Recently I watched a television program where two Roman Catholics discussed The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. At the very beginning of the discussion, the host of the program said something like the following: ‘Now, to begin with, Mormons are atheists. Isn’t that correct?” The visitor, a self-acknowledged expert on Latter-day Saint beliefs, replied, “Well yes, of course. They worship a false God.” The host added, “Yes, they do not believe in the Triune God.”
Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints find themselves in a most unusual position. We believe in God, the Eternal Father. We believe in Jesus Christ, accept his gospel, acknowledge him as Savior, Lord, God, and King. We look to him for forgiveness of our sins and declare that salvation comes in and through his name and in no other way (Philippians 2:9-11). We strive to live our lives according to his example and teachings and are committed to the fact that the depth of our Christianity is most evident, not in theological gymnastics, nor in a received vocabulary, but rather in the way we treat other men and women. We exercise hope in the immortality of the soul, a belief that we will live again after death, because Jesus himself rose from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:21-22). And yet, interestingly, many in Christendom declare that the Latter-day Saints are not Christian.
Reasons for Exclusion
Non-acceptance of the Doctrine of the Trinity
Perhaps more than any other reason, Latter-day Saints aren’t considered to be Christian because of our non-acceptance of the post-New Testament creeds and theological formulations concerning Christ and the Godhead, beginning with the Council of Nicaea in AD 325. Latter-day Saints do believe there are three members of the Godhead—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; that each of the members of the Godhead possesses all of the attributes of Godliness in perfection; and that the love and unity that exist among these three Persons is of such magnitude that they constitute a divine community that is often referred to in the Book of Mormon as “one eternal God” (see 2 Nephi 31:21; Alma 11:44; 3 Nephi 11:27, 36; 28:10; Mormon 7:7).
Elder Jeffrey R. Holland stated:
We believe these three divine persons constituting a single Godhead are united in purpose, in manner, in testimony, in mission. We believe Them to be filled with the same godly sense of mercy and love, justice and grace, patience, forgiveness, and redemption. I think it is accurate to say we believe They are one in every significant and eternal aspect imaginable except believing Them to be three persons combined in one substance, a Trinitarian notion never set forth in the scriptures because it is not true …
It is not our purpose to demean any person’s belief,” Elder Holland affirmed, “nor the doctrine of any religion. We extend to all the same respect to their doctrine that we are asking for ours. (That, too, is an article of our faith.) But if one says we are not Christians because we do not hold a fourth- or fifth-century view of the Godhead, then what of those first Christian Saints, many of whom were eyewitnesses of the living Christ, who did not hold such a view either?
Were they not Christians?
Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints pray to God the Eternal Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, by the power of the Holy Ghost; we acknowledge the Father as the ultimate object of our worship (John 5:19, 26; 7:16; 14:28; D&C 20:19) and confess the Son of God as our Lord and Redeemer, our one and only hope for deliverance from sin and death in this world, as well as our glorious hope for eternal life in the world to come. We teach of the Holy Spirit as the Messenger of the Father and the Son, the Revealer of the mind and will of God, and the Sanctifier, the means by which filth and dross are burned out of the human soul as though by fire. We are encouraged and charged by our leaders to seek the constant companionship of the Spirit, to attend to its promptings, to follow its lead.
We baptize people “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost” (3 Nephi 11:23-26; D&C 20:73-74). And, for that matter, the highest ordinance or sacrament within our Church, eternal marriage, received only in the temple, is performed in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. In short, the Latter-day Saints live and move and have their being by and through the members of the Godhead; ours is a lived rather than a spoken or creedal connection to these holy beings.
Scripture Beyond the Bible
Another reason for the exclusion of Latter-day Saints from the category of Christian is because we do not believe in the sufficiency of the Bible. In point of fact, to state that the Bible is the final word of God—more specifically, the final written word of God—is to claim more for the Bible than it claims for itself. We are nowhere given to understand that after the ascension of Jesus and the ministry and writings of those first century apostles, that revelations from God that would eventually take the form of written scripture and thus be added to the canon, would cease. As Joseph Smith taught, one would need to have received a modern revelation in order to know for certain that there will be no more revelation beyond the Bible.
