Posted by:
derrida
(
)
Date: November 11, 2011 02:29PM
I posted this at some A$$hat's blog where a couple of Mormons came out of the woodwork to defend the church. I think I make a good defense of the modern day Christian position viz. grace and works.
Of course, I hope I don't need to reiterate that I hate the LDS church and I really only have use for Christianity to the extent that its doctrines can be used to bog down and frustrate Mormons from achieving mainstream status for their "restoration" polytheology. Mormons love to say that they are Christians too, and yet in public discussions with Christians the Mormon difference of works righteousness can be made apparent, and one does that for the explicit purpose of disadvantaging Mormons in the public sphere.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Fellow atheists, please consider this bit of realpolitick wisdom before going off on Christians for being just as imaginary in their beliefs as Mormons are. If Christians evangelize here, then I back your attacks on them here. But if they are simply attempting to articulate differences of doctrine that can be wielded against Mormons, then please consider what you are aiming at.
Yes, Mormonism makes many of us allergic to religion of any sort and both religions are based on fantasies and hypothetical textual constructions, but I suggest that Mormons are guilty of even bigger and more dangerous lies.
As I would tell fellow atheists at the About.com atheism forum, Mormons represent a fundamentalism that many of the more liberal and secularized versions of mainstream Christianity have thrown off. In that sense the LDS are a throwback, a REGRESSION that really must be resisted by anyone who values reason and modern progress. Using current day Christianity, in its most liberalized teaching of grace, is a weapon to use in the public arena against Mormons who will predictably champion works righteousness, Abrahamic sacrifice, and levels of justification and sanctification before God based on one's works. That way lies dangerous institutional abuse as we all well know.
http://blog.chron.com/mormonvoice/2011/10/mormons-are-christians-heres-why/#comment-494Blake Garten says:
November 8, 2011 at 10:03 pm
The problem with Abraham sacrificing someone else’s life is that one would be hard pressed to find anyone except the most vile fanatic, someone we would unhesitatingly incarcerate, who would be willing to knife his or her son on the basis of hearing a voice purportedly from God. Society would look at that behavior and be horrified. On that view alone discussion of Abrahamic obedience is pointless and unrealistic; it’s a maturity that no human being will ever achieve, which makes my point that Christ’s grace is sufficient, in a new and everlasting covenant. Go to 1 Cor 15:1-4 and read: “Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain. For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.” Christians stand on this. Mormons don’t. That’s why there is a difference and why Christians distrust Mormons. Mormons don’t like it, evidently, because they get indignant that they aren’t smoothly and automatically considered Christians.
As I said previously, they are Christian in name and that’s about all. Their downgrading of the Savior’s sacrifice, of his gift, is understandably obnoxious to Christians. The gospel is the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus for sins. That’s why he is the Messiah. That’s why public or general revelation is over. Such revelation cannot override, supplement, or complete the Christian faith, which is precisely what Mormon “revelations” and “prophets” claim to do. See 2 Cor. 4:3-4: “And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. The god of this age has blinded the minds of unbelievers, so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.” To Christians, Mormons are spiritually “perishing” in works righteousness.
Finally, the past doctrinal changes of Mormonism provide no confidence that there will not be equally radical revisions to Mormon doctrine in the future. There may be more strange developments yet to come as Mormonism reinvents itself to fit the cultural mores around it. Such fruits are not the work of God but the work of man. The Mormon God is changeable, fickle, flexible, blown about by the winds of doctrine and the philosophies of men.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/11/2011 02:30PM by derrida.