From: bunner@vms.macc.wisc.edu (Dana A. Bunner)
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc
Subject: Re: Mormons are not Christians
Date: 13 Oct 92 03:39:15 GMT
Organization: University of Wisconsin Academic Computing Center

In article <adre02hI25io01@JUTS.ccc.amdahl.com>, agr00@ccc.amdahl.com (Anthony G Rose) writes...

Against my better judgement I'm going to reply to this one.

>Most Christian denominations agree with all the others on issues that are
>important to salvation.
> 
>Some Catholic churches believe in all of the same things the Christian
>churches beleive and they have no problem fellowshiping together.

Can I take this statement to mean that Catholics are not Christians since
you have clearly separated them into two groups?  Or that at least "some"
Catholic churches are Christians while others are not, depending on what 
they believe?

>Then,
>again, some Catholic churches have fallen into teaching perverse teachings
>and doctrines, thus, that church cannot be considered as Christian. 

Well I guess I have my answer.  If I may ask, Is the Pope Christian?

>If a religion is teaching things that are false, if the members of that
>faith are interested in Truth, they should want to be told the Truth.
>If what you believed was not true, and it was going to affect your
>eternity, would you want to know about it?

Irrelevant to whether one is Christian or not.  To be a Christian does not
require that one has "all truth."  Perhaps to meet your definition it does
but then again you don't get to decide.

>>The Evangelical definition of basic Christian beliefs posted here a week or
>>so ago would have excluded several major Christian religions.
> 
>No they wouldn't have.  You need to redecide which ones are Christian
>religions.  

Aah, I'm beginning to see the light.  If they don't meet this definition
then they aren't Christians, thus no Christians could possibly be 
excluded!  How deviously clever of you Christians.

>>I went into a "Christian" Bookstore three weeks ago and found an entire
>>rack of publications whose purpose was to attack the beliefs of a variety
>>of religions.
> 
>If the things in those books are telling the truth, then there is nothing
>wrong with them being there.  If you thing they are lying, then why don't
>you read them, find the errors, and get someone to do something about it.

>their door.  They are not "Attacking" beliefs of the religionss.  They
>are comparing the belifs, and showing why the different ones cannot be
>considered as Christians, because they do not believe as the Christian
>faith does.

Sorry but I find this line of thought to be repulsive.  Once again if you
insert some type of modifier such as "Evangelical" in front of each 
occurance of the word Christian above, then I have no problem with it.
The use of the term Christian in such a narrow fashion really turns me off.
Regardless of my personal belief, I reject your right to determine the 
authoritative definition for what constitutes Christianity.
It comes off to me as all too un-Christlike.

>You should consider what your church (assuming you are a Mormon, I
>apologize if that assumption is incorrect) does.  They have over 41,000
>missionaries world-wide going door-to-door approxiamately 10 hours a day
>spreading the Mormon gospel.  Have you ever sat through those lessons?
>If you have, then you know one of the early things they tell you if that
>there was an apostacy in the Christian Church, that the LDS church is the
>one true church, and that ALL others are wrong. 

Again I don't dispute your right to take issue with these actions.  In fact
I applaud it.  I am an ardent supporter of free agency.  And I like one
sticking to their convictions.  But I see little difference in the "We're
the One" attitudes of the LDS and your definition of Christianity.  If 
anything the LDS position is the more tolerant one, at least they don't
condemn the unbelievers.  (Well some LDS statements aren't too charitable
in this regard but the official position is not one of condemnation.)

>So, it is the same
>thing, the Christians right books and have seminars, and the Mormons go
>door-to-door.  The difference is, that you cannot prove anything wrong
>about the seminars and books in the Christian book stores

Now this is a challenge you don't really want to make.  In my little 
visit there a few weeks ago, I spend about an hour in the negative book
section and found literally dozens of errors.  I searched through one 
booklet and found very little which was accurate.  A few were so filled
with errors that they were humorous.

BTW - How quickly do these bookstores get rid of the Bakker, Swaggert, &
Co type books once their authors fall from grace?  I hope it's quicker than
the LDS bookstores with Paul Dunn stuff, his books are still in some 
stores ... albeit at substantial discounts.

I particularly enjoy the "science" sections at Christian bookstores.

Is Josh McDowell a "Christian?"  I'm afraid I don't have the hang of this
telling them apart business.  If Josh is, then maybe we can entice James
Merritt into warming up his Josh FAQ.

Dana
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc