Christians should avoid Mormon-sponsored nativities

Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness?
And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel?
And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? for ye are the temple of the living God; as God hath said, I will dwell in them, and walk in them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people.
Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you.
And will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. II Corinthians 6:14-18

And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them. Ephesians 5:11

The God of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints--commonly known as the Mormon Church--is an extraterrestrial from a planet near a star called Kolob, and was once a man; the Jesus of Mormonism was the spirit brother of Lucifer (for more information on Mormon doctrine, consult some of the blogs and sites on the sidebar of this blog). Which is to say, Latter-day Saints worship a different God and Jesus from those of Christianity. For this reason, Christians should obey the command of God's word in II Corinthians and have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of Mormonism.

As reported by Carol Christensen in the Topeka Capital-Journal, November 26, 2021 (links in original):

St. Francis of Assisi is credited with popularizing nativities when he set up in 1223 in Greccio, Italy, what we would now call a “living nativity” (a cave with live animals, people representing Mary and Joseph, and a representation of baby Jesus) in order to help laypeople better understand and emotionally connect with the story of Christ’s birth.

The practice of making visual depictions of Jesus’s birth has spread since then throughout the Christian world, and today many Christians have nativities in their homes to help them remember the “reason for the season” and feel an emotional — and spiritual — connection with Jesus and His birth.

It was for similar reasons that Nativities and Noels was started in Topeka in 2012, nearly 800 years after St. Francis set up his cave nativity. Now in its 10th year, this free event features more than 800 nativities from around the world and continuous live vocal and instrumental Christmas music.

It will be Friday, Dec. 3, through Sunday, Dec. 5, at the Topeka Stake Center of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 2401 S.W. Kingsrow Road. The event will run from 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, and from 1 to 7 p.m. on Sunday.

The event has reminded attendees of the true reason for and spirit of Christmas and helped them feel a stronger connection with Jesus and His birth at an often-hectic time of year. The nativities from nearly 100 countries have also helped remind visitors that people throughout the world celebrate Christ’s birth and feel connected to Him.

First-time visitors may be amazed at the variety of nativities on display: such as traditional, ornaments, miniature, homemade, electric, musical, children's, international, even ones from Kansas! They range in size from under an inch to several feet tall and are made from a wide variety of materials — porcelain, wood, clay, metal, and cloth, but also paper, marbles, corn husks, coconut shells, gourds and recycled newspapers, magazines, fence slats, pop cans, steel drums, and auto parts.

The display changes every year. This year, 200 nativities that haven’t been shown before will be on display.

Nativities and Noels, which initially featured only music and nativities from local Latter-day Saints, has expanded and includes music from members of other local Christian churches, including First Christian Church of Holton, Topeka Bible Church and Topeka Church of the Brethren. Washburn Rural High School's This Generation will sing at 1 p.m. Friday.

Nativities are on loan this year from friends from 12 other Topeka-area churches: Christ the King Catholic Church, Community of Christ, First Lutheran Church, First United Methodist Church (Garnett), First United Methodist Church (Topeka), Most Pure Heart of Mary Catholic Church, New Hope and Love Community Church, St. Mark’s African Methodist Episcopal Church, Topeka Bible Church, Topeka Church of the Brethren, University United Methodist Church, and Wanamaker Woods Church of the Nazarene.

There’s a wonderful feeling of Christian unity and connection when people of many different churches help with this celebration of Jesus’s birth.

Multiple COVID safety precautions will be taken at the event, and masks are recommended.

For more information, please check out “Nativities and Noels” on Facebook: www.facebook.com/nativitiesandnoels. The Facebook page also has posts from last year’s virtual event. Last year’s inspiring, locally produced videos on the “Nativities and Noels” YouTube channel are also still up and worth watching. Highlights from this year’s Nativities and Noels will be posted on the Facebook and YouTube pages after the event.

We are excited to hold Nativities and Noels in person again.

Here are some of my favorite comments from visitors from the public during earlier Nativities and Noels:

• “We had a nativity like that one when I was growing up!”

• “I have some nativities. May I share one or more next year?” (Answer: “Yes!”)

• “There’s such a wonderful spirit here!”

• “I’m going to tell my family (or friends or Sunday School class, etc.) about this!”

• “This is the highlight of my Christmas season.”

I hope that you will come to Nativities and Noels this year. It — and the spiritual and emotional connections you can make there — just might be the highlight of your Christmas season too!

Carol Christensen is co-chair of Nativities and Noels and the volunteer Communication Director for the Topeka Stake of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Mainland China's first Mormon temple to open

As reported by Keith Zhai and Tony Munroe of Reuters, April 6, 2020:

The Utah-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also known as the Mormon church, plans to open its first temple in mainland China at a time when Beijing has been clamping down steadily on religious freedoms.

The temple in the eastern Chinese city of Shanghai will help fill a gap left by renovation work since last July at the church’s temple in Hong Kong, Russell M. Nelson, president of the church, announced on Sunday.

He also said seven other temples would open, including one in Dubai, its first in the Middle East.

“In Shanghai, a modest, multipurpose meeting place will provide a way for Chinese members to continue to participate in ordinances of the temple,” Nelson said.

“Because we respect the laws and regulations of the People’s Republic of China, the Church does not send proselytizing missionaries there; nor will we do so now,” he said.

A former cardiac surgeon, Nelson has spent time in China, studied Mandarin and was granted an honorary professorship by China’s Shandong University School of Medicine.

In January, the church sent two planeloads of protective medical equipment to the Children’s Medical Center in Shanghai to help manage the coronavirus outbreak.

No official figure is available for the number of Mormons in China.

China’s constitution guarantees religious freedom but under President Xi, Jinping Beijing has tightened restrictions on religions seen as a challenge to the authority of the ruling Communist Party.

The government has cracked down on underground churches, both Protestant and Catholic, and has rolled out legislation to increase oversight of religious education and practices.

Chinese law requires that places of worship register and submit to government oversight, but some have declined to register and are known as “house” or “underground” churches.

The Chinese government formally recognizes five religions: Buddhism, Taoism, Islam, Catholicism and Protestantism.

“Expatriate and Chinese congregations will continue to meet separately. The Church’s legal status there remains unchanged,” Nelson said.

“In an initial phase of facility use, entry will be by appointment only. The Shanghai Temple will not be a temple for tourists from other countries,” he said.

In 2018, the Vatican and China signed an agreement on the appointment of Roman Catholic bishops, a breakthrough on an issue that for decades fuelled tensions between the Holy See and Beijing and thwarted efforts toward diplomatic relations.

Utah Senate votes unanimously to decriminalize polygamy

It comes as no surprise to this blogger to read of this development; I've been predicting such a thing for years. When objective standards are jettisoned--in the case of marriage, one man and one woman--then everything becomes a matter of preference. There is then no logical basis on which to say that one preference is superior or more moral than another.

While there are examples in the Old Testament of Israelite leaders having more than one wife, these are examples of God's mercy in not striking them down; nowhere is polygamy or polyandry approved of in the Bible. The New Testament standard was laid down by the Lord Jesus Christ in Mark 10:7:

For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife;

Secular British scientist Jacob Bronowski, in The Ascent of Man, made a secular case against polygamy, arguing that the practice was outlawed in various societies in order to prevent older men from taking advantage of younger women. Indeed, the typical polygamous arrangement found among fundamentalist Mormons doesn't seem to be a 25-year-old man with a few women in their early 20s as wives, but rather a dirty middle-aged man in his 50s with a harem of teenagers. And, of course, if one man has a large number of wives, there must therefore be a large number of men without a wife. Although there are more women than men, the discrepancy isn't large enough to be evened out by polygamy. Historically, when large numbers of men have been unable to find enough women, they've invaded other lands in order to get them. Which is to say, this never ends well.

As reported by Nate Carlisle of the Salt Lake Tribune, February 28, 2020 (updated February 29, 2020) (links in original):

Utah polygamists can party like it’s 1889.

The Utah Senate on Friday gave final approval 27-0 to a bill that would reduce polygamy among consenting adults to an infraction — an offense below some traffic tickets — essentially decriminalizing the practice.

Gov. Gary Herbert has indicated he will sign the measure. If he does not, there appear to be enough votes in the Legislature to override a veto.

The bill, SB102, represents a historical shift in how Utah has regarded polygamy, which has been a felony (even for willing participants) for most of the state’s history. The current law makes polygamy punishable by up to five years in prison. It can be up to 15 years if the polygamists are found to have committed fraud, domestic violence, sexual abuse or human smuggling.

The new measure would do nothing to change the stiffer category. And while polygamy among consenting adults still would officially be a crime in Utah, the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Deidre Henderson, R-Spanish Fork, has said her intent was to lessen the penalties to dissuade law enforcement from pursuing charges against people who are breaking no other laws.

