Trinity and Mormon godhead

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Stephen168 said:
What does achieving the same status as God mean? Do you worship others that have achieved the same status as God?
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No. They will only be gods in some eternity in the future. We don’t know really. We definitely do not worship them. For us there is only one God who is eternal and unchanging. All of these other things occurr outside of our time and space reference – it is all accepted on faith. We cannot in principle know anything about that - just that it is possible for some. There is one scripture that says that Abraham has gone on to his reward, but that’s all we know. We certainly don’t worship them.
 
AshleyBelle said:
Any Catholic in heaven IS a “Saint.” 🙂

We only officially “declare” someone a saint when we know beyond a doubt that they are in heaven. Most of us, (and you can bet I’m included ) NEED to go through purgatory.
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Ah yes I forgot that. Does it seem fair to you that we all will have the same reward as Mother Theresa or St. Francis, or someone who has lived an amazingly exemplary life?

Should all have the same reward? Is that just?
 
Tsuzuki said:
Our spirits are not eternal. Our “intelligence” is eternal. And while the verdict is still out as to what exactly that means in Mormonism, I like to think of it as a singularity of will/perception with no other attributes. A Catholic might better visualize the Mormon concept of an intelligence as an uncreated part of God working through a created person, not to be confused with that person’s created spirit. The divine spark, if you will. That which animates both spirit and flesh.

Why, thank you. I could also describe it in terms of the Tao and the Ten Thousand Things.
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But intelligences are not part of God. They are individual for eternity. “Divine spark”? An interesting idea - I would not rule it out. But intelligences are individual and we are told they in some sense have gender. (as I recall…)
 
mfbukowski said:
Ah yes I forgot that. Does it seem fair to you that we all will have the same reward as Mother Theresa or St. Francis, or someone who has lived an amazingly exemplary life?

Should all have the same reward? Is that just?
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Are you familiar with the Parable of the workers and the vineyard?

*edit

lol as I was posting this, it looks like Tzuki beat me to it 😛
 
mfbukowski said:
Ah yes I forgot that. Does it seem fair to you that we all will have the same reward as Mother Theresa or St. Francis, or someone who has lived an amazingly exemplary life?

Should all have the same reward? Is that just?
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“If** any man** would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me” (*Mt *16:24)
 
nebula said:
I hope you don’t mind, but this is an entry from my blog. THe reason I’ve posted it here is 1. because it fits the subject matter of this forum and 2. so that Catholics who know the trinity better than me will hopefully correct any factual errors.

I’ll never forget the day when, as a new member baptized maybe three months ago, missionaries showed up at my apartment to ask me what the different was between the godhead as spelled out by the Articles of Faith and the trinity as believed by orthodox Christianity. Part of the reason it’s an episode burned into my mind is that I was so shocked that these poor missionaries who had gone through the Missionary Training Center, one who was on the tail end of his mission, did not understand basic Mormon theology. For all you orthodox Christians out there who read this, let this be a lesson for you when you speak to Mormons before you accuse them of lying or being brainwashed.
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Hi - Snow (new forum member) here.

Not sure what your point here is as you do not say what, specifically, about LDS doctrine the youngsters did not know or misunderstood. It certainly wouldn’t be wise to consider a 19-20 year kid, with no formal training, to be a knowledgeable theologian, but based on my experience any rank and file Mormon has a much better grasp of the Godhead than a rank and file Catholic - and I ask about this topic frequently so I do have some experience in checking. That being said, the LDS understanding of the Godhead is much simpler and straight-forward that the mainstream doctrine of the Trinity. Indeed, the only ones I find have a strong grasp of the whole Trinity concept, to the extent that it is graspable, are trained theologians and bright folks on the interent - who are kind of a select group (self selected)
Let’s start with the trinity. The grounding assumption of any formulation of the trinity starts with the assumption that there is but One God. By God here I mean the immutable, infinite, eternal, necessary being labeled God. There are two ways to come to this conclusion, through philosophy and through exegesis of the Bible.
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I found your characterization interesting - and accurate. The Trinity - the modern concept of the Trinity as decided upon by the Creeds and Councils of the 4th and 5th century is not found in the New Testament and can only be arrived at through philosophical reasoning or assumption. Indeed, the issue of homoousios cannot, to my knowledge even be inferred from anything in the NT and was, in fact, put into the creedal doctrine of the Trinity by a non-Christian at Nicea.

