Questions bout LDS for Squirt (Jesus Christ, Latter-Day Saints, Earth, followers)

[Squirt]

Geoff,

http://www.catholic.com/library/prob..._of_mormon.asp

Since our agreement was to discuss the information on this link, that's what I'm going to start by doing. What follows (in red) are the first few paragraphs from the article:

In these "latter days," there are few people who haven’t been visited at least once by Mormon missionaries. At some point in your doorstep dialogue, these earnest young men will ask you to accept a copy of the Book of Mormon, read it, and pray about it, asking the Lord to "send the Holy Ghost to witness that it is true." Then, very solemnly, they’ll "testify" to you that they know the Book of Mormon is true, that it’s God’s inspired word, and that it contains the "fullness of the everlasting gospel."

I have no real quarrel with anything said here, although I did find the phrase, "very solemnly, they’ll 'testify'" to be just a bit on the dramatic side, and the fact that the word "testify" was in quotes to imply that their message couldn't really be taken seriously. It just kind of set the tone for what was to follow.

They’ll assure you that if you read their text in a spirit of prayerful inquiry, you, too, will receive the testimony of the Holy Ghost. That testimony supposedly will convince you beyond doubt that the Book of Mormon is exactly what they claim it to be.

All good and well.

Keep in mind that the missionaries want you to have a feeling about the Book of Mormon after reading it. They’ll tell you that you’ll receive the witness of the Holy Ghost in the form of a "burning in the bosom"—a warm, fuzzy feeling—after reading and praying about it. This feeling is the clincher for them. It’s the real "proof" that the Book of Mormon is inspired Scripture, and everything else follows from that conclusion.

A warm, fuzzy feeling? Really? I don't recall ever having heard a member of the Church describe the witness of the Holy Ghost as a "warm fuzzy feeling." Certainly this language is meant in a derogatory way. I know of very few people who gain a testimony of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon simply by a casual reading of it. The missionaries will also add that you must read the Book with an open mind and with a sincere desire to know whether it is truly from God or not. They will tell you to ponder what you've read and to pray about it, having faith in the Lord Jesus Christ that you will receive an answer to your prayers.

But think about it. How often have you felt strongly about something or someone, only to learn your feelings were misguided? Feelings, although a part of our human makeup, can’t be a yardstick in matters like this.

This is a common misunderstanding among non-members of the Church. Of course, we can't just trust some kind of a gut feeling in matters as important as this, and we don't expect people to. If I were writing a response to the author of this article, I'd reply by saying, "Think about it. How often have you asked God for wisdom or spiritual guidance and relied upon the Holy Ghost to direct your path, only to find that He has lied to you?"

After all, some people might get a good feeling after reading anything from the Communist Manifesto or the Yellow Pages. They could pray about such a feeling, and they could take the lingering of the feeling as some kind of divine approbation, but no such sensation will prove the inspiration of Marx’s or Ma Bell’s writings.

I hope you'll admit that neither the Communist Manifesto or the Yellow Pages are particularly good examples here. I'd question the motives of anyone who found that either of these writings brought him closer to Christ.

When you tell the missionaries you don’t need to pray about the Book of Mormon, they’ll think you’re copping out, that you’re afraid to learn the truth. Admittedly, you’ll seem like a cad if you simply refuse and leave it at that. You need to provide them with an explanation for refusing.

Apparently as long as you give the missionaries a good excuse for refusing to read the Book of Mormon, you can keep yourself from "looking like a cad." How can you possibly judge a book to be true or false if you haven't taken the time to read it. No excuse justifies an unwillingess to at least see what the Book has to say.

The devout Mormon believes this text is inspired because Joseph Smith said it is. He believes Smith had the authority to claim divine inspiration for the Book of Mormon because the book itself says Smith was a prophet and had such authority.

This isn't the case at all. None of us believe the text of the Book of Mormon is inspired "because Joseph Smith said it is." We believe it because the Holy Ghost told us it is. Furthermore, the Book of Mormon itself never says Joseph Smith was a prophet. The Book of Mormon is an ancient text. People living between 600 B.C. and 400 A.D. didn't exactly know about Joseph Smith.

[Squirt]

Geoff,

Here's the next section from your article: This time my comments will immediately follow each paragraph. I think it will make it easier to read. The text of the article is in red; my comments are in black.

Let’s take a closer look at the text the missionaries offer. At first glance the Book of Mormon appears to be biblical in heft and style. It’s couched in tedious "King James" English, and it features color renderings of Mormon scenes made to look like Bible illustrations.

