The Guy on the ground is supposed to be Joseph Smith, a 14 year old future treasure hunter and occultic diviner, who is being visited by the "Heavenly Father" and Jesus who are telling him he shouldn't be a Methodist or a Presbyterian because their creeds were all an abomonination to them.
Now we don't know which one is the Father and which one was the Son, since they look identical. Now, Jesus got his body here on this earth, but The Father got his body when he was a Man, just like us, on another planet where he learned to be a god by slowing growing in obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel on the planet where he was born. That's pretty orthodox theology, don't you think?
Notice how both the Father and Jesus look a lot like pictures that you see occasionally of Joseph Smith. Well that is because Joseph Smith claimed to be a direct blood descendant of Jesus, but we're not sure if he was descended from Jesus' marriage to Mary, or Martha or Mary Magdaline. Jesus, of course was not only happily married but he was a practicing polygamist.
There I hope that helps. Now you can go and tell your pastor that he shouldn't call the LDS Church heretics, since they are just as orthodox as any Catholic or Protestant sect.
Wrong reason!
Because it makes them sad!
(And ballistic!!!!!)
Actually, while the story indicates one is the son of the other, we don't even know who these two characters are according to the "First Vision" account. (They are both simply two unnamed "personages"--Personage #1; and Personage #2)...and when you look at a handwritten account by Smith of this "First Vision"...there is no second Personage. (I guess in that version, one of the two "Personages" was superfluous)
The Father got his body when he was a Man, just like us, on another planet where he learned to be a god by slowing growing in obedience to the laws and ordinances of the gospel on the planet where he was born.
Well, just imagine that. God having genes from his mom. Imagine that, the God of gods being reduced to some twinkle in his mom's eye way back then--and that at one point, that's all he was.
Now you can go and tell your pastor that he shouldn't call the LDS Church heretics . . .
Recently the Vatican has instructed parishes not to release our records to the LDS but my pastor has never spoken of or singled out the LDS in any way, shape, or form. They might be a big deal in Utah but they're not a blip on the map in New York City.
I do believe the definition fits:
her·e·tic (hÄ›r'Ä-tÄk)
n. A person who holds controversial opinions, especially one who publicly dissents from the officially accepted dogma of the Roman Catholic Church.
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/heretic