For any Christians (or other types of believers out there), do any of you believe Mormons will have a chance at salvation? If so, why? If not, I think I already know most of those reasons, so please only list them if they are relevant to other responses. Please, please keep it as peaceful as possible.

Thank you!

I believe ultimately that it is up to the powers that be.

If a person really believes that what they are doing is right and they are striving to be their best, Maybe it's "E" for effort and a chance to find out what was really right.

It's kinda like when a person uses the "Adam and Eve" example.
Eve sinned because she was truly deceived. In her heart and mind, (right or wrong), she was completely convinced in the rightness of her actions.

In Adam's case, he knew better, said so, and still committed the sin.

Who was more wrong or more sinful? The sinner who truly thought they were doing something right? Or the sinner who sinned fully knowing better?

I believe part of the point of Jesus' death, for those that believe in it, was for "all" to have salvation, no matter what. Everyone getting a chance to learn what they did wrong and fix it. Those that are willfully wrong - well, that again is up to the powers that be.

Thanks for your thoughts. No other opinions out there? The reason that I ask is that I'm just about to lose my very TBM Dad. Am I going to end up living forever with the guilt of letting my Dad go to hell if I don't try to save him? Currently, I'm not sure I believe in anything.

Well based on that I'm going to chime in - not a Christian but I've thought about the issue a lot.

1) It makes no sense that a just & merciful God would base

2) An often misunderstood thing about Mormon theology is that, in fact, the core of Mormonism is accepting Jesus Christ as your personal Savior.

That really is the core of Mormon theology. So even if you do believe Jesus only save people who believe, your dad should be covered. Certainly no one on earth could have a perfect understand of Jesus anyway. Little squabbles about how your definition of Jesus might be a little different than his definition of Jesus are silly.

I have to run but I'll give you more details later.


3) Your dad is dying. It would be immoral to hurt him and your relationship by getting into a pissing match about religion. This is now what Jesus would want. If you are confused about this go reread the gospels. Jesus is all about caring for the individual. The needs of the individual always trumped the rules every time. He wasn't condemning - he was helping and healing.

Up until lately, I have felt the same- and I have so much respect for my Dad, and how he has lived his life. I disagree about a lot of his beliefs, but I absolutely respect him for living what he truly believed to be right, and for the great good he has done, and for the service and love he gave to others. Honestly, I feel like for him, and many others, Mormonism was no more or less valid than any spiritual system. Damn it... I'm almost certain I've already seen him for the last time, since he lives across the country. I just want to enjoy what we have left. It's just this nagging fear that he's going to hell... In my gut, I don't believe it. But then, listening to my gut was what made me a Mormon (and then not listening to it kept me a Mormon- I think my gut is not a reliable source of truth). Damn it, Damn it, Damn it. I'm having a hard time swallowing the truth of any ancient scripture these days, but I have really wanted to believe... I guess I also fear I'll start believing at some point, and then face the idea that he's already in hell. Or, I'll be unable to believe, simply because facing that idea would be too hard. Or, I won't believe, because it doesn't make sense, and then I'll end up right there in hell with him! Damn it all! Wow, I kinda wish I never had any religion. I guess.

Any religion that claims to be speaking for God is deceived. None of them are. If we start at Exodus 20 and the mistake Israel made for making Moses a middle-man, all of the Biblical corruptions and teachings on heaven and hell fall into place as error. The focus on the afterlife instead of this life becomes clearer that these ideas are from man, not God.

Hell is not a place of torture. Hell fire is a place in which those who want to dethrone God and side with the devil are eventually destroyed, not tortured.

When our emotions get stuck in the afterlife, it's a pure deception to distract us from living today. I believe the Sadducees had this view and argued with the Pharisees over the resurrection, for to them, it was unimportant. I agree. What matters is here and now.

Religions are created by man to deal with death, believing we need to do something to live forever, when we do not. God created us and therefore His decision will be the same as when we were born on earth for us to continue in the afterlife. Throw away the teachings of Paul. He doesn't even quote the Old Testament correctly, and his insane ideas about justification by faith are just that -- insane.

See my post below for more details.

