Replies

If one gives the LDS the benefit of the doubt on how they view the “godhead” and the three beings that comprise it, one can count them as henotheistic.

I agree with both of you.

However, any way we want to split theological hairs, Mormons aren't Christian. No way. No how.

Dear Zakeet,

“However, any way we want to split theological hairs, Mormons aren’t Christian. No way. No how.”

I would say it more cautiously, that the LDS is not a Christian organization, and that the god of LDS theology is not the God of Christianity, or of Jesus Christ.

Catholics believe in baptism of desire, including implicit baptism of desire, and it is beyond my capacity to read the hearts of individual members of the LDS to know whether or not this has happened.

I will say that members of the LDS who have never been baptized in a Christian community are not formally incorporated into the Body of Christ through baptism, and thus are not formally Christians.

sitetest

Right, about Mormons not being Christian. Mormons don’t even understand God, much less the working out of God’s plan, the nature of God, Christ, the Holy Spirit, Satan; everything was skewed by Joseph Smith and his desire for power and women. I understand Joseph Smith. I was like him as a teenager and young man . . . power and women, power and women . . . that’s what I wanted. Lots of people pull the trigger and actually form cults to get what they want.

The reason I like the word henotheism is that it fits Mormons if you go deeper into the meaning of the term than the dictionary abbreviation of its meaning. The Mormons primary weapon in apologetics is obfuscation and using terms that have different meanings for their faithful than for everyone else, so I think any term that clarifies is useful. Continue to explain that the Mormons are polytheists since everyone knows what that means outside the Mormon fold. But inside the fold, their apologists have dealt with that. “No we aren’t,” they say, “we worship one god.” The faithful Mormon follows authority, the debate is ended, they are not polytheists in their own mind, so the Christian labeling them that is “ignorant” or a “bigot” in the Mormon mind. But the core definition of polytheism is “belief in or worship of more than one god.” Polytheism doesn’t require worship . . . just belief in “or” worship . . .