Sarah M.S. Pearsall, professor of American history at Cambridge University, said SB102 represents a big change for wives, husbands and children in polygamous households in Utah, especially since the practice has been viewed as “barbaric and unacceptable” since the earliest American colonies.

“It [also] is a significant change in the history of American marriage,” Pearsall wrote in an email to The Salt Lake Tribune, “since it enshrines the principle that consenting adults should not be treated as criminals for choosing to live in plural marriages.”

Henderson framed the legislative discussion in terms of keeping women and children safe from people who commit crimes within polygamy.

“In these isolated, insular communities, that’s where a lot of the problems can really escalate,” Henderson told reporters earlier this month. “And that’s where the bad people can really — and have — weaponized the law in order to keep their victims silent and isolated in their control.”

Ryan Fisher of Sound Choices Coalition, which tries to educate the public on what it sees as the harm of polygamy, issued a statement in anticipation of SB102’s passage. Fisher said the Legislature has not listened to victims from polygamous abusers.

“Senator Henderson and those that pushed this bill,” the statement said, “are recklessly trying to change history before they understand the consequences of the decriminalization and subsequent spreading of polygamy and the harms to men, women and children that are inherent in this social system.”

Polygamy was a common practice among followers of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who settled Utah in the mid-19th century. It expanded greatly under the faith’s second prophet-president, Brigham Young, perhaps the Western world’s most famous polygamist.

The church officially began to abandon plural marriage in 1890 as a condition of statehood. The Utah Constitution still says “polygamous or plural marriages are forever prohibited.”

The LDS Church excommunicates members found practicing polygamy. Most of Utah’s modern polygamists still trace their beliefs to the teachings of Mormon founder Joseph Smith.

Brielle Decker, the 65th wife of Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints leader Warren Jeffs, is ambivalent about the bill. She acknowledges plural families are afraid to report crimes to police and doesn’t expect that to change.

“They’re not going to just uphold the law all the sudden,” Decker said. “Polygamists always think they’re above the law.”

Jeffs is serving a sentence of life plus 20 years in a Texas prison for crimes related to sexually assaulting two girls he married as plural wives. He is one of the bad polygamists both sides used in arguments for and against SB102.

Some of Jeffs’ former followers, including Hildale Mayor Donia Jessop, said people who did not participate in his sex crimes were afraid to leave the FLDS and seek social services for fear it would expose their family to prosecution and having children removed from homes. Other former FLDS followers, including a Jeffs nephew, Ian Jeffs, said any lessening of the penalties would only embolden abusive polygamous leaders.

The bill passed the Senate the first time with zero no votes and won in the House, 70-3. The House made one amendment — clarifying that sexual battery within polygamy is punishable by 15 years in prison, too — that required another approval from the Senate on Friday.

Herbert made mention of the bill’s broad support on Capitol Hill during his monthly news conference Thursday.

“With marriage laws being what they are today,” the governor said, “and the liberalization of and more broadening of it, eliminating [polygamy] from being a felony to a lesser offense is probably warranted.”

First meeting between a Roman Catholic Pope and a Mormon President takes place in Rome

Neither the Roman Catholic Church nor the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a true Christian church, but antichrists of a feather flock together. As reported by Peggy Fletcher Stack and David Noyce of the Salt Lake Tribune, March 9, 2019 (bold, links in original):

For the first time, a Catholic pope and a Latter-day Saint prophet met — faith to faith and face to face.

Pope Francis and Russell M. Nelson, top leaders of separate global Christian religions, sat down together Saturday at the Vatican for a 33-minute exchange a day before the American-born faith dedicates its first temple in Rome, the cradle of Catholicism.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced the meeting between the 82-year-old Francis and the 94-year-old Nelson, early Saturday morning. M. Russell Ballard, the 90-year-old acting president of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, attended as well.

While the historic encounter may not be as significant for the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics — popes frequently give audiences to foremost religious figures — the spiritual calculus adds up to watershed recognition for the globe’s 16 million Latter-day Saints.

After their private meeting with the pope, Nelson and Ballard emerged, arms linked, at the Vatican.

“We had a most cordial, unforgettable experience with His Holiness," Nelson said in a news release. "He was most gracious and warm and welcoming to President Ballard and me.

“What a sweet, wonderful man he is,” the Latter-day Saint president added, "and how fortunate the Catholic people are to have such a gracious, concerned, loving and capable leader.”

So what did the religious leaders discuss? Global relief, for starters, and the two religions’ mutual efforts to relieve human suffering.

“We explained to His Holiness that we work side by side, that we have projects with Catholic Relief Services all over the world, in over 43 countries," Ballard said in the release. "[We’ve] been shoulder to shoulder as partners in trying to relieve suffering. He was very interested in that.”

Nelson said they also talked about the "importance of religious liberty, the importance of the family, our mutual concern for the youth of the church, for the secularization of the world, and the need for people to come to God, and worship him, pray to him and have the stability that faith in Jesus Christ will bring in their lives.”

And they chatted about the new Rome Temple, with its role in connecting families eternally in Mormon theology.

The visiting Latter-day Saint delegation presented the pontiff with a Christus figurine and a framed copy of the faith’s family proclamation in Italian. In return, Francis gave his guests a copy of his apostolic exhortation on the family.

Francis and Nelson concluded their meeting with a hug.

The Vatican offered no details of Francis’ Saturday audience with the Latter-day Saint delegation, The Associated Press reported.

The importance of the weekend events for Mormonism is evident in the fact that, for the first time in Latter-day Saint history, all 15 top male Latter-day Saint leaders (though none of its high-ranking female officers) will be present in the same location on foreign soil. It represents another marker that the Utah-based faith is ready to take its place in a spot where many biblical events occurred.

“Rome is Rome,” said Latter-day Saint historian Matthew Bowman, “a symbol of political authority and religious authority, a city that symbolizes the heart of Christianity.”

The Francis-Nelson meeting “indicates the relatively ecumenical nature of modern Roman Catholicism (and particularly this pope’s instincts toward public magnanimity),” Bowman said. “It also signals something about the politics of modern temple building — that they are as much a sign of material legitimacy as they are intended for ritual use.”

The existence of temples in key locations “shows the church’s intentions to be a serious global religion,” said Bowman, author of “The Mormon People: The Making of an American Faith," “one whose presence on the landscape is to be noted.”

The church is “still growing up in a lot of ways,” the historian said. “It’s trying to assert that it is a global faith with global aspirations and global ambitions.”

Ugo A. Perego, director of the LDS Institute of Religion in Rome, was at the temple there when the meeting of the leaders took place.

He was thrilled by the high-powered conversation.

“It is an exciting and historical time for everyone,” Perego wrote in an email. “I was born Catholic, and I can see a lot of good from a meeting like this one. Private closed-door meetings with the pope are not very common and not just anyone can ask for one.”

The institute director speculated that Francis might be more familiar with the American church than most would think.

“Being from Argentina and with a large membership in that country [of more than 450,000 Latter-day Saints], he surely knows about us,” Perego said. “Now we are definitely on his radar..."

Theological gap

...Both churches — the largest on the planet and a much smaller one — claim to be the true church of Jesus Christ.

They have deep theological differences, so great that the Vatican does not recognize Mormonism as Christian, citing the Latter-day Saint rejection of the Trinity as one of the reasons. Neither recognizes the other church’s baptism, requiring converts to be rebaptized into their respective new faith.

The conflict between the two even extends beyond theology to the question of divine authority, Bowman noted. “Each side claims ‘we have priesthood authority that nobody else has.’ That makes them rivals on multiple levels.”

In the 19th century and much of the 20th, many Latter-day Saints viewed the Roman Catholic Church as “the great and abominable” church described in Mormon scripture.

Recently, though, the two have collaborated on social issues (opposing same-sex marriage and defending religious freedom) and on humanitarian efforts (feeding the hungry, offering disaster relief, and building up resources for a sustainable living).

In 2014, two Latter-day Saint officials — Henry B. Eyring of the governing First Presidency and the late apostle L. Tom Perry — joined religious leaders and scholars from 14 faiths and 23 countries in Rome for a three-day Vatican-sponsored "colloquium" titled "An International Interreligious Colloquium on the Complementarity of Man and Woman."

At that time, the pontiff shook Eyring’s hand, a gesture believed to be the first such exchange between a pope and a leading Latter-day Saint authority.

Other high-ranking Latter-day Saints previously have met or greeted a pope, but not in any official religious capacity.

Jon Huntsman Sr., who died last year, visited Pope John Paul II and counted the late pontiff and the late Latter-day Saint President Gordon B. Hinckley as two men he most admired.

Such connections might have seemed unthinkable when Joseph Smith Jr. launched his little church in upstate New York in 1830 — or to the Latter-day Saints who trekked across the continent to set up their own Beehive State.