The Book of Mormon is very biblical in style. Maybe that's because they both ultimately come from the same source. It's "couched in tedious King James English" because at the time Joseph Smith translated it, King James English was considered to be the language of scripture. I'm not sure what problem the Catholic Church sees with illustrations. That comment strikes me as overly critical over nothing. Besides, the Books of Mormon the missionaries hand out to prospective converts actually have no pictures in them at all.

The introduction tells you that the "Book of Mormon is a volume of holy scripture comparable to the Bible. It is a record of God’s dealings with the ancient inhabitants of the Americas and contains, as does the Bible, the fullness of the everlasting gospel." There it is again—the "fullness of the everlasting gospel." Naturally, you ask yourself just what that phrase means.

Yes, I think that's a logical question.

According to the Mormon church, authentic Christianity can’t be found in any of the so-called Christian churches—only, of course, in the Mormon church.

This is virtually identical to the beliefs of Roman Catholicism. Like you, we believe that there is much good in all religions, but that the Lord has authorized only one Church to teach His gospel and administer the ordinances (i.e. sacraments) thereof.

Mormons teach that, after Jesus ascended into heaven, the apostles taught the true doctrines of Christ and administered his sacred ordinances (roughly the equivalent of Catholic sacraments). After the death of the apostles, their successors continued the work of the gospel, but with rapidly declining success. Within a few generations, the great apostasy foretold in the Bible had destroyed Christ’s Church (contrary to Jesus’ own promise in Matthew 16:18).

That would be an accurate statement, until we come to the last few words in parentheses ("contrary to Jesus' own promise in Matthew 16:18). We interpret this verse differently than you do. Consequently, we believe that the great apostasy foretold in the Bible really did take place. It's nice to know you believe it was foretold, but it would be interesting to hear why you don't believe the prophesy came to pass.

The Mormon church asserts that the Church Christ founded became increasingly corrupted by pagan ideas introduced by nefarious members. (Sound familiar?) Over a period of years, the Church lost all relationship with the Church Christ established. Consequently, the keys of authority of the holy priesthood were withdrawn from the earth, and no man any longer had authorization to act in God’s name.

Right. I couldn't have stated it better myself.

From that time onward there were no valid baptisms, no laying on of hands for the receipt of the Holy Ghost, no blessings of any kind, and no administration of sacred ordinances. Confusions and heretical doctrines increased and led to the plethora of Christian sects seen today.

Again, correct.

Mormons claim that to restore the true Church and true gospel to the earth, in 1820 God the Father and Jesus Christ appeared to Joseph Smith in a grove of trees near his home. They told him that all professing Christians on the face of the earth were abominable and corrupt and that the true Church, having died out completely shortly after it began, was to be restored by Smith.

No, that's not quite how it happened, and the error in this statement offends me. God did not say that "all professing Christians on the face of the earth were abominable and correct." He did say that their Creeds were an abomination in His sight. That's entirely different. We have never denied that millions upon millions of sincere Christians have walked the earth since the time of Christ. We simply reject the 4th and 5th century Creeds as being the work of men and not of God.

Mormons run into no small difficulty in reconciling the great apostasy theory with Christ’s promise in Matthew 16:18: "You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it."

We do? I don't know what in the world that difficulty might be.

How could it be that Christ, who should have known better, would promise that his Church wouldn’t be overcome if he knew full well a great apostasy would make short shrift of it in a matter of decades? Was Christ lying? Obviously not. Was he mistaken? No. Did he miscalculate things? No, again. Christ’s divinity precluded such things.

First of all, I find it sad that anyone would suppose we would accuse Christ of lying. That comment was quite unneccessary when a different interpretation of the verse can easily explain our belief. When Jesus Christ said that the gates of hell would not prevail against His Church, he was not even speaking of an apostasy at all. To a first-century Jew, such as Peter and the other Apostles, "the gates of hell" would not have had the sinister connotation the phrase has today. Many people interpret "the gates of hell" as pertaining to the power of Satan, or to evil and corrupt men. Some probably even think of it as some kind of hyperbole meaning "Nothing in the world shall prevail against the Church I am to establish." But in looking at the Hebrew worldview, the phrase would have meant nothing more than the entrance to the underworld or the residence of the spirits of those who had died. Jesus was saying only that even the dead would hear His gospel. He would take it to the spirits in Prison during the three days His body lay in the tomb. That Spirit Prison continues to exist today, and His gospel continues to be taught to those who did not have the opportunity to hear it during their mortal lives (not by Christ Himself, but by His followers). By the time we stand before God to be judged, all will have had a chance to choose for themselves whether to accept or reject Jesus Christ as their Savior.