By the way, the Greek word "gienna" which is translated as "hell" in the New Testament was a place outside the city where they burned trash. Burning trash is something that consumes the trash and changes its composition. THe trash is burned up and destroyed. Hell is a place of destruction as well, not torture. Those who want to dethrone God have no reason to exist, eventually. They are destroyed. Your father and all Mormons and yourself have no intent to dethrone God, so you don't have to worry about it.

I was thinking, where have I heard this before? Then it hit me.


I was answered that I must join none of them, for they were all wrong; and the Personage who addressed me said that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight; that those professors were all corrupt; that: "they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof."

If we look at the first vision story published in 1830 and not the one in 1836-1838, then we can conclude that Joseph Smith went to the woods to receive a forgiveness of sins, not to ask a question about which was the true church. That version was created after he formed the LDS Church.

The being that appeared to him in 1820 quoted Isaiah saying no one does good on earth, not one. This is also quoted by Paul in his pagan ideas. I believe Isaiah also wrote out of his own butt, his own brain, creating the idea that if you don't believe in God, then you can't do any good.

That is just 100% false. Many atheists can do good from their hearts for their family and friends. That's reality. Each person has the power to do good, with our without a belief in God.

One needs to separate what Isaiah concluded verses what God actually told him.

The Bible is a mixture of truth and error--God's view verses what a man thinks. It gets more and more corrupted after Moses. Thus, I believe the being that appeared to Joseph Smith knew this about Isaiah's opinion and quoted a corrupted scripture to mislead Joseph Smith. Thus, that being was not Jesus, but a being from the devil...the struggle with darkness before the light appears is the one-two punch of the devil who plays bad cop and good cop to deceive.

The devil picked Joseph Smith because he came from an unstable background and his family were rather indigent and not trustworthy. In his day, his entire neighborhood where he grew up signed an document in a court of law testifying of his dubious character.

His trial hearing of 1826 proves he was into the occult as witnesses testified of his occult powers. Thus, it is further evidence the devil was behind Mormonism from the very beginning.

I've been in the same boat as you on several occasions. I have found, more or less, my own happy medium (a story for another day) and I just hope you are also able to do the same. I really do understand.

Don't give up something real for a pretend fear.

No. This whole idea of saving people is from man, not God. Indeed, these people stand in God's judgement seat where they don't belong. Who are you to even ask such questions? You are not God, and neither are they.

Did you know that the last part of the gospel of Mark that gives the commission to go save people was ADDED later? Go do the research. The New Testament is a mess.

The leaven of the Pharisees is what causes you to feel the way you do. It's people who sit on God's throne and then invent doctrines to save people that are not true. God is going to forgive everyone except those who blaspheme the Holy Spirit. If you believe in Jesus, that is what He said.

Paul's and John's writings are a corruption of his teachings. Jesus wasn't even sent to the Gentiles, but only to the lost house of Israel. He taught that plainly. Man has twisted His teachings into unrecognizable concepts that cause a good person like you to be more afraid of man-made ghosts than just loving your dad today and not worrying about the afterlife.

I am in no position to judge BUT if anyone were thought to go to hell on any account it would have to be Joseph Smith. It sounds harsh and it's weird saying it because so many people believe he is such a good man and everyone on here used to think that too...but whatever perspective you look at it from (within a religious standpoint) would be that he has committed terrible sins. Who knows though...I am not God and I do not claim to know what happened to him. Just a thought.

Exactly. We are not God. We have no business making eternal judgments on anyone. Religions have been doing that for thousands of years. It's time we stop doing it.

For what it's worth, I don't think hell or Satan exist. I don't believe in a devil that tempts us - I think the devil is just a convenient scapegoat to explain away mankind's own capacity for cruelty and evil.

The message Christ left was that we are to love and serve others. And I believe that is how we will be judged after death. We should treat others with love and kindness. And I don't think whatever building we go into on Sunday makes a whole lot of difference.

And I don't think that Christ, who spent so much time talking about love, would create a punishing hell for people who didn't live up to his expectations. I imagine we'll realize that we had chances to do good that we let slip by, and that we'll feel a lot of regret over those. But Christ is going to love us anyway.

Christ said "Inasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of these ye have done it unto me." He didn't say anything about having the "right" membership card in your pocket when you do it.

I believe everyone will live in the afterlife based on this logic: God created all of us for a reason, and thus, we will continue after we are dead because of the decision He already made. Nothing we do can change it.