Warming trend

At first, those hardy Mormon pioneers who settled the Salt Lake Valley and the Catholics who began joining them in the 1860s generally had a live-and-let-live relationship, Catholic historian Gary Topping told The Salt Lake Tribune in 2009 during the centennial celebration for the downtown landmark Cathedral of the Madeleine.

"Catholics and Mormons were operating on two separate tracks pretty much," Topping, archivist for the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City, explained.

Still, he added, “there was always a little sniping going on."

The state’s predominant church was building what they hoped would be Zion, while the Catholics planted parishes, schools and Holy Cross Hospital.

Salt Lake City’s first Catholic bishop, Lawrence Scanlan, had hoped the schools he started would lead to conversions among Latter-day Saint children, Topping said. "He was disabused of that pretty quickly."

There continued to be some cooperation but also barbs between the two churches in Utah.

The low point for relations came in 1958. when Latter-day Saint general authority Bruce R. McConkie wrote an encyclopedic volume, “Mormon Doctrine,” which identified the Catholic Church as the “church of the devil” and the “most abominable above all other churches.”

Then-Catholic Bishop Duane Hunt apparently took the matter to Latter-day Saint President David O. McKay, and McConkie's book was revised in the next edition.

"He never said it directly, but I think McKay was so upset by the negative impact of McConkie’s book that it jolted him into believing he had been part of the problem,” McKay biographer Gregory Prince said in a 2009 interview. "He quietly reversed field. After that, he never again was negative to Catholics, privately or publicly."

Building a partnership

In the past few decades, Utah’s Catholic bishops and Latter-day Saint leaders have formed strong bonds over common values and visions.

Catholics run homeless shelters; Latter-day Saints fund meals and volunteer to help.

In 2008, former Utah Catholic Bishop George H. Niederauer had moved to San Francisco as archbishop and asked his Latter-day Saint buddy, then-President Thomas S. Monson, to help drum up support for California’s Proposition 8, which defined marriage as between a man and a woman.

Monson enlisted his church members and statewide volunteers in the effort, ultimately taking the lead against same-sex marriage.

Latter-day Saint presidents and apostles grew to respect and value their association with Catholic bishops and priests. They worshipped together, sang together, dined together, golfed together, laughed together and wept together.

“Over the years we have collaborated with the Latter-day Saints for the common good,” Monsignor Terrence Fitzgerald said. “We support common values, we share the common conviction that we are all children of God and deserve respect.”

From time to time, Utah Catholic bishops have aided LDS efforts “to obtain permits to build their temples, as in the case with Bishop [John] Wester and the LDS temple in Paris,” Fitzgerald said, just as Monson encouraged Latter-day Saints in Draper “to support our efforts to build the Skaggs Catholic Center.”

Two churches buttressing each other helps “build decency in the community. … [It’s] collaborating in the best way possible,” the monsignor said. “That is what is expected of Christians and others of good faith.”

A testament to these multifaith ties was on display in June 2015 at a reception honoring Wester before his departure to head up the Archdiocese of Santa Fe.

Ballard, the Latter-day Saint apostle, expressed his sadness at seeing Wester leave Utah.

"You are losing your wonderful bishop," he told the crowd gathered in a Salt Lake City hotel ballroom, "and I am losing one of my very dear friends."

Wester and Ballard, along with Ivory Homes founder Ellis Ivory, had become regular golfing buddies.

Besides sharing a few jokes and laughs, “we talked about community issues and concerns over values,” Ballard said. “It was a marvelous experience for me..."

...Utah’s current Catholic bishop, Oscar A. Solis, congratulated the Latter-day Saints on building a temple in Rome.

“We are pleased that the members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have a religious facility convenient for their members in Rome,” Solis wrote in an email. “We all benefit when people of every faith have the ability to worship as they wish and can receive the support they need for meaningful lives...”

100 years ago: The death of Mormon Church President Joseph Fielding Smith, Sr.

But as touching the resurrection of the dead, have ye not read that which was spoken unto you by God, saying,
I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not the God of the dead, but of the living. Matthew 22:31-32

And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment; Hebrews 9:27

For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit:
By which also he went and preached unto the spirits in prison;
Which sometime were disobedient, when once the longsuffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, eight souls were saved by water...
...For for this cause was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit. I Peter 3:18-20, 4:6

On November 19, 1918, Joseph Fielding Smith, Sr., President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints since 1901, died of pneumonia resulting from pleurisy, six days after his 80th birthday. Mr. Smith, a nephew of Mormon Church founder Joseph Smith, had five wives and fathered 45 children, although he officially opposed polygamy because he believed it was more important for Utah to achieve statehood within the U.S.A.

On October 3, 1918, six weeks before his death, Mr. Smith, the Latter-day Saints' "Prophet, Seer and Revelator" received the "Vision of the Redemption of the Dead," which he submitted to the counselors of the First Presidency, the Council of the Twelve, and the Patriarch on October 31, and it was unanimously accepted by them. The revelation is now part of the Mormon scripture Doctrine and Covenants as section 138.

Some excerpts:

27 But his ministry among those who were dead was limited to the brief time intervening between the crucifixion and his resurrection;

28 And I wondered at the words of Peter—wherein he said that the Son of God preached unto the spirits in prison, who sometime were disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah—and how it was possible for him to preach to those spirits and perform the necessary labor among them in so short a time.

29 And as I wondered, my eyes were opened, and my understanding quickened, and I perceived that the Lord went not in person among the wicked and the disobedient who had rejected the truth, to teach them;

30 But behold, from among the righteous, he organized his forces and appointed messengers, clothed with power and authority, and commissioned them to go forth and carry the light of the gospel to them that were in darkness, even to all the spirits of men; and thus was the gospel preached to the dead.

31 And the chosen messengers went forth to declare the acceptable day of the Lord and proclaim liberty to the captives who were bound, even unto all who would repent of their sins and receive the gospel.

32 Thus was the gospel preached to those who had died in their sins, without a knowledge of the truth, or in transgression, having rejected the prophets.

33 These were taught faith in God, repentance from sin, vicarious baptism for the remission of sins, the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands,

34 And all other principles of the gospel that were necessary for them to know in order to qualify themselves that they might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the spirit.

35 And so it was made known among the dead, both small and great, the unrighteous as well as the faithful, that redemption had been wrought through the sacrifice of the Son of God upon the cross.

36 Thus was it made known that our Redeemer spent his time during his sojourn in the world of spirits, instructing and preparing the faithful spirits of the prophets who had testified of him in the flesh;

37 That they might carry the message of redemption unto all the dead, unto whom he could not go personally, because of their rebellion and transgression, that they through the ministration of his servants might also hear his words...

...50 For the dead had looked upon the long absence of their spirits from their bodies as a bondage.

51 These the Lord taught, and gave them power to come forth, after his resurrection from the dead, to enter into his Father’s kingdom, there to be crowned with immortality and eternal life,

52 And continue thenceforth their labor as had been promised by the Lord, and be partakers of all blessings which were held in reserve for them that love him...

...57 I beheld that the faithful elders of this dispensation, when they depart from mortal life, continue their labors in the preaching of the gospel of repentance and redemption, through the sacrifice of the Only Begotten Son of God, among those who are in darkness and under the bondage of sin in the great world of the spirits of the dead.

58 The dead who repent will be redeemed, through obedience to the ordinances of the house of God,

59 And after they have paid the penalty of their transgressions, and are washed clean, shall receive a reward according to their works, for they are heirs of salvation.

60 Thus was the vision of the redemption of the dead revealed to me, and I bear record, and I know that this record is true, through the blessing of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, even so. Amen.

Although the passages cited my Mr. Smith in I Peter don't tell us the exact words spoken by the Lord Jesus Christ to the spirits in prison, a reasonable inference is that He proclaimed that He had fulfilled the prophecies and completed His work of salvation. There's nothing in these passages to indicate that He was offering the possibility of salvation after death. Indeed, the vision received by Joseph Fielding Smith contradicts the statement of the Lord in Matthew 22:31-32 and Hebrews 9:27. The God of the Bible is the God of the living, but Mormonism is obsessed with the dead.

The perceptive reader will notice in paragraphs 58-59 of the vision clear proclamations that salvation is by works and not by the grace of God. Mormonism then and now believes that the blood of Jesus Christ is not sufficient to pay for all sins, but there are sins for which the sinner must shed his own blood, contrary to the biblical teaching that the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin (I John 1:7). The Mormon "gospel" is not the true gospel of Jesus Christ at all, but a false gospel, which, according to Galatians 1:6-7, is not a gospel at all.

Since the Vision of the Redemption of the Dead received by Mormon "Prophet, Seer and Revelator" Joseph Fielding Smith, Sr. flatly contradicts the clear statements of the Bible, I conclude that Mr. Smith's vision didn't come from God; it's a false revelation, and Mr. Smith was a false prophet.

Joseph Fielding Smith, Sr. was succeeded as Latter-day Saints President by Heber J. Grant. Mr. Smith's son Joseph Fielding Smith, Jr. served as President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints from 1970-1972.

