How do the Mormons do it?

[Cowboy_Pete]

It never ceases to amaze me the sort of “lying for the lord” and mangling of their own doctrines that certain Christians are willing to do in order to make Christianity their personal treehouse with a “mormons keep out” sign.

Originally Posted by Cowboy Pete
I can only imagine how confusing it would be if we had to figure out if Peter, when he denied Christ three times, was giving his opinion or speaking Truth.

Peter was speaking truth at that time, but he was not teaching anyone anything at the time, especially not doctrine.

???!!

rainman (and Stephen 168, who gives tacit agreement to what you said when he agrees to part of your post without correcting this blatant error), you actually believe that Peter was telling the Truth when he denied three times that he Knew Jesus?

Peter was clearly lying out of fear. Just hours before, he’d promised Jesus to follow him everywhere, and Jesus said that he’d deny him three times before the cock crowed.

Is there any Catholic in the house willing to stand up and set the record straight on Peter’s denial of Christ? Because I know that this story is told correctly in the Catholic Church. Or at least the Jesuits get it straight.

 

[Cowboy_Pete]

Pete:

You might have an easier time on this forum if you deal with Stephen168 in the same manner that the Lord dealt with Herod: don’t reply to him. I was given the same warning, by a good Catholic on this forum, and I wish I had heeded it.

rainman:

I can see why you would be afraid to communicate with Stephen168.

Do you think that Jesus was “afraid to communicate” with Herod?

 

[rainman10]

It never ceases to amaze me the sort of “lying for the lord” and mangling of their own doctrines that certain Christians are willing to do in order to make Christianity their personal treehouse with a “mormons keep out” sign.

You mean like what the Mormons do? Lying for their lord?

???!!

rainman (and Stephen 168, who gives tacit agreement to what you said when he agrees to part of your post without correcting this blatant error), you actually believe that Peter was telling the Truth when he denied three times that he Knew Jesus?

Peter was clearly lying out of fear. Just hours before, he’d promised Jesus to follow him everywhere, and Jesus said that he’d deny him three times before the cock crowed.

Is there any Catholic in the house willing to stand up and set the record straight on Peter’s denial of Christ? Because I know that this story is told correctly in the Catholic Church. Or at least the Jesuits get it straight.

Yes, my bad. However Peter was not teaching anything at the time, especially doctrine. And you are right, he was speaking out of fear. This is not what the Mormon prophets were doing when they were preaching their opinions. They were not doing it out of fear.

 

[Cowboy_Pete]

If you want “scientific” evidence for the book of Mormon, well, look at the description of the geography when Lehi left Jerusalem. The account is much more accurate as to the Geography of Saudi Arabia than anything that would have been available to Joseph Smith. Not to mention that the specific directions from Jerusalem to what Lehi called “Bountiful,” not only map to a small fertile land on the edge of a horrible desert, but also contains evidence that someone named “Lehi” lived there thousands of years ago. That’s pretty solid stuff.

The rest of the book of Mormon has an uncertain starting point, since we don’t know where Lehi landed. Heck, there is even a sect that reads the book of Mormon that claims that Lehi landed in Africa, and that all the rest of the book of mormon events took place between Ethiopia and Eritrea. I don’t agree with them, but I can’t point to any passage in the Book of Mormon that proves them wrong. Once you leave Bountiful, there’s no more frame of reference. One might as well say that the Bible isn’t true because there’s no physical evidence of pre-flood events.

 

[Cowboy_Pete]

It never ceases to amaze me the sort of “lying for the lord” and mangling of their own doctrines that certain Christians are willing to do in order to make Christianity their personal treehouse with a “mormons keep out” sign.

You mean like what the Mormons do? Lying for their lord?

We don’t do that. That phrase was coined by anti-mormons. Do you know the things they say about your church?

 

[Stephen168]

We don’t do that.

Was he studying porn? That’s always an easy way out
Most of the folks I knew that studied their way out of Mormonism were studying porn.

 

[Naf623]

The claim of the Mormon Church was the same as Joseph Smith until science proved him wrong. Now the claim is that it is only a story of some people. Even then science shows it is the story of none of the people. Someday the Mormon Church will have to admit it is nothing but feel good fiction.

