A Converstation

Is it challenging for someone raised as a Mormon to leave their religion and find a new faith? Were they aware of other religions before leaving Mormonism?

Guy Grooms

Certainly, like the general population and likely more so, church members are aware of other religions. It would be some of the doctrines of the Church of Jesus Christ that are especially difficult to replace with the beliefs in other faiths.

For example, the belief that marriage and family relationships can endure after death is hard to abandon. Many people imagine a happy reunion with a child lost to death or with a beloved spouse, parent or sibling.

It would be hard to go from the belief that God will give every person a chance to hear and accept the truth, whether in this life or the next, to the doctrine that billions of people, most of whom are Asian or African, who lived honorable lives, but because of an accident of birth never had the opportunity to learn about Christ, must go down to an endless hell.

The excessive and cruel tortures of the Buddhist or Hindu narakas would be no easier to accept.

I think it would be difficult to abandon the belief that God intends to give us, in this life and continuing into the next life, the opportunity to progress and gain knowledge, intelligence and capacity. It would be hard to no longer believe we are truly the children of God, and all that implies about our potential, to accept an eternity of limited possibilities.

Ray Farmer

SAYS YOU: "the belief that marriage and family relationships can endure after death"

ME: LDSaints think "til death do you part" means that Christians don't believe in any kind of family relationship after death. Of course, it is obvious that there is a separation at death, even for LDSaints. That is what that clause means. One of you will be in paradise/hell and the other living on the earth at death. That is all that means. Ask Christians if they believe they will enjoy their family in Heaven and they will affirm that belief. Even non-believers in anything believe that much.

Of course, Your "sealing" is not what it seems. Oaks says sealings are subject to "desired readjustments" because of "events" (?) or "transgressions in mortality" (Oaks, October 2019 General Conference, Trust in the Lord).

I had a good friend. Died of Cancer at 35 years. Died happy because he and his wife were sealed in the temple and he believed that he would be with his family (two children). However, his widow desired "readjustments" after his demise. She got unsealed from him (and I guess the kids went to) so she can be sealed instead to her new man! What the hell?

As far as "transgressions in mortality", don't you LDSaints believe that you will be punished for unrepentant sins in spirit prison and, after having thus paid, will be washed clean? So, if I am sealed but transgress, why can't I, now dead but clean, qualify for the Celestial Kingdom?

All of that mess, and related messes, was one of the easiest doctrines to abandon as I grew toward Christ and His gospel.

SAYS YOU: "It would be hard to go from the belief that God will give every person a chance to hear and accept the truth"

ME: Clearly, the Book of Mormon teaches that this is the life to prepare to meet God. There is no pre-mortal existence where choices there qualify those who, in mortality, live by no standard of righteousness a glorified eternity. It is this life. There is no teachings even close to the LDSaint concepts of Spirit School and repentance after death. The Book of Mormon teaching that this life is the probationary period. You cannot say, "I repent" after this preparatory state.

The Light of Christ is given to everyone that comes into the world. All can progress as they react to that light, that Voice of the Good Shepherd. Those who have an incomplete knowledge, through no fault of their own, but react to their conscience will be judged accordingly. They are a law unto themselves. "God is just" so those who are without the law "because of an accident of birth never had the opportunity to learn about Christ" yet react positively to the Light of Christ are covered by the atonement. The willfully ignorant, the rebels, those who resist the spirit and harden their hearts, are a different case.

Moroni 8:22-3. For behold that all little children are alive in Christ, and also all they that are without the law. For the power of redemption cometh on all them that have no law; wherefore, he that is not condemned.... But it is mockery before God, denying the mercies of Christ, and the power of his Holy Spirit, and putting trust in dead works.

As a believer in the divinity of the Book of Mormon, I found this post-mortal concept and related doctrines not only easy to abandon, but to flee from.

SAYS YOU: "the belief that God intends to give us, in this life and continuing into the next life, the opportunity to progress and gain knowledge, intelligence and capacity."

ME: Christians I know believe this. No principle-abandoning required to move on from the LDSaints.