See also my post Researcher claims that Mormons are still baptizing Holocaust victims and other dead Jews (December 29, 2017).

Current Mormon President Russell Nelson uses the word "revelation" more than most of his predecessors

One of the marks of a cult is that the cult leader claims to receive revelation that others don't have, and which can't be questioned. I have to correct, somewhat, what I said in a previous post, asking when was the last time the "Prophet, Seer and Revelator" of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints prophesied, saw, or revelated. The church's current President at least claims, more than most of his predecessors, to receive revelation; as reported by Peggy Fletcher Stack of the Salt Lake Tribune, October 2, 2018 (links in original):

By his own account, Russell M. Nelson speaks often to God, or, rather, God speaks often to him.

Nelson, the 94-year-old president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, said recently that he was awakened at 2 a.m. with a distinct impression that he should go to the Dominican Republic.

Within days, the Church News reported, the energetic nonagenarian was on a plane to that Caribbean nation.

This is an “era of unprecedented revelation,” Nelson told the missionaries gathered to hear him there Sept. 1.

Indeed, in his first nearly nine months as the Utah-based faith’s top “prophet, seer and revelator," Nelson has used the term “revelation” again and again to describe his motivation for initiatives and changes.

It is not unusual for Latter-day Saint presidents to speak of being inspired by deity. After all, members believe that their movement began with founder Joseph Smith’s directions from God in a New York forest not to join any other church but to start his own. From then to now, all Mormon prophets believed their calling was to express the mind and will of God for the church and the wider world.

Few of Nelson’s modern predecessors, however, have made such strong use of the word “revelation,” at least in public or in news releases. The current Latter-day Saint leader, on the other hand, speaks boldly of his prayer life and divine mandates.

In January, the month Nelson took the faith’s reins, his wife, Wendy Watson Nelson, reported that one night she was prompted to leave her husband alone in their bedroom.

“Two hours later, he emerged from the room,” Wendy Nelson told apostle Neil L. Andersen, who reported it on Facebook. “Wendy, you won’t believe what’s been happening,” the church president told his wife, according to Andersen’s account. “The Lord has given me detailed instructions on what I am to do.”

His choice of counselors in the governing First Presidency? The Lord instructed him. New apostles? The Lord inspired him. Emphasizing the church’s full name and eschewing its long-standing “Mormon” nickname? The Lord “impressed” it on his mind.

It’s not surprising, then, that Nelson’s first major sermon to the global membership during his inaugural General Conference since taking the hierarchy’s helm was titled “Revelation for the Church, Revelation for Our Lives.” No church president in recent decades has seemed so at ease with the rhetoric of his own revelation.

Ever since their faith’s founding in 1830, Latter-day Saints have come to expect their prophet to have regular exchanges with the Almighty, who they believe is directing the church.

Smith reported a visionary experience with God and Jesus as well as the spiritual ability to “translate” ancient scripture — including the faith’s Book of Mormon — into modern English.

His adherents collected Smith’s proclaimed interactions with the heavens and published them (as well as other materials) in a volume known as the Doctrine and Covenants.

Subsequent Latter-day Saint prophets were less comfortable than Smith attaching “thus saith the Lord” to their admonitions. But they definitely felt the mantle of godly spokesman.

In the 1930s, Mormon apostle John A. Widtsoe described two kinds of revelation, said historian Matthew Bowman, author of “The Mormon People: The Making of an American Faith.”

The first type is the one employed by Smith and his immediate successor, Brigham Young, which “pertained to the cosmos and the kingdom of God.”

The second is “more mundane, day-to-day things of the kingdom,” said Bowman, paraphrasing Widtsoe. “But those are revelations, too.”

Widtsoe was trying to help members, the historian said, grapple with the “fading of the charismatic element in the church.”

Bowman said short-lived church President Harold B. Lee believed that the faith’s welfare plan — to help members during the Great Depression and beyond — was revelatory.

As an apostle in that desperate era, Lee went into an isolated woods to pray about the issue, describing it in language much like Smith’s well-known “First Vision.”

“As I kneeled down, my petition was, ‘What kind of an organization should be set up in order to accomplish what the presidency has assigned?’” Lee recalled in a General Conference speech in 1972. “And there came to me on that glorious morning one of the most heavenly realizations of the power of the priesthood of God. It was as though something were saying to me, ‘There is no new organization necessary to take care of the needs of this people. All that is necessary is to put the priesthood of God to work.’”

Perhaps the most momentous assertion of divine revelation to a 20th-century Mormon prophet happened in 1978 to Spencer W. Kimball, who ended a centurylong ban on black men and boys being ordained to the all-male priesthood and on women and girls entering Latter-day Saint temples.

The decision to change the long-standing policy came first to Kimball after years of prayer and meditation and then to top Latter-day Saint authorities meeting in the Salt Lake Temple.

“We joined [President Kimball] in prayer in the most sacred of circumstances,” recalled Gordon B. Hinckley, who was an apostle at the time and later rose to church president. “I do not recall the exact words that he spoke. But I do recall my own feelings and the nature of the expressions of my brethren. There was a hallowed and sanctified atmosphere in the room.”

For Hinckley, “it felt as if a conduit opened between the heavenly throne and the kneeling, pleading prophet of God who was joined by his brethren,” he told members a decade after the experience. “The Spirit of God was there.”

The future president went on to say that there was not the sound of a ”’rushing mighty wind,’ there were not ‘cloven tongues like as of fire’ as there had been on the Day of Pentecost. But there was a Pentecostal spirit.”

The assembled men did not hear a “voice audible to our physical ears,” Hinckley said. “… But the voice of the [Holy] Spirit whispered with certainty into our minds and our very souls.”

As president, Hinckley did not mention God when introducing “The Family: A Proclamation to the World” or his plans to erect smaller temples — both significant theological and programmatic developments — nor even when he offered his stern 2006 admonition against the sin of racism.

One of the few changes Hinckley attached directly to God, at least in public, was the Perpetual Education Fund, which offers school loans to needy members. He described it in a 2001 General Conference sermon as “a plan which we believe is inspired by the Lord.”

That hardly means these men shied away from mentioning their revelatory experiences in private or from referring openly to their prayers and pleadings with the Lord.

“They clearly believed they were inspired by God and willingly assumed the prophetic mantle,” said Patrick Mason, head of Mormon studies at Claremont Graduate University. “But they rarely went to the ‘God spoke to me’ rhetoric.”

Modern Mormons typically say “we’ve been praying and feel inspired,” Mason said. “We teach revelation, but we inhabit inspiration as a practice.”

Most Latter-day Saint leaders are “a little gun-shy to go to the ‘R’ word,” the scholar said. “Nelson isn’t...”

...Even before Nelson became the church’s 17th president, he was comfortable using the “R” word.

In that first sermon, the Latter-day Saint prophet reiterated that “the privilege of receiving revelation is one of the greatest gifts of God to his children.”

Before Nelson’s appointment more than 34 years ago to full-time church service as an apostle, he was a renowned heart surgeon. He said in his April speech that “in an operating room, I have stood over a patient — unsure how to perform an unprecedented procedure — and experienced the Holy Ghost diagramming the technique in my mind.”

He also mentioned that “to strengthen [his] proposal” to his wife, Wendy (his first wife, Dantzel, had died), Nelson told her, “I know about revelation and how to receive it.”

In January 2016, when Nelson was the senior member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, he described a controversial policy about gays as a revelation.

The policy, which leaked out the previous November, dictates that married same-sex couples be considered “apostates” and generally bars their children from Mormon rituals until they are 18.

In a speech from Brigham Young University-Hawaii to the faith’s millennials everywhere, Nelson explained the policy’s reasoning.

Balancing their understanding of Mormon doctrine about the “plan of salvation,” which is built on male-female eternal marriage, with compassion for children of same-sex couples, he said the apostles “considered countless permutations and combinations of possible scenarios that could arise."

Nelson’s immediate predecessor, President Thomas S. Monson, then declared “the mind of the Lord and the will of the Lord.”

“Each of us during that sacred moment felt a spiritual confirmation,” Nelson said, in the first official explanation of the hotly debated policy’s origins. “It was our privilege as apostles to sustain what had been revealed to President Monson.”

That is how, Nelson said, revelation works.

Nelson explained that revelation from on high is a sacred process.

“The [three-member] First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles counsel together and share all the Lord has directed us to understand and to feel, individually and collectively,” he said. "And then, we watch the Lord move upon the president of the church to proclaim the Lord’s will.”

Such statements echoed words and phrases used by Kimball and others to describe their experience ending the racial ban in 1978.

This language is one of “authority and legitimation,” Bowman said. “It adds weight to claims [he] is making.”

The “willingness to claim revelation in public,” the historian noted, “has grown more rare over time.”

