From: agr00@ccc.amdahl.com (Anthony G Rose)
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc
Subject: Anthony Rose ANSWERING --------------> Sean
Date: 16 Dec 92 02:33:47 GMT
Reply-To: agr00@juts.ccc.amdahl.com (TONY ROSE)
Organization: Amdahl Corporation, Sunnyvale CA


Sean, here is my response to your letter.  Sorry for the delay.
God Bless,
-tony
----------------------------------------------------------------------
>Article 41942 of talk.religion.misc:
>From: hartigan@ac.dal.ca
>Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc
>Subject: Re: Why do people give Mormons a hard time?
>Date: 12 Dec 92 16:51:54 GMT

You write:

>>In article <b1I.02qS2eAy01@JUTS.ccc.amdahl.com>, agr00@ccc.amdahl.com
>>(Anthony G Rose) writes:
>>> In article <1992Dec11.164533.9464@ac.dal.ca> hartigan@ac.dal.ca writes:

>>>Why in the name of the blazing blue Buddha do people hate Mormons so much?

>> The problem
>> is not with the Mormon people, it is with the LDS church's doctrines.
>>
>> The LDS church is built upon the assumption that there was a TOTAL
>> APOSTACY within the Christian Churches.

>Fair enough. But the Protestant churches are more or less built on the
>assumption that the Roman Catholic Church is apostate. Conservative
>Protestants go around calling the Roman Church the "Whore of Babylon."
>Conservative Protestant missionaries are working throughout the developing
>world trying to convert Catholics to "Christianity."  Yet I don't
>see the Catholic Church carrying on a propaganda war against the Protestant
>churches (although of course it did for the first few centuries after
>the Reformation).

The Catholic Church adheres to the "essential doctrines" of the Orthodox
Christian Church; unlike the LDS church.  Therefore, Protestants do not
consider the Catholic Church to be apostate.  There are some "non-essentials"
within the Roman Catholic Church that the Protestants are leery of.
Such as the strong emphasis placed on some of the saints and Mary. The
reason for the concern among Protestants on this is because some
believe that this emphasis placed on the saints and on Mary is actually
taken away emphasis from Jesus.  However, since the doctrines of the
Roman Catholic Church do acknowledge and adhere to the "essentials",
the are NOT considered apostate, or a cult.  Mormonism does NOT
acknowledge or adhere to the "essential doctrines" of the Orthodox
Christian faith, and thus have a different situation all together. The
two are not comparable.  I hope this short explanation helps you
understand the position that the Protestants hold in these two areas.
If you would like more information, please write to me at:

              JUDE 3 MISSIONS
              467 Saratoga Avenue
              San Jose, California   95129

>> Therefore, they have over
>> 46,000 full-time missionaries going door-to-door throughout the world
>> telling people in their living rooms that all the Christian churches are
>> an abomination in the eyes of God.  Whether they win a convert or not, they
>> have indoctrinated this fallacy in the minds of the people they meet.
>
>I can see why this would upset you, but I think you're being too harsh.
>I have known a lot of Mormon missionaries, and they are usually really
>good guys with no axe to grind against Protestantism. They present
>a reasonable case that there was an apostasy. Hell - there WAS an
>apostasy. If you think your doctrines are the pure teaching of
>the early Christians, you need to read your history.

I agree with the statement that Mormon Missionaries are good guys, and
they don't have axes to grind when they come and sit in your living
room.  They are usually not hostile (although some are), and are
usually incredibly polite.  However, the doctrines they bring to your
front door and into your living room DO have major axes to grind with
the Historical Christian faith.  They claim an abomination and a
total apostasy among everyone else as they present their "one true
church".  As far as their case goes for the total apostasy, they do
present a good case for it for someone who is uneducated and fails to
do the research for themselves.  Such research will quickly spot the
holes in their claims.  As far as the history part of it all goes,
we can go back to when it all started and look at the way Jesus and
Paul told us it would be.  I their words are reliable.  Paul said:

              "The Spirit clearly says that in later times
               SOME will abandon the faith and follow
               deceiving spirits and things taught by demons."
                                   (1 Timothy 4:1)

Notice Paul says that God's Spirit CLEARLY teaches that SOME will depart
from the faith; not ALL!  And Jesus told us:

              "And I shall say unto thee, Thou are Peter and
               upon this rock I will build my church; and
               the gates of hell shall not prevail against
               it."  (Matthew 16:18)

"Peter" here comes from the Greek word "Petros" but "rock" comes from the
Greek word "petra", 1 Corinthians 10:4 says that the "petra" was Christ.
Mormons tend to claim that the gates of hell won't overpower the
"rock of revelation." There are some problems with this interpretation:

     (a) To apply the meaning of "rock of revelation" to the
         rock of Matthew 16:18 is simply unwarranted in Biblical
         Scripture. Even if it did mean "rock of revelation" then
         that rock must have been overpowered by the gates of hell
         according to the Mormon claim that the "councils of Gods"
         were gone from the time of Christ approximately, until the
         LDS church was put on the earth ("mankind ONCE MORE
         rejoices in the priceless privileges of the councils of
         God" - from: The Articles Of Faith pps. 203-204)

     (b) The Mormon assumption is that the "gates of hell" won't
         overpower the rock, NOT THE CHURCH.

