Mormons and the Trinity: Oh, how they balk!

  • Thread starter Thread starter Tannhauser_1509
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
T

Tannhauser_1509

Guest
Lately, I have been researching the rise of Arianism during the early years of the Church. What I’ve found is that the First Council of Nicaea saw some fierce and intense argumentation on both the Arian and Trinitarian sides (one source even claimed that it’s said St. Nicholas slapped Arius across the face during debate, leading the bishop Eusebius of Caesarea to urinate on Nicholas’ robes). The point is, the issue of Christology was what united the Church in its early years, as well as what unfortunately caused such divisiveness among its members, and it’s still undoubtedly what divides us today. God have mercy on us!

My question concerns the Mormons, and specifically the methods that apologists of the faith often use in polemics in order to reduce such councils as these to petty debates in the wake of a universal apostasy. I’ve spoken with a few LDS friends of mine, who, when I try to defend the Trinity in its Nicene conceptualization, regard it as illegitimate and unfounded in any early Christian sources or Scriptures. Their tactics I find, frankly, annoying, as they tend, as it were, to point their noses to the sky and laugh at early ecumenical councils. (BTW They love their modern prophets!)

But I think they’re right about one thing, and that is that the Church used some oppressive tactics in order to enforce the new Nicene Creed and also to subdue Arian churches. The LDS often point to this as an example of false religion being used by world powers to control people.

Alright, my question: Why did the Trinitarians succeed? Where did Arius and his predecessors go wrong? How can I explain the coherence of the Trinity to my Mormon friends who make a mockery of this most traditional theology? In a way, I can sympathize with Arius and company’s conclusions: they struggled just as Jesus’ disciples struggled to answer His most critical question: Who do you say that I am?

Just to give you a taste of what the LDS Church has to say about the Trinity, here’s a talk given by one of their apostles, Jeffrey R. Holland: youtube.com/watch?v=X7b0klLbQAI
 
Tannhauser_1509 said:
Lately, I have been researching the rise of Arianism during the early years of the Church. What I’ve found is that the First Council of Nicaea saw some fierce and intense argumentation on both the Arian and Trinitarian sides (one source even claimed that it’s said St. Nicholas slapped Arius across the face during debate, leading the bishop Eusebius of Caesarea to urinate on Nicholas’ robes). The point is, the issue of Christology was what united the Church in its early years, as well as what unfortunately caused such divisiveness among its members, and it’s still undoubtedly what divides us today. God have mercy on us!

My question concerns the Mormons, and specifically the methods that apologists of the faith often use in polemics in order to reduce such councils as these to petty debates in the wake of a universal apostasy. I’ve spoken with a few LDS friends of mine, who, when I try to defend the Trinity in its Nicene conceptualization, regard it as illegitimate and unfounded in any early Christian sources or Scriptures. Their tactics I find, frankly, annoying, as they tend, as it were, to point their noses to the sky and laugh at early ecumenical councils. (BTW They love their modern prophets!)

But I think they’re right about one thing, and that is that the Church used some oppressive tactics in order to enforce the new Nicene Creed and also to subdue Arian churches. The LDS often point to this as an example of false religion being used by world powers to control people.

Alright, my question: Why did the Trinitarians succeed? Where did Arius and his predecessors go wrong? How can I explain the coherence of the Trinity to my Mormon friends who make a mockery of this most traditional theology? In a way, I can sympathize with Arius and company’s conclusions: they struggled just as Jesus’ disciples struggled to answer His most critical question: Who do you say that I am?

Just to give you a taste of what the LDS Church has to say about the Trinity, here’s a talk given by one of their apostles, Jeffrey R. Holland: youtube.com/watch?v=X7b0klLbQAI
Click to expand...
The Trinitarians succeeded because of Christ’s promise is Matthew 16:18-19.
 
Tannhauser_1509 said:
Lately, I have been researching the rise of Arianism during the early years of the Church. What I’ve found is that the First Council of Nicaea saw some fierce and intense argumentation on both the Arian and Trinitarian sides (one source even claimed that it’s said St. Nicholas slapped Arius across the face during debate, leading the bishop Eusebius of Caesarea to urinate on Nicholas’ robes). The point is, the issue of Christology was what united the Church in its early years, as well as what unfortunately caused such divisiveness among its members, and it’s still undoubtedly what divides us today. God have mercy on us!

My question concerns the Mormons, and specifically the methods that apologists of the faith often use in polemics in order to reduce such councils as these to petty debates in the wake of a universal apostasy. I’ve spoken with a few LDS friends of mine, who, when I try to defend the Trinity in its Nicene conceptualization, regard it as illegitimate and unfounded in any early Christian sources or Scriptures. Their tactics I find, frankly, annoying, as they tend, as it were, to point their noses to the sky and laugh at early ecumenical councils. (BTW They love their modern prophets!)

But I think they’re right about one thing, and that is that the Church used some oppressive tactics in order to enforce the new Nicene Creed and also to subdue Arian churches. The LDS often point to this as an example of false religion being used by world powers to control people.