Stuart Reid, a former Utah legislator who previously worked in the church’s public affairs department, believes that Nelson’s use of the term “revelation” is no accident but rather reflects the Latter-day Saint leader’s real interactions with divinity.

“The Lord really does speak to him in the night,” Reid said on a recent episode of The Salt Lake Tribune’s “Mormon Land” podcast. “He is a person who seeks revelation and insight … of what the Lord expects of this church.”

The elderly leader seems to have a sense of urgency, Reid said. If listeners pay attention to his language and “start connecting the dots, they will see he is laying a foundation for the church in ways we have not heard in a long, long time. … Each intermediate step [announcement] is a building block in that foundation.”

Nelson is preparing the faithful for the long-awaited Second Coming of Christ, Reid said, and relaying God’s will is a key factor in that readying.

This blogger believes that Mormons, like others who are deceived, are being prepared for the day when their "Prophet, Seer and Revelator" will receive a revelation that the Antichrist is the true Christ, and that Latter-day Saints must recognize him as such.

See also my posts: Mormons eschew youth in choosing their latest president (January 22, 2018)

40 years ago: "Revelation" prompts Mormons to reverse long-standing policy and admit Negroes to the priesthood (June 9, 2018)

150 years ago: Future Mormon President delivers false prophecy (September 2, 2018)

Another university caves in to whiny atheists

The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good. Psalms 14:1 (see also Psalms 53:1)

No one is forced to read or believe any literature placed in hotel rooms, but atheists are so pathetically fragile that they need smelling salts or grief counselling at the thought of even being in the same room as anything that mentions God.

Courageous University Administrations could be the title of a very thin book. Here we go again, as reported by Peggy Fletcher Stack of the Salt Lake Tribune, October 1, 2018 (links in original):

After a complaint from a group that tracks what it sees as violations of the separation of church and state, Dixie State Inn, a hotel associated with the state-owned southern Utah university, removed all copies of the Bible and the Book of Mormon from guest rooms.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation alerted Dixie State’s president about the problem in June, who then turned it over to the St. George school’s lawyers to consider.

The group reminded Dixie that the establishment clause of U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment forbids public schools from promoting, endorsing or advancing any religion.

After an in-depth analysis by Alison Vicroy, the university’s assistant general counsel, the school asked the inn to take the religious texts out of individual guest rooms.

That was “an appropriate course of action,” Dixie State spokeswoman Jyl Hall said Monday. “The university doesn’t want either the appearance or the reality of advancing one religion over another.”

Copies of the Bible and Book of Mormon, the latter being The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ signature scripture, Hall said, are still available at the front desk.

Bibles, often supplied by Gideons International, are commonly found in privately owned hotels. Marriott International, whose founders are Latter-day Saints, bought Starwood (which includes Sheraton and Westin outlets) two years ago and plans to place copies of the Bible and Book of Mormon in 300,000 rooms in its newly acquired hotels by year’s end, according to The Associated Press.

See also my post University of Windsor caves in to whiny atheists and removes prayer from convocation ceremony (December 20, 2012)

150 years ago: Future Mormon President delivers false prophecy

But the prophet, which shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, even that prophet shall die.
And if thou say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the Lord hath not spoken?
When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously: thou shalt not be afraid of him. Deuteronomy 18:20-22

Today--September 2, 2018--marks 120 years since the death of Wilford Woodruff at the age of 91. Mr. Woodruff joined the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in 1833 and worked his way up the ladder, as a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles from 1839-1889, serving as President of the Quorum from 1880-1889, and then as President of the church from 1889 until his death. He practiced plural marriage, with at least 9 wives and 34 children by them, but officially banned the practice in 1890 when it became apparent that Utah would never be granted statehood within the U.S.A. unless plural marriage was outlawed.

Mr. Woodruff believed that the second coming of Jesus (the Mormon Jesus, that is, not the biblical Jesus) and the end of the world were imminent. He was 12 years away from becoming the Mormon Church's "Prophet, Seer and Revelator" when, on August 22, 1868, he preached a sermon in which he prophesied that New York City would be "destroyed by an earthquake;" Boston would be "swept into the sea, by the sea heaving itself beyond its bounds;" and Albany, New York, would be "destroyed by fire." Speaking afterwards, Brigham Young--the current "Prophet, Seer and Revelator"--stated that "what Brother Woodruff has said is revelation and will be fulfilled."

I don't know how Mr. Woodruff defined "imminent," but 150 years have gone by since he delivered his apocalyptic sermon, and the prophesied events still have yet to come to pass. This blogger finds it very hard to believe that even the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints would regard T + 150 years and counting as being within reasonable bounds of "imminent."

When it comes to the Mormon President's title, is there anyone who can remember the last time any "Prophet, Seer and Revelator" actually prophesied, saw, and revelated? As Dave Hunt and Ed Decker stated in their book The God Makers (1984), the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is a "non-Prophet religion."

LDS President wants to discard the word "Mormon"

As reported by Peggy Fletcher Stack and Scott D. Pierce of the Salt Lake Tribune, August 16, 2018 (updated August 23, 2018) (bold, links in original):

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints really, truly, absolutely wants to be known as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Not the LDS Church. Not the Mormon church.

It made that clear Thursday — even though the last attempt to eradicate those nicknames for the Utah-based faith flopped.

The new push came from God to President Russell M. Nelson, the church said in a news release Thursday.

“The Lord has impressed upon my mind the importance of the name he has revealed for his church,” Nelson is quoted as saying, “even The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.”

The faith’s headquarters in Salt Lake City and Latter-day Saints across the globe have much “work before us to bring ourselves in harmony with his will,” the 93-year-old Nelson said in the statement. “In recent weeks, various church leaders and departments have initiated the necessary steps to do so.”

Thursday’s statement — released on mormonnewsroom.org — referred readers to the “updated Newsroom style guide,” which calls on news organizations to follow these instructions:

• Use the full name — The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — on first reference.

• Refer to “the Church,” the “Church of Jesus Christ” or the “restored Church of Jesus Christ” in shortened or subsequent references.

• Avoid using the abbreviation “LDS” or the nickname “Mormon” as substitutes for the church’s name, as in “Mormon Church,” “LDS Church” or “Church of the Latter-day Saints.”

• Refer to members as “members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints” or “Latter-day Saints,” not “Mormons.”

The new guidelines also state that “‘Mormonism’ is inaccurate and should not be used,” and that the term “‘the restored gospel of Jesus Christ’ is accurate and preferred.”

The style edict says “Mormon” is correctly used in proper names such as the Book of Mormon, the faith’s signature scripture, or when used as an adjective in historical expressions such as “Mormon Trail.”

Still, many believing observers are skeptical that this drive will be any more successful than a similar effort to jettison “Mormon” that launched before the 2002 Winter Olympics. That attempt ended a decade later with a return to the long-standing and, in some quarters, beloved nickname “Mormon.”

Rocky Anderson, who was Salt Lake City’s mayor from 2000 to 2008, diligently followed the dominant church’s request back then — even using “the Church of Jesus Christ” on second reference, which sometimes earned jeers even from faithful Latter-day Saints.

“It was really awkward,” Anderson said Thursday. “I did find it a mouthful.”

What’s in a name?

For authorities such as Nelson, the faith’s name is more than branding.

After its founding in 1830, the church was known variously as The Church of Christ, The Church of Jesus Christ and even The Church of the Latter-day Saints. In 1838, it became The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when church founder Joseph Smith received what was recorded as a revelation from God:

“For thus shall my church be called in the last days, even The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints,” Smith declared in Doctrine and Covenants 115:4.

Blogger Steve Evans, founder of By Common Consent, sees Nelson’s effort as “fighting for the divinely revealed name of the church in the hearts and minds of the members.”

In a 1990 speech (a year after former church President Ezra Taft Benson sang “I Am a Mormon Boy” from the pulpit), Nelson, then a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, spoke of the importance of using the church’s full name.

“He views it as something sacred, which I respect,” Evans said. “But the initiative won’t succeed — if success means getting everyone to stop using the terms ‘Mormon’ or ‘LDS Church.’”

Evans predicts this undertaking will only “confuse outsiders,” he said. “I don’t think it substantively alters external perspectives of the church, but I do think it makes us look a little persnickety.”

The church already has “a popular brand — why not embrace it and use it? … We should be leveraging those names instead, while simultaneously teaching the real name of the church and reinforcing why it is something holy to us.”

LDS blogger Jana Riess, a senior columnist for Religion News Service, also believes the drive may fail.

“It would be extremely unlikely for the majority of journalists to adopt this new style,” she said, “in part because the church has not provided a single-word term that is as descriptive as ‘Mormon’ or ‘LDS.’”

When people plug “the Church of Jesus Christ” into a Google search, Riess said, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints “is not going to come up.”

And Latter-day Saints themselves likely will continue to use the only monikers they’ve used their whole lives, she said, but now “might feel guilty about it.”