However, those who see God, know Him, and then call him a liar and claim he is hiding things from us about Life, will be in serious risk. Such will be anyone who sides with the devil, who is seeking to dethrone him. As such, the risk of being destroyed in the future increases greatly, if they don't change their minds. In other words, those who blaspheme the Holy Spirit by calling God's power evil, apparently, have warped minds that cannot be reclaimed. Such is the case of the devil as well. Their destruction is sure, since they apparently can't change their minds about it. It's not about being tortured forever in fire. That's a corruption. It's about being annihilated or disassembled. Destroyed is a better word. There is no forgiveness for these people because they are incapable of changing their view about God.

So to answer your question, of course a Mormon will be "saved". Everyone will be, except those who blaspheme the Holy Spirit as explained above.

To me, the afterlife is not very important. What's more important is here and now.

"In other words, those who blaspheme the Holy Spirit by calling God's power evil, apparently, have warped minds that cannot be reclaimed."

In my studies, the way I have come to understand this is that by calling God's power evil you are thereby cutting off the only route of your own forgiveness. Thus you can no longer be saved and are damned. This is the unforgivable sin... and it makes sense, no?

I think the whole concept of Satan and Hell are nothing more and nothing less than spiritual abuse. A convenient boogeyman invented to scare people away from asking too many questions about the faith. Isn't it convenient that these places reserved for the "bad people" are also said to hold those who failed to swallow such claims? I'm not picking on the Mormons here, just any religions that include these elements.

The Quran says that if you allow yourself to be led away from Islam by deceivers you will end up having molten led poured down your throat in the afterlife.

Given that the LDS church says a man would be punished for falling away and joining Islam, and Islam says he'd be punished for falling away and joining the LDS church, and neither have evidence to back them up, are either of these claims really any more credible than the other? No.

The great philosopher Bertrand Russell said that even if we knew for a fact that one of the world's religions was completely correct, we should all expect to be damned merely as a matter of probability.

That would be scary until you realize: there are an infinite number of hypothetical afterlife scenarios. For every scenario you can imagine in which you are punished for a particular behavior, you can imagine a counter scenario in which that same behavior is rewarded. Without any evidence to act as an arbiter, there's no reason to be afraid of any of them.

That means all things being equal, you really don't need to be afraid of a hell, without evidence that it exists or what the criteria for being sent there would be.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 01/14/2013 06:31PM by doubtisavirtue.

I'm not Christian but I will respond. It doesn't seem very Christ like of Christ to exclude someone. In addition Christ is the one who gave such scant evidence of His own teachings that it was so open to interpretations.

If anything Christ needs to sack up and save everyone like He said He would.

You are correct. Jesus said everyone will be forgiven except those who blaspheme the Holy Spirit. These are those who know God, who He is, what he teaches, and says He is a liar and that his power is EVIL. They claim the devil has the truth and God does not -- blaspheme. T

They claim God is hiding the truth about resurrection and Life processes, and He's not sharing it for selfish reseason to control eveyrone. They claim He has ulterior motives.

Because these beings believe he is lying, they reason further: "If God created us, maybe one day he will get bored of us, and kill us all, and start over. He is messing with us."

Thus, the devil's point of view is to have everyone follow him, and if no one worships God, then God will have no power.

He believes God is bluffing about destroying him because he is still alive.

He believes if he gets enough followers, God will cough up the family jewels of Life, and everyone will have the power to maintain eternal life independent of God, rather than depending on Him, who may change his mind. The devil doesn't trust God.

If one sides with the devil, of course, then apparently, the mind can't be changed. The view of God is that He is evil, and therefore, the mind gets locked into error that can't be changed. That is where the devil is at. He can't change his mind, even if he tried.

Thus, such beings like him can't be forgiven because they can't change their views about God. Thus, those who blaspheme the the Holy Spirit of truth cannot be forgiven in this world nor in the world to come.

But *everyone else* lives forever, not because Jesus died on the cross (that Peter Pan doctrine is of pagan origin) but because they don't call God a liar and they don't claim His Holy Spirit power evil.

Mormonism perverts this teaching by defining blaspheming the Holy Spirit is rejecting the "LDS priesthood" once you have received it (D&C 84). Total garbage. Thus, the D&C ties the son of perdition doctrine to the LDS CHurch, and not to God Himself, which is a complete corruption of what Jesus taught.

