The first five years of the Mormon Church (1830-1835), Mormon Scripture taught the Protestant doctrine of Grace Alone.
The Book of Mormon actually teaches the doctrine of grace in many places. For example, here is 2 Nephi 2:4,6-8 (emphasis added):
4 [...] And the way is prepared from the fall of man, and salvation is free.
6 Wherefore, redemption cometh in and through the Holy Messiah; for he is full of grace and truth.
7 Behold, he offereth himself a sacrifice for sin, to answer the ends of the law, unto all those who have a broken heart and a contrite spirit; and unto none else can the ends of the law be answered.
[In other words, no one else can perfectly obey God's moral law codes, and will always fail to obey all of God's laws]
8 Wherefore, how great the importance to make these things known unto the inhabitants of the earth, that they may know that there is no flesh that can dwell in the presence of God, save it be through the merits, and mercy, and grace of the Holy Messiah, who layeth down his life according to the flesh, and taketh it again by the power of the Spirit, that he may bring to pass the resurrection of the dead, being the first that should rise.
[In other words, one's own merits cannot answer/fulfill the ends of the law codes of God. Thus, only through the grace-gift of the redeeming Spirit of Christ in you (implanted in you) can you be redemmed/exalted]
So the Book of Mormon is clear that one is saved (made immortal) and redeemed (exalted) through the Spirit (Pneuma) of Christ. Pneuma is pronounced "Nooma," and is a fluid substance that enters the body and redeems and glorifies it (see my post here). For it is the merits of Christ (as lived as the perfect Messiah on earth) that makes one perfectly holy, and not through their own merits.
Later LDS Scripture explains that the Spirit (
Pneuma) of Christ is transferred into humans though the Holy Spirit (
Sacred Pneuma), which redeems them by changing their Fallen/Adamic body into a celestial body. See my posts
here for more details. D&C 88:4 (dated 1832) teaches this by stating that the "Comforter [
Sacred Pneuma] is the promise which I [
Christ] give unto you of eternal life, even the glory of the celestial kingdom;" verse 17, "And the redemption of the soul is through him [
the merits of Christ] that quickeneth all things ..." This "quickening" is meant the transformation of the Fallen/Adamic mortal body into a resurrected celestial (
pneumatic) body of glory. This is clarified in verses 27-29 (emphasis added):
For notwithstanding they [who] die, they also shall rise again, [as] a spiritual body. They who are of a celestial spirit [
gifted the pneuma of Christ] shall receive the same body which was a natural body; even ye shall receive your bodies, and your glory [splendor] shall be that glory by which your bodies are quickened [
transformed]. Ye who are quickened by a portion of the celestial glory shall then receive of the same, even a fulness. [
This "fulness" is God's splendorous omnipresent Fluid Pneuma as explained in the 5th and 7th Lectures on Faith, published in 1835].
Verses 18-21:
Therefore, it [the Fallen/Adamic body] must needs be sanctified from all unrighteousness, that it may be prepared for the celestial glory; For after it hath filled the measure of its creation, it shall be crowned with glory, even with the presence of God the Father; That bodies who are of the celestial kingdom may possess it forever and ever; for, for this intent was it made and created, and for this intent are they sanctified. And they who are not sanctified through the law which I have given unto you, even the law of Christ [the Law of Christ per the Book of Mormon] ...
The rest of the section 88 goes on to discuss the importance of abiding in "the law" to avoid
filthness, but again, the law here in context is the law of Christ as described in the Book of Mormon, which is simply
repentance unto baptism. In other words, the Book of Mormon is clear that repentance was practiced before baptism, afterward you simply
endured persecution as a Christian to be redeemed (rested in the Lord). For it was your "baptism of fire" (fiery
pneuma) which redeems you (by the
merits of Christ) and not your own merits. So exaltation with a celestial body is a free gift of grace, yet one is to ideally be greatful for the gift by reciprocating it by being loving and kind as a gift to others, while trying to aviod "sin," etc. As D&C 88: 86 goes on to say, "Abide ye in the liberty [
freedom through grace alone] wherewith ye are made free [
free of the heavy yoke of the Mosaic law code via the easy yoke of Christ: love]; entangle not yourselves in sin, but let your hands be clean, until the Lord comes."
A careful study of the LDS Church after 1900, shows that it began to reject the original teachings of grace in LDS scripture and began to instead teach pious perfectionism and to be exalted via one's own pious merits. Yet I have seen some positive changes in the LDS Church (AKA the
Brighamite sect) when it comes to reducing shame cycles, perfectionism, and chronic feelings of inadequacy. For example, the current LDS President (as of 2023), gave a talk in the past titled
Perfection Pending. Meanwhile, the Utah-based LDS Church has made somewhat of a radical shift in the last several years toward emphasizing grace over works, which is not what I grew up hearing as an LDS youth. For example, in
this recent debate (by A Thoughtful Faith podcast), the Latter-day Saints in this video strongly emphasize the saved by grace doctrine (found in the Book of Mormon itself) while they reinterpret or underplay the past teachings of LDS leaders on works-based exaltation (not by grace alone). This is an interesting change.