Our claim has never changed. We believe The Book of Mormon to be an accurate History of one group of Israelites who left Jerusalem around 600BC; the time of Jeremiah, and travelled, under the direction of God, across the sea, and landed in what we now call The Americas. From there they separated into two factions, one of whom we have no records for their lives/travels etc. Whilst one other civilisation’s history is also included in the Book of Mormon, nothing about our claims or teachings excludes the introduction of DNA from other sources, and there are so many possibilities as to when/how this could have been included. We have no idea if there were any inhabitants prior to the Jaredites; therefore there could already have been intermingling of DNA profiles even before the Book of Mormon ‘proper’ starts (i.e. the 600BC date). The BOM records that the Jaredites came into contact with another group (Mulekites), and that they eventually were integrated into the Nephite population. Therefore any intermingling of DNA with the Jaredites and any prior inhabitants would thus also become part of the Nephites gene pool. Furthermore, as we have absolutely no records of the Lamanites during periods when they were not at war with the Nephites, there are any number of occasions where another group could have easily intermingled with them also.
We have never claimed it to be a full account of everything that happened in ancient America.

How do you determine what is unchangeable doctrine from what is merely the personal opinion of a prophet?
Do you claim there is such a thing as unchangeable doctrine?
Do you claim that when “a prophet is acting as such,” his pronouncements are infallible?
How do you know when “a prophet is acting as such?”

Easier and quicker than me posting up explanation:
fairwiki.org/Mormonism_and_doctrine/Prophets_are_not_infallible

Is their a place I can go to to see a list of the “official” doctrines of the LDS church?
“Latter-day Saints believe that Jesus leads the church through revelation and has chosen a single man, called ‘the Prophet’ or President of the Church, as his spokesman on the earth.” Given this, can you give me a list of the revelations, if there are any, of the current prophet, Thomas S. Monson, when he was acting as such, or show me where I can find them? How about the previous one? What has Jesus told humanity trough Thomas S. Monson, his “spokesman on earth?”

Again, simplest one is:
www.lds.org
look up General Conference addresses; available as audio, video and transcripts.

Your response still doesn’t answer the question. If it turns out that your (i.e. “one’s” - I’m not specifically referring to anyone) personal testimony, including the prophet’s personal testimony, regarding this or that matter, as certified by God’s gift of “the burning in the bosom” (so you say, of course - naturally I do not agree with it) is later determined to be false, by future LDS members’ testimonies, what do you make of the prior ones?

We do not believe this could be the case. Our testimony comes direct from God, through his Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit testifies of all truth, and this forms part of our testimony, how we know that these things are true.

BTW, where does this notion of a “burning in the bosom” testimony come from? As far as I know, it’s not from the Bible.

No, you’re right; the specific ‘Burning in the Bosom’ does not come from the Bible. It comes from a revelation given through Joseph Smith to Oliver Cowdery. Doctrine and Covenants 9:8 reads:
“But, behold, I say unto you, that you must study it out in your mind; then you must cask me if it be right, and if it is right I will cause that your bosom shall burn within you; therefore, you shall feel that it is right”
This is the same principle that all Latter Day Saints follow to discover the truth of anything. First is to study, ponder and consider the matter oneself. The Burning in the Bosom, however, is not necessarily the same feeling for each individual. It is something much confused, even within the church at times. The revelation was given to an individual; and constitutes The Lord explaining to them personally how The Holy Spirit will feel in them. Each individual may feel the Spirit in a slightly different manner; for me I feel peaceful, yet excited and invigorated; it encourages me to keep going in the way I have started to find the feeling in the first place. Since these feelings come when I pray, when I study the scriptures, when I provide service to others and when I appreciate the beauty and majesty of the world around me; God’s creation and gift to us all, I know that these feelings are from Him; as Satan would not wish me to continue along a path doing any of those things. It brings me great joy to feel the spirit in my life in such a way; another testimony to me that it is the truth from God.

 

[Naf623]

This is a reduction of the Catholic Church to something less than it is. It is not “just a church”. It is the Church that Jesus Christ established, on the foundation of the Apostles. They, having been given the directive to teach the Gospel to all nations, obeyed Jesus Christ, and in so doing, handed on to their successors the Gospel itself, and the authority (keys) to act in Christ’s name.

I will agree that all other churches fall short of this, including Mormonism.

I agree that there have been people, very often with the very best of intentions and most devout in their beliefs, who have continued to worship Christ since the time of His death; however I do not agree that the doctrines and practises remain the same as He instituted while on the earth, or that His appointed apostles laid out through revelation from Him.
Baptism by immersion for one.
Many other churches claim the same thing as you do; that theirs is correct, that they have true succession of authority because their group that separated themselves from yours was right and recognised by God that it should do so etc. etc. Another reason why a restoration was necessary as opposed to yet another schism.