I enjoyed your thoughts in the OP.
 
MFB: Not hiding anything. This is correct. As I said it is a radical form of theosis or deification as believed by Catholics.

RA: Don’t try to compare LDS exaltation with RC anything – and leave the Eastern Orthodox peeps out of it too. *Theosis *is NOT what has been traditionally taught in Mormonism. That is a recent BYU FARMS attempt at reconcile what is heretical (LDS) with what is acceptable (true theosis). But I’ll let the RCs deal with you on this one.
 
Snow said:
I found your characterization interesting - and accurate. The Trinity - the modern concept of the Trinity as decided upon by the Creeds and Councils of the 4th and 5th century is not found in the New Testament and can only be arrived at through philosophical reasoning or assumption. Indeed, the issue of homoousios cannot, to my knowledge even be inferred from anything in the NT and was, in fact, put into the creedal doctrine of the Trinity by a non-Christian at Nicea.

I enjoyed your thoughts in the OP.
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And Mormons wonder why Christians don’t view Mormonism as a Christian religion. hint: You believe in a false god AND work pretty hard at tearing the One True God apart.
 
MFB: But intelligences are not part of God. They are individual for eternity. “Divine spark”? An interesting idea - I would not rule it out.

**RA: **This is Kabbalah, which Smith used to form several of his views.

MFB: But intelligences are individual and we are told they in some sense have gender. (as I recall…)

**RA: **From what i recall, I have the documentation somewhere, this is debate within Mormonism and you will not find agreement. The EXACT nature of “intelligence(s)” is not fully defined. But it is eternal, and the “stuff” (if you will) out of which we were all formed (including God).

RA
 
Tsuzuki said:
Intelligence is the glory of God.

“The glory of God is intelligence, or, in other words, light and truth.” - D&C 93:36

They are individual in manifestation, but nowhere does it say that they are eternally individual, only eternal. In fact, it could be argued that the reason why our intelligences are as uncreated and eternal as God is because it is God working through us, which is why “when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God.” (Mosiah 2:17)

Our spirits have gender, but nothing is known about our intelligence other than the fact that it is eternal.
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An interesting POV
 
Snow said:
Hi - Snow (new forum member) here.

Not sure what your point here is as you do not say what, specifically, about LDS doctrine the youngsters did not know or misunderstood. It certainly wouldn’t be wise to consider a 19-20 year kid, with no formal training, to be a knowledgeable theologian, but based on my experience any rank and file Mormon has a much better grasp of the Godhead than a rank and file Catholic - and I ask about this topic frequently so I do have some experience in checking. That being said, the LDS understanding of the Godhead is much simpler and straight-forward that the mainstream doctrine of the Trinity. Indeed, the only ones I find have a strong grasp of the whole Trinity concept, to the extent that it is graspable, are trained theologians and bright folks on the interent - who are kind of a select group (self selected)

I found your characterization interesting - and accurate. The Trinity - the modern concept of the Trinity as decided upon by the Creeds and Councils of the 4th and 5th century is not found in the New Testament and can only be arrived at through philosophical reasoning or assumption. Indeed, the issue of homoousios cannot, to my knowledge even be inferred from anything in the NT and was, in fact, put into the creedal doctrine of the Trinity by a non-Christian at Nicea.

I enjoyed your thoughts in the OP.
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Welcome. Your writing style is familiar. Are you sure you’re really new?
 
