Harry Reid

I guess this is a fact that more politically-minded people probably know - but Harry Reid, new Senate Majority Leader in January, is also a Mormon. It's interesting that his religion is not nearly the issue that Mitt Romney's is.

Heavenly Mother

I clicked on one of the links that Andrew Sullivan provided in his discussion of Mormon undergarments, and came across a fascinating website on Mormonism. One Mormon doctrine that I did not expect to find at all is that Mormons believe there is a Heavenly Mother alongside a Heavenly Father, and that together they produce the spirits of human beings.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints rejects the idea found in some religions that the spirits or souls of individual human beings are created ex nihilo. Rather it accepts literally the vital scriptural teaching as worded by Paul: "The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God." This and other scriptures underscore not only spiritual sibling relationships but heirship with God, and a destiny of joint heirship with Christ (Rom. 8:16-18; cf. Mal. 2:10).

Latter-day Saints believe that all the people of earth who lived or will live are actual spiritual offspring of God the Eternal Father (Num. 16:22; Heb. 12:9). In this perspective, parenthood requires both father and mother, whether for the creation of spirits in the premortal life or of physical tabernacles on earth. A Heavenly Mother shares parenthood with the Heavenly Father. This concept leads Latter-day Saints to believe that she is like him in glory, perfection, compassion, wisdom, and holiness.

Elohim, the name-title for God, suggests the plural of the Caananite El or the Hebrew Eloah. It is used in various Hebrew combinations to describe the highest God. It is the majestic title of the ultimate deity. Genesis 1:27 reads, "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him, male and female created he them" (emphasis added), which may be read to mean that "God" is plural.

Mormons believe that God the Father has a body like human beings, as does God the Son, while the Holy Spirit is a spirit.

Latter-day Saints perceive the Father as an exalted Man in the most literal, anthropomorphic terms. They do not view the language of Genesis as allegorical; human beings are created in the form and image of a God who has a physical form and image (Gen. 1:26). The Prophet Joseph Smith explained, "The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man's; the Son also; but the Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of Spirit" (D&C 130:22). Thus, "God is a Spirit" (John 4:24) in the sense that the Holy Ghost, the member of the Godhead who deals most often and most directly with humans, is a God and a spirit, but God the Father and God the Son are spirits with physical, resurrected bodies. Latter-day Saints deny the abstract nature of God the Father and affirm that he is a concrete being, that he possesses a physical body, and that he is in space and time.

On the idea that God the Father and Mother produce human spirits:

The Father, Elohim, is called the Father because he is the literal father of the spirits of mortals (Heb. 12:9). This paternity is not allegorical. All individual human spirits were begotten (not created from nothing or made) by the Father in a premortal state, where they lived and were nurtured by Heavenly Parents. These spirit children of the Father come to earth to receive mortal bodies; there is a literal family relationship among humankind. Joseph Smith taught, "If men do not comprehend the character of God, they do not comprehend themselves" (TPJS, p. 343). Gods and humans represent a single divine lineage, the same species of being, although they and he are at different stages of progress.

When I read this, I am reminded of the Shiur Qomah texts, which describe (the male) God in extremely anthropomorphic terms, as well as of the Enoch literature, in which Enoch ascends to heaven alive and is transformed into the highest angel (eventually gaining the name Metatron in the Hekhalot texts). It would be fascinating to learn what the intellectual/religious influences were upon Joseph Smith and other founders of the Mormon church, and whether they knew of the Enoch books or the other pseudepigrapha.

Andrew Sullivan and Mormonism

Andrew Sullivan has raised the question of whether Mormons are Christians, in connection with the probable Presidential candidacy of Mitt Romney (soon-to-be ex-Governor of Massachusetts), who is a Mormon. Among other things, he says in response to an e-mail: "And the inspiration for Mormonism's radically innovative understanding of the message and life of Jesus - Joseph Smith's "discovery" - is so alien to mainstream Christianity (and so transparently loopy) that I don't consider Mormons Christians. This is not to say I don't support their religious freedom or their right to play a full part of American politics and society. But they're not Christians as I understand Christianity" (italics mine). He later says that, "they are Christians of a very different stripe than most others."

His main discussion then turns to the racial politics of the Mormon church, and the fact that until the late 1970s black men could not be part of the Mormon priesthood (which is open to all men - and no women, a fact not noted by Sullivan). He thinks that this fact will probably cause problems for Romney should he run for President (and he might be correct, considering how troublesome George Allen's racist past - and present - was for him in his recent failed run for re-election to the Senate in Virginia).

He then, in a couple of recent postings, turns to the vital issue of Mormon undergarments (which adult Mormons wear after having gone through a ceremony in a Mormon temple), and publishes a photo of what they look like. He defends himself against a Mormon critic who was offended by his publication of the photo with these words: "My policy on this site is to publish reality, within certain boundaries of religious respect. If I can publish a cartoon of Muhammad, I can sure publish tasteful pictures of Mormon underwear."

I'm disturbed by the way that he's bringing up Romney's Mormonism. The racial history of the church seems relevant to me, as does the stand of the Mormon church against gay marriage or abortion - or in fact its stance on any political issue. But why engage in polemics against the idea that Mormons are Christians, or call Mormonism "transparently loopy"? Those of us who are not Christians sometimes raise our eyebrows at various aspects of Christian doctrine as taught by the Roman Catholic Church or the various Protestant churches - but our making fun of Christianity is not a reasoned argument against it. It seems to me that Sullivan is trying to make a principled argument that questions Romney's fitness for the presidency based on some of the doctrines, or former doctrines, of the LDS church. Engaging in mockery or calling Mormonism "loopy" doesn't advance his argument, and makes him sound bigoted.