Truth in Political Advertising

Don't do the Christian faith any favors, Al Sharpton. As it happens he certainly hasn't. Mitt Romney will bank a lot of credibility as a candidate, thanks to Al Sharpton's mouth, and unfortunately, a lot of people will probably be pulled further into the deception that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is actually a Christian denomination, instead of the cult of Christianity that it actually is, also thanks to Al Sharpton.

A self-described Pentecostal preacher whose credentials are somewhat mysterious, Al Sharpton has always had a penchant for being in the middle of sensational news stories. This one centers around his own hypocrisy. First he declares: "As for the one Mormon running for office, those who really believe in God will defeat him anyways, so don't worry about that; that's a temporary situation." Then after Mitt Romney calls Sharpton's statement bigoted (gasp), Sharpton turned on the spin. As is usual for him, he is anything but apologetic.

Despite his clumsy statement in this era of political correctness, what truly, did Sharpton say that was incorrect? I know that this blog post may offend many people, specifically Mormons, but what about truth in advertising? When Mitt Romney was campaigning in Florida some months back, a man in the crowd stood up and said something like, "You are a pretender, sir. You are not a Christian. You are a Mormon." The crowd went on to boo the man. The Bible has ample accounts of men who suffered for standing up for the true God of the Bible. That man in my view, has nothing to be ashamed of for doing what he did.

While most of the time I groan when I hear Al Sharpton speak, the core implication of his statement is true, namely that Mormonism is wrapped around a false god. No? Except for those universalists on the very radical fringe of Christianity, most Christians would readily identify Mormonism as a cult. Why is that? There are many reasons.

The LDS church may use the name of Jesus Christ in its title, but this is not the Jesus Christ of the Bible. The LDS church (Mormon) does not accept the full divinity of Jesus as Bible believing Christians do. They believe that Jesus was a created being, not fully God. It goes so much deeper than that though. Mormonism has been a cultic group in development for nearly two-hundred years, and what they believe is such a wretched twisting of Scripture that it is couched in secrecy, so as not to expose its ridiculousness.

If it sounds as though I'm being just a grouchy, mean guy with an axe to grind, that isn't the case. The fact is, it is often an unpleasant and offensive task to stand up for the truth, but I intend to do so anyway. Eighteenth century philosopher and statesman Edmund Burke said, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Since the main goal of the LDS church in the last decade or so has been to gain acceptance in the world as a mainstream Christian denomination, I do not intend to sit by and "do nothing." I don't like deception, whether it is the type that is engineered, or the type that is allowed simply because, "It's not hurting anybody."

In his effort to do damage control, Al Sharpton has now said Mormons, "don't believe in God the way I do, but, by definition, they believe in God." I don't know what Al Sharpton's theology is all about, but that statement is incorrect. Mormons do not believe in the God of the Bible.

Mark 12: "28 One of the scribes came and heard them arguing, and recognizing that He had answered them well, asked Him, "What commandment is the foremost of all?" 29 Jesus answered, "The foremost is, 'HEAR, O ISRAEL! THE LORD OUR GOD IS ONE LORD; 30 AND YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL YOUR STRENGTH.' "

Mormons believe that there are many gods. In fact, they believe that God was once a man like you and me, and that he had a God who fathered him, and so on and so on back through eternity. They believe there are as many Gods as there are stars in the heavens. Mormons believe that as humans, that we can earn our way into Godhood ourselves, and the right to govern a planet of our own, which we may populate from heaven with a heavenly spouse. I could go on and on about this subject, because the teachings Mormonism's founder, Joseph Smith, are so outlandish and ridiculous and so great in number that I could literally write a book about them.

In that passage in Mark, Jesus went on to say, "31 "The second is this, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' There is no other commandment greater than these." 32 The scribe said to Him, "Right, Teacher; You have truly stated that HE IS ONE, AND THERE IS NO ONE ELSE BESIDES HIM; 33 AND TO LOVE HIM WITH ALL THE HEART AND WITH ALL THE UNDERSTANDING AND WITH ALL THE STRENGTH, AND TO LOVE ONE'S NEIGHBOR AS HIMSELF, is much more than all burnt offerings and sacrifices." 34 When Jesus saw that he had answered intelligently, He said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." After that, no one would venture to ask Him any more questions."

