What has the Mormon Church historically taught about Christianity?
While some current church leaders portray the LDS Church as Christian, the church actually has a long history of condemning Christianity. The church has also stated repeatedly that no one can be saved without the permission of Joseph Smith. The church has even suggested that Islam is better than Christianity.
Mormon Church Condemns Christians
“This is not just another Church. This is not just one of a family of Christian churches. This is the Church and kingdom of God, the only true Church upon the face of the earth…” — Prophet Ezra Taft Benson, Teachings of Ezra Taft Benson, p.164-165
“In bearing testimony of Jesus Christ, President Hinckley spoke of those outside the Church who say Latter-day Saints ‘do not believe in the traditional Christ.’ ‘No, I don’t. The traditional Christ of whom they speak is not the Christ of whom I speak. For the Christ of whom I speak has been revealed in this the Dispensation of the Fullness of Times. He together with His Father, appeared to the boy Joseph Smith in the year 1820, and when Joseph left the grove that day, he knew more of the nature of God than all the learned ministers of the gospel of the ages.’” — Prophet Gordon B. Hinckley, LDS Church News, June 20, 1998, p.7
“My object in going to inquire of the Lord was to know which of all the sects was right, that I might know which to join. No sooner, therefore, did I get possession of myself, so as to be able to speak, than I asked the Personages who stood above me in the light, which of all the sects was right (for at this time it had never entered into my heart that all were wrong)—and which I should join.”
“I was answered by God 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; that: “they draw near to me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me, they teach for doctrines the commandments of men, having a form of godliness, but they deny the power thereof.” He again forbade me to join with any of them;…” — Prophet Joseph Smith, Joseph Smith History 1:18-20
“What is it that inspires professors of Christianity generally with a hope of salvation? It is that smooth, sophisticated influence of the devil, by which he deceives the whole world” — Prophet Joseph Smith, Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, p.270
“…all the priests who adhere to the sectarian religions of the day with all their followers, without one exception, receive their portion with the devil and his angels.” — Prophet Joseph Smith, The Elders Journal, Joseph Smith Jr., editor, vol.1, no.4, p.60
“For centuries men gathered and argued concerning the nature of Deity. Constantine assembled scholars of various factions at Nicaea in the year 325. After two months of bitter debate, they compromised on a definition which for generations has been the doctrinal statement among Christians concerning the Godhead.
“I invite you to read that definition and compare it with the statement of the boy Joseph. He simply says that God stood before him and spoke to him. Joseph could see Him and could hear Him. He was in form like a man, a being of substance. Beside Him was the resurrected Lord, a separate being, whom He introduced as His Beloved Son and with whom Joseph also spoke.
“I submit that in the short time of that remarkable vision Joseph learned more concerning Deity than all of the scholars and clerics of the past.
“This knowledge of Deity, hidden from the world for centuries, was the first and great thing which God revealed to His chosen servant. And upon the reality and truth of this vision rests the validity of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.” — Prophet Gordon B. Hinckley, “The Great Things Which God Has Revealed,” Spring Church Confernece 2005
“Both Catholics and Protestants are nothing less than the ‘whore of Babylon’ whom the Lord denounces by the mouth of John the Revelator as having corrupted all the earth by their fornications and wickedness. Any person who shall be so corrupt as to receive a holy ordinance of the Gospel from the ministers of any of these apostate churches will be sent down to hell with them, unless they repent” — Apostle Orson Pratt, The Seer, p. 255
“And the angel of God said unto me: Behold there are save two churches only; the one is the church of the Lamb of God, and the other is the church of the devil; wherefore, whoso belongeth not to the church of the Lamb of God belongeth to that great church, which is the mother of abominations; and she is the whore of all the earth. And it came to pass that I looked and beheld the whore of all the earth, and she sat upon many waters; and she had dominion over all the earth, among all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people.” — Book of Mormon, 1 Nephi 14:10-11
“After the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was organized, there were only two churches upon the earth. They were known respectively as the Church of the Lamb of God and Babylon. The various organizations which are called churches throughout Christendom, though differing in their creeds and organizations, have one common origin. They all belong to Babylon” — Apostle George Q. Cannon, Gospel Truth, p.324
“When the light came to me I saw that all the so-called Christian world was grovelling in darkness.” — Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 5:73
“With a regard to true theology, a more ignorant people never lived than the present so-called Christian world.” — Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 8:199