What are we left with then? Could it be that Mormons are mistaken in their interpretation of such a crucial passage? This is the only tenable conclusion. If there were no great apostasy, then there could have been no need for a restoration of religious authority on the earth. There would be no "restored gospel," and the entire premise of the Mormon church would be undercut.

I believe we're left with the possibility that the Catholic are the ones who have misinterpreted that crucial passage. God's own prophets prophesied of an apostasy and said that Christ would not return for His millennial reign until it had taken place. The author of this article is right in saying that if there had been no apostasy, there would be no need for a restoration of religious authority on the earth. Our premise is that both the predicted apostasy and the predicted restoration have occurred.

The fact is that the only church with an unbroken historical line to apostolic days is the Catholic Church. Even many Protestants acknowledge this, though they argue that there was a need for the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century.

Now those are two statements which I find quite incredulous. Jesus Christ established His Church on a foundation of Prophets and Apostles, not on a foundation of Popes and Cardinals. How can there possibly be apostolic succession without the existence of Apostes. And how can any structure be expected to stand if its foundation is removed? Lastly, why on earth would the Protestants feel the need to reform a Church with an unbroken historical line to apostolic days? Wouldn't that be quite unnecessary?

As non-Catholic historians admit, it can be demonstrated easily that early Church writers, such as Ignatius of Antioch, Eusebius, Clement of Rome, and Polycarp, had no conception of Mormon doctrine, and they knew nothing of a "great apostasy."

Clearly, they didn't. They were a part of it. Couldn't see the forest for the trees, as they say. The apostasy was pretty well underway by the early second century. It is not surprising that these men were unaware of the fact that they were embroiled in it.

Nowhere in their writings can one find references to Christians embracing any of the peculiarly Mormon doctrines, such as polytheism, polygamy, celestial marriage, and temple ceremonies. If the Church of the apostolic age was the prototype of today’s Mormon church, it must have had all these beliefs and practices. But why is there no evidence of them in the early centuries, before the alleged apostasy began?

That's a pretty bold statement for the author to make. I have a 350-page book that contains hundreds of references to ancient doctrines and practices that are quite similar to those the Latter-day Saints teach today. Obviously, with a universal apostasy, it is to be expected that many of them would have been lost or corrupted.

[Geoffthe3rd]

It is really interesting how in common it is, sadly it does boil down to a point in where we have to ask which one is right and wrong. I wish our churches could unite, but i dont know. I have to say though that both our groups get blasted by the Protestants lol

[Squirt]

Originally Posted by Geoffthe3rd

It is really interesting how in common it is, sadly it does boil down to a point in where we have to ask which one is right and wrong. I wish our churches could unite, but i dont know. I have to say though that both our groups get blasted by the Protestants lol

Well, if I were to remain a Christian but were not to remain a Latter-day Saint, I would almost certainly be a Catholic.

[Squirt]

Even though you've not had anything to say about any of my comments, Geoff, you did tell me that you wanted me to address the content of this article. So, I'm going to continue with the third section:

The fact is that there is no historical or archaeological indication of any kind that the early Church was other than the Catholic Church. When dealing with Mormon missionaries, remember that all the evidence is in favor of the claims of the Catholic Church. If you want to watch their sails go slack quickly, ask the missionaries to produce any historical proof to support their claim that in the early centuries the Church was Mormon. They can’t do it because there is no such evidence.

I'm not sure what kind of archaelogical evidence one might expect to find to prove that the early Church and the Catholic Church are one and the same. With respect to historical evidence, I don't believe your case is anywhere near as strong as you'd like to believe. Either you are unaware of this fact or are simply ignoring it, but the first few centuries of Christianity was extremely fragmented. Literally dozens of competing "denominations" laid claim to the authority once held by the Lord Himself. You will undoubtedly lump these all together as apostates, but can you prove that? On the other hand, it's really kind of silly to say that the first century Church was "Mormon." There isn't a "Mormon Church" today and there certainly wasn't a "Mormon Church" in ancient times. There is actually quite a bit of evidence that many of the doctrines restored by Joseph Smith were taught and believed in the years immediately following the deaths of the Apostles.

The Book of Mormon itself suffers the same fate when it comes to its own historical support. In a word, it hasn’t got any.