In academia, “Mormonism” is by far the preferred term, said Patrick Mason, head of Mormon studies at Claremont Graduate University in Southern California.

In addition to Claremont, there are three other professorships in “Mormon studies” — at the University of Utah, Utah State University and the University of Virginia.

“I cannot imagine a university approving a professorship in ‘Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saint Studies’ or ‘Restored Gospel of Jesus Christ Studies,’” Mason wrote in an email. “‘Mormonism’ and ‘Mormon’ will continue to be dominant in the academy.”

Mason has a personal stake in this. He has just published a book called “What Is Mormonism?” Still, the LDS scholar concedes that Mormonism “has always been a fraught and imprecise term.”

Beyond the main body

Does “Mormon” apply equally to members of the mainstream LDS Church, the Community of Christ, the polygamous Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and all other religious descendants of Joseph Smith and the early Latter-day Saint movement, Mason asked, “or just to the LDS Church?”

Some people are upset when “Mormonism” is used synonymously with the LDS Church and its members — as if they are the only “Mormons” and all the other groups don’t exist, he said, while members of the Community of Christ (formerly the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) say “they don’t want to be called ‘Mormons,’ because they associate the term with the Utah-based LDS Church.”

Such confusion may have been part of the reason for this move, said historian Matthew Bowman, author of “The Mormon People: The Making of an American Faith.”

“This strikes me as a move toward boundary maintenance, in both the manner of its presentation and the fact of it,” Bowman wrote in an email. “Nelson’s language asserts his revelatory authority and implicitly contrasts that authority with the common vernacular of the world. He frames language use here as a matter of discipline and loyalty. The nomenclature he offers stresses the uniqueness of the church.”

Bowman said that, in the end, “this effort seems to me an attempt to emphasize the distinctiveness of the church.”

A global faith

Wilfried Decoo, a Latter-day Saint writer and professor in Belgium, understands his faith’s desire to be seen as “Christian” by urging everyone to use its full name.

By rejecting “Mormon” as short for the church, Decoo wrote in a 2011 essay, “we give up the key element of our international brand name, recognizable in all languages.”

In another language, for example, “Latter-day Saints” is translated as: “I am a Holy Being of the Almost Final Period.”

“This policy kind of shows how parochial-American someone at the top thinks without any clue of international semantics,” he said Thursday from his home in Europe. “I don’t think it will have any effect outside of the church, and even inside … It’s just impossible to enforce.”

Gordon B. Hinckley, who became church president in 1995, understood the dilemma.

“‘The Mormon church,’ of course, is a nickname. And nicknames have a way of becoming fixed,” he preached in the October 1990 General Conference. “I suppose that regardless of our efforts, we may never convert the world to general use of the full and correct name of the church. Because of the shortness of the word ‘Mormon’ and the ease with which it is spoken and written, they will continue to call us the Mormons, the Mormon church, and so forth.”

Hinckley recalled a member in England telling him: “While I’m thankful for the privilege of being a follower of Jesus Christ and a member of the church which bears his name, I am not ashamed of the nickname ‘Mormon.’”

When someone asked him about it, the man replied, “‘Mormon’ means ‘more good.’”

Hinckley knew that wasn’t the actual meaning, but adopted the man’s thinking about the tag.

“We may not be able to change the nickname,” the affable leader concluded, “but we can make it shine with added luster.”

After all, Hinckley said, Mormon is the “name of a man who was a great [Book of Mormon] prophet who struggled to save his nation, and also the name of a book which is a mighty testament of eternal truth, a veritable witness of the divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ.”

This blogger finds the Latter-day Saints' desire to drop the word "Mormon" to be rather suspicious, as I remember seeing television commercials for the church in the 1980s where they referred to themselves as the Mormons. I suspect that the move is not only to continue the LDS practice of deceiving people into believing that they're actually Christians, but may also be because the word "Mormon" may have negative connotations, which begs the question as to why "Mormon" may have negative connotations. Could it be because when people hear the word "Mormon" they think of the word "cult?"

This reminds me of when Amway in North America tried using the name Quixtar in the early 2000s. Could that have been because the name Amway brought to mind thoughts of deceptive marketing practices? If I recall correctly, the television commercials for Quixtar mentioned it as being formerly Amway, which tended to negate whatever the purpose of the name change may have been.

I doubt that the Latter-day Saints will be successful in getting the word "Mormon" dropped from common use; The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is just too long a name to be used comfortably in conversation or writing, and "Mormon" has been around too long to be discarded. I'm not the only one who's doubtful that Russell Nelson's desire will be realized (and I hardly need say, but will do so anyway, that the "God" who spoke to Dr. Nelson is a false god--a "god" who was once a man and is an extraterrestrial from a planet near a star called Kolob). According to Ms. Stack in the Salt Lake Tribune, August 27, 2018 (links in original):

So if “Mormon,” “Mormonism” and “LDS” are out, what’s in?

Go ahead. You find an appropriate one-word stand-in for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, its people and its principles.

It must be clear and universally acceptable. It must tie the Utah-based faith to Christianity and its own history without confusing it with other denominations.

Oh, and it must be short, recognizable and straightforward. You know, like “Mormon.”

Moments after church President Russell M. Nelson announced last week that God told him to reinforce the faith’s full name and eschew its long-standing nicknames, speculation sprang up about alternatives.

We posed the question on social media and got hundreds of responses — some creative, some snarky, some silly, but none satisfying.

The Church Formerly Known as Mormon? May have worked for rock artist Prince, who died in 2016, but it violates church leaders’ request by including the very word they are trying to downplay.

Because “Latter-day Saint” is approved, how about Latter-day Saintism? Nah, too easily confused with more devilish devotions.

Ex-Mo or anti-Mo? Don’t go there.

Latter-day Sainthood (Laddies or Latties, for short)? Too haughty and presumptuous, perhaps.

Ziontology? Clever, yes, but ask Scientologists how that would fly.

TCOJCOLDS (pronounced Taco J. Colds)? An anagram lover’s dream but a marketer’s nightmare.

You see, if there were an obvious solution, it probably would have been trotted out already — and caught on.

A name or emphasis change is hardly an unreasonable request, but it’s especially tough for institutions to implement (think the New Coke).

Back in the 1990s, some folks quietly questioned the decision by the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to switch to the Community of Christ, a vague-sounding nomenclature that meant reporters routinely would add (formerly RLDS) to explain the religion’s roots.

The problem for the Salt Lake City-headquartered faith is that “Mormon” is the most commonly used one-word moniker both inside and out of the 16 million-member church. It is familiar, easy and distinctive — and has been part of the lexicon for nearly 200 years.

Latter-day Saint authorities propose using “the Church” or “the Church of Jesus Christ” for shortened references, but the latter has a long association with other Christian faiths and the former is vague and could mean any church anywhere.

Besides, “The Church” traditionally refers to the Roman Catholic Church, which, with its 1.2 billion members, is by far the world’s largest Christian faith.

Lots of groups would lay claim to the “Church of Jesus Christ,” including Disciples of Christ, United Church of Christ and the numerous Churches of God in Christ (which often take a parenthesis to know they are Pentecostals).

A Latter-day Saint offshoot even has the website address thechurchofjesuschrist.org.

All this breeds confusion, not the clarity Nelson craves.

Some wonder if reporters or academics could say, on second references, The Church of Jesus Christ (Mormon), tying the two together — as earlier Latter-day Saint media ads did.

Would it be OK to dub the group Jesus Mormons? Nope, there’s that pesky term again.

How about Latter-day Saint Christians? That’s feasible. After all, church officials said “Latter-day Saints” is an acceptable substitute for members.

In fact, before the church’s full, formal name was spelled out in 1838 by founder Joseph Smith, many members called it the “Church of the Latter-day Saints.” But church brass specifically rejected that name for the institution in the style guide that accompanied Nelson’s pronouncement.

Through the decades, the term “Mormon” — the name of an ancient prophet in the faith’s foundational scripture, the Book of Mormon — became dominant and “Latter-day Saints” faded from public recognition.

In the 1990s and early 2000s, the church pushed the public and members to drop “Mormon” in favor of “Latter-day Saints” or “LDS Church” as an attempt to counter the perception that members and their church were not part of the Christian family. It even adopted a new logo that emphasizes Jesus Christ by casting his name in larger letters.

The effort mostly failed. By 2010, the church reversed itself and wholeheartedly re-embraced “Mormon.” It spent millions promoting the “I’m a Mormon” ad blitz and two feature documentaries titled “Meet the Mormons.”

So is “Latter-day Saints” — or just “Saints” — a good replacement for all that? Meet the Saints. I’m a Saint.

Some members feel squeamish about calling themselves “Saints,” fearing that it sounds self-laudatory and self-serving.

Indeed, “Saint” generally is associated with an especially holy Catholic or Orthodox Christian — not to mention a prominent pro football team.