SAYS YOU: "It would be hard to no longer believe we are truly the children of God"

ME: The Christians I know believe they are children of God in the most important sense. They are adopted children if they live by the Spirit.

Romans 8

14. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God.
15. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.
16. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:
17. And if children, then heirs; heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ; if so be that we suffer with him, that we may be also glorified together.

If we were “truly the children of God” in the sense LDS accept (literal) why would we need to be adopted? My kids are “literally” my kids. I did not need to adopt them

I guess "moving on" is not so much abandoning the LDSaint beliefs you cite specifically. In my case, I moved on as my "belief system" conformed more and more to the doctrines of the Bible and Book of Mormon. I had to shed most major LDSaint beliefs, but that was not very difficulty as they were exposed, one by one, by (especially) Book of Mormon doctrine.

Guy Grooms

Yes much of what you’ve written is much closer to the truth now than it was a hundred years ago. One of the better kept secrets is that christian theology has been moving in the direction of ideas taught by the prophet Joseph Smith for a long time.

Thankfully the morbidly harsh interpretations of scripture characteristic of the Puritans or the early Calvinists have gone out of style. There’s still more than a few evangelicals that insist that hell is a literal lake of fire where the ungodly, or just most of those historically born with dark skin or asian features, suffer the pains of being burned to death for all time. Sadly, these terribly cruel sectarian doctrines have convinced many young people, who easily recognize the injustice, to leave religion altogether.

I think that the Christian world is still very much divided over the eventual fate, and purpose of family relationships. Many insist that all family ties connected to the institution of marriage have no place in the eternities. The promises that God repetitively made to Abraham and Sarah, that they would have posterity, that would be as numerous as the stars, or as the sands upon the seashore, or the particles of the earth, are mostly undiscussed.

I think you’ve touched on something really important. The question whether we are just another creature God has created or in reality His children. If we are God’s children, in an important and significant way, than it would be reasonable that we have potential to become like God. The bible has several verses that refer to us as the children of God without any mention of us being adopted children. We are instructed by Jesus himself to address God as “Our Father who art in Heaven”

There is a pattern here. Much of the Christian world seems intent on diminishing instead of lifting. For example, suggesting we are not really the children of God, or that so many are of so little importance to God that heaven is okay to watch untold billions drift off to endless torment without anything resembling a serious effort to reclaim them. The extraordinary potential that people have is downplayed as is their most important human relationships.

Much of what the Church of Jesus Christ teaches is no different than the rest of christianity, what is different is an expansion of what the life and mission of Jesus Christ means to all of humanity, the relationships that end meaning more to us than anything else and the opportunities for our future growth into the supremely exalted and intelligent beings God wants us to become.

Ray Farmer

SAYS YOU: "Yes much of what you’ve written is much closer to the truth now than it was a hundred years ago."

ME: I found this observation to be somewhat troubling. I study a lot of John Wesley's and William Law's writings from the 1700s, Spurgeon's writings from the 1800s and Tozer's and Ryle's from the 1900s. Wesley's writings are almost 100% consistent with the Book of Mormon, my touchstone for truth.

SAYS YOU: "Christian theology has been moving in the direction of ideas taught by the prophet Joseph Smith for a long time."

ME: This is not especially a good thing, even if true. Christianity today is a hot mess and to point out a church's similarity to the fallen theology is not such a good activity.

SAYS YOU: "There’s still more than a few evangelicals that insist that hell is a literal lake of fire where the ungodly....suffer the pains of being burned to death for all time."

ME: The Book of Mormon calls hell "awful". In it is heard weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth. Is it the lake of fire as described in the Book of Mormon? Who knows. It seems to repeat that description again and again, so it must mean something horrendously awful. Apostate churches, as you point out, do not teach this these days. You would have me believe that some Telestial Kingdom will be a place where the inhabitants will have joy beyond our comprehensions.