So, you signed up for a forum without even knowing what kind of forum it was? You’re certainly braver than I would ever be, in that regard. I don’t even like to visit forums listed in a google search, because you never know what you might find that you never wanted to see or know about!

It was listed as Catholic so I was comfortable not to find anything ‘risky’, and I was searching for beliefs of other denominations (although I forget the specific doctrine I was after to be honest). This thread was the actual result of the search, and I thought I could provide a reasonable answer.
There is nothing regarding religion that I would not care to see or know about; regardless of whether I agree. Whilst my resolve and determination are weak, my testimony of Him and His gospel remains steadfast.

Once again, LDS seem to perceive hostility from anyone that’s not LDS, especially when it comes to religious discussion, whether it’s really there or not. Many of us have a tendency to be very blunt in our posts, but that’s because we’re very confident that we’re speaking the truth. We don’t really think we should pussyfoot around the truth to make it more comfortable to another’s ears. Is it more charitable to speak the truth, honestly, hoping that it will hit a nerve? Or, should we avoid hurting someone’s ‘feelings’ at the risk of them losing their souls because we never told them what they believed was a grave error? Wouldn’t we also be partly responsible for their loss of salvation, in that case? Jesus certainly never softened the sting of truth when he spoke to the Pharisees. He didn’t just tell them they were wrong about what they believed, He came right out and called them a brood of vipers! He already knew that they would reject Him, because they really were vipers!

I appreciate the sentiment. It is the same reason that our church sees fit to proselyte. We see ourselves as the watchmen described by Jeremiah in the same manner you describe above. I like to use the analogy to a close friend or brother; you would not stand by and watch them do something you saw as endangering their life without attempting to at least dissuade them; why should one’s care for our fellow men’s eternal welfare be any less vehement? So we agree
As I said, my perception of hostility was more due to not being prepared for quite what was to come, especially given that it related in no way to the post I had made.

Just remember, Catholics are very adamant in their defense of the Church because we know that it is the original, and all others are mere shadows of it. We believe that many of them still have at least some portion of the truth, but not all of it. When we make our arguments, we are hoping that others may ponder what we say and at least better understand our Faith, even if they do not have a change of heart and fully embrace it as a result of what they learn from us. Either way, we love all who come here, whether they’re here out of curiosity about us, or to defend their own faith.

And we believe exactly the same about our church, doctrines and beliefs. And the same about other churches also. I do have some queries of my own which I will post up in due time; am I best to make my own thread(s) about them, or bring them up here?

At the same time, we are also well aware that the devil can play tricks on us and try to fool us into believing that his inspirations come from God. Because of that fact, we are always very careful about what we accept as true inspiration. For those saintly Catholics that have a very deep interior life, they will always subject their inner thoughts and inspirations to the scrutiny and guidance of an experienced spiritual director. If you read about the lives of any contemplative Catholic Saints, you will see many examples of this type of spiritual action in their daily lives. The devil also has the power to put evil thoughts into our minds, that he will suggest to us are really good thoughts. He can also appear to us in disguise, in visions, for the same evil purpose. We have to be extremely cautious in determining whether any of these things are good or not, because he can be very persuasive if we’re not careful.

As above; Satan’s desire is to lead us away from anything that will being us closer to God, and further from His influences. The devil’s tricks will not direct us to pray, or to study the scriptures, or to do good works for others. Therefore, because the Spirit I feel directs me to do these things, I know that it is of God.

 

[Naf623]

I’ve never heard the game called that, but thanks to another poster, I do know of “Telephone”. If you think Catholic Tradition is only passed down orally, then you might be able to make that kind of argument, but there are thousands of volumes of writings in the Vatican Library that would prove otherwise. Among them are many of the writings of the early Church Fathers, that are carefully preserved to this day. Our Traditions are certainly not just passed down verbally. All of the Catholic Church’s beliefs are very well documented in our Doctrines and Dogmas (which are open to the public), that have always been kept in written form, ever since the beginning of the Church.

I will be coming back to this soon. Once I have more time to organise my thoughts better.
You may not like my conclusions; but as you yourself pointed out to me: we’re not here to hear only things we like.

You are wrong but the argument you think you are avoiding does not apply to the Book of Mormon. There is evidence that proves it to be fiction. How you rationalize that as a Mormon is the point of this thread.