         Let's suppose that you are my next door neighbor, and that you
         are building a home on top of a large rock. A terrible
         storm comes up that night. When the wind dies down I hear
         you crying over there. I call out, "Is it still there?"
         I certainly wouldn't be referring to the ROCK! Obviously,
         the question is whether or not THE HOUSE YOU WERE BUILDING
         UPON THE ROCK WAS STILL THERE.

         A.T. Robertson writes:
               "The ekklesia (that is, the church) is built
                upon the Messiahship of her master, and death,
                the gates of Hades, will not prevail against her
                by keeping Him imprisoned. It was a mysterious
                truth, which He will soon tell them in plain
                words (verse 21); it is echoed in Acts 2:24,31
                (McNeile). Christ's church will prevail and
                survive because He will burst the gates of Hades
                and come forth conqueror.  He will ever live and
                be the guarantor of the perpetuity of His people
                or church." (Word Pictures in the NT, Vol. I, p.133)


Paul also said:  "Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus
                  THROUGHOUT ALL AGES, world without end. Amen"
                               (Ephesians 3:21)

Note that it says "throughout all ages"  Even the Book of Mormon
refutes the doctrine of a TOTAL APOSTACY!

              "Therefore, more blessed are ye, for ye shall never
               taste death; but ye shall live to behold all the
               doings of my Father unto the children of men, even
               until all things shall be fulfilled according to the
               will of the Father, when i shall come in my glory with
               the powers of heaven."  (3 Nephi 28:7)

How can you have a TOTAL apostasy, when you've got three Nephite deciples
remaining on earth, during the great apostasy? Jesus said, "For where
two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst
of them." (Matthew 18:20) Isn't it reasonable then, to say that it only
takes two or three people gather together in Christ's name to constitute
a church? You can have a church in one home (see Romans 16:5). Even Mormon
scriptures refute the total apostasy premise.

               "And I will make thee a minister for him and for
                thy brother James; and unto you three I will give
                this power and the keys of this ministry until
                I come." (Doctered Covenants 7:7)

Here you've got John the beloved and two others on earth till Christ comes
back, with "this power and the keys of this ministry." How can something
be restored through Joseph Smith, when it was never lost to begin with?"

>Besides, they never call the other churches an "abomination." They
>regard the other churches as being legitimate, although incomplete,
>vehicles of faith.  I think you may have been reading too much
>anti-Mormon propaganda, comrade.

The FOUNDATION of the Mormon Church was based on THAT VERY WORD!
"The Pearl Of Great Price" is a standard work of the church and IS
canon.  In that book we read of the account of the supposed first
vision.  There was a supposed revival in the town and Joseph couldn't
decide whether he should join the Baptist, Methodist, or other denominations
involved in the revival.  So he says he went into the woods to pray
FOR THE FIRST TIME in his life, and he supposedly saw God the Father and
Jesus Christ.
              "I asked the Personages that stood before me
               which of all the sects WAS RIGHT-and which
               I should join. I was answered that I MUST
               join none of them, for they were ALL WRONG;
               and the Personage who addressed me said that
               ALL their creeds were an ABOMINATION in his
               sight; that those professors were ALL CORRUPT.."
                 (Pearl Of Great Price, Joseph Smith 2:19)

If you consort a dictionary of today, and one from the early 1800's,
you will see that the definition of ABOMINATION, CORRUPT, and
WRONG, has not changed:

ABOMINATION: hatred and disgust; anything hateful and disgusting
CORRUPT:     spoiled rotten; morally debase; EVIL; depraved.
             contain alterations or errors.
WRONG:       not morally right or just; sinful; wicked.

And these are not just the words of the church, they claim that
these are the words of the Lord!  If "whoever said this" meant as
you say, "..being legitimate, although complete", they would not
have chosen these words.  And this is in LDS Scripture.

I certainly don't have to read one page of anti-mormon literature to
get this.  It is right there in the canon.

