Author: Bill McKeever
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Book of Mormon Graphic Leaves out Important Detail
Note: The following was originally printed in the April 2017 edition of Mormonism Update. To receive this publication every other month, you must be a financial support of $25 or more per month. An illustration in the February 2017 issue of Friend magazine, an LDS publication geared toward Mormon children. left out an important portion of the gold plates…
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Mormon Apostle Offers Solutions To Counter Information on the Web
Note: The following was originally printed in the February 2017 edition of the MRM Update, offered to financial supporters of Mormonism Research Ministry. To request to a free subscription of our other periodical, Mormonism Researched, please visit here. The December 2016 issue of Ensign magazine carried an article by Mormon Apostle M. Russell Ballard that expressed a concern…
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Grace unto Works
When speaking to individuals who place a strong emphasis on personal performance when it comes to being justified before God, one can unwittingly fail to emphasize that the New Testament has much to say about how we should live our lives as Christians. When we focus solely on what it takes to justify (make right)…
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Joseph Smith’s Alleged Ignorance of the Bible
On the FAIR-LDS.org website, an article responds to the question, “Did Joseph know what the italics in the Bible meant?” FAIR stands for the Foundation for Apologetics and Information Research, an organization made up of LDS apologists who attempt to defend Mormon positions. The article doesn’t explain why such a question is being asked, but…
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What Is So Amazing About the Mormon Version of Grace?
Note: The following was originally printed in the September/October 2016 edition of Mormonism Researched. To request a free subscription, please visit here. John Newton (1725-1807), the slave trader turned Anglican pastor, wrote many hymns during his lifetime, but none have enjoyed as much fame as “Amazing Grace.” According to Newton biographer, Jonathan Aitken, “Amazing Grace” is the “most sung,…
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Richard Mouw–Defending a Brand of Mormonism Many Mormons Don’t Believe
Note: The following was originally printed in the July/August 2016 edition of Mormonism Researched. To request a free subscription, please visit here. Dr. Richard J. Mouw, the former president of Fuller Seminary in Pasadena, CA, has been involved in Mormon-Evangelical dialogues for the past decade and a half. Yet, despite actively engaging the topic for such a long…
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Unexplaining the Mormon Priesthood Ban on Blacks
February 2015 Synopsis For much of its history, leaders of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints had a fairly standard explanation as to why those of African heritage were prohibited from holding any priesthood office in the church. The ban was officially lifted in June 1978 by the First Presidency, the top leaders…
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The Great and Abominable Church
In the March 2015 edition of Ensign magazine, Mormon Apostle Dallin Oaks discusses the topics of atheism, moral relativism, secular humanism and the “great and abominable church.” The article, titled, “Stand as Witnesses of God,” was a devotional address he gave in February of 2014. On page 30 he likens atheism to the teachings of…
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A Gift of Grace?
Editor’s Note: The following was originally printed in the May/June 2015 edition of Mormonism Researched. To request a free subscription, please visit here. At general conference in April 2015, Dieter F. Uchtdorf, a member of the LDS First Presidency, gave a message called “The Gift of Grace.” In it he said “salvation cannot be bought with the currency of obedience.”…
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Does Lorenzo Snow’s Famous Couplet No Longer Have a Functioning Place in LDS Theology?
“It is a ‘Mormon’ truism that is current among us and we all accept it, that as man is God once was and as God is man may become.” Apostle Melvin J. Ballard General Conference, April 1921 “From President Snow’s understanding of the teachings of the Prophet on this doctrinal point, he coined the familiar…
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LDS Newsroom Video Features Temple Garments
The following was originally printed in the January/February 2015 edition of Mormonism Researched. To request a free subscription, please visit here. Among the many unique aspects of the LDS faith, the peculiarity of the Mormon temple garment has attracted a lot of curiosity as well as ridicule among non LDS members. Known in Mormon circles as the…
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Redefining Celestial Marriage
Mormon temples and the rituals performed in them constitute one of the more important disciplines of the LDS faith. While a great portion of the activity in a Mormon temple is on behalf of the dead (baptisms for the dead, endowments for the dead, etc.), marriage ceremonies for the living, called celestial marriage, also plays…
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Response to the First Presidency on the Charge of Hatred
The following is a real letter written by Bill McKeever to the First Presidency of the LDS Church. April 4, 2007 The First Presidency The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints 50 East North Temple Salt Lake City, UT 84150-0002 Dear Sirs, As a Christian living in the Salt Lake Valley, I wish to…
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¿El Hombre Puede Ser Como Dios?
Aunque no se encuentra en los Libros Canónicos, una copla que define con precisión la enseñanza SUD que los hombres pueden llegar a ser Dioses fue expresada por el quinto Presidente SUD Lorenzo Snow. En junio de 1840, Snow declaró,“Como es el hombre, Dios antes era; Como es Dios, el hombre puede ser.” Esto ilustra…
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Who Is the One Mormons Call Elohim?
For centuries Christians have professed their belief in a God who is God alone (Is. 44:8), self-existent (Is. 43:10; 48:12), transcendent (Num. 23:19; Ps. 50:21), immutable (Ps. 102:27; Is. 46:10; Mal. 3:6), eternal (Ps. 90:2; 93:2), omnipresent (1 Kings 8:27; Prov. 15:3; Is. 66:1; Jer. 23: 23, 24), and incorporeal (John 4:24; Col. 1:15; 1…
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The Translation of the Book of Mormon plates
Chip Thompson from Solid Rock Cafe uses the illustration of the translation of the Book of Mormon plates for some fascinating discussions.
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The Virtue of Joseph Smith
Speaking at the general conference last October, Mormon Apostle Neil L. Andersen gave a talk simply titled “Joseph Smith.” Toward the end of his message, Andersen said, “I give you my witness that Jesus is the Christ, our Savior and Redeemer. He chose a holy man, a righteous man, to lead the Restoration of the…
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What About Those Essays?
When asked by the New York Times why The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints decided to post several “Gospel Topics” essays on its official web site, church historian Steven E. Snow said, “There is so much out there on the Internet that we felt we owed our members a safe place where they…
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Removing the “Doctrine” out of the Doctrine and Covenants
In the “Explanatory Introduction” to the Doctrine and Covenants, the book is described as “a collection of divine revelations and inspired declarations given for the establishment and regulation of the kingdom of God on the earth in the last days. Although most of the sections are directed to members of The Church of Jesus Christ…
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Modalism in the Book of Mormon
Does the Book of Mormon teach a Trinitarian concept of God? Some have assumed so because certain verses taken separately do seem to use Trinitarian language. However, taken as a whole, the Book of Mormon lends itself more to a modalistic understanding of God rather than Trinitarian. Modalism is an old heresy that attempts to…