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{"id":1164,"date":"2002-02-13T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2002-02-13T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tmatt\/2002\/02\/13\/latter-day-saints-and-that-c-word\/"},"modified":"2013-01-30T15:49:47","modified_gmt":"2013-01-30T20:49:47","slug":"latter-day-saints-and-that-c-word","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/tmatt\/2002\/02\/latter-day-saints-and-that-c-word\/","title":{"rendered":"Latter-day Saints and that C-word"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Science fiction novelist Orson Scott Card is tired of hearing outsiders whispering about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints<\/a> \u2014 especially the dreaded C-word.<\/p>\n\n

The word in question is not \u201cChristian.\u201d It\u2019s \u201ccult.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

\u201cI daresay that the Mormon church<\/a> is less cult-like than many of the religions that delight in calling us one,\u201d argued Card. \u201cIndeed, calling Mormonism a cult is usually an attempt to get people to behave like robots, blindly obeying the command that they reject Mormonism without any independent thought. Kettles, as they say, calling the pot black.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

Debates about Mormonism and public life always heat up when Utah is in the spotlight and the XIX Winter Olympics certainly qualify as that. Journalists have focused on the church\u2019s vow not to proselytize visitors and, of course, whether Mormon morality could stick a cork in the hot party scene that surrounds the games. News is news.<\/p>\n\n

While avoiding deadly overkill, LDS leaders cranked up public-relations efforts to portray their faith as part of mainline Christianity. This strategy is sure to catch the attention of other faiths that send missionaries to the games, such as the 1,000 Southern Baptist volunteers in Utah for Global Outreach 2002.<\/p>\n\n

Tensions are inevitable. Thus, Card launched a preemptive strike in a Beliefnet.com<\/a> column entitled \u201cHey, Who Are You Calling a Cult?\u201d It\u2019s ludicrous, he said, to smear Mormons<\/a> with the same word that defined the Jim Jones flock in Guyana and the \u201csneaker-wearing folks who killed themselves to join aliens \u2026 behind a comet.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

It\u2019s true, he said, that Mormon prophet Joseph Smith was a charismatic leader with fiercely loyal followers. But this is true of almost all new religious movements. Card defied anyone to argue that modern Mormons are \u201cautomatons\u201d who yank converts out of their homes and brainwash them.<\/p>\n\n

\u201cIf Mormonism were a cult, I would know it, and I would not be in it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n

Meanwhile, the Southern Baptist Convention\u2019s web site on \u201cCults, Sects and New Religious Movements\u201d includes page after page of materials dissecting LDS beliefs and practices. It uses this definition: \u201cA cult \u2026 is a group of people polarized around someone\u2019s interpretation of the Bible and is characterized by major deviations from orthodox Christianity relative to the cardinal doctrines of the Christian faith, particularly the fact that God became man in Jesus Christ.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

Hardly anyone still calls the Latter-day Saints a \u201ccult\u201d in terms of a \u201cpsychological or sociological definition\u201d of that term, stressed the Rev. Tal Davis, of the SBC\u2019s North American Mission Board<\/a>. But traditional Christians must insist that they can use a \u201ctheological definition\u201d of the word \u201ccult.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

\u201cThis may not be the best word and we admit that,\u201d said Davis. \u201cWe\u2019re using it in a technical way, trying to make it clear that we\u2019re describing a faith that is \u2014 according to its own teachings \u2014 far outside the borders of traditional Christianity. \u2026<\/p>\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not trying to be mean-spirited. We want to be very precise. We take doctrine very seriously and we know that the Mormons do, too.\u201d<\/p>\n\n

The doctrinal conflicts are many and sincere, stressed scholar Jan Shipps, a United Methodist who is author of \u201cSojourner in the Promised Land: Forty Years Among the Mormons.\u201d Traditional Christians and the Latter-day Saints are not just arguing about issues of interpretation. These disputes are about pivotal additions to the earlier stream of faith.<\/p>\n\n

The clashes start at the very beginning, with the nature of God. Christians worship one God, yet known as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Saints have a radically different approach, said Shipps, believing God and Jesus to be separate beings \u2014 each with a literal body and parts. They say Jesus was sired by God, with a divine Mother in Heaven.<\/p>\n\n

\u201cThe Trinity, the Trinity, the Trinity, there is no way around the Trinity,\u201d said Shipps. \u201cBut you know, it would also help if Christians \u2014 if they are going to use the word \u2018cult\u2019 \u2014 would admit that Christianity changed the very nature of the Jewish God. Christianity then grew up to become a new religious tradition.<\/p>\n\n

\u201cMormonism is a new religious tradition that has grown out of Christianity. It is an entity unto itself. It is what it is.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"