From: hartigan@ac.dal.ca
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc
Subject: Re: Why do people give Mormons a hard time?
Date: 12 Dec 92 12:51:54 -0400
Organization: Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

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 Churchs.

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).
 
>  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. 

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.

> 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 origianl 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.

The point is, comrade, these things are not nearly as cut-and-dried
as some people want to make them.

> 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.
 
> Despite this delimnam and spreading the false accusation that
> the Christian Churches are in an APOSTACY,

Aren't they? 
 
> we Christians love the Mormons
> with all our hearts,

Forgive me, comrade, but y'all have a strange way of showing it. 

> You ask, as many Mormons do, "why are you persucuting 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. 
 
> If you were out in the middle of a river drowning, splashing your hands in
> the air while gulping water by the gallons, and sinking into despair, if
> I were on the shore safe and sound, and through you a life presever,
> would you ask me, "WHY ARE YOU PERSECUTING ME?"

Can you not see that this is a misleading analogy? You're cheating, my
friend. 

> 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
don't want, and insisting that they need it, becomes an act of aggression.

Thanks for cluing me in -- I can see some of your points, but I think
you are going way overboard. 

Sean Hartigan
hartigan@ac.dal.ca

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