As to the word “Mormonism,” it covers many traditions and beliefs that track their origin to Joseph Smith, including the Community of Christ, ahem, RLDS.

Some have suggested members be called “Brighamites,” a throwback tag given to the main body of Latter-day Saints who followed Brigham Young along the Mormon Trail (the church gives a pass to the trail reference since it’s historic) to the Great Basin.

Clearly, coming up with a worthy replacement for “Mormon” is a tall order. Even the church-owned Deseret News needs time to devise one for its weekly Mormon Times content.

“We are currently evaluating potential names for this section,” Editor Doug Wilks writes, “and will make a change in coming weeks.” (The newspaper has dropped Mormon Times from its website.)

“Mormonism” has been a handy term, says Latter-day Saint scholar Richard Bushman, an emeritus history professor at Columbia University, to describe a bigger religious reality than a single faith group.

“We are a church. We are a gospel. We are a priesthood and an organization,” he says in the latest Salt Lake Tribune “Mormon Land” podcast. “But something larger has been created from that. ... We are a people, almost an ethnicity, and a culture that emanates from the people.”

Nelson’s injunction is no trivial exercise, Bushman says. It is forcing Latter-day Saints to “rethink who we are and what these words amount to.”

Stuart Reid, a former public affairs official who helped with the church’s earlier effort to drop “Mormon,” sees Nelson’s motivation as more expansive than a simple rebranding.

It is the result of “revelation,” Reid says in the same “Mormon Land” episode. The prophet is preparing the faithful “for the Second Coming of Christ.”

Language does evolve so there’s no telling how outsiders or insiders will describe The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints come 2050.

The word “Mormonism” could be little more than a vague echo of bygone days — or, if Reid is onto something, maybe the end of the world will already have happened.

40 years ago: "Revelation" prompts Mormons to reverse long-standing policy and admit Negroes to the priesthood

On June 9, 1978, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, popularly known as the Mormon Church, opened its priesthood--normally entered by all white Mormon males at age 12--to "all worthy men," ending a 148-year-old policy of excluding Negro men. Spencer W. Kimball, the church's "Prophet, Seer and Revelator," announced in Salt Lake City that the decision had been based on a revelation that had come to church leaders. He said, "The long-promised day has come when every faithful, worthy man in the Church may receive the holy priesthood." The change was expected to facilitate the church's active missionary program. Women were still not considered worthy for the priesthood.

As was the case with the Latter-day Saints' ban on polygamy in 1890--at a time when Utah was being denied statehood because of the practice of polygamy--the "revelation" concerning the priesthood conveniently came at a time when the church was under social pressure and criticism of its racial attitudes and policies. The occurrence of such "revelations" may seem strange for a church that claims to be restoring the true faith that was supposedly lost centuries earlier, but the "revelations" of the present "Prophet, Seer and Revelator" take precedence over those of any Mormon Presidents.

In contrast to the Mormon priesthood, the priesthood of the true church of the Lord Jesus Christ includes all members of the body of Christ:

Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices, acceptable to God by Jesus Christ...
..But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light; I Peter 2:5,9

For more on the 40th anniversary of the "revelation" concerning the Mormon priesthood, see Priesthood Revelation 40 Year Anniversary by Bill McKeever at the blog Mormon Coffee (June 8, 2018).

Click on the links to see the following articles from the Salt Lake Tribune:

This week in Mormon Land: the lives of black Latter-day Saints past and present — and whose idea was the priesthood and temple ban in the first place? (May 31, 2018, updated June 1, 2018)

Tears, disbelief, shock, joy — How Mormons reacted when they heard the priesthood ban was lifted (June 3, 2018, updated June 4, 2018)

One Sunday, they received the sacrament; the next, they blessed it — how life changed for black Mormons after the priesthood ban (June 3, 2018, updated June 5, 2018)

‘Mormon Land’: Brigham Young, fearing interracial marriage, started the priesthood/temple ban on blacks, but there’s more to the story, says Utah historian (June 6, 2018, updated June 7, 2018)

See also my posts:

40 years ago: Mormons uphold exclusion of Negroes from the priesthood (January 8, 2010)

Mormon Church and NAACP reach historic agreement (May 19, 2018)

Mormons and Muslims celebrate the end of Ramadan together

Antichrists of a feather flock together, as reported by Jacob Paulsen of the blog Colorado Mormons, May 29, 2018 (bold in original):

On Tuesday, May 22, 2018, members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons) attended a beautiful Iftar dinner hosted by Multicultural Mosaic Foundation (“Mosaic”), and its President, Ismail Akbulut. The purpose of the event was to deepen friendships while increasing mutual understanding, among local Latter-day Saints and Muslims.

In the tradition of Islam, an Iftar is the evening meal in which Muslims complete their daily fast as part of their holy month of Ramadan. Throughout this special month, Muslims strive to more fully observe the principles of virtuous and generous living that are central to their beliefs. For example, in his highly informative opening presentation (following a welcome given by Brother Akbulut), Mosaic’s Interfaith Director, Dr. Ismail Demirkan, explained that for devout Muslims the Ramadan fast is about abstaining from more than just from food and water, but from other more worldly activities and sin–indicating that one’s words, thoughts, and treatment of others receive greater attention during Ramadan.

In addition to fasting, another of the five pillars of Islam consists of almsgiving, which is the subject of particularly heightened attention during Ramadan, according to Dr. Demirkan. In fact, citing the Prophet Muhammad, he explained: “ you will never be a true believer if your neighbor goes to bed hungry and you go to bed with a full stomach.” In his overview of the Muslim faith, Dr. Demerkin also made reference to the other three pillars of Islam, e.g., declaration of faith, prayer, and pilgrimage (to Mecca).

Following Dr. Dermirkin’s remarks, Elder Thomas T. Priday, one of two Colorado-based Area Seventies for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, shared some of his own thoughts regarding fasting in the Latter-day Saint tradition and made reference to many other areas of common belief between Muslims and Latter-day Saints. Citing recent remarks by LDS Church President Russell M. Nelson, Elder Priday affirmed “that all people are God’s precious children and therefore our brothers and sisters” and that “all people, organizations and governmental units [must] work with greater civility, eliminating prejudice of all kinds and focusing more on the many areas and interests that we all have in common.” Noting the blessings that enter our lives as we practice fasting and prayer, Elder Priday closed with a story of an extended family member who overcame the great challenge of quitting smoking only after the power of heartfelt fasting and prayer were offered by family members on his behalf.

At about a quarter past 8 p.m., just as the sun was setting, a Muslim brother went to the front of the room and offered a stirring call to prayer, which was effectively the combination of a pleasant song and chant expressing praise for and the greatness of God. Thereafter, all guests were invited to enjoy the evening meal, which began with enjoying fresh dates, followed by the main dinner courses and dessert. All the while, local Latter-day Saints–including many members of local stake presidencies and public affairs leaders across the Denver metropolitan area–enjoyed the sweet conversation and fellowship of their gracious Muslim hosts.

Of the event, President William Thunell, First Counselor in the Arvada Stake Presidency, expressed his appreciation for the opportunity to hear the insightful presentations that were provided and to learn of the many similarities between our two faiths, rather than focusing on differences as can often be the case in the world today. President Thunell added, “the highlight for me was to visit with our hosts at our table and to ask them questions about their faith, and how it operates in their lives, and in particular to hear how they practice repentance and seek forgiveness.”

Denver North Director of Public Affairs for the LDS Church, Jonathan Toronto, added: “We are so grateful for this special invitation extended by our remarkable brothers and sisters of the Muslim faith, for the opportunity to feel of their love and fellowship in such a personal setting, and we look forward to additional opportunities to engage in these sorts of deeply meaningful and enriching interfaith events with our friends of other faiths.”

This isn't the first time such an event has happened. Click on the links to read articles about similar events in 2017 (Montreal); 2017 (Salt Lake City); 2016 (Montreal); and 2010 (southern California). For a remarkable combination of liberalism, Mormonism, and outright lies on this and other subjects, go here.

Mormon Church and NAACP reach historic agreement

Why any Negroes would want to either join the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints or join with them in activities for the alleged betterment of society is beyond the ability of this blogger to understand. The reader should keep in mind that Mormonism claims to be restoring the "true" gospel of Jesus Christ that was supposedly lost hundreds of years ago. The teachings of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young are claimed to be direct revelations from God. However, Mormon leaders since then have shown themselves willing to abandon these "restored" truths in the face of strong criticism from outsiders. When Utah was being denied statehood in the 19th century because polygamy was a central Mormon practice, the Latter-day Saints received a revelation that polygamy was now to be outlawed, thereby paving the way for Utah's admission to the Union. When the Latter-day Saints were being criticized for refusing to admit Negroes to their priesthood, they received a revelation in June 1978 reversing their practice of the previous hundred years and more. When the content of Mormon temple rituals was revealed in documentary films such as The God Makers (1982) and books such as The God Makers (1984, 1997) by Ed Decker & Dave Hunt and What's Going on in There? (1988) by Chuck Sackett, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints received a revelation in 1990 removing some parts of the rituals that some found offensive; the excised parts included those that said that Christian pastors were hirelings of Satan. If the teachings of Mormonism are restored truths, how can the church leaders be willing to abandon them just because they become inconvenient and politically incorrect?