So why was the canon of scripture closed? Emeritus Professor Lee M. McDonald, an Evangelical Christian scholar, posed some fascinating questions relative to the present closed canon of scripture. “The first question,” he writes, “and the most important one, is whether the church was right in perceiving the need for a closed canon of scriptures.” McDonald also asks:
Did such a move toward a closed canon of scriptures ultimately (and unconsciously) limit the presence and power of the Holy Spirit in the church? More precisely, does the recognition of absoluteness of the biblical canon minimize the presence and activity of God in the church today? … On what biblical or historical grounds has the inspiration of God been limited to the written documents that the church now calls its Bible?
While McDonald poses other issues, let me refer to his final question: “If the Spirit inspired only the written documents of the first century, does that mean that the same Spirit does not speak today in the church about matters that are of significant concern?”
Indeed, we might ask: Who authorized the canon to be closed? Who decided that the Bible was and forevermore would be the final written word of God? Why would one suppose that the closing words of the Apocalypse represented the “end of the prophets”? Latter-day Saints find themselves today in a hauntingly reminiscent position relative to the continuing and ongoing mind and will of God. Is ours not the same basic message that Jesus and Peter and Paul and John delivered to the unbelieving Jews of their day—that the heavens had once again been opened, that new light and knowledge had burst upon the earth, and that God had chosen to reveal himself through the ministry of his Beloved Son and his ordained apostles?
Let’s be clear on this matter: no branch of Christianity limits itself entirely to the biblical text in making doctrinal decisions and in applying biblical principles. Roman Catholics turn to scripture, to church tradition, and to the magisterium or teaching office in the church for answers. Protestants, particularly Evangelicals, turn to linguists and scripture scholars for their answers, as well as to post-New Testament church councils and creeds. This seems, at least in my view, to be in violation of Sola Scriptura, the clarion call of the Reformation to rely solely upon scripture itself. In fact, there is no final authority on scriptural interpretation when differences arise, which of course they do regularly.
“When [traditional Christians] accuse Mormons of not believing the Bible,” Professor Stephen Robinson has written, “they usually mean that we do not believe interpretations formulated by postbiblical councils. If [traditional Christians] are going to insist on the doctrine of sola scriptura [scripture alone] … then they ought to stop ascribing scriptural authority to postbiblical traditions.”
Would the early Christians who had for decades had access only to the Gospel of Mark (considered by most Biblical scholars to be the first Gospel written) have considered the deeper spiritual realities set forth later in the Gospel of John to be a portrait of “a different Jesus”? Hardly. Thus the current mantra of “Latter-day Saints worship a different Jesus” is a sad, misguided, and too often malicious misrepresentation of the way things really are. Latter-day Saints clearly worship the historical Jesus, the Christ of the New Testament—the man who was born in Bethlehem, lived and ministered during the reign of Tiberius Caesar, functioned under the oversight of Caiaphas (Jews) and Pilate (Romans), gave his life as a sacrificial offering to atone for the sins of humankind, and rose from the grave in glorious resurrected immortality. That there may be differences on certain points of theology is not unimportant, but it does not merit the misleading concept that Latter-day Saints somehow worship a “different Jesus.” Supplementation of the Bible is clearly not the same as contradiction of the Bible.
One wonders whether modern conservative Christianity may unwittingly have created a type of double standard in terms of (a) what is required to be saved, and (b) what it takes to be a Christian.
In the New Testament and at the time of Paul’s and Silas’s miraculous release from prison, the Philippian jailer asked the question of questions: “Sirs, what must I do to be saved? And [the apostles] said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.” Paul wrote to the Roman Saints that “if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation … For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”
Could it be, then, that a Latter-day Saint who professes total faith in and reliance upon Jesus Christ and who seeks in gratitude to keep his commandments, can be saved but at the same time not qualify to be called a Christian? That seems strange at best.
What Kind of a Christian?
Sadly enough, the one feature and facet of Christianity with which too few seem to concern themselves is what might be called orthopraxy—how we act, how we live out our Christian faith. Jesus charged his disciples: “A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.” In assessing whether a man or woman is a true follower of the Savior, a Christian, we might ask: How does this person treat others, especially those who believe or act differently? Is the manner in which a person presents the gospel message such that the gospel may be perceived as “good news”?