>> We are instructed as Christians, to contend for the faith that was once
>> delivered unto the saints (Jude 3), and to test ALL things by the Word of
>> God.  Galatians 1:6-9 says that if we or an angel from heaven preach any
>> other gospel, let them be accursed.  The original Greek word that Paul
>> used is ANTHAMA, which is defined as THE WORSE POSSIBLE CURSE OF GOD.
>
>Hell -- Jesus preached a different gospel than St. Paul. I guess that
>means he gets the curse, too. Also the apostle Thomas, and the other
>apostles of the Jerusalem church who thought Paul was a nutbar.

I don't mean this as a flame, okay, because I can tell you are
sincerely asking these questions, and just don't know.  You claimed
that they didn't use the word "Abomination", and every Mormon knows
it is there in the canon, this tells me that you are just uninformed.
I really appreciate you asking about all this so I could have a
chance to explain the reason for what I do, and that it is not just
persecution.

Also, the statement above is just simply false.  And I think even the
Mormons would claim that.  Paul didn't preach a different gospel, Paul's
letters testify of JESUS CHRIST.  There is not conflict, testifying Christ
was the purpose of his letters.  Read some of them!

>> create the planet earth.  And that Jesus was the Son of God who's plan of
>                                                              ~~~~
>Again, the LDS position is that the plan that Jesus agreed to was not his
>plan, it was his father's plan.

The following reference are from The Pearl of Great Price:

Abraham 3:23-28  Council called of all the leading spirits
Abraham 4:25,26  God proposed a plan for our progression.
Abraham 3:24-26  That plan was for us to come to earth...and to
                 have free-agency to choose which path we each
                 wanted to follow.
Moses 4:1-4 and Abraham 3:27,28 Lucifer, our elder brother who
                                desired glory, stood up and
                                proposed his own plan.
Moses 4:1-3  Lucifer's plan was to take away free agency, force us
             to obey all the law. He wanted us to worship him.
Moses 4:2    Jesus stood and offered himself as our sin offering,
             giving man his free agency and the chance to attain
             eternal glory, or godhood with heavenly father.
Abraham 3:28 All council voted No to Lucifer and Yes to Jesus.

So I guess we are both sort of correct on this point.  The plan was
originally God's, but it was voted on, and if Lucifer's plan had
won the vote, things would certainly be different. (assuming all this
is true, that is :-)   )

>> Although the LDS church send thousands of missionaries all over the
>> world to teach about the APOSTACY of the Christian Churches, they spend
>> millions of dollars each year trying to convince the world they are
>> Christian.
>
>Well...they _are._  Who are you to say that your version of Christianity
>is the only one worthy of the name?  Be fair.

Christianity is based on each individual, not on an organization.  If you
know the real Jesus in a personal relationship, you are a Christian:

              "Yet to all who receive him, to those who
               believe in his name, he gave the right to
               become children of God"  (John 1:12)

The LDS church says that you are not saved (going to spend eternity
in the presence of God) unless you are a member of The Church Of
Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.  The Jesus of the Bible taught you
must belong to a person, the LDS church teaches you must belong to an
organization.  Jesus didn't say, "My church is the way, the truth, and
the life, no man comes to the father except by my church".  He said,

              "_I_ am the way, the truth, and the life, no man
               comes to the father except by ME"  (John 14:6)

They may be Christians, but they are Christians of a different Christ.

>> Despite this delimna, and spreading the false accusation that
>> the Christian Churches are in an APOSTACY,
>
>Aren't they?

No, not according to Biblical revelation in the Bible.  I think I have
presented that case fairly well above.

>> we Christians love the Mormons
>> with all our hearts,
>
>Forgive me, comrade, but y'all have a strange way of showing it.

Jesus had a strange way of showing His love at times too.  For one example,
when he said:

      "You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being
       condemned to hell?"  (Matthew 23:33)

He SEEMED to be judgemental, and didn't APPEAR to be too nice at times like
this, However, He WAS Incarnate Love

>> You ask, as many Mormons do, "why are you persecuting us"?  When the fact
>> of the matter is, that the LDS church threw the first stone when it
>> claimed that all of Christianity was APOSTATE.
>
>Fair enough. I can see why this would annoy you. Still, though, it's not
>like you aren't guilty of the same thing.

Only one person can be guilty of throwing the FIRST stone!

>> Well, as Christians, we are waking up the Mormons who are sleeping in the
>> flames, and throwing ropes to those that are drowning.
>
>If someone doesn't think they are drowning, throwing them a rope they

If you don't like that analogy, how about the other one.  It IS possible
that you could be asleep and not know you house is on fire!


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*                                                                       *
*                                                                       *
*   "Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth"    *
*                                                                       *
*                                               Galatians 4:16          *
*                                                                       *
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*  Tony Rose:   agr00@amail.amdahl.com   or agr00@juts.ccc.amdahl.com   *
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