“The Christian world, so-called, are heathens as to the knowledge of the salvation of God” — Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 8:171
“Brother Taylor has just said that the religions of the day were hatched in hell. The eggs were laid in hell, hatched on its borders, and then kicked on to the earth.” — Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses 6:176
“Christians — those poor, miserable priests brother Brigham was speaking about — some of them are the biggest whoremasters there are on the earth, and at the same time preaching righteousness to the children of men. The poor devils, they could not get up here and preach an oral discourse, to save themselves from hell; they are preaching their fathers’ sermons — preaching sermons that were written a hundred years before they were born. … You may get a Methodist priest to pour water on you, or sprinkle it on you, and baptize you face foremost, or lay you down the other way, and whatever mode you please, and you will be damned with your priest.” — Apostle Heber C. Kimball, Journal of Discourses, 5:89
“The Gospel of modern Christendom shuts up the Lord, and stops all communication with Him. I want nothing to do with such a Gospel, I would rather prefer the Gospel of the dark ages, so called” — Prophet Wilford Woodruff, Journal of Discourses, vol. 2, p.196
“But as there has been no Christian Church on the earth for a great many centuries past, until the present century, the people have lost sight of the pattern that God has given according to which the Christian Church should be established, and they have denominated a great variety of Christian Churches … But there has been a long apostasy, during which the nations have been cursed with apostate churches in great abundance” — Apostle Orson Pratt, Journal of Discourses, 18:172
“Christianity…is a perfect pack of nonsense…the devil could not invent a better engine to spread his work than the Christianity of the nineteenth century.” — Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 6, p.167
“Where shall we look for the true order or authority of God? It cannot be found in any nation of Christendom.” — Prophet John Taylor, Journal of Discourses, 10:127
“What! Are Christians ignorant? Yes, as ignorant of the things of God as the brute beast.” — Prophet John Taylor, Journal of Discourses 13:225
“What does the Christian world know about God? Nothing… Why so far as the things of God are concerned, they are the veriest fools; they know neither God nor the things of God.” — Prophet John Taylor, Journal of Discourses 13:225
“Doctrines were corrupted, authority lost, and a false order of religion took the place of the gospel of Jesus Christ, just as it had been the case in former dispensations, and the people were left in spiritual darkness.” (p. 266). “For hundreds of years the world was wrapped in a veil of spiritual darkness, until there was not one fundamental truth belonging to the place of salvation …Joseph Smith declared that in the year 1820 the Lord revealed to him that all the ‘Christian’ churches were in error, teaching for commandments the doctrines of men.” — Prophet Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 3, p.282
“Instead of having apostles, prophets, and other inspired men in the church now, receiving visions, dreams, revelations, ministry of angels and prophesies for the calling of officers, and for the government of the church–they have a wicked, corrupt, uninspired pope, or uninspired archbishops, bishops, clergymen, etc., who have a great variety of corrupt forms of godliness, but utterly deny the gift of revelation, and every other miraculous power which always characterized Christ’s Church.
“These manmade, powerless, hypocritical, false teachers, make merchandise of the people, by preaching for large salaries, amounting in many instances to tens of thousands of dollars annually. They and their deluded followers are reprobate, denouncing the faith once delivered to the Saints.” — Apostle Orson Pratt, “Divine Authenticity of the Book of Mormon,” page 20
“…the Book of Mormon remains secure, unchanged and unchangeable, …But with the Bible it was not and is not so….it was once in the sole and exclusive care and custody of an abominable organization (Christianity), founded by the devil himself, likened prophetically unto a great whore, whose great aim and purpose was to destroy the souls of men in the name of religion. In these hands it ceased to be the book it once was.” — Apostle Bruce R. McConkie, The Joseph Smith Translation, pp. 12, 13
“Must we, under the broad folds of the American Constitution, be compelled to bow down to the narrow contracted notions of Apostate Christianity? Must we shut up our consciences in a nut shell, and be compelled to submit to the bigoted notions, and whims, and customs of the dark ages of popery, transferred to us through the superstitious of our fathers? Must we be slaves to custom and render homage to the soul-destroying, sickening influences of modern Christianity? No!” — Apostle Orson Pratt, The Seer, Vol.1, No.7, p.111
“And also those to whom these commandments were given, might have power to lay the foudation of this (Mormon) church, and to bring it forth out of obscurity and out of darkness, the only true and living church upon the face of the whole earth…” — Supposedly Jesus Christ Himself, Doctrine and Covenants 1:30
Salvation not Through Jesus Christ, but Joseph Smith?