There is evidence that proves that the BOM cannot be the complete story of everything which occurred in the Ancient Americas; however the evidence is far from conclusively disproving that the events described occurred. The evidence available (DNA is all, so far as I am aware? As the rest relies on lack of evidence, which is a non-argument as it simply bolsters neither side’s position) only tells us that the BOM story is not the whole picture, which nobody has ever claimed it to be.
The BOM was originally written to house only those stories that were considered doctrinally and morally important. Other records were kept regarding a more full historical account. But this still would not include the Lamanites anyway.

Jesus is talking about Himself, not about Mormon doctrine. reference John 6:29
*
Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent.”*

He it talking about God’s laws and doctrines; wherever they may be found. That to learn their truth, one must abide by them and the truth will be manifest to those who faithfully do so.

Mormonism is very individualistic, yet, Jesus Christ came to save all of mankind. There is no you, without Him, and there is no one who speaks for God alone. It takes a communion, where three or more are gathered in His name.

Jonah was sent alone to Ninevah.
The Apostles were sent singularly to preach and testify.
Jeremiah: “spiritualized and individualized religion and insisted upon the primacy of the individual’s relationship with God” (From Wikipedia Article)
Elijah was alone in His defence of The Lord to the priests of Baal (in probably my absolute favourite OT story).

And that’s one of the points I am trying to make. If God says something is wrong, it is wrong under ALL circumstances. You can’t just pray to get permission to change God’s mind. The difference between Humanae Vitae and Continuing Revelation is that in HV the Catholic Church reaffirmed its stand against contraception whereas in CR all that apparently needs to happen is strong opposition from the govt or spouse for a stance to become a doctrine that was all of a sudden in the workings of changing “once we were ready for it”.

The Bible would disagree with you;
The Commandment says “Thou shalt not kill”; yet The Lord commanded that every person (irrespective of age or gender) be utterly destroyed upon the Israelites entry into the promised land.
The Commandment says “Thou shalt not bear false witness”; yet Abraham deceived Abimelech king of Gerar by lying that Sarah, his wife, was his sister.

No man may change the laws which God has laid down; but only He understands their true, full meaning, and sees the eternal plan. We follow what He says, irrespective of whether it makes sense to us at the time; we do it because we know that He always knows better than we can.

 

[Naf623]

Let’s have a quick look at the ‘Bread Box’ analogy for the ‘no evidence can be used as avoidance against’ argument.

Les say there is a bread box, and three people. One of those people has actually placed a loaf into the breadbox, before either of the other two arrived. Therefore he knows what is in, while the other two have merely conjecture. At this point both person ‘A’ claiming that there is a loaf in the box, and person ‘B’ claiming there is not, have equal weight to their argument; regardless of their personal opinion on the matter. Not only this, but no amount of arguing can either resolve the issue, or change the truth of there being a loaf in the box. The person who put the loaf in the box is standing ready to answer, if asked, if he did, indeed, place a loaf into the box; and both parties are prepared to take his word for it if he tells them, but only one of them is prepared to ask him and when he relays this to his opponent, his testimony is refuted.
I assume I don’t need to interpret?

 

[RebeccaJ]

I agree that there have been people, very often with the very best of intentions and most devout in their beliefs, who have continued to worship Christ since the time of His death; however I do not agree that the doctrines and practises remain the same as He instituted while on the earth, or that His appointed apostles laid out through revelation from Him.
Baptism by immersion for one.

This is the problem, 1) study the early Church, there is no sign of Mormonism 2) study the early Church and it is the same Church as the Catholic church.

Baptism by immersion is a larger subject. You can start another thread. Just because you say, “I DO THIS IN THIS WAY”, doesn’t make it something that was lost or restored.

Many other churches claim the same thing as you do; that theirs is correct, that they have true succession of authority because their group that separated themselves from yours was right and recognised by God that it should do so etc. etc. Another reason why a restoration was necessary as opposed to yet another schism.

You do understand, Mormonism is just a break off of a break off of a break off of a break off? Many churches claim a “restoration”, but what they claim to restore, was never lost, and, what they look like looks nothing like Christ’s Church. It’s wholly made up by a person or a group of people.

Joseph Smith gathered to himself the things he liked to believe and made a church out of it. Yours is the church of Joseph Smith, not of Jesus Christ. He is not alone in this, many have done so through the ages.