Mormonism is just radically different from Biblical Christianity. That fact is well-known to current LDS prophet and president, Gordon B. Hinckley, and to those who are in positions of high authority within the LDS organization. That fact is easily demonstrated. You simply ask your local Mormon authority, "If I accept you as being a Christian, will you accept me as being a Mormon?" The answer will be a decided "No." This has largely to do with the fact that Mormonism is a religion wherein individual progression to holiness is based on the works of the believer in question.

Why claim that your religion is distinctly Christian, when it is not? Because an association with the true God of the Bible lends a credibility lacking to one's cult. This has been the trouble since the Garden of Eden. Satan mixed truth with lies to achieve his ends. I would have much more respect for the LDS organization if they would simply own what they believe--publicly, and stop denying their own doctrine, and let people accept it or reject it based on its merits.

In my nearly fifty years of life, I have never seen a movement like the one I now do within the LDS community. I grew up with, and attended school with many Mormon friends. I have worked on an off with Mormons at my job since I was sixteen. They used to be very open about their beliefs. The first Mormon guy I worked with detailed to me how the LDS leaders taught him that if he tithed properly, lived a righteous life and obeyed all the commandments of God that he could eventually progress to godhood and have a planet of his own to rule and that he could have his family with him for all eternity. I heard the same thing through high school and many other things which I decided to verify for myself, and did so by looking up these teachings in the Doctrine and Covenants, and the Pearl of Great Price. Oddly, most aberrant Mormon teachings are not to be found in the Book of Mormon. They are to be found in the "revelations" Joseph Smith claimed to have received directly from God, recorded in the Doctrine and Covenants.

I have talked with Mormon friends on different occasions and asked them why the LDS church believes certain doctrines, and often times they deny the doctrine in direct contradiction to what their own writings say. I even brought the chapters and verses to one Mormon co-worker who refused to read his own church writings, simply because they were presented to him by a non-Mormon. In the upcoming 2008 presidential campaign, we will no doubt hear Mitt Romney use Christian terminology, but keep in mind that the terms he may use will mean something completely different to the Mormon listener than to the Christian listener.

Mitt Romney seems to be a morally upright person, even if he is immersed in a doctrinally cultic theological system. My problem with him is that he seems to be a political opportunist of the first order, reminiscent of Al Gore. Al Gore was decidedly pro-life before he was tapped to run for the vice-presidency alongside Bill Clinton, and he immediately flipped his view to become as pro-choice a liberal as one can be. As Governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney was a Republican with decidedly liberal positions on abortion and same-sex marriage who had proudly touted his record in those areas. Anyone can change his mind, but it is the politically convenient timing of his complete flip-flop on those issues that inspires little confidence in him as a dependable candidate in my view.

Even when he was supporting pro-choice initiatives in Massachusetts, Governor Romney's position was conveniently ambiguous. He made statements as recently as 2005 such as, "Let’s let the states deal with it through a democratic process, rather than have a judiciary make a pronouncement of one size fits all." and, "each state should be able to make its own decision, and allow those states that are strongly pro-life to make laws that fulfill the will of their own citizens."

This kind of wishy-washy stance is one thing over a cup of coffee with friends, but it is far less than decisive and is not indicative of strong leadership. It is more indicative of a candidate who is seeking to appease the populace with enticingly strong relativism. If Barack Obama is the "rock star" of the Democratic party, Mitt Romney has emerged as the darling of the Republican party. Certainly, one can compare the political rhetoric of both of those candidates with close examination and see that it is largely built on promises with little substance.

There is a lot that can happen between this point and the 2008 White House. As I write, the first Republican debate is taking place in South Carolina, and candidates will have an opportunity to speak to the issues. It will be interesting to see who does, and who relies simply on their generally perceived personality appeal, and who will engage in political double-speak.