Ah, social media — where complete strangers can be in-your-face douchebags to a degree they’d never try in person.
For the occasion in question, a friend had posted a photo of a Latter-day Saint temple on social media, and commenters rushed in with the standard jackassery — “world’s biggest cult,” “how could ANYONE believe,” nurf nurf nurf…
And the common problem is that they throw out accusations and descriptions of Latter-day Saint belief which are objectively inaccurate. Those may get the applause from like-minded people when they get together to feel smugly superior to those poor gullible Mormons, but when they’re trying to tell Latter-day Saints that we believe things that we, well, don’t believe… As I remarked in the thread, there are a great many theological disagreements to be had between Latter-day Saints, evangelicals, etc., but if you’re going to criticize us for our beliefs, you should at least be able to criticize us for what we actually believe. (The response to that was something about “magic underwear,” which forced me to acknowledge that his willful ignorance was beyond the charity levels of this mere mortal to correct.)
The single biggest offender was this graphic, which was presented — again, to Latter-day Saints — as if it conclusively proved our religion false (and “crazy”).
I responded that I could easily create a graphic against evangelicals or whoever, mischaracterizing cherry-picked beliefs in the most inflammatory language possible (“Evangelicals believe God has multiple personalities and talks to Himself,” etc.), but all that would show is that I’m more comfortable poking fun at strawmen than explaining where I disagree with accurate representations of other faiths. But of course, Nurf nurf nurf magic underwear…
I know that I have at least the occasional visitor of other faiths here, so as a public service and at exhaustive length, I will go through each of these and explain why they’re either misleading, flat-out false, or accurate but not “crazy.”
•Jesus Christ is Satan’s brother. Technically true, but misleading as stated. The impression given is of some kind of Zoroastrian dynamic, in which there are two brothers equally balanced or something. In broader terms, though, Latter-day Saint doctrine teaches that all of God’s children are brothers and sisters — you, me, Jesus, Satan, your mom, angels, even my ignorant and ignoble conversant. That, of course, makes us guilty in the eyes of Orthodox Christianity of the heresy of Arianism, in that we obviously believe that Jesus is a subordinate being to God the Father, but that’s the kind of thoughtful controversy with which this post is not concerned… plus, I believe I can demonstrate enough scripture supportive of Arianism from the New Testament (John 6:38 and John 20:17 are a good starting point) that it makes it at least a reasonable (i.e, “not crazy”) doctrine.
•God lives near a planet called Kolob. True enough, although certainly not a central point of doctrine. I assume that this always make such lists because “Kolob” sounds “out there” to casual readers. But if one posits that God actually resides in or near a physical place (which is the real theological controversy), is there any concrete difference in calling it “Heaven” or “Kolob” or “the Celestial Kingdom” or “Shamayim” or “Ouranós” or “Caelum”? (The latter three are the Hebrew, Greek and Latin words, respectively, that are usually translated “Heaven.”)
•Jesus is married to a goddess wife. Um… No. If Jesus was married during His mortal life (which would be plausible, and which some early Latter-day Saint leaders preached, but which certainly isn’t an article of faith either way), then I presume that she would have been a righteous but entirely mortal woman.
•Jesus has children with his wife or wives. Again, no. While it certainly would be plausible that Jesus, if He had been married, could have therefore had children, we certainly claim no doctrine on it one way or another. Furthermore, I think the general understanding among that small fraction of individual Latter-day Saints who have the matter any thought is that any such children would have been unremarkable and would not have been the basis for a secret bloodline from a Dan Brown novel.
•The Garden of Eden was in Missouri. Sure. Not a huge theological shibboleth, but yes, Joseph Smith did teach that as a revealed fact. If you believe in anything like a global flood (or even a major multi-continental flood, even if all land wasn’t underwater at one time), there’s no reason to think that the place that Noah began from would be anywhere close to the traditional area of his final landing in the Middle East two-hundred-plus days later, or therefore that the entirety of Genesis needed to take place in the Middle East.
•Blacks could not get into Heaven pre-1978. Nope. Not even remotely true. What is true is that members of African descent weren’t ordained to the priesthood prior to 1978, and thus were unable to receive temple ordinances, for which ordination is a necessary precursor. But no one has ever taught EVER that Blacks couldn’t be saved, redeemed and exalted.