Wrong. Now I don't expect you to believe that, and I'm not going to take the time to provide any evidence now. I don't even know if you're even still reading this thread, since it's been so long since you posted. But if you would care to raise any specific questions pertaining to this very general accusation, I'll do my best to answer them.

The Book of Mormon describes a vast pre-Columbian culture that supposedly existed for centuries in North and South America. It goes into amazingly specific detail describing the civilizations erected by the "Nephites" and "Lamanites," who were Jews that fled Palestine in three installments, built massive cities in the New World, farmed the land, produced works of art, and fought large-scale wars which culminated in the utter destruction of the Nephites in A.D. 421. The Latter-Day Saints revere the Book of Mormon as the divinely-inspired record of those people and of Christ’s appearance to them shortly after his crucifixion in Jerusalem.

Yes, this is an accurate statement of what the Book of Mormon is.

The awkward part for the Mormon church is the total lack of historical and archaeological evidence to support the Book of Mormon. For example, after the cataclysmic last battle fought between the Nephites and Lamanites, there was no one left to clean up the mess. Hundreds of thousands of men and beasts allegedly perished in that battle, and the ground was strewn with weapons and armor.

Awkward? Maybe from the author's perspective. We Latter-day Saints don't find it awkward at all. Let me ask you something. Do you accept the Bible as the word of God because of some kind of archeological evidence? I can't imagine a faith so weak that it would require physical artifacts to support it! And while we're at it, suppose evidence of this war was discovered. Would it honestly make any difference whatsoever to you? I think that both of us know very well that it wouldn't.

Keep in mind that A.D. 421 is just yesterday in archaeological terms. It should be easy to locate and retrieve copious evidence of such a battle, and there hasn’t been enough time for the weapons and armor to turn to dust. The Bible tells of similar battles that have been documented by archaeology, battles which took place long before A.D. 421.

Since the author specifically mentioned the year 421 A.D. and pointed out that this was "just yesterday in archaeological terms," I'm going to ask you to consider another group of people who lived at more or less this same period of time in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. These were the Huns, a nomadic people for whom horses heavily represented the basis of their military power. Many scholars estimate that each Hun warrior may have had has many as ten horses. Nevertheless, according to S. Bokonyi, a foremost authority on the subject, "We know very little of the Huns' horses. It is interesting that not a single usable horse bone has been found in the territory of the whole empire of the Huns." We're talking thousands and thousands of horses and "not a single usable horse bone... found." Does this bit of knowledge convince you that the Huns never had horses after all?

The embarrassing truth—embarrassing for Mormons, that is—is that no scientist, Mormon or otherwise, has been able to find anything to substantiate that such a great battle took place.

I'm not sure what qualifies the author of this article to assume that the Latter-day Saints are even the slightest bit embarrassed about the lack of conclusive evidence for this particular battle. I can assure you that we aren't at all embarrassed about this. People have been trying to prove the Book of Mormon false for 175 years, and for 175 years they have been unsuccessful. Anti-Mormons love to point out that the book must be false because it mentions a particular plant, animal or invention that was supposedly unknown prior to the Spanish Conquest. And yet, to date, almost all of these items actually have been discovered, and more are being discovered all the time.

[Squirt]

You know what really, really bugs me? Having someone want a one-on-one discussion and them bailing out with no explanation. Oh well, I guess Geoff didn't feel he could adequately refute my arguments. Anyway, since I said I wanted to refute this article on Mormonism that appeared on a Catholic website, I've decided to finish what I started. Again, the quotes from the article are in red. My comments follow each paragraph and are in black.

There are other problems with the Book of Mormon. For example, critics of Mormonism have shown convincing proof that the Book of Mormon is a synthesis of earlier works (written by other men), of the vivid imaginings of Joseph Smith, and of simple plagiarisms of the King James Bible.

Actually, critics have shown no such thing. If they had, you'd think the author would have come up with a few concrete examples instead of just making a sweeping generalization. And his charges of plagairism are utter nonsense. Does he even understand what the word means? Plaguriasm is taking someone else's writings and attempting to pass them off as one's own. The Book of Mormon contains some of the very same texts that are found in the Bible, but if this constitutes plagairism, the writers of the Bible were guilty of nothing less. In the four gospels, for instance, Christ and the Apostles consistently quote scripture from the Old Testament. In fact, about 10% of Jesus' daily conversation consisted of literal quotations from earlier scripture. And even if we leave the gospels out of the picture entirely, consider Micah, who lived hundreds of years after Isaiah, and who prophesied word for word the same thing as Isaiah did -- without once giving him credit. If we're talking true plagairism, that's as good an example as you'll find anywhere. Since the author of the article didn't give any examples to support his accusations, I'm going to assume he was refering to the "Isaiah passages" in the Book of Mormon. These, incidentally, account for a total of about 2 and 1/2 percent of the total words in the Book of Mormon and are specifically credited to Isaiah. Hence, the charges of plagairism fall flat on their face.