There has been books by LDS scholars making attempts to shift LDS culture in a healthier direction as well after 2005. For example, Terryl and Fiona Givens' books
The Christ Who Heals and
All Things New, attempt to correct past
Brighamite traditions, which has been steeped in Augustinian and Protestant dogma; and move the culture toward what they see as Joseph Smith's
actual Restoration (away from Protestantism and Augustinianism).
[In an August 2021] Stake Leadership meeting at the Herriman Utah Rose Canyon Stake, Area Seventy Richard N. Holzapfel responds to comments from the youth about being able to recognize the spirit - but also on pornography and body shaming. His comments reflect a significant shift in the framing of these issues for the youth.
[In an August 2021] Stake Leadership meeting at the Herriman Utah Rose Canyon Stake, Area Seventy Richard N. Holzapfel asked a couple of youth how they felt about repentance. He told them to be honest and authentic. His response to their frank answer was a remarkable assessment of the impact of decades of what he described as hurtful teachings about repentance, purity and perfection.
The video transcript reads:
This has been really great … now … let's be honest here these are two amazing young men and young women. I mean really be honest, these are great so if they're telling you this think of what other kids are saying, think about other adults what they're thinking. Unfortunately, some of you know that Elizabeth Smart as a young girl was stolen from her bedroom in the middle of the night by a by a nut and he raped her repeatedly and did awful things, awful things, because Elizabeth Smart grew up on the east bench of Salt Lake in a very wealthy, exclusive Latter-day Saint community in Salt Lake. She had some ideas in her brain and one of them was that she now was like a old piece chewed gum. Who wants a piece of chewed gum? She didn't realize that man could not take her virtue. She wasn't like a piece of wood that the nail was in it and repentance is removing the nail but the hole is still there. Some phrases that we've used in seminary and in young men and young women, in Sunday Schools for decades in this Church that have hurt the rising generation; and so we've got to get this clear about what repentance is and I suggest that we read President Nelson deeply and President Elder Anderson, I think Lihona, I can't remember [if it is the] February issue, I'm not going to promote his book, his book is great though, everybody should read his book but the article in the Liahona which is free you we should read that and we should accept the prophetic teachings of today. We don't want to go back to the to The Miracle of Forgiveness by President Kimball. You know what he said in his diary before he died, [he said] if I could go back I would rewrite that book. So let's let's drop the dead prophets and embrace the living [prophets]! So President Nelson, apostles and prophets such as Elder Todd Christopherson in particular but Elder Anderson, who's really come on strong this last year in teaching … that the number one problem we have is perfectionism, it's among both the young men and young women but principally the young women are struggling with perfectionism; and there's things that we say, do your best. What's the best? I never can do my best, we have to look at our language, how it's being read, how it's been understood.
Despite these changes however, LDS (Brighamite) culture continues to be rather perfectionistic as a
high demand religion: often causing feelings of inadequacy and perfectionism and scrupulosity (religious obsessive compulsiveness). So as an unncorrelated, Independent Mormon, I plan to not ever feel obligated to enter a bishop or stake presidents office. This is based on past negative experiences, as well as my reading of
Living on the Edge of the Inside: A Survival Guide by Christian Kimball, and realizing that there's just too many problems with that legalistic way of being a Brighamite Mormon (that simply doesn't work for me personally). Yet I am not against the Brighamite sect and and see it as a net good. But I would ideally like to see the day when there is no longer
any manner of "-ites," and all
Smith-Rigdon Restoration branches become one.
I do think that one can be a mentally healthy Brigamite Mormon if one has good boundaries which I discuss in my
introductory post to this blog. The site
StayLDS.com has good advice on handling the worthiness interview process for those who wish to go down that route. I also think that for serious crimes like murder or incest or rape one can benefit from an ecclesiastical system that disfellowships or even excommunicates (in these specific instances), on top of confessing their crime to law enforcement.
So this blog series will not be an attempt to encourage all Latter-day Saints to avoid attending the temple or paying tithing or any like that. I am a
Big Tent Mormon and respect and support any Mormon in any direction they wish to take. I have just chosen to take a different Restoration path that does not involve worthiness interviews or attending the temple. This
blog series will explain why I came to this conclusion.