Either you believe Jesus Christ guides and guards what is His, or you don’t. It is really as simple as that. I see no reason to not trust God.

 

[Stephen168]

"Pearl of Great Price: Joseph Smith – History 1:34:

He said there was a book deposited, written upon gold plates, giving an account of the former inhabitants of this continent, and the source from whence they sprang.

Our claim has never changed. We believe The Book of Mormon to be an accurate History of one group of Israelites who left Jerusalem around 600BC; the time of Jeremiah, and travelled, under the direction of God, across the sea, and landed in what we now call The Americas. From there they separated into two factions, one of whom we have no records for their lives/travels etc. Whilst one other civilisation’s history is also included in the Book of Mormon, nothing about our claims or teachings excludes the introduction of DNA from other sources, and there are so many possibilities as to when/how this could have been included. We have no idea if there were any inhabitants prior to the Jaredites; therefore there could already have been intermingling of DNA profiles even before the Book of Mormon ‘proper’ starts (i.e. the 600BC date). The BOM records that the Jaredites came into contact with another group (Mulekites), and that they eventually were integrated into the Nephite population. Therefore any intermingling of DNA with the Jaredites and any prior inhabitants would thus also become part of the Nephites gene pool. Furthermore, as we have absolutely no records of the Lamanites during periods when they were not at war with the Nephites, there are any number of occasions where another group could have easily intermingled with them also.
We have never claimed it to be a full account of everything that happened in ancient America.

Joseph Smith said the Book of Mormon was about THE SOUrCE of the aboriginal people of the Americas. As you have explained the Mormon Church has changed the the story to A source. Nephites, Jaredites, Mulekits, Lamanites were all jewish; NOT Asian. ALL scientific evidence proves the aboriginal people of the Americas came from Asia NOT the middle east. Science has thought this before DNA evidence. DNA is just the cherry on top.

 

[Cowboy_Pete]

Um, Stephen?

Would you say that the Amerinds are “former inhabitants” of this continent?

Seems to me that they still inhabit it.

Think harder.

Moroni, who Joseph Smith was quoting, was obviously speaking about the Nephites. An *extinct *people, former inhabitants of this land.

 

[mwok]

mwok,

Once more I am seeing a reason that, whereas I began being a participant in these threads with 100% assurance and conviction that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is true and is led by living prophets and apostles with continuing revelation and that there is 100% truth in the concept of personal revelation, that personal conviction and knowledge has increased seven-fold by reading some of the comments such as yours here and the strange connect-the-dots assertions about what impact an HV had in the world.

When my wife decided that for reasons of health and for our families’ well-being through her need for good health, to accept a doctor’s suggestion for an IUD after we had eight children, then she was not being “evil”. That is a notion that would be scoffed at by certainly most doctors, by most mothers and women who have adopted children, and by husbands who are familiar with the complexities of the health of their wife as relates to a very complex health area of their everyday lives.

Of course the secular world would scoff at anything being evil. Please understand that I mean no disrespect to and your unique situation, but the Church’s stance is that contraception is evil. Just like in unique circumstances we may choose to tell a lie, the lie is the evil. This is true for contraception as well and I will ask Our Blessed Mother Mary to interceed on you and your wifes behalf that you may one day see the damages that contraceptions cause. And please understand I do this not to be rude but because I sincerely am concerned that you choose contraception.

 

[mwok]

The Bible would disagree with you;
The Commandment says “Thou shalt not kill”; yet The Lord commanded that every person (irrespective of age or gender) be utterly destroyed upon the Israelites entry into the promised land.
The Commandment says “Thou shalt not bear false witness”; yet Abraham deceived Abimelech king of Gerar by lying that Sarah, his wife, was his sister.

No man may change the laws which God has laid down; but only He understands their true, full meaning, and sees the eternal plan. We follow what He says, irrespective of whether it makes sense to us at the time; we do it because we know that He always knows better than we can.

The thing about God’s Commandments is that God is not bound by them, we are. If He chooses to take back the life He created then who are we to question? All creation belongs to Him. As for Abraham, what because he was Father Abraham he was exempt from disobeying God? What about King David? Is he exempt for murdering Bethsheba’s husband ,Uriah, because he is the great-great-great-great-great grandfather of Our Lord?

 

[Tony888]

Of course the secular world would scoff at anything being evil. Please understand that I mean no disrespect to and your unique situation, but the Church’s stance is that contraception is evil. Just like in unique circumstances we may choose to tell a lie, the lie is the evil. This is true for contraception as well and I will ask Our Blessed Mother Mary to interceed on you and your wifes behalf that you may one day see the damages that contraceptions cause. And please understand I do this not to be rude but because I sincerely am concerned that you choose contraception.

