The Mormon "Profit"

One of the accusations made of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is that its leadership has become wealthy off the backs of its members.  Time Magazine spotlighted the the financial strength of the church in a cover story a few years back called "Mormons, Inc." And the frequent, unoriginal reference to our Prophet as a 'Profit' by critics across the internet is buried in thousands of personal blogs and news comments, usually closely accompanied by unintentional misspellings and other errors. (The lack of literate critics is disheartening sometimes.)

I needn't point out the specifics of hypocrisies when this charge is leveled by Catholics or the various Evangelical mega-churches.

But I do wish to call out a handful of specifics that those engaging in such accusations should be aware of and treat fairly.

1. The vast majority of Mormon leadership is uncompensated.  Congregational leaders (Bishops), missionaries, and so on - all volunteer their time.  Mormons believe that ministers should work to support themselves with their own hands, and that the preacher and learner are equal.

2. The handful of leaders that receive remuneration have other administrative duties in the church that require full-time attention.  Our church has buildings and schools and charities to manage that have heavy overhead. Our charities are, by the way, some of the most efficient in the world in terms of how contributed dollars are used.

3. In no case does the church's remuneration afford a luxurious lifestyle.  As I understand it, most if not all church leaders take a step down in income when they choose to enter the ministry full time.  Many are very successful scientists, doctors, businessmen, and so on - and could do much better in the private sector.  President Gordon B. Hinckley lived out his years in an apartment by Temple Square.  It was pointed out to me once; his wife kept flowers on the balcony.  Also the private jet.  Just kidding - no private jet.

4. At any rate, the accrual of wealth would be pointless since many of the highest callings in the church have a lifetime tenure. There is no retirement, no condo in Florida, no Vegas weekend - just ministry to the very end.  If there is anything luxurious about the lifestyle at all, it is that they are afforded travel expenses to go around the world and visit with members. But again, not on a private jet. When they travel, they buy a commercial ticket; they are picked up at the airport by local membership; they often stay in members' homes, eat with their families, and so on.

So, even if the President of the Church really made $500,000 per year (which is both doubtful and yet would be in line with typical salaries for someone leading such a large entity), it is of very little benefit, as he will spend it serving the church.

And those of us who have had the privilege of standing in the presence of one of the 15 men we believe to be Prophets, Seers, and Revelators, of shaking their hands, of speaking with them directly, have no doubt that their every intention in their church service is completely selfless.  I have had that privilege many times in my young life, and each time recognized the character of a man who has been refined by decades of unselfish service and sacrifice.

Do Mormons Worship Joseph Smith?

No. We don't worship Joseph Smith. Or Mormon, or Moroni (the guy on the Temples with the trumpet) or anyone other than Jesus Christ. Those other people are messengers. They are not even 'intermediaries'. A true messenger brings teachings from God, but then directs us to establish a direct, personal relationship with God and Jesus Christ.

God does now (and has always) used messengers to establish his Word. But all of our prayers are directed to God our Heavenly Father and closed in the name of his only intermediary, his son Jesus Christ.

With regards to the mission of Joseph Smith (and the Mormon view of what a Prophet is), consider this excerpt from an article by James Faust, a former member of the Church's First Presidency:

"As I submit to you my testimony of Joseph Smith, I acknowledge his humanness along with his great spiritual powers. He did not claim to be divine, nor a perfect man. He claimed only to be a mortal man with human feelings and imperfections, trying honestly to fulfill the divine mission given to him. He so describes himself in recorded counsel given to some of the members of the Church who had just arrived in Nauvoo on October 29, 1842. Said the Prophet, 'I told them I was but a man, and they must not expect me to be perfect; if they expected perfection from me, I should expect it from them; but if they would bear with my infirmities and the infirmities of the brethren, I would likewise bear with their infirmities.' (History of the Church, 5:181.)"I am impressed with his complete candor, for in addition to admitting his own humanness, he also recorded the declarations from the Lord which were given to him in the nature of loving reproof. . . ."While Joseph sought perfection, he did not claim perfection. If he were intending to fabricate a great falsehood or wanted to perpetrate a fraud or practice deceit, would he have been so truthful about his own humanness? His complete candor in admitting human frailties and in declaring the loving discipline of God offers powerful proof of his honesty and probity. His statements stand on more solid footing because they were declarations against human nature and admissions against self-interest."

- James E. Faust, "The Expanding Inheritance from Joseph Smith," Ensign, Nov. 1981, 76–77"

Why are there so many contradictions in the Mormon Scriptures?

Last night I was asked this by a young lady who has been faithfully reading but was not satisfied by her father's answer.  Her father's answer was to 'pray about it'.

Her frustration with the answer is understandable.  Dismissing a concern by conveniently referring a person's sincere inquiry to spiritual processes might come across as disingenuous. After all, if your faith is in something that is true, it should ultimately reconcile with any tests of science and logic (assuming those tests are not flawed).

