From the article: The Church holds that “Jesus Christ was married at Cana of Galilee, that Mary, Martha, and others were his wives, and that he begat children” (Orson Hyde (apostle) The Judgments of God on the United States, (March 15, 1855) in Journal of Discourses, p. 210).
If a Roman Catholic bishop suddenly held this view -- and if the Roman Catholic church only claimed this wasn't the "official" teaching of the church...but didn't otherwise correct the teaching or say it was a false teaching...then the church would be guilty of "putting it out there" for believing...and since the Mormon church has "apostles" and "prophets" who supposedly reveal things DI-rect from the Mormon god...ya better believe that the "it's not official" line only means that "hey, it might be true."
Hyde's wife, Marinda Johnson Hyde, btw became a simultaneous wife of both Hyde and Joseph Smith...sharing a bed with both men while remaining married to Hyde.
From the article: The Church teaches the Father in heaven was once a man as we are now, capable of physical death.
Yup. Imagine that. Before the Son of God ever became a man, the Mormon god was a man who also died as a man.
Here is Joseph Smith commenting on this:
I learned a testimony concerning Abraham, and he reasoned concerning tghe Gods of heaven. '...Intelligences exist one above another, so that there is no end to them.' If Abraham reasoned thus--If Jesus Christ was the Son of God, and John discovered that God the Father of Jesus Christ had a Father, you may suppose that He had a Father also. Where was there ever a son without a father? And where was there ever a father without first being a son? Whenever did a tree or anything spring into existence without a progenitor? And everything comes in this way. Paul says that which is earthly is in the likeness of that which is heavenly. Hence if Jesus had a Father, can we not believe that He had a Father also? I despise the idea of being scared to death at such a doctrine, for the Bible is full of it. I want you to pay particular attention to what I am saying. Jesus said that the Father wrought precisely in the same way as His Father had done before Him. As the Father had done before? He laid down His life, and took it up the same as His Father had done before. (Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p. 373)
This shows you the Mormon god is distinct from the God of the Bible.
What about Lds 20th century "apostles" on this same subject?
LDS "Apostle" Bruce McConkie wrote, "The Father is a glorified, perfected resurrected, exalted man who worked out his own salvation by obedience to the same laws he has given to us so that we may do the same" (A New Witness for the Articles of Faith, pg. 64).
As somebody once pointed out...Notice McConkie's use of the word "resurrected" and the phrase, "worked out his salvation." Only those who die can be resurrected, and only those who are lost need salvation.
At this point, my brothers and sisters, I think we ought to focus on what the O’Baminites believe, and what the result of their being blessed with another four years in power as high priests in the Temple of Washington DeeCee will mean for us.
Excellent post! I love how succinct the article is in reducing it to its basics. I had studied it awhile back, but forgot about a few of the details.
I agree with your assessment of the basic decency and just simple niceness of most Mormon individuals.
However, the originators of the sect were, I believe, motivated principally by greed, power hunger, and simple sexual lust. It was their good fortune to find so many submissive and gullible followers. But that doesn’t change the less than honorable motives of the founders (one of whom was the great, great grandfather of Mitt Romney).
The MORMON religious Organization has Taught that stuff; has Lived that stuff and has voluminous records of that stuff; but it was in the past, and it does NOT get drug out for the world (or new members) to see unless we ANTIs (Christians who actually know what is in the bible) bring it up.
MORMONism can claim all day long that this stuff is no longer applicable; but they CANNOT show any LATER writing from Headquarters that DENOUNCES, Repudiates or Changes the old ways.