It's a similar message -- but distinct -- to what he gave at the 1971 October General Conference...threaded @ FR here: The Only True and Living Church [Lds intolerantly claim in '71 to be ONLY face-of-earth true church]
From the message/piece: It is our firm conviction that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is...“the only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth.” (D&C 1:30) This doctrine often generates resistance and repels the casual investigator. Some have said, “We want nothing to do with anyone who makes so presumptuous a claim as that.” The early Latter-day Saints were...the butt of many clever stories. We, of course, are not free from that today...It is little wonder that our missionaries are sometimes thought to be overbearing...
Of course, no such wording is found in Lds "scriptures" of the First Vision in the Pearl of Great Price. Allow us to review that chapter of Mormon “scripture,” shall we?
What do we find, description-wise?
v. 16
Felt
Saw a pillar of light
v. 17
“the light”
“two Personages” brightness & glory defy all description
a son of the other
v. 18: “the Personages”
v. 19 “the Personage”
v. 20: “the light”
v. 24 “a light” “heard a voice”
v. 25 “a light” “two Personages”
You'll notice that unnamed "Personages" do not = "the Father and the Son" (as in God the Father, and Jesus Christ)
If they were ALL wrong, why did Joseph Smith take ensuing membership class instruction at the local Methodist church in the 1820s???
Notice the "absolutes" Joseph used: NONE/ALL/ALL/ALL/ANY -- in terms of describing the Christian churches of his day, ALL of the Christian creeds, and ALL of the Christian professing believers.
Challenge to Mormons: What is so objectionable about the Apostolic Creed? (Keep in mind the word "catholic" in that creed at the time simply meant "universal")
Snapshot of Joseph Smith’s Slanderous Invectives vs. Christian Sects |
Mormon Source[Note: Most of these are Mormon ‘scriptures'. In fact, First three rows below are Lds 'scripture' & therefore cannot be rug-swept any more than a Jew might try to take three commandments off of the very tablets of stone Moses brought down from the mountain] |
| “...which of all the sects was right… must join NONE of them, for they were ALL WRONG… those professors were ALL CORRUPT…” | Joseph Smith – History vv. 18-19. – Lds "scripture" Pearl of Great Price |
| ...“which of all the sects was right…ALL their CREEDS were an ABOMINATION in his sight…they teach for doctrines the commandments of MEN…” | Joseph Smith – History vv. 18-19. – Lds "scripture" Pearl of Great Price |
| Mormon church the only ‘Christ-sanctioned’ church on earth: “…the foundation of this [Mormon] church…the ONLY true and living church on the face of the whole earth” [Obvious ‘scorched earth’ implication: All other churches are false and dead] | Lds “scripture” Doctrines & Covenants 1:30 |
| Direct question asked of Joseph Smith: 'Will everybody be damned, but Mormons?" Answer from Lds "prophet" Joseph Smith: 'Yes, and a great portion of them, unless they repent, and work righteousness." | Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 119 [Not “scripture” – but still publicly spoken by the Mormon ‘living prophet’ and published by a later Mormon ‘living prophet,’ Joseph Fielding Smith – via a publisher owned by the Mormon church – Deseret News Press, 1938] |
| “In 1952…the first official proselyting plan was sent to missionaries throughout the world…It included seven missionary discussions that emphasized…[four topics, one of them being]…THE APOSTASY and Restoration…” [This makes it 60 years that Mormon church missionaries, now numbering 55,000, have formally emphasized in its training & door to door saturation a priority in bashing the worldwide Christian church as “apostates” (100% AWOL)] | Our Heritage: A Brief History of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints p. 116, 1996 |
I’ve always thought it preposterous that any church would NOT claim to be the only church that teaches the whole truth.
My personal objection to Mormonism, is that they're so stale and plastic. Mormons are like the people of Pleasantville before they get "colorized". They're nice, polite, hard-working, but have no soul.
If “all their creeds are an abomination” then why do the LDS share so many ‘creeds’ with other churches? Like:
Baptism, communion, marriage, tithing, Sunday worship, observance of Christmas and Easter, prayer, singing of praises, etc? What exactly is so ‘wrong’ with these things that the Lord Himself supposedly told Smith that they were wrong? And why did not they get corrected? When I was LDS I listened to the same “only correct and true Church” so now the LDS want to be accepted as “just another Christian faith”.
Recently in the news, a Florida college instructor directed his students to step on a sheet of paper, with “Jesus” written on it.
One student refused, a devout Mormon.
Not this Horse Shiite again.
It was that arrogant statement of superiority and exclusiveness that gotmme to investigate LDS, whereupon I learned we are not of the same faith in any way, shape, form or fashion.
Oh! A friend extolled to me, today, the wonders of a certain Scott Wolton.
They went on and on about his pedigree and that stoopit Bat Stone.
Apparently he is now peddling his wares on the history channel.
I didn’t have the heart to illuminate them on his fraud and ruin their day.
I did leave a hint so they could discover it for themselves.
Sounds like one of those monotheistic belief systems. The upstart and intolerant newcomers. Polytheists and pantheists are not impressed.
Ya THINK!!!???
I don't think we can ever transcend Joseph Smith or consider him to be a valued personality, but now we'll move on.I don't think you'll see that among believers in the faith, because there are too many other things that came from himthat are the reasons why we do what we do and we are what we are. That there are unanswered questions, to be sure.That there are things that I'm as anxious as the next guy to learn more detail on, I really want to know. But in the interim,it really doesn't, doesn't trouble me.We're in the religion-making business, as you intimated earlier, only for a short time, I mean, compared to theChristian church, which has been at this for a couple of millennia. We're about halfway to Nicaea.And so, and so in that sense — I remember a very tender moment. I was speaking with — I've been invitedto the Salt Lake Theological Seminary, basically an Evangelical seminary, to discuss a book I had done on Jesus.And they had read it, and they wanted me to come and just respond to questions.And it was, it was a very enjoyable couple of hours.The very last question that was asked by one of my friends there was this one.He said, 'Bob, what can we do for you?'And I, I wasn't ready for that question. I said, 'What do you mean?'He said, 'What can we, as Evangelicals, do for our Mormon friends?'And I, I guess my mind could have gone a hundred different ways, but what I came back with was this.I said, 'Boy, I appreciate you asking that. I don't think I've ever been asked that.'But, but I said, 'Try this. Cut us a little slack, will you? Give us a little time.We're in the religion-making business, and this takes time. It takes centuries.And, and trying to explain the faith and articulate the faith, that doesn't come over night.We've really only been about that for 20 or 30 years.'