"The revealed doctrine of the restored Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches that all the children of God—with exceptions too limited to consider here—will ultimately inherit one of three kingdoms of glory, even the least of which 'surpasses all understanding.'(Kingdoms of Glory, October 2023)

And who finds themselves a Telestial Glory? "....those who reject the Savior and have observed no divine limits on their behavior. This is the kingdom where the wicked abide, after they have suffered for their sins. These are described in modern revelation as “they who received not the gospel of Christ, neither the testimony of Jesus. These are they who are liars, and sorcerers, and adulterers, and whoremongers, and whosoever loves and makes a lie.”

Certainly this idea that one can observe no divine limits on their behavior, live in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity all their life and then be restored to happiness in glory is contrary to the Book of Mormon teachings.

Alma 41

10. Do not suppose, because it has been spoken concerning restoration, that ye shall be restored from sin to happiness. Behold, I say unto you, wickedness never was happiness.
11. And now, my son, all men that are in a state of nature, or I would say, in a carnal state, are in the gall of bitterness and in the bonds of iniquity; they are without God in the world, and they have gone contrary to the nature of God; therefore, they are in a state contrary to the nature of happiness.
12. And now behold, is the meaning of the word restoration to take a thing of a natural state and place it in an unnatural state, or to place it in a state opposite to its nature?
13. O, my son, this is not the case; but the meaning of the word restoration is to bring back again evil for evil, or carnal for carnal, or devilish for devilish--good for that which is good; righteous for that which is righteous; just for that which is just; merciful for that which is merciful.

SAYS YOU: "these terribly cruel sectarian doctrines have convinced many young people, who easily recognize the injustice"

SAYS ME: Alma had a son who was convinced God was unjust, too. Alma 42:1-2 "And now, my son, I perceive there is somewhat more which doth worry your mind, which ye cannot understand--which is concerning the justice of God in the punishment of the sinner; for ye do try to suppose that it is injustice that the sinner should be consigned to a state of misery. Now behold, my son, I will explain this thing unto thee". Chapter 42 explains all this. And then Alma 42:26 "And thus God bringeth about his great and eternal purposes, which were prepared from the foundation of the world. And thus cometh about the salvation and the redemption of men, and also their destruction and misery".

This is Alma's consistent teaching.

Alma 5:56 And finally, all ye that will persist in your wickedness, I say unto you that these are they who shall be hewn down and cast into the fire except they speedily repent.

Alma 12:17 Then is the time when their torments shall be as a lake of fire and brimstone, whose flame ascendeth up forever and ever; and then is the time that they shall be chained down to an everlasting destruction, according to the power and captivity of Satan, he having subjected them according to his will.

The only reason you and modern churches are drifting away from the above plain and precious teaching can only be surmised. But everywhere the Holy One of God has contradicted doctrines where apostates are drifting.

Alma 5:52 And again I say unto you, the Spirit saith: Behold, the ax is laid at the root of the tree; therefore every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit shall be hewn down and cast into the fire, yea, a fire which cannot be consumed, even an unquenchable fire. Behold, and remember, the Holy One hath spoken it.

SAYS YOU: "The promises that God repetitively made to Abraham and Sarah, that they would have posterity, that would be as numerous as the stars, or as the sands upon the seashore, or the particles of the earth, are mostly undiscussed."

ME: We all struggle with metaphors. "Sands as the sea" does not mean we will be reproducing throughout the eternities which will give us the time we need to have so much offspring. At one point the Lamanites were numbered as "the sands of the sea". Alma 2:27 And behold, as they were crossing the river Sidon, the Lamanites and the Amlicites, being as numerous almost, as it were, as the sands of the sea, came upon them to destroy them.

SAYS YOU: "The question whether we are just another creature God has created or in reality His children"

ME: We are his children in the sense that He created us. He is the father of all things that he created.

Alma 11:39 And Amulek said unto him: Yea, he is the very Eternal Father of heaven and of earth, and all things which in them are;....

It is only when we experience the "Mighty Change" that we become His children, by adoption. That is the only sonship that matters in the end.