“If we get our salvation, we shall have to pass by the Prophet Joseph Smith; if we enter our glory, it will be through the authority he has received. We cannot get around him.” — 1988 Melchizedek Priesthood Study Guide, p. 142, Apostle George Q. Cannon quoted
“Our entire case as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints rests on the validity of this glorious First Vision. … Nothing on which we base our doctrine, nothing we teach, nothing we live by is of greater importance than this initial declaration. I submit that if Joseph Smith talked with God the Father and His Beloved Son, then all else of which he spoke is true. This is the hinge on which turns the gate that leads to the path of salvation and eternal life.” — Prophet Gordon B. Hinckley, Ensign, Nov. 1998, pp.70-71
[There is] “no salvation without accepting Joseph Smith. If Joseph Smith was verily a prophet, and if he told the truth…no man can reject that testimony without incurring the most dreadful consequences, for he cannot enter the kingdom of God” — Prophet Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, vol. 1, p.190
“No man or woman in this dispensation will ever enter into the celestial kingdom of God without the consent of Joseph Smith…every man and woman must have the certificate of Joseph Smith, junior, as a passport to their entrance into the mansion where God and Christ are… [Joseph Smith] reigns there as supreme a being in his sphere, capacity, and calling, as God does in heaven. Many will exclaim—”Oh, that is very disagreeable! It is preposterous! We cannot bear the thought!” But it is true.” — Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 7, p.289-91
“He that confesseth not that Jesus has come in the flesh and sent Joseph Smith with the fullness of the Gospel to this generation, is not of God, but is anti-christ” — Prophet Brigham Young, Journal of Discourses, vol. 9, p.312
“I tell you, Joseph holds the keys, and none of us can get into the celestial kingdom without passing by him. We have not got rid of him, but he stands there as the sentinel, holding the keys of the kingdom of God; and there are many of them beside him. I tell you, if we get past those who have mingled with us, and know us best, and have a right to know us best, probably we can pass all other sentinels as far as it is necessary, or as far as we may desire. But I tell you, the pinch will be with those that have mingled with us, stood next to us, weighed our spirits, tried us, and proven us: there will be a pinch, in my view, to get past them. The others, perhaps, will say, If brother Joseph is satisfied with you, you may pass. If it is all right with him, it is all right with me. Then if Joseph shall say to a man, or if brother Brigham say to a man, I forgive you your sins, “Whosoever sins ye remit they are remitted unto them;” if you who have suffered and felt the weight of transgression—if you have generosity enough to forgive the sinner, I will forgive him: you cannot have more generosity than I have. I have given you power to forgive sins, and when the Lord gives a gift, he does not take it back again.” — Apostle Orson Hyde, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 6, p.154-155
“It is to be feared that in course of a century, some gifted man like Paul, some splendid orator, who will be able by his eloquence to attract crowds of the thousands who are ever ready to hear, and be carried away by, the sounding brass and tinkling cymbal of sparkling oratory, may command a hearing, may succeed in breathing a new life into this modern Mahometanism, and make the name of the martyred Joseph ring as loud, and stir the souls of men as much, as the mighty name of Christ itself. Sharon, Palmyra, Manchester, Kirtland, Far West, Adam-ondi-Ahman, Ramus. Nauvoo, and the Carthage Jail, may become holy and venerable names, places of classic interest, in another age; like Jerusalem, the Garden of Gethsemane, the Mount of Olives, and Mount Calvary to the Christian, and Mecca and Medina to the Turk.” — Prophet Brigham Young, History of the Church, Vol. 7, p.40-41
Islam Better than Chistianity?
“The Greek and Roman Churches, which have been called Christian, and which take the name of Christians as a cloak, have worshipped innumerable idols. On this account, on the simple subject of the Deity and His worship, if nothing more, I should rather incline, of the two, after all my early traditions, education, and prejudices, to the side of Mahomet, for on this point he is on the side of truth, and the Christian world on the side of idolatry and heathenism.” — Apostle Parley P. Pratt, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 3, p.38
“..instead of saying that Mahometanism prevailed against Christianity, and that Christianity was in danger of being done away by its prevalence, we would rather say, that where Mahometanism prevailed, it taught and established one truth at least, viz., the true and living God, and so far as this went, it did preserve people from worshipping idols. And had the crescent waved on the tower of London, or on the church of St. Paul, instead of the cross, and had the Mahometan religion been enforced instead of the Roman religion that was enforced for a series of generations, and had tradition riveted what the sword enforced, then that nation and the surrounding nations would have been worshippers of one true God instead of idols; they would have recognized it in theory at least, whether they would have worshipped Him in spirit and in truth or not. But now [Christians] do not recognize Him in theory, for they acknowledge as their god an imaginary being without body, parts, or passions.” — Apostle Parley P. Pratt, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 3, p.39
“Now, if we take Mahometanism during those dark ages, and the corruptions that are so universally prevalent over the earth, and the idolatrous systems of religion, falsely called Christianity, and weigh them in a balance; with all my education in favor of Christian nations and Christian powers, and Christian institutions, so called, with all my prejudices of early youth, and habits of thought and reading, my rational faculties would compel me to admit that the Mahometan history and Mahometan doctrine was a standard raised against the most corrupt and abominable idolatry that over perverted our earth, found in the creeds and worship of Christians, falsely so named.” — Apostle Parley P. Pratt, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 3, p.40
“Though Mahometan institutions are corrupt enough, and need reforming by the Gospel, I am inclined to think, upon the whole, leaving out the corruptions of men in high places among them, that they have better morals and better institutions than many Christian nations; and in many localities there have been high standards of morals. So far as that one point is concerned, of worshipping the one true God under the name of Mahometanism, together with many moral precepts, and in war only acting on the defensive, I think they have exceeded in righteousness and truthfulness of religion, the idolatrous and corrupt church that has borne the name of Christianity.” — Apostle Parley P. Pratt, Journal of Discourses, Vol. 3, p.41
Much, much more of what the Mormon church really thinks of Catholics and Protestants, at the link.
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