- Posted by Christopher Estep on December 17, 2007
The question of whether so-called "Mormons" are or are not Christians has once again come to the forefront of the national dialog, but this time it is because of the candidate of Mitt Romney for president. The "Mormons aren't Christians" mantra has a corollary that declares "Mormonism is a cult" which is just as foolish. Mormons are in fact Christians and the only way that it can be argued that we aren't is if you attempt to change the English language.
And that's where it all begins and ends, isn't it? Both "Christian" and "cult" are words that many try to twist to fit their own bigotry and bias. I can't count how many times I've heard these same bigots say "but when we say cult, we mean ______" and do the same with the word "Christian". I find it ironic that many will say that a cult has its own exclusionary language and in the very same breath say that these two words have different meanings among themselves than in the actual dictionary.
But the center of the argument is the meaning of words. Put simply, a Christian is "one who professes belief in the teachings of Jesus Christ". Mormons so-called will declare emphatically (emphasized by the central name Jesus Chris in the very name of our church) that we do in fact follow Christ and worship him as the Son of God. Our profession of belief in his teaching is not even in question. It is at this point that the bigoted opponents will drop their "aha!" statement. They will jump at that opportunity to then claim that they can define what "following" and "worshiping" entail as well as to apply their particular definition of "Son of God" or of "Jesus Christ" as a stick to accuse someone else of not fitting that definition.
But that's not the case, and this is very important. They are making these statements because we don't fit their definition, which has no basis in either reality nor the meaning of the words in the English language. They will make meaningless statements like pointing out that we don't view the Bible as the only scripture (which is true). Ironically, this would also exclude about 300 years of Christians since the Bible didn't even exist until then.
They will say it's because we don't subscribe to their definition of the nature of God and the Godhead which is not found in the Bible but is codified in creeds which were voted upon hundreds of years after Jesus was crucified.
Basically, they have a checklist of what they see as necessary criteria to be considered a Christian and that is a very arbitrary criteria, regardless of what a dictionary might say.
The bottom line is that the people who make these accusations want "Christian" to be their own personal club, ironically just like what they would call a cult. Are we like them exactly? No. We aren't protestants, but then neither are Orthodox nor Roman Catholics.
I'm not saying this necessarily hoping to convince anyone because you can't convince one of these bigots of anything contrary to their bigotry anymore than you can convince a member of the Klan that a black person is as smart as a white person or a Muslim that women are their equal. Try it sometime. Take a white supremacist and try to discuss racial equality with them and you will get nothing more than their own definition of what equality means.
Are we protestants? No. Are we Catholics? No. We don't try to hide the differences. We believe in prophets and apostles and we believe that there is more scripture than just the Holy Bible, though that is our scripture as well. And what bugs our protestant critics most of all is that we boldly say that we are right and everyone else is wrong. We don't require agreement to fellowship with others that follow the Savior. From our belief that we are the ones who are right, we could easily say "it is you who are not Christians" but we don't. We allow people to worship Christ according to their beliefs and their conscience. Personally though, I find the denigration of others to be most unchristian. More irony.
This whole acrimonious debate is based on hatred, though our detractors will undoubtedly deny this. Then again, slaveholders denied hatred too. Islam doesn't consider themselves hateful, either. To attempt to deny our right to proudly declare ourselves the Christians that we are is a slap in the face. You don't slap someone in love. A Muslim beating his wife would say differently, but then that's the point isn't it?
It's really very simple, you see. We are not seeking to be included or to deceive anyone as some think. We simply find the hurtful accusation that we are not Christian, i.e. we don't follow Christ, to be incorrect and bigoted.
Christianity isn't a member's only club. You who are making these statements are too used to voting on doctrine, voting on pastors, voting on your theology that you have arrogantly assumed that you can vote on Christianity. You can't.
You don't get to decide who is and is not a Christian. That is only for Jesus Christ himself to decide and I'm sure he will make that decision in the afterlife. He is God. He doesn't need your advice.
Mormons are Christians. Like it or lump it. There are over 12,000,000 of us and we aren't going anywhere.