The only Bible that Joseph Smith relied on was the King James Version. This translation was based on a good but imperfect set of Greek and Hebrew manuscripts of the Bible.

Okay, so what's the point?

Scholars now know the Textus Receptus contains errors, which means the King James Version contains errors. The problem for Mormons is that these exact same errors show up in the Book of Mormon.

What Bible translation doesn't contain errors? And once again, the author may see this as "a problem for Mormons." Mormons certainly don't see it as a problem for themselves. We don't believe the Bible to be infallible in the first place, and in the introduction to the Book of Mormon, Joseph Smith specifically states that if there are errors in the book, they are the errors of men, not God. He never claimed that the Book of Mormon was perfect; he only said that it was the most correct of any book of scriptures on the earth. The Bible we have today is the result of copies of copies of copies being handed down for many generations, and has been translated who knows how many times. The Book of Mormon underwent one translation from its original source. Understandably, it would contain fewer errors than the Bible, but even so, it is entirely possible that in over 500 pages, there was an error or two.

It seems reasonable to assume that since Smith was a prophet of God and was translating the Book of Mormon under divine inspiration, he would have known about the errors found in the King James Version and would have corrected them for when passages from the King James Version appeared in the Book of Mormon. But the errors went in.

Yes, because even through Joseph was an inspired prophet of God, he was a fallible man. And like it or not, men make mistakes. Would you like me to point out a few made by the Catholic Popes over the years?

[Squirt]

According to a standard Mormon theological work, Doctrines of Salvation, one finds this definition: "By fullness of the gospel is meant all the ordinances and principles that pertain to the exaltation of the celestial kingdom" (vol. 1, p. 160). That’s an official Mormon statement on the subject. But there’s a problem.

Interesting. So now "Doctrines of Salvation" contains "official Mormon statements"? This is an absolute lie. "Doctrines of Salvation" is not nor has it ever been part of the LDS canon. It's one man's opinion, one person's interpretation. I find it more than a little bit presumptuous that this Catholic author thinks he is in a position to state what is and is not official LDS doctrine.

If the Book of Mormon contains all the ordinances and principles that pertain to the gospel, why don’t Mormonism’s esoteric doctrines show up in it? The doctrine that God is nothing more than an "exalted man with a body of flesh and bones" appears nowhere in the Book of Mormon. Nor does the doctrine of Jesus Christ being the "spirit brother" of Lucifer. Nor do the doctrines that men can become gods and that God the Father has a god above him, who has a god above him, ad infinitum.

The Book of Mormon doesn't contain all the ordinances and principles that pertain to the gospel. It doesn't even claim to. Besides, an esoteric doctrine is, by definition, one that is withheld from the general population. If it were to appear in the Book of Mormon, it would no longer be esoteric. As for his examples of other "doctrines" that are not found in the Book of Mormon, some of them are not "doctrines" at all. Others are doctrine but were restored to Joseph Smith and are found in the Doctrine and Covenants which does, incidentally, contain "official LDS doctrine." Before people decide to explain what Mormons believe, they really ought to get their facts straight. But then research can be so time-consuming, and so much of the time it doens't yield the juicy material that one's own imagination does.

[Squirt]

These heterodox teachings, and many others like them, appear nowhere in the Book of Mormon. In fact, pivotal Mormon doctrines are flatly refuted by the Book of Mormon.

This guy is really getting desperate. The Book of Mormon is one of our "Standard Works." To say that it flatly refutes itself is one of the stupidest statements I think I've ever heard anyone make about it.

For instance, the most pointed refutation of the Mormon doctrine that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are actually three separate gods is found in Alma 11:28-31: "Now Zeezrom said: ‘Is there more than one God?’ and [Amulek] answered, ‘No.’ And Zeezrom said unto him again, ‘How knowest thou these things?’ And he said: ‘An angel hath made them known unto me.’"

There is nothing whatsoever contradictory about this statement. Here are several other passages from the Book of Mormon. Hopefully they will clarify our belief concerning the nature of God:

And now, behold,