Richard_Abanes said:
MFB: Not hiding anything. This is correct. As I said it is a radical form of theosis or deification as believed by Catholics.

RA: Don’t try to compare LDS exaltation with RC anything – and leave the Eastern Orthodox peeps out of it too. *Theosis *is NOT what has been traditionally taught in Mormonism. That is a recent BYU FARMS attempt at reconcile what is heretical (LDS) with what is acceptable (true theosis). But I’ll let the RCs deal with you on this one.
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My understanding of theosis is from orthodox sites, nowhere else.
 
Richard_Abanes said:
MFB:

RA: Don’t try to compare LDS exaltation with RC anything – and leave the Eastern Orthodox peeps out of it too. *Theosis *is NOT what has been traditionally taught in Mormonism. That is a recent BYU FARMS attempt at reconcile what is heretical (LDS) with what is acceptable (true theosis). But I’ll let the RCs deal with you on this one.
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Well that would be inaccurate.

Theosis is the deification of man and that is exactly what the LDS Church believe in.

Interesting that you lambast BYU FARMS for it’s forays into the matter. One of it’s two principle papers on the topic - A Comparative Analysis of Patristic and Mormon Doctrines of Divinization is not by a Mormon, but rather is a Master’s Thesis written by a Roman Catholic Dominican Monk at the Graduate Theological Union at the University of Berkley.

Thirty years ago you couldn’t find much of anything on the topic of early Christian beliefs of theosis / diefication. Now it is understood to have been a widespread doctrine of the early Church, different is aspects, certainly, than the LDS view, but clearly taught and accepted.
 
mfbukowski said:
My understanding of theosis is from orthodox sites, nowhere else.
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Well then, this is what the Orthodox have to say about Mormonism and theosis (which any catholic agrees):

"Some Mormons also suggest that discussions of theosis by early Church Fathers show an early belief in the Mormon concept of deification, although they disagree with much of the other theology of the same Church fathers, most notably the doctrine of the Trinity.

The Mormons’ belief differs with the Orthodox belief in deification because the Latter-Day Saints believe that the core being of each individual, the “intelligence” which existed before becoming a spirit son or daughter, is uncreated or eternal. Orthodox deification always acknowledges a timeless Creator versus a finite creature who has been glorified by the grace of God. The Mormons are clear promoters of henotheism, and the Church Fathers have absolutely no commonality with their view."
 
RebeccaJ said:
And Mormons wonder why Christians don’t view Mormonism as a Christian religion. hint: You believe in a false god AND work pretty hard at tearing the One True God apart.
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Do you think that attacking LDS beliefs and branding them false, like name-calling, is and effective tactic?

The God that Mormons believe in is the God of Abraham and Isaac. The God of the Old Testament. The Father, Son and Holy Ghost of the New Testament. Now you may consider that a false god, but that’s your business.
 
SNOW: Theosis is the deification of man and that is exactly what the LDS Church believe in.

**RA: **This has been dealt with adn refuted by me and others in print. Do some research.

**SNOW: **Interesting that you lambast BYU FARMS for it’s forays into the matter. One of it’s two principle papers on the topic - A Comparative Analysis of Patristic and Mormon Doctrines of Divinization is not by a Mormon, but rather is a Master’s Thesis written by a Roman Catholic Dominican Monk at the Graduate Theological Union at the University of Berkley.

RA: Sigh. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah – Jordan Vajda. You neglected to mention he’s an apostate who converted to Mormonism. Nice deletion of a detail. And again, been there, done that.

Snow: Now it is understood to have been a widespread doctrine of the early Church, different is aspects, certainly, than the LDS view, but clearly taught and accepted.

RA: Sorry, wrong. That’s been refuted. See my book INSIDE TODAY’S MORMONISM, pp. 212ff. I’m not going to repeat myself. Other articles are out there on the Internet, I’m sure, if you care. But you probably don’t. 😉

peace,

RA
 
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