I’m only trying to understand. Only trying.
Well I am not Catholic so if you could put together some speeches that form what you believe to be Catholic doctrine, then post them and lets hear what the Catholics have to say.
As a defense of my posting, though, the only addition or insertion was the Brigham Young (6:322). And that was what I “edited.” I struggled as to whether I should mix prophets’ words (and I still do). My only justification is if they speak for the Church, then should their words not sing in chorus? If you don’t think so, we can delete BY to discuss the meat. The other quotes were were from Joseph Smith and from all in the same sermon (as far as I read it).
Ok, here’s the thing: yes, we do believe that Joseph Smith, Brigham Young, et al were prophets…and when they act AS prophets (that is, when recieving revelation and instructions for the church, with a 'thus saith the Lord" disclaimer attached, having presented whatever it is to the Quorum of Twelve and had it confirmed…become canonized and accepted by the church–quite a process, actually) then what they say goes. It’s then from God. Period.
However, prophets are, first and foremost, MEN…and men are imperfect, almost by definition. There’s only been One Perfect Man, and Brigham Young wasn’t Him.
There is this about the nature of Mormonism that ‘outsiders’ not only don’t GET, but refuse to believe; they all seem to see us as mind numbed goose stepping followers…when in reality I don’t know many cultures as full of (to put this as kindly as possible) innovative and individual thinkers. Speculation is the LDS pastime of choice. It is for this reason that we HAVE a core doctrine that is so strictly codified in scripture, and which is, to the annoyance of our opponents, so narrow. We are all quite free to believe a great many wonderful and odd things. For instance, we have LDS strict 24/7 creationists. We have full on evolutionists who simply believe that evolution is 'how God did it." Some of those things may even be true…but then again, they might not be.
And our church leaders are as likely to engage in this as anybody else. The only difference is that when they speak, they have more ears to listen. It doesn’t mean that they are RIGHT—or that, even if such a leader is convinced himself that something is true, and preaches it as if it WERE true, that
the Church is teaching it and presenting it as doctrine.
We are very, very careful about this, as a matter of fact.
The result is, even our leaders are free to go off the reservation and proclaim personal opinion. It’s OK. They don’t have to stay utterly silent except when God speaks through them. I rather doubt that Abraham, Moses, Peter…any of the prophets of old kept silence except for when God spoke through them, either. The difference between them and the prophets NOW is…all the old guys got to burn their screwy musings, and all their conversations except for the ‘prophetic’ ones are gone: we will never know everything…though we DO know, for instance, that Jacob had some major problems with his kids, and made some pretty big mistakes with them. THAT family story read like the world’s worst soap opera.
(sorry, went away for a second there…back now…)
ANY way, a great many leaders of the church have made a great many speeches to various groups. Most of them are great. ALL of them are enlightening…NONE of them are to be considered prooftexts for doctrine.
Oh? My mistake. I thought these were published sermons given by the prophets as a way to disseminate doctrine and I thought Journal of Discourses was connected to the Church? Maybe I didn’t read it at the LDS site.
They were sermons and speeches given by leaders of the church. I would venture to say that few of them were given for the purpose of 'disseminating doctrine." Read BY’S stuff, and it’s fairly obvious that his, mostly, were to talk about behavior; exhorting to action or something of that nature. Even those that hammered doctrinal opinion were about attempting to persuade to a point of view, not say 'thus saith the Lord…BOOM."
And yes, the Journal of Discourses is ‘connected to the church’ in that it is a collection of ‘discourses’ made BY church leaders, collected by a group of British Mormons who thought it would be a good idea to publish them in England. They were never an official publication of the church the way the scriptures are; they were published privately.
Now me, I LOVE the Journal of Discourses, for what they actually ARE. As vital clues into the thoughts of the speakers and their listeners, especially when combined with what was going on around them at the time, they are invaluable. If you were to go through the Journal of Discourses and use them to figure out what BY was thinking…I actually have no problem with that.
The PROBLEM, Xavier, is that Brigham Young was the leader of the church at the time. I believe he WAS a prophet, called to do a job that only he could do—and nobody can deny that he did it very, very well indeed. But Brigham Young was not the ‘church.’ Truth did not change because his opinion did—and he was well aware of that. He was also well aware that he tended to let his mouth run away with him–and he said so.
What are the four corners of your doctrine that we might debate, fair lady?
“four corners?”
Try…the
Thirteen Articles of Faith. I know that the word “creed” has an ashy taste in the mouth of Mormons, but let’s face it; those thirteen articles ARE a creed, by definition. Look at them.
elieve. I am wondering if you do?