I will provide evidence in LDS Scripture and early Church history itself, that does not support invasive worthiness interviews. I will show how the word "repentance" itself does not describe an ongoing process of confessing to clergyman; but instead repentance is about re-choosing the
rightwise path toward God. I will explain in detail why I disagree with the Brighamite "covenant path," which in brief is because LDS Scripture itself actually teaches instead "saved by grace alone" through a kind of "spiritual
gene therapy" and deification. I will argue that you cannot perfect yourself and
earn your exaltation but instead you are already rooted in the "
true vine" with a
body of glory through faith in the merits of Christ; and like a branch on a vine blooming and bearing fruit, you are simply called to become who you already are
in Christ as a luminous being.
I have argued in
this blog series that the temple itself and it's
Freemasonic rituals and emphasis on procreation and a God of sexual parts and passions, was aimed at changing the
consciousness of the Saints; and those rituals achieved their goal by 1890 and therefore the temple ritual in my opinion is not necessary for one's exaltation. Instead, one's degree of exaltation is one's
bodily state. One is either of the seed of Adam and in that bodily state, or through faithful loyalty one has undergone a kind of
spiritual gene therapy through the seed of Christ through faith: becoming literal children of Christ (as the Book of Mormon itself teaches) and thus co-heirs with Christ.
In chapter 1 of his book Passing the Heavenly Gift, Denver S. came to a similar conclusion regarding the temple ordinances, writing:
Interestingly, the language of [D&C] Section 20 also defines the process for salvation and justification. The doctrine is important still. Quoting from the original published version in 1833 (then Section 24):
And we know, that all men must repent and believe on the name of Jesus Christ, and worship the Father in his name, and endure in faith on his name to the end, or they cannot be saved in the kingdom of God. And we know, that Justification through the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, is just and true; And we know, also, that sanctification through the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, is just and true, to all those who love and serve God with all their mights, minds, and strength, but there is a possibility that men may fall from grace and depart from the living God. Therefore, let the church take heed and pray always, lest they fall into temptation; Yea, and even he that is sanctified also. [16]
These doctrines of justification and sanctification, along with the church offices which allowed ordinances of baptism, laying on hands and administration of the sacrament were established without regard to priesthood. Priesthood and church office were not originally conflated; they would later become so. But that is a revisionist view of the events.
Denver continues to explain that the ordinances like in the temple are merely symbolic and ceremonial, pointing you to develop your own direct experience of resting in the Lord:
Most of the ordinances of the [LDS] church are not the real thing. They are types, symbols of the real thing. They are official invitations ... The [LDS] church and its ordinations and ordinances does not confer power. They invite the recipients to press forward into God’s presence and receive Him, where the actual endowment of peace, joy, promises of eternal life, and power are conferred by Him [Christ] who has the right to bestow them. The keeper of that gate is the Holy One of Israel, and He employs no mortal servant there.[31] If men could confer more than an ordination, there would be nothing to prevent corrupt, wicked men from selling salvation to their friends, family and those they favor even if unworthy; or from barring salvation to others who are worthy, based on petty jealousies and envy. This idea of men holding God’s power is what led to the corruptions of Catholicism.
In other words, the ordiances are a shadow of the goal itself, which is to enter the presence of the Lord. Denver goes into much more detail in his book.
Believing one is saved by grace through the merits of Christ alone, and not by achieving a "worthiness status," does not mean that one's righteous/
rightwise deeds and loving acts don't glorify God (according to LDS Scripture); for the Christian is called to let their light shine with caring acts of charity and affection. It just means that one is not "chasing worthiness" but one has been
made worthy of "God's presence" through the merits of Christ alone. So that it is not about checking off boxes to earn one's ticket to heaven. Instead, heaven is the state of luminous beings, as God is like the sun as a radiant Force that requires every being in His presence to have a luminous body like His Messengers in the Divine Council. So that it's not about checking boxes or acting pious or "holier than thou." It's about a transformation of one's character through a renewing of the mind and becoming a new creation.
Furthermore, m
y study of the word "repent" in LDS scripture reveals that the word repent simply means to have a change of mind or heart, which even LDS church President Nelson has affirmed. The context of repentance in LDS scripture (especially between the years 1832 to 1844 when Joseph Smith was the prophet, seer and revelator), is largely based on the language of the Methodist camp meetings at the time. Thus, in the proper historical context, the word repent meant for the first Mormons (reading the Book of Mormon in the mid 1800s) that they should undergo a change of heart and mind and move away from a life of S.I.N. (Selfish, Impulsive, Nobodying) and receive the Pneuma (pronounced Nooma), being born anew through the baptism of fire. The original concept of repentance and confession was along the lines of changing your mind, admitting your fallibility, confessing your misdeeds to those you have harmed -- by apologizing and making restitution -- and publicly confessing your faults in public to those standing before you at the waters of baptism while conveying your commitment to a new life. In other words, it was the equivalent of an AA meeting and was not a one-on-one "worthiness" interview of sitting before a single male priest behind closed doors.
