Jeff, thanks for the thought out response.
Your discussion is misleading, however. You are intertwining the idea of "going to Heaven" and the idea of "returning to Heavenly Father", which you and I both know are two different concepts in the Mormon doctrine.
According to Mormon doctrine, almost everyone will go to Heaven, but it is only the ones who fulfill all of the ordinances that will be exalted and return to Heavenly Father on the Celestial Plane of Heaven.
Apostle Talmage is not referring to Exaltation, he is referring to Salvation (i.e. at least making it to the Telestial Plane [lowest level of Heaven]), and he is saying that that Salvation is dependent upon our own compliance to the laws and ordinances of God.
Jesus Christ fulfilled the law so that we would not have to (because we could not). Christ told us not to rely on our own works or attempts to fulfill the law because we are destined to failure in that. But instead rely upon His Grace.
Let me give you a practical example. If a Bishop in the church performs a Baptism and the Bishop has been leading a sin-filled life (for example, let's say that he embezzled some money from his workplace). Then according to Mormon doctrine, the Power of the Priesthood would be removed from him. So, since the Bishop just got through Baptizing a person, and the Power of the Priesthood wasn't with him at the time, what of the person who was Baptized? The Baptism was invalid, yet this person who received the Baptism is not aware of the Bishop's sinful life and subsequent revocation of the Power of the Priesthood.
That example can apply to any person who claims the Priesthood, because we are all sinners, and the Power of the Priesthood cannot be with people in sin. That is why we must rely on God's Grace through Jesus Christ and not through men who claim to wield the power of the priesthood that Jesus Christ held.
My point is that these men who think they hold the Priesthood and are thereby fulfilling the CONDITIONS of salvation as espoused by Apostle Talmage are failing in those CONDITIONS and, at the same time, rejecting the Grace of Christ that says that we don't need to be subject to those conditions.
The church also teaches that families and marriages can be forever and that anyone who so desires, who reaches Heaven can attain that blessing in the hereafter.
But...that is all secondary and basically wound up in interpretation on what our more detailed condiotions will be in the eternities.
The fundamental teaching that Christ is the author of salvation and that salvation and Heaven are a return to God and His Kingdom for eternity based on our acceptance of Jesus Christ is the same and rock solid.
My guess is, that once there, we both will accept whatever details God in Heaven has to offer without any qualms or reservation. I believe, beng of different persuasions in our faith in Christ, that if we focus on that fundamental agreement, that we can most effectively work together to bring souls unto Him...and best influence the direction of our nation as opposed to conflicting with one another when we ought to be working together.
But that is just my own opinion and my main point was to witness Christ Jesus to you, definitively and directly so that you might know that members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are indeed christian.
In the end, it will be between each of us and our Savior...but I believe it is clear that the Church teaches and preaches Christ Jesus and Him crucified and our unflinching dependence on His atonement and redemption for salvation.
The rest is wrapped up in what we should do and how we should live if we are trully converted. Christ himself said that ww would keep His commandments and that is also what the church teaches...but saying that and believing it are only a reflection of what Christ himself taught in the new testament and do not in the least take away from the power of his atonement or its essential qualities.