Alright, my question: Why did the Trinitarians succeed? Where did Arius and his predecessors go wrong? How can I explain the coherence of the Trinity to my Mormon friends who make a mockery of this most traditional theology? In a way, I can sympathize with Arius and company’s conclusions: they struggled just as Jesus’ disciples struggled to answer His most critical question: Who do you say that I am?

Just to give you a taste of what the LDS Church has to say about the Trinity, here’s a talk given by one of their apostles, Jeffrey R. Holland: youtube.com/watch?v=X7b0klLbQAI
Click to expand...
I just happened onto this thread and thought I’d add my LDS 2 cents worth…

FWIW, the LDS also disagree with the Arian side of the dispute. So were Arianism to have become orthodoxy, LDS would have the same (hopefully respectful) reaction to Arianism as to the Nicene Creed.

In general, early Church councils are not taught in the LDS church. Any LDS member knowledgeable of them learned about them on his or her own.

As an aside I just posted an LDS objection to the doctrine of the Trinity on another forum at this link forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=988974&page=3 (post 35).

I hope this helps…
 
You could start by asking the question why do ‘most’ Christians believe in the trinity and why are Mormons smaller in number than Christian believers. Because if Jesus is not God, than none of what we believe makes sense so if you look at their belief as a whole, it’s about as far away from traditional Christianity as it can be.

St. Patrick was very instrumental in explaining the trinity by using a Shamrock and others taught the faith like the Church Fathers and Bishops clarified the teachings so that we would know the truth which is found in Jesus Christ who is the way, the truth and the life!..The Nicene Creed was also instrumental in helping people understand the trinity…There’s plenty of scriptural evidence to the trinity but still people will believe what they are led to believe and they certainly wouldn’t listen to a Catholic… 🤷
 
Gazelam, it’s great that we could get your two cents. Thanks. I understand that the LDS would not teach Arianism at least in the form it was advocated for at the first ecumenical council. However, I wonder if you might admit that Mormon theology is an ideological offspring of it. They both accept the same major premise, namely, that Jesus is not coeternal with the Father. Anyway, I read your arguments from a different thread, and admittedly I find them largely unsatisfying.

But I’ll play this note for now and let others chime in on the OP.
 
adamhovey1988 said:
The Trinitarians succeeded because of Christ’s promise is Matthew 16:18-19.
Click to expand...
Prayers for all who do not believe in the Blessed Trinity and the Divinity of Jesus Christ. Our Faith would be empty without Our Divine Lord. We would have to “make up” something to hang onto. God Bless, Memaw
 
G.K. Chesterton wrote an interesting piece on Mormonism. Keep in mind that when he wrote this the Mormons were practicing polygamy. So this is part of what he writes about. This is an excerpt from his book, “The Uses of Diversity”, published in 1920.

"We shall never make anything of moral and religious movements in history until we begin to look at their theory as well as their practice. For their practice (as in the case of the Mormons) is often so unfamiliar and frantic that it is quite unintelligible without their theory.

I have not the space, even if I had the knowledge, to describe the fundamental theories of Mormonism about the universe. But they are extraordinarily interesting; and a proper understanding of them would certainly enable us to see daylight through the more perplexing or menacing customs of this community; and therefore to judge how far polygamy was in their scheme a permanent and self-renewing principle or (as is quite probably) a personal and unscrupulous accident. The basic Mormon belief is one that comes out of the morning of the earth, from the most primitive and even infantile attitude. Their chief dogma is that God is material, not that He was materialized once, as all Christians believe; nor that He is materialized specially, as all Catholics believe; but that He was materially embodied from all time; that He has a local habitation as well as a name. Under the influence of this barbaric but violently vivid conception, these people crossed a great desert with their guns and oxen, patiently, persistently, and courageously, as if they were following a vast and visible giant who was striding across the plains. In other words this strange sect, by soaking itself solely in the Hebrew Scriptures, had really managed to reproduce the atmosphere of those Scriptures as they are felt by Hebrews rather than by Christians. A number of dull, earnest, ignorant, black-coated men with chimney-pot hats, chin beards or mutton-chop whiskers, managed to reproduce in their own souls the richness and the peril of an ancient Oriental experience. If we think from this end we may possibly guess how it was that they added polygamy."

theblogthatwasthursday.wordpress.com/tag/chesterton-on-mormonism/
 
If you’ve ever listened to Dr. Ravi Zacharias, he pretty much echoes Chesterton with every word. This quote reminded me of Zacharias with every sentence. Thank you for the excerpt.

And that’s the beauty of an ecumenical council, isn’t it? A doctrine is defined before it is pronounced a heresy.
 
The Son is the divine sacrifice or divine gift from the Father. Or you could say, Christ is God giving himself fully to us so that we may give ourselves fully to him and find salvation. To assume the Son is lesser than the Father is to assume the gift is not the ultimate gift from God.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top