•Mormons baptize dead people. Not phrased accurately (in fact, phrased in such a way that no one reading it could understand it accurately), but pointing to something factual. Latter-day Saints are baptized in behalf of dead people. The idea is that the ordinance of baptism by proper priesthood authority is essential, but that the great majority of the Earth’s inhabitants have died without having had the opportunity. We are therefore baptized in the temple as a proxy for dead individuals (our own ancestors being our primary responsibility), not as a blanket “get into heaven free” card for the deceased, but so that the righteous dead (or those to whom the gospel was preached in the next world, cf. 1 Peter 4:6) won’t be kept out of heaven for not having that ordinance performed.
•Mormons will become gods. Sounds crazy, doesn’t it? And yet… “The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God: And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ.” (Romans 8:16-17) God calls Himself not just Jesus’ Father but our Father all through the New Testament — quite a slip if He was really meaning to emphasize an unbridgeable gulf between Creator and Created. Does anyone comprehend what it means to be a joint-heir with Christ? Not remotely. But as an Apostle of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints put it recently, “God is not interested in His children just becoming trained and obedient ‘pets’ who will not chew on His slippers in the celestial living room. No, God wants His children to grow up spiritually and join Him in the family business.”
•Mormons get their own personal planet after death. I really don’t know where this one started. My best guess is that it’s the idea expressed just above, run through a game of “telephone” a dozen times by people who consciously want to make Latter-day Saint doctrine sound as bad as possible.
•Mormons will are [sic] the real Christians. Two possible meanings here:
- Latter-day Saints believe that their doctrine is the closest to what Jesus actually taught and meant. True — and every adherent of every other brand of Christianity should say that same about their own church, else why be a member? Additionally, we believe that a necessary sacred authority (which we call “the priesthood”) to perform ordinances such as baptism, holy communion (which we call “the sacrament”), etc. was lost in the centuries of turmoil after the death of the original apostles, and was restored through Joseph Smith and is present in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
- Latter-day Saints believe that only members of their church are really Christians. Good Lord, NO!!! We will readily proclaim that there are striving, righteous Christians within every Christian tradition, no matter how much we agree or disagree with their doctrine. The Beatitudes are in every New Testament — could someone who exemplifies those attributes be anything less than a whole-hearted Christian?
•Mormons wear magic underwear and never take them off unless bathing. (Sigh.) It was an odd sensation during the Romney candidacy to be wearing what was apparently the most interesting underwear in the world. “Magic,” of course, is a word chosen to make it seem ridiculous. Is the Bible “magic?” How about blessed communion wafers? How about a priest’s collar or cassock, or an Orthodox Jew’s phylactery? The Garment of the Holy Priesthood is not “magic,” it’s sacred because it is a tangible reminder of covenants we have made in holy temples — not an outward emblem to others, but an inward emblem to ourselves. The Church has an entire page on its official website explaining this, along with ancillary resources, so there’s no reason for anyone of good conscience to blather on about “magic underwear.” (As far as the “never take them off unless bathing” part, the only instruction we receive is that the garment should not be removed for activities which could reasonably be performed with them on. I know most Latter-day Saint athletes change out of them in the locker room when putting on their sports uniforms, and I’m pretty sure that I wasn’t wearing them when my four children were conceived. Further affiant sayeth naught.)
•It is a sin to drink caffeine. (Coffee, Coke, Pepsi) I’m guzzling Diet Dr Pepper as I write this, so… Yes, there is a Latter-day Saint “health code,” known as the Word of Wisdom. Along with encouraging moderation in meat and eating fresh veggies and fruits, there are several things that are to be avoided entirely: “hot drinks” (which, at the time the Word of Wisdom was written, meant tea and coffee), “strong drink” (alcohol), and tobacco. Beyond that, there’s a (sensible) strong cultural awareness that addictive substances are just a not good thing to tie yourself to. I wish I didn’t drink so much Diet Dr Pepper; I also wish I wasn’t tired all of the time. When I can solve the latter, I’ll happily get rid of the former. In the meantime, even if caffeine were a sin, trust me — I’ve got bigger flaws to excise from my soul before caffeine would be the one thing standing between me and exaltation.
None of this, obviously, was meant as a missionary tract, unless you think it’s overbearing preachiness to help other people know what they’re talking about. Myself, I actually like understanding what and why other people believe, knowing that it places no obligation on me to believe the same way myself. Just in the last year, I had a respectful conversation with Eastern Orthodox adherents about infant baptism, and I came away with a much clearer understanding of exactly what they believe it accomplishes. (I hope that in that same discussion I explained my own faith’s understanding of baptism — if not, the error is due to my faculties.)