But in his defense, that is the correct answer.  All religion (not just the 'Mormon' religion) have a faith element. And making sport of other religions when their faith seems to cross the line into a dogmatic acceptance of things that seem plainly to be wrong is not a new pastime. And part of maintaining faith is using prayer to reconcile attitudes and feelings. Some would classify this phenomenon as perfectly psychological, while I firmly believe that it evidences the divine and direct involvement of a loving Heavenly Father.  

The contradictions I have encountered fall in to one of three categories: Weakness of human language, contextual misunderstanding, and paradoxes.

Weakness of human language is seen in texts that have been mistranslated or sometimes in the ambiguous use of words. The Bible itself is full of these - it is not a 'Mormon' problem.  One of my favorites is the story of David performing a census. The story is told in two places in the Bible; in one, the Lord encourages David to perform the census; in the other it is Satan who inspires it in David.  If one accepts the two at face value, the only way to reconcile them is to believe that the Lord and Satan are the same person - that is obviously not true.  Furthermore, if you accept the idea that the Lord incites the census, which is described as a sin, it means that the Lord caused someone to sin - and the God I believe in would not do such a thing. The loss of a single word creates a flaw in the text that is just that - a textual flaw.  Reading under the influence of the Spirit (specifically, after praying about it) can help you to understand what is supposed to be taught by the story, without the crisis of faith that might result from finding an error in an otherwise holy text.

In addition to errors introduced through generations of translation, there is the recycling of words in a single language.  Words are only symbols, and only effective in communicating ideas when the symbols match up.   Again in the Bible, if I recall correctly, the word "Angel" occurs in places where it was translated from 5 different words.  If we get down to the intended meaning, very often 'Messenger', then problems of textual understanding are resolved.

Contextual Misunderstanding:  If you remove a single phrase or passage from scripture and compare it with another from another part of scripture, the two will often not seem to line up.  Understanding the historical background, doctrinal intention, and cultural and language aspects of a teaching will go a long ways towards fixing apparent discrepancies.  To give a simple example, in one place, "God is Love". In another place "God is a Father".  Is "Father" equal to "Love"? Well, in some respects, yes.  A horse is a four-legged animal, a cow is a four-legged animal, so a horse is a cow? Obviously not.  

Paradoxes are my favorite discrepancy.  Why? Because they are deliberate contradictions... and one must assume when an author introduces such a thing, it is not because the author is stupid.  It is because they are teaching us something and challenging us.  When you find something that seems to be placed there to challenge our faith, there is often (perhaps always) a much deeper truth beneath it; one that reconciles the ideas together and teaches us how to be.

Since I think Paradoxes are placed in scripture to hide sacred things, I will avoid delving too deeply in to them here.  But to postulate an example of a crisis that might be created, consider this simple example: Does the Lord care how we dress and groom?  On the one hand, we are not to judge by appearances, since the Lord 'looketh on the heart'.  On the other hand, the Spirit whispers that being neat and comely (for example, when we attend worship services) is good.  It should not be hard for you to see how extremes in either direction would be wrong, and under what situations the Lord (or His Prophet) might direct people to focus less or more on appearance.  There must be, then, an underlying principle that reconciles the two principles together.

And praying sincerely might help you find it.

What do you think when you see people breaking all of your rules?

This question was posed in Las Vegas, where all ten commandments are apparently suspended.

You know, it is remarkable how many self-professing Christians participate in all that the devil has to offer. But then, hypocrisy is not a new accusation against any religion.

The question is fair, but it has a certain edge to it - the person asking may have been accusing me of being judgmental. The truth is, right or wrong, sometimes I am. I'm not perfect either.

But often I'm not, and so I want you to understand what I feel when I see people 'breaking my rules' and I am in a proper, Christian frame of mind.

First, understand that the Mormon Philosophy of Obedience is not centered on a mathmatic equation of "break x commandments equals y time in z degrees of hell." Of course we believe that nothing unclean can live in God's presence, but the Savior's Atonement can make that happen.

Instead, we are concerned with the whole of who we are, and who we will become if we continue to engage in our current behaviors. We believe that the commandments help us tailor our behavior to get the best benefit of the natural laws of the universe, bringing about peace in this world, and eternal life in the world to come. And becoming who we ought to be qualifies us for the blessings of the Atonement, including cleansing from sin.

So what do I feel when I observe the debauchery of Las Vegas?

Sorrow. Sorrow that in an attempt at gaining some fleeting happiness, people are breaking themselves against natural laws, multiplying their problems, and creating entanglements that they do not understand, whether it is in the visible scar of a tattoo, or the less visible scars of immorality, substance abuse, and gambling, they are incurring both the negative consequences of physical universal laws, and the displeasure of an otherwise loving God.