The Book of Mormon on the repentance process:
The current Utah-based LDS Church (Brighamite sect) has set up gatekeepers to interview you before entering through the gates of the temple into the realm of the Holy One; but in my view this is against Scripture. As we read in 2 Nephi 9: 41 (emphasis added):
O then, my beloved brethren, come unto the Lord, the Holy One. Remember that his paths are righteous. Behold, the way for man is narrow, but it lieth in a straight course before him, and the keeper of the gate is the Holy One of Israel; and he employeth no servant there; and there is none other way save it be by the gate; for he cannot be deceived, for the Lord God is his name.
Mosiah 3: 13 basically explains in the years before 30 AD, that if people merely believed in Christ before he had come, that they'd receive a remission of their sins. It's basically a born again doctrine of believe and you'll be saved (reconstituted and made holy), resting in the Lord. It is made all the more clear that believing in Christ -- by faith and baptism alone, and taking upon oneself his name and receiving his seed, saves (reconstitutes you) -- because in this case, Christ has not even come yet in Mosiah 3; but just believing that he will come, this believing (trusting assurance) that he will come and will fulfill the role of the Messiah, will remove sins from them and saves (reconstitutes them). In other words, when you take on the name of Christ, his seed (DNA) is implanted into you and grows in you and swells and reconstitutes you (see Alma 32) forming you into a holy one like Christ who is a holy being (see Lecture 7).
In the Book of Mormon, wickedness has more to do with how you treat people socially: whether or not you give in to classism and elitism or are stiffnecked and pridefully self-centered and contentious with murderous hate. Note as well that the Book of Mormon updates the concept of the atonement in Alma 7:12:
And [Jesus] will take upon him death, that he may loose the bands of death which bind his people; and he will take upon him their infirmities, that his bowels may be filled with mercy, according to the flesh, that he may know according to the flesh how to succor [1828 dictionary: support; assistance that relieves and delivers from difficulty, want or distress] his people according to their infirmities.
I interpret this as Terryl and Fiona Givens do, as Jesus experienced our infirmities (our woundedness, suffering, hurts), but not to simply "remove" them from us. He experienced our infirmities (woundedness), so that he'd gain our experience which he needed in order to support us as a consoling friend when we experience infirmities. In other words, he knows exactly what we are going through and wants us to be healed and empowered. Like a friend dusting us off and picking us up to go on fighting the good fight.
Hence, the emphasis is on the healing Christ, healing our traumas and woundedness, not the "sanitizing" Christ leading to perfectionism and pharasical ideas and "purity policing."
The Doctrine and Covenants on repentance and clergyman getting involved in the process:
In D&C 121: 34-37 we read (emphasis added):
Behold, there are many called, but few are chosen. And why are they not chosen? Because their hearts are set so much upon the things of this world, and aspire to the honors of men, that they do not learn this one lesson –That the rights of the priesthood are inseparably connected with the powers of heaven, and that the powers of heaven cannot be controlled nor handled only upon the principles of righteousness. That they may be conferred upon us, it is true; but when we undertake to cover our sins, or to gratify our pride, our vain ambition, or to exercise control or dominion or compulsion upon the souls of the children of men, in any degree of unrighteousness, behold the heavens withdraw themselves; the Spirit of the Lord is grieved; and when it is withdrawn, Amen to the priesthood or the authority of that man.
Many LDS Leaders have in the past (and even today), sought "to exercise control or dominion or compulsion," by for example demanding a young woman going into extreme detail about their sexual experiences during a "worthiness interview," or body shaming them (as the Area 70 covered above). Or a leader demanding the LDS member believe exactly as the LDS leader does (as John Dehlin experienced during his excommuncation process). Or withholding a temple recommend from a person who doesn't choose to wear the LDS garment as much as they are supposed to (according to the dictates of the LDS leader). This "controllingness" is not the case with
every LDS leader, but the Brighamite system is set up to allow extreme forms of legalism based on the personality and temperment of the leader. So that if an LDS member has poor boundaries due to their belief that they need to be work to be perfect and achieve a "worthy status," they can be susceptible to "spiritual manipulation" and suffer religious trauma syndrome. This can be remedied if the LDS member understands that the actual
restored gospel (in LDS Scripture) teaches that you are
already worthy through the grace gift of Christ (being "
in Christ"), regardless of what an LDS leader thinks or does (based on the current legalistic policies of the Brighamite sect). For example, we saw above that the policy I grew up with, of Leaders often encouraging you to read
The Miracle of Forgiveness (and similar books and pamphlets) caused serious psychological harm, and is
now considered wrong (as expressed from the pulpit by the Area 70 quoted above)!
