronicles 29:29
Prophecy of Ahijah the Shilonite
2 Chronicles 9:29
Visions of Iddo the Seer
2 Chronicles 9:29, 12:15
Book of Shemaiah the Prophet
2 Chronicles 12:15
Story of the Prophet Iddo
2 Chronicles 13:22
Book of Jehu the Son of Hanani
2 Chronicles 20:34
Sayings of the Seers
2 Chronicles 33:19

The Book of Jude has a quotation taken from the Book of Enoch:

“Behold, he comes with ten thousands of his saints, to execute judgment upon them, and destroy the wicked, and reprove all the carnal for everything which the sinful and ungodly have done, and committed against him.” (Extracted from the 2nd chapter of the Book of Enoch.)

The early Christians didn’t even have the New Testament. How much different are the modern-day “Christians” from those who lived shortly after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ?

“Yea, he that truly humbleth himself, and repenteth of his sins, and endureth to the end, the same shall be blessed—yea, much more blessed than they who are compelled to be humble because of their exceeding poverty.”

To be sure there has been a lot of sin in Protestant disunity. And reading Joseph Smith’s story, we have to own up the results that it has brought us.

There has been a recent desire to focus on core doctrines (Nicea) rather than denominational particulars. But the typical view is that there is a universal church that goes beyond denominational lines. No one is a Christian because of what church they attend and no one is not a Christian because of what church they attend.

There is a similar problem with #2.

Catholics seem to use both approaches and their religion is very adaptive to all kinds of non-standard, even pagan beliefs, yet created and orthodox understanding of Christ.

Catholics might (or do) point to the Protestants as being in the state of not being able to agree on the doctrine and in a hopeless state of disarray.

I suppose what we are doing here, at least from my perspective, is part of a struggle for understanding among all believers of Christ to find some sort of unity.

Perhaps unity is possible only through the very structured Catholic model that is both authoritarian and adaptive?

Does the success of Catholicism in maintaining unity say anything about its “Truthfullness” or authority from an Evangelical perspective? How do Evangelicals deal with the disjunct between Christs command for unity in the church and the disunity among denominations? Does unity mean just acceptance of the least common denominator, e.g. Nicaean Creed?

1. The Priesthood focused approach- this path downplays the importance of any single doctrine but focuses on following the priesthood leadership. This path allows for lots of different beliefs but controls what is taught in church.

It is sort of like a corporation, at IBM you can have any political beliefs you like but you cannot advocate them at work. The workers follow the CEO and upper management, not necessarily because they are absolutely “correct” about the direction they are taking, but because you can’t run a corporation effectively. with lots of infighting and politics. The workers sublimate their own positions to keep their jobs and help the corporation.

The problems with this approach is that often the leaders become too important and venerated beyond reasonable limits. This approach also causes resentment of those with less popular views who are not allowed to teach their beliefs. This approach also seems to focus too much on loyalty and does not allow for the ship to be righted if the leaders are particularly rigid on some issue, it makes it very difficult to question previous leaders for fear of discrediting the authority of contemporary leaders. (The blacks and the priesthood issue is an example of this.)

2. The dogma approach- this method is to set what a member should believe and not question. This is the way of Nicaea, i.e. establish what is true and condemn or discredit. he unorthodox and the heretical. The benefits are that you can establish a relatively easy standard to determine who is in and who is out. The problem, of course, is that you rely on human intepretation and politics to determine this and once set, the dogma does not change or adapt should further revelation come along to correct a human misconception.

The example for both Mormons and LDS would be the Pharasaic Judaism of the first century. They established particular understanding of Messiah and Judaic law which Jesus set on its head. Their dogmatic approach prevented them from seeing the restoration of the true understanding of Messiah and the law. (Of course mormons would point to the Nicaean and other creeds as another example of becoming set on the wrong path).

I favor the first approach, but I think you have to have a correct view of the leaders. The problem I see is that there is no good explanation for revelation and priesthood and how it interacts with faults of men, and there is no open internal mechanism for keeping the leadership on task.

I think if there was a better, realistic explanation of prophets and priesthood that fits in with history, and a lot less focus on or veneration of the guy who is leading the church at a particular moment I think we will be much more open to change and accept new “true” revelation as it comes.

John Moorehead, a Christian blogger living in Utah has been blogging about Christianity’s interaction with Mormonism and Paganism. He did a specific post recently you might find interesting:

The Mormon Neopagan New Spirituality Synthesis

I think this link points out what Jared is talking about. If Mormonism doesn’t continue to develop some sort of theological orthodoxy it’s going to spin into a such a structureless system of thought that it will be impossible to define (and thus no longer hold Mormons together).

I don’t at all disagree with #56. I think science is great. I think how Kullervo described it in #49 is the best way to look at it though. It CAN do a lot, but not everything (as secular materialist would hold).

Kullervo,
I am using “truth” according to the general correspondence theory of truth, i.e. that true statements correspond to reality.

The statement “snow is white” is true if in fact, snow is white. Isn’t that what most people mean when they say a statement is true, i.e. that meaning of the statement corresponds to reality? If not, what do people mean when they say “truth”.

Its hard to see that the theory of relativity is simply “consistently observed reality” its predictive as well as descriptive.