I disagree with all of you on this. And especially with BC. First of all, BC is missing something vital. The Jesus of Mormonism is a DIFFERENT one! The wrong one. He is not God, and was simply a man who was conceived in the normal way...through a sex act between God and one of his wives.

To answer the question of the OP, the way of salvation according to Christians, is to accept Jesus as Savior and Lord. But obviously it has to be the correct Jesus. According to biblical scripture, Jesus is God in the flesh; he fully possess all 10 divine attributes. The triune God is one God manifest in 3 persons.

To Mormons, however, salvation is not the goal. Exaltation is.

Please back that up with scripture.

Where does it say that you have to have exactly the right concept of Jesus for his grace to work?

How do you know you are 100% right? If your particular flavor of Christianity is wrong in your understanding of Christ does that mean you go to hell?

Your Jesus is certainly a lot less just and merciful than the Jesus I once believed in.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/15/2013 10:24AM by bc.

Yes, no one owns God and gets it all right. I believe he can be found in many places ... or not. I noticed an interesting thing last F&T Sunday (2 weeks ago). Of the about 15 testimonies (at least it felt like that many) only one person said "I believe Joseph Smith is a prophet" and about 5, including a small child said "I believe Jesus is my Savior". This is a recent change with the splitting of the ward. Maybe people's focus is changing. Not sure but he can be found by those who genuinely seek him. I wish they would put away D&C and start teaching from the New Testament about the love of Christ. But they just won't.
Also, people actually shared personal things in Sunday School about their lives last week. I'd never seen that either.
The thing is, once you do find the Christ you seek, then you outgrow the church because you want more of Jesus and less of everything else which is a natural progression of the Christian.



Edited 8 time(s). Last edit at 01/15/2013 03:05AM by suckafoo.

I don't believe that being in the "right" church can save you. Therefore, being in the "wrong" church doesn't necessarily send you to hell. Jesus said "I am the Way." So it's all about who you trust, yourself, the church, or Jesus. Jesus said He would not reject anyone who comes to Him.

That's what I think too. He promised we will find him if we seek him with all our hearts and that doesn't have anything to do with a place, but everything to do with our personal hope and faith in Christ. He's a personal God and loves each personally.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 01/15/2013 08:51AM by suckafoo.

To answer your question, salvation to any Christian means acceptance of Jesus Christ as savior. So in Christian terms your dad is fine.

To any loving God worthy of the name, of course, it wouldn't matter in the slightest.

Just enjoy your remaining time with your dad. Just love him. Don't bring religion into it. It's not necessary. If his beliefs bring him comfort in his final days, so be it.

Since all religions teach a similar version of the Golden Rule, it seems highly unlikely that God wouldn't be the first to follow His own instructions. In the end, perfect justice will prevail.

Christ died for everyone. So not only will Mormons obtain salvation, everyone will eventually be brought back into God's presence. Even if only those who believe in Christ were going to be saved, Mormons believe in Christ so they would be saved.

Thanks for your input, everyone. I really appreciate it.

I find the concept of heaven/hell to be so far out there it amazes me when you can get people together on a thread like this to talk about it seriously...

I know what you're saying, but there is a time a place for everything. When someone's father is dying, it's generally not the time for our typical slam-type debate.

Yeah, I hear you.

If my mom were in the hospital with back pain I don't think I'd find it helpful to hear people arguing over whether stepping on a crack will in fact break my mother's back, and whether the angle of your foot determined the extent of the injuries, and whether the person had the intent of breaking their mother's back before they stepped, after their foot touched the crack, or before they left the house that morning.

But the OP did solicit salvation-themed advice, I guess...

If there is a heaven, we'll have to build it.

(borrowed from a YT video I saw recently - I like it)

So, it follows that if there is a hell, we'll have to build that, too.

But let's just focus on the heaven part - feels so much better than hell, doesn't it?

How about this almostThere, still your fears. Throw out all doctrines and get to the space of peace. Pray to the Deity of Your understanding - talk as you would to a great friend about your Dad and pray he goes where he need to go with peace and love. Where ever he is supposed to go, the higher powers can guide him. If there are still things for him to learn or do, that's where he'll go. If it's time for him to just rest, then he'll go rest.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/15/2013 12:30PM by partymxman.