Is this person’s speech and interpersonal relations such that people feel welcomed and appreciated, rather than spurned and rejected? To what extent does this person’s faith community feed the hungry, care for the poor, respond swiftly to natural disaster, or otherwise involve itself and its members in extending and disbursing Christian charity? This is how the first century saints were known and identified, and it is today a pretty persuasive evidence of the depth of one’s Christianity. The age-old question is still poignant and haunting: “If you were arrested and were to be tried for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?”
The fact is, no mortal man or woman is in a position to judge, to discern and perceive the depths of another human soul. No one of us has within his or her grasp the data, the delicate details, to so determine. C. S. Lewis, the beloved Christian writer and defender of the faith, a man whose focus on “mere Christianity” has made him a favorite of millions, declared: “It is not for us to say who, in the deepest sense, is or is not close to the spirit of Christ. We do not see into men’s hearts. We cannot judge, and indeed are forbidden to judge. It would be wicked arrogance for us to say that any man is, or is not, a Christian in this refined sense … When a man who accepts the Christian doctrine lives unworthily of it, it is much clearer to say he is a bad Christian than to say he is not a Christian.”
What Exactly is a Christian?
A Christian is one who is a follower of Jesus. No one of us has the power or right to look into the hearts of men and women and discern the reality of their Christianity or the depths of their commitment to the Son of God. Faith is a personal matter and is really between that person and God. What then are some standard definitions of a Christian, put forward by more traditional Christians?
From the 1828 Webster’s Dictionary: “A believer in the religion of Christ; professor of his belief in the religion of Christ; one who … studies to follow the example, and obey the precepts, of Christ.”
From The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary: “A member of a particular sect using this name”; a civilized human being; a decent, respectable person.”
From the Harper’s Bible Dictionary: “Christian’ is the term that was increasingly applied to Jesus’s followers in the late first and early second centuries.”
From the Holman Bible Dictionary: “an adherent of Christ; one committed to Christ; a follower of Christ.”
In the Westminster Dictionary of Theological Terms: “a name applied originally in Antioch to followers of Jesus Christ (Acts 11:26) and now used to designate those who believe in Jesus Christ and seek to live in the ways he taught.”
From The Amsterdam Declaration (2000): “The word Christian should not be equated with any particular cultural, ethnic, political, or ideological tradition or group. Those who know and love Jesus are also called Christ-followers, believers and disciples.”
Some friends of other faiths have suggested to me that it appears that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is seeking to move into “the mainstream of Christianity.” To be sure, Latter-day Saint leaders have encouraged members of the Church to get to know their neighbors better; to be more involved in community, civic, and political affairs; to show greater love, acceptance, and tolerance for those of other faiths; and, in general, help the world to better understand us. In addition, our Church is seeking to be better understood, to teach our doctrine in a manner that would (a) allow others to see clearly where we stand on important issues, and (b) eliminate misperceptions and avoid misrepresentations.
To be honest, it would be foolish for Latter-day Saints to stray from their moorings and seek to blend in with everyone else in the Christian world. People are joining our Church in ever-increasing numbers, not because we are just like the Roman Catholics or the Greek Orthodox or the Baptists or the Methodists or the Presbyterians or the Anglicans down the street. These people choose to leave their former faith and be baptized into The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints because of our distinctives; our strength lies in our distinctive teachings and lifestyle. In that spirit, President Gordon B. Hinckley said:
Those who observe us say that we are moving into the mainstream of religion. We are not changing. The world’s perception of us is changing. We teach the same doctrine. We have the same organization. We labor to perform the same good works … They are coming to realize what we stand for and what we do.
Joseph Smith once observed:
If I esteem mankind to be in error, shall I bear them down? No. I will lift them up, and in their own way too, if I cannot persuade them my way is better; and I will not seek to compel any man to believe as I do, only by the force of reasoning, for truth will cut its own way.
There is too much at stake in the world today for God-fearing people to spend their time and energies attacking, belittling, or misrepresenting those who choose to believe differently. Jesus certainly called us all to a higher standard than that. What was his plea in prayer for his followers only hours before his sufferings and death? “That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us: that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.”