I like this def - **Evil **is the violation of, or intent to violate, some moral code

I think people may use contraception while sinning but contraception is not evil in and of itself.
.

 

[Miriam1947]

. . .

As above; Satan’s desire is to lead us away from anything that will being us closer to God, and further from His influences. The devil’s tricks will not direct us to pray, or to study the scriptures, or to do good works for others. Therefore, because the Spirit I feel directs me to do these things, I know that it is of God.

Speaking of Satan, let’s talk.

From the book: When Mormons Call by Isaiah Bennett.

The afterword by James Aiken.

"God himself was once as we are now and is an exalted man and sits enthroned in yonder heavens!

. . . Here then, is eternal life–to know the only wise and true God; and you have got to learn how to be gods yourselves [Joseph Smith, King Follett Discourse April 7, 1844].

The central claim of the Mormon church–that men and women can become the deities of their own worlds, the same as God the Father now is with billions worshipping them–represents the ambition of Lucifer, who said in his heart, “I will ascend above the heights of the the clouds, I will be like the Most High” (Is. 14:14)

To such aspirations, the biblical response can only be, “Yet thou shalt be brought down to hell, to the sides of the pit” (Is. 14:15)

The devil has craved worship and equality with God ever since he fell. So consumed with this desire is he that he was willing to surrender his dark control of the pagan nations of the world if the Lord Jesus would only fall down and worship him ( Matt. 4:8-9).

When not directly encouraging people to worship him the devil has encouraged others to gradually come under his sway by following his example, by falling from grace through aspiring to be like God. This was the original lie he told Adam and Eve–that death would not come to them if they aspired to “be as gods” (Gen. 3:4-5). This was the lie that, once believed and acted upon, caused the fall of the human race.

It is also the lie that the Mormon church wishes its members to believe and act upon. This may shock some, but it is the truth.

There is a time for being polite and a time for being diplomatic, but there is also a time for plain speaking. The fact is: The Mormon church’s “evangelization” efforts serve to spread the original lie that Satan told in the Garden. The Mormon church tries to inspire people with Luciferian ambitions."

There’s more but I have to type this since it is not in a copy and paste place on the internet.

 

[Cowboy_Pete]

Naf, Tony, I must warn you.

Based on my own experience and on reading past exchanges, if you explain to Miriam that being “worshiped by billions as the Father is” is only one interpretation of Lorenzo Snow’s enigmatic statement that “as God is, man may become,” and that Gordon B. Hinckley has taught that “we don’t really know” what that means, they will accuse you of “lying for the Lord” which they put in quotes, pretending that it’s some quote from an LDS person. It’s a very insulting game that some of the play here, so don’t imagine for a second that you’re entering a good faith discussion. If you contradict them about what they’ve been taught what mormons believe, they will call you a liar.

 

[Miriam1947]

Naf, Tony, I must warn you.

Based on my own experience and on reading past exchanges, if you explain to Miriam that being “worshiped by billions as the Father is” is only one interpretation of Lorenzo Snow’s enigmatic statement that “as God is, man may become,” and that Gordon B. Hinckley has taught that “we don’t really know” what that means, they will accuse you of “lying for the Lord” which they put in quotes, pretending that it’s some quote from an LDS person. It’s a very insulting game that some of the play here, so don’t imagine for a second that you’re entering a good faith discussion. If you contradict them about what they’ve been taught what mormons believe, they will call you a liar.

What do you believe? Is your aspiration to become like God and rule your own planet with worshipers?

If you have read what I posted then you know I posted an afterword by James Aiken.

I have family members who are Mormons. They were not active for a very long time but now some have become very active in the Mormon church. Should I not worry about their souls if in fact what James Aiken wrote is true?

 

[Cowboy_Pete]

What do you believe? Is your aspiration to become like God and rule your own planet with worshipers?

No.

My aspiration is to let Christ’s atonement work a miracle in my life, to cleanse me of my sins, and to subordinate my Will to His, to the point that I am One with His will, as described in John chapter 17. My ambition is to serve him in this life and the next. To honor the priesthood which he has given me, and through his word and his power, to bless the lives of my family, and of others.

It seems to me that Lucifer’s primary sin was not ambition, but rather Rebellion.