Among those teachings are those concerning black people. The Mormon explanation for the origin of the black race is that the angels who remained neutral in the dispute between Jesus and Lucifer were cursed by being born into human bodies with black skin. The Mormon doctrine of blood atonement is that there are certain sins which must be paid for by having the sinner shed his own blood. One such sin is that of marrying a black person; according to Journal of Discourses, which is among Mormon scriptural writings, the penalty for this "under the law of God is death on the spot. This will always be so." (Volume 10, p. 110, cited in The God Makers, p. 232 (1984), p. 249 (1997)). I'm not aware that the 1978 decision admitting Negroes to the Mormon priesthood has changed that "sin" or its penalty.

For those unaware of what the acronym stands for, it's National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, founded in 1909. As reported by Peggy Fletcher Stack of the Salt Lake Tribune, May 17, 2018 (updated May 19, 2018) (links in original):

In a dramatic gesture on the 64th anniversary of the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision, Mormon church President Russell M. Nelson strolled decisively into a news conference Thursday at the LDS Administration Building in downtown Salt Lake City arm in arm with top NAACP officers.

Creating a powerful image, Nelson and NAACP President Derrick Johnson called on the world to “demonstrate greater civility, racial and ethnic harmony, and mutual respect” while eliminating “prejudice of all kinds.”

The mutual respect was palpable as the two sets of white and black leaders described plans for future joint efforts.
“In meetings this morning,” Nelson said, “we have begun to explore ways — such as education and humanitarian service — in which our respective members and others can serve and move forward together.”

Johnson said his historic civil rights organization looked forward to many collaborative activities.

“President Nelson, the statement you just made expresses the very core of our beliefs and mission at the NAACP,” he said. “We admire and share your optimism that all peoples can work together in harmony and should collaborate more on areas of common interest.”

Nelson, considered a “prophet, seer and revelator” by millions of members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints around the globe, reiterated the church’s “fundamental doctrine — and our heartfelt conviction — that all people are God’s precious children and are therefore our brothers and sisters.”

“All human beings — male and female — are created in the image of God,” he added. “Each is a beloved spirit son or daughter of heavenly parents, and, as such, each has a divine nature and destiny.”

Johnson said the ties being established between the Utah-based faith and the NAACP should serve as a model for how groups can unite to achieve common goals.

“Like the Latter-day Saints, we believe all people, organizations and government representatives should come together to work to secure peace and happiness for all God’s children,” Johnson said. “We are clear that it is our job to speak for those who cannot speak for themselves. And we do so in an advocacy voice, but now with a partner who seeks to pursue harmony and civility within our community.”

Several invited black Mormons — including LDS icons Darius Gray, Don Harwell and Cathy Stokes — filled front rows as the statements were read and exulted at the unity between the groups. Jeanetta Williams, president of the Salt Lake branch of the NAACP, also was on hand.

“This is unprecedented,” said Thom Reed, a black Mormon and an LDS Church employee. “It speaks to the openness of the new [governing] First Presidency and their willingness to engage with people all over the world.”

Then he added: “It’s the start of something big.”

Tracy Browning, another black Mormon and church employee, views the LDS-NAACP alliance as “an amazing opportunity for us to come together and see our commonalities, to be peaceful and respectful.”

NAACP officials described the meeting as cordial.

“It was like being on a first date,” said Leon W. Russell, chairman of the board. “We find out who you are, and you find out who we are.”

The most “concrete” idea that came from the summit, Russell said, was “the need to continue the dialogue.”

Zandra Vranes, co-author of “Diary of Two Mad Black Mormons,” applauds the exchange but was hoping for more.

“I want us, as Latter-day Saints, to engage in what the church has called us to do, which is to have more civility and racial harmony in our communities,” said Vranes, one of the blogging “Sistas in Zion.” “But I also want us to do that within our own Mormon organization as well.”

It is hard to “call out the world,” she said, “when we have a [church] that doesn’t have racial harmony. The best way for us to be at the forefront of showing the world how to do it is to do it ourselves.”

The NAACP can tell LDS leaders what blacks face in general, such as police brutality, but they don’t know, Vranes said, “what we face in the ward.”

For many, Thursday’s watershed meeting and statements seem particularly potent, given the previous tension between the two organizations.

In the 1960s, the NAACP protested Mormonism’s racial ban, excluding men and boys from the faith’s all-male priesthood and women and girls from its temples.

Even after that prohibition ended in June 1978, prejudice and racist attitudes persist to this day among some Mormons, causing continued pain for Latter-day Saints of color — even as membership skyrockets in Africa.

Last year, in the wake of racial clashes in Virginia, the LDS Church issued increasingly strong statements — especially after an alt-right Mormon blogger voiced bigoted views — condemning “white supremacist attitudes” as “morally wrong and sinful.”

But the church’s racial history never came up in this week’s meeting, said the NAACP president.

“We both have an interest in disaster relief and alleviating poverty,” Johnson said. “We want to decrease bigotry and hatred. We want to look to the future.”

Wilbur Colom, an adviser to Johnson, said the group met Wednesday with Clark Gilbert, who shared with the NAACP members information about the church’s Pathway program, an online educational outreach service.

“They gave us everything they had and anything we wanted,” Colom said, who then quoted Gilbert as saying, “And we’ll work with you to take Mormonism out, and put Martin Luther King in.”

On Sunday morning, the remaining NAACP visitors will take their seats in the historic tabernacle on Temple Square for the weekly “Music and the Spoken Word” broadcast, which will include, they say, the famed Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing the black national anthem “Lift Every Voice and Sing.”

As reported by Ms. Stack in the Salt Lake Tribune, May 16, 2018 (updated May 17, 2018) (links in original):

In 1965, the NAACP led an anti-discrimination march in downtown Salt Lake City to protest the LDS Church’s racial policies at the time. A half-century later, national leaders of that historic black civil rights organization are in the Beehive State for a friendly landmark meeting with top Mormon officials.

These two groups — the NAACP and the governing LDS First Presidency — are set to issue an unprecedented joint statement Thursday morning.

And the extraordinary exchange traces its roots to a nearly decadelong friendship between two lawyers — Steve Hill, a white Utah Mormon, and Wilbur Colom, a black Mississippi activist.

Colom, who is acting as an NAACP special counsel, had a fleeting knowledge of Mormonism when he met Hill at a professional conference.

Back in 1975, Colom worked with Mark Cannon, a Mormon administrative assistant to Warren Burger of the United States. When the African-American attorney heard that the LDS Church barred black men and boys from its all-male priesthood and black women and girls from the faith’s temples, he was appalled.

Colom recalls telling Cannon: “If Mormons think God is saying I am inferior, they can’t be talking to God.”

Cannon assured Colom that the priesthood/temple ban would end — and, three years later, it did.

On June 8, 1978, the Utah-based Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced its priesthood would now be open to “all worthy male members.”

Then, in 2009, Colom met Hill through a mutual friend, and the two formed a fast friendship, including traveling to Africa together and with current NAACP President Derrick Johnson.

Colom and Johnson began looking at groups “that were strangers to us, ones we had very little contact with,” Colom says. “Those tended to be mostly conservative — with a flawed history.”

Last summer, an NAACP chapter in Mississippi partnered with an LDS stake (a regional group of congregations) on a service project. It was so successful that Colom wondered about forming a stronger bond with Mormon officialdom, so he called his buddy Hill.

In December, Hill reached out to an LDS general authority, who turned to apostle D. Todd Christofferson, who then invited the NAACP board and subcommittees — up to 100 people — to meet in Salt Lake City for the first time in that black organization’s storied 109-year history.

One problem? They were already scheduled to meet in Tampa.

Without much arm-twisting, the board agreed to forgo the Florida locale and move the meeting to landlocked Utah.

“I thought it would take at least a year to set this up,” Hill says, “but it took less than two weeks.”

In this era of “uncivil communication,” Colom says, “It’s time for two well-established groups to deal with each other civilly, to find areas of commonality.”

To that end, the LDS Church and the NAACP plan to work together in three areas: disaster relief, education and civic projects.

There is much to admire about Mormonism, Colom says. “We are not different people. We are one.”

In fact, “Be One” is the theme of the LDS Church’s June 1 celebration marking the end of the faith’s priesthood/temple prohibition on blacks.

See also my post 40 years ago: Mormons uphold exclusion of Negroes from the priesthood (January 8, 2010).