John 1:12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:

Moses 6

64. And it came to pass, when the Lord had spoken with Adam, our father, that Adam cried unto the Lord, and he was caught away by the Spirit of the Lord, and was carried down into the water, and was laid under the water, and was brought forth out of the water.
65. And thus he was baptized, and the Spirit of God descended upon him, and thus he was born of the Spirit, and became quickened in the inner man.
66. And he heard a voice out of heaven, saying: Thou art baptized with fire, and with the Holy Ghost. This is the record of the Father, and the Son, from henceforth and forever;
67. And thou art after the order of him who was without beginning of days or end of years, from all eternity to all eternity.
68. Behold, thou art one in me, a son of God; and thus may all become my sons. Amen.

SAYS YOU: "I think that the Christian world is still very much divided over the eventual fate, and purpose of family relationships. Many insist that all family ties connected to the institution of marriage have no place in the eternities"

ME: Well, here is a peculiarity. First off, it is clear that relationships with those born into in the family of God, fellow believers, is emphasized in the scriptures over blood relationships. Second, do you not believe that my wife and my daughters are actually my sisters, my son and dad and grandfathers all my brothers? Other than the Fatherhood of God, how can there be a patriarchy created among brothers? Just because their time to come to earth was before other brothers? Doesn't make sense.

"The Christian world is still very much divided" simply because each incorporated church introduces supposedly inspired teachings that go beyond what is written.

SAYS YOU: "Much of the Christian world seems intent on diminishing instead of lifting. For example, suggesting we are not really the children of God, or that so many are of so little importance to God that heaven is okay to watch untold billions drift off to endless torment without anything resembling a serious effort to reclaim them. "

ME: How does suggesting we are not really the children of God diminish? If God could take something He created and turn it into a god, would that be even more amazing? Why is being offspring of a relationship between a Father God and the unmentionable Mother god the only way to produce a being of god-potential?

"so many are of so little importance to God that heaven is okay to watch untold billions drift off to endless torment without anything resembling a serious effort to reclaim them". Are you using D. Oaks technique of making up silly beliefs of "other Christians" to make a point? What does this have to do with "literal offspring"? We know the Lord cries, "what more could I have done in my vineyard?" God obviously is under the impression that He has done everything that could be done and I agree. He is not asking for any suggestions from Living Oracles.

Helaman 14:30 And now remember, remember, my brethren, that whosoever perisheth, perisheth unto himself; and whosoever doeth iniquity, doeth it unto himself; for behold, ye are free; ye are permitted to act for yourselves; for behold, God hath given unto you a knowledge and he hath made you free.

Mosiah 16

2. And then shall the wicked be cast out, and they shall have cause to howl, and weep, and wail, and gnash their teeth; and this because they would not hearken unto the voice of the Lord; therefore the Lord redeemeth them not.
3. For they are carnal and devilish, and the devil has power over them; yea, even that old serpent that did beguile our first parents, which was the cause of their fall; which was the cause of all mankind becoming carnal, sensual, devilish, knowing evil from good, subjecting themselves to the devil.
4. Thus all mankind were lost; and behold, they would have been endlessly lost were it not that God redeemed his people from their lost and fallen state.
5. But remember that he that persists in his own carnal nature, and goes on in the ways of sin and rebellion against God, remaineth in his fallen state and the devil hath all power over him. Therefore, he is as though there was no redemption made, being an enemy to God; and also is the devil an enemy to God.

SAYS YOU: "Much of what the Church of Jesus Christ teaches is no different than the rest of christianity, what is different is an expansion of what the life and mission of Jesus Christ means to all of humanity"

ME: I know the Church is making efforts to seem like mainstream Christianity, but the above simply is not true. I have been reading three talks by D.Oaks that completely downplay the life and mission of Jesus at the same time he exalts the importance of obedience to the celestial laws. Read Trust in the Lord, October 2019, Divine Love in the Father’s Plan, April 2022, Kingdoms of Glory, October 2023 and see for yourself. In the three talks, there is no use of the words faith, grace, mercy, justice, forgive, sanctify, justify, crucify, Holy Spirit, Born Again, Mighty Change, worship or hope. All of those concepts define what Jesus did for us. Law, however got 15 mentions, Temple 7, covenant 27 and church 35 times! This is no expansion of the mission of Jesus.

I went too long again. Enough for now.