Sola Scriptura and The Book of Mormon

Now, regarding the 'other' book:  Many denominations struggle with the idea of 'another Bible'.  Some try to define Christianity on this sole point; a Christian being someone who accepts only the Bible as scripture.  (Oddly, I would think the definition of Christian should have something to do with accepting Christ, which is not an issue for Mormons at all).  

The concept of 'sola scriptura' is based in a couple of passages in the Bible that prohibit adding to or changing scripture.  An understandable prohibition, as altered scripture would probably alter belief and behavior and undermine any religion with a text as its manifesto or constitution.  The prohibition is found in the early Old Testament (ironically, before several thousand years of scripture is appended) and in the Old Testament (again, ironically several thousand years after the first dictation of this rule). 

In a further irony, even after the canon was 'closed' chronologically, books were added and removed and sorted through centuries of revision, translation, and re-compilation.  Even today the re-translations continue, modern seminarians are required to study ancient greek in order to be qualified to interpret scripture, and no two Protestants carry the same version of the otherwise 'infallible' Bible.

So, the Mormon answer is: God still has the power to speak to man, still loves man, and man still needs God to speak. (Take a look around you.  Clearly we are lacking God).  And his word should be written and published.  And, as the the Bible states, no one should alter or revise the part of the written word that is His word.  But man is fallible, and so is often the written word, and so are all of the extant human languages used to write his word. So we continue to receive revelation until it is perfectly aligned with the will of God, and until God has no more to say to man.

The Book of Mormon has been criticized as a text designed to lead Christians astray, or created by the devil to create confusion, or as the work of a charlatan trying to sell a religion to oppress gullible followers. Then amusingly, the other criticism that comes frequently from our friends in other flavors of Christianity is, once they have actually read the Book of Mormon, is that the Book is 'too close to the the Bible', and that it has 'too many similarities to portions of the Old and New Testament', (it actually quotes them outright in many places). 

Most of the 13 million+ members of the LDS Church would tell you that while they find contradictions and ambiguities throughout the Bible, the Book of Mormon clears them up, agreeing with itself and simultaneously reconciling ideas in the Bible.  Not a bad piece of literary work for a young farm boy in rural New York in the early 1800s.

The Church of Mormon?

A recent article in the paper about a local businessman who had been called to serve as Bishop of his congregation attempted at the same time to give some background on the church.  The article was fair and kind, but had some unique phrasing to it - clearly the work of someone who has not had a lot of exposure to the LDS Church.  

One particular oddity was referring to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in this manner:  "commonly known as the Church of Mormon".  

I have heard us called by our full name as above, abbreviated as the LDS Church, and nicknamed the Mormon Church, but never as the "Church of Mormon".  

Members have been called Mormons since, as far as I can tell, the church was organized, because of our acceptance of "The Book of Mormon" as canon (scripture), one of the factors that most clearly distinguishes us from other Christian denominations.  But Book of Mormon is named for its compiler (not even its primary author, or the Savior it testifies of).  Mormon is a relatively minor character, aside from his contribution as the book's finisher.  

In short, it's not Mormon's Church.  It is the church that people nicknamed 'Mormons' attend. And they believe it is Christ's church.

Are Mormons Evangelical?

Some people view us as the most evangelical church around - with over 50,000 full-time missionaries, whose primary role is proselytizing (working to convert people to one's faith), we certainly stand out in some markedly evangelical ways.

So most members of the LDS church see themselves (or at very least their church) as highly evangelical. Certainly the requirement to preach the gospel is a key component of our doctrine. And many people outside the church who know our young, name-tag wearing missionary force have a keen sense of the evangelical mission of the church.

Oddly enough, there seems to be some dissonance between how we and our immediate sphere of influence perceive us, and how most of the world perceives us. In a recent meeting with Elder L. Tom Perry, one of the most senior leaders in the church, leaders in Minnesota learned that the church has studied the question and that most people have little or no perception of who we are - their exposure has been very limited and there are plenty of mis-perceptions about our beliefs.

A recent conversation with an acquaintance provided anecdotal support for this conclusion; she told me that "the difference between Mormons and 'mainstream Christianity' is that we are not Evangelical enough", and that we allowed others to define us. This assessment of the church came across in spite of the fact that the person making it had both received a Book of Mormon from a member of the church, and had received a visit from missionaries on her doorstep. She knows that we have an evangelical bent to us, and yet her perception is that it is not enough.

I think many members of the church are so careful to not offend, or to come across as pushy, or afraid to be perceived as preachy, that we err to the other extreme. What we don't realize is, that by not talking openly about what we believe, we may actually come across as closed off, secretive, or even arrogant.

So, while our doctrine is that the duty to preach the Gospel (evangelize) is key and central to our faith, we have a long way to go in becoming who we ought to be.

So, your Mormon neighbor does want you to ask about their faith. They want to have a chance to invite you to see their church and meet other members. Since you're curious any way, do them a favor and ask. And they'll still be your friend even if you decide not to pursue it any further than that.