RMN's "Correction"

[Palerider]

After listening to RMN's pushback in conference on all the blowback about the name of the church, I have to admit he made a compelling case.

The name of Christ's church should be the Church of Jesus Christ. But I have to disagree with his contention that because a church is "named" the church of Jesus Christ, therefore it must be his church. The two concepts aren't necessarily connected at all.

But the idea of making a "correction" of an error that had "crept into" the church opens an interesting line of thinking.

First of all, I have this quote by Joseph Smith elsewhere here on the site but would like to reiterate it here.

"One of the grand fundamental principles of Mormonism is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may."

I imagine if I dug a little further I could find more support for the use of this term by past prophets without much trouble. But allowing for RMN's proposition that this is an error that crept into the church, I'll stipulate that past prophets who used the term "Mormon" did so as a part of their human imperfection.

But one does have to wonder why the change after 188 years? Was Nelson the first one to take the D&C seriously? Or was he the first one for whom the discrepancy became an irritation? Was it really the Lord who impressed upon his mind this error after all this time? Or was it one of those cases where "this has been bothering me for a long time, the Lord must want me to do something about it."

Regardless, I'd like to offer another possible explanation for why the term "Mormon" so quickly attached itself to the church. And I'll use RMN's own proposition to support my thought.

Yes, the Book of Mormon title is obviously where the term comes from but if the "Mormon Bible" is critical to the belief system as are the writings of the prophet Mormon then maybe converts could rightly be called followers of Mormon or Mormons. Maybe...

But my second thought on this (and perhaps closer to the mark) is perhaps the Lord wanted the term "Mormon" attached to this church for the very reason RMN suggests. The real church of Jesus Christ would be known as just that. The Mormon church is known by the name Mormon, because they ARE Mormons....they are not the Church of Jesus Christ but are in reality just another iteration of Christianity albeit an odd one.

It is my contention that if the true Church of Jesus Christ were to appear on the earth there would be no trouble in recognizing it. It would be so blatantly obvious that all of these other churches lead by men would suddenly feel ridiculous at the thought of attempting to attract followers.

It would be the equivalent of three 9 year old kids who had found a violin and were each pretending they knew how to play it, having Itzhak Perlman walk into the room and show them how it's really done.

Mormons are called Mormons because in reality that's who they are. Just because they claim the official name "The Church of Jesus Christ" doesn't automatically mean that's their unrealized identity.

And just because Joseph Smith and his buddies dinked around with various iterations for the name of their church and finally wrote this one down in the Doctrine and Covenants of the Mormon church, doesn't make it a reality.


ETA: edited for spelling and clarification.

[alas]

I agree with you. We have scripture with Mormon’s name on it. It is claimed to be the keystone of our religion. And that different scripture is how we are different, so to differentiate us from the thousands of other Christian sects, people call us by our defining feature. Like the call Baptists “baptists” because that distinguishes them from the rest of Christianity, and identifies what makes them different. Not because they worship some God named “Baptize.”

Actually, we should be named prophetists, because we worship our prophets. Just run a test to see how much time we spend talking about, quoting, emphasizing our prophets. We dong have the children sing, “Follow the Savior” with a catchy little tune that the kids love. Nope, it is “Follow the prophet”.

[EternityIsNow]

But the idea of making a "correction" of an error that had "crept into" the church opens an interesting line of thinking.

First of all, I have this quote by Joseph Smith elsewhere here on the site but would like to reiterate it here.

"One of the grand fundamental principles of Mormonism is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may."

So the error started with Joseph Smith then. The devil has been laughing all along. Now it all makes sense...

I wonder if this is really about Nelson's shelf almost falling when he was first called as an Apostle. When he expected to meet Jesus and did not. He may have looked around to see why, what was wrong with the church, where is Jesus? (apologies to Waldo). Aha, the problem must be that the name Mormon has been muddying the waters all along, if we call it Jesus's church, then it will magically manifest itself into his real church, and Jesus will appear to Nelson... and everyone can chant Jesus is God and Nelson is his Prophet. Or something like that.

I think Monson and Hinkley were realists, they knew Jesus was probably never appearing to them, so they made the best of the situation, within the bubble of conservatism in their environment. Somehow they knew at some deep level that they were fan boys and not the real prophet thing, but Nelson does not want to go with the reality version of life. Nelson should re-read the NT to see who this Jesus character was before he continues this divine cosplay he is perpetuating. The man is dangerous because he believes his own fantasy.

[dogbite]

This has been his gospel hobby since the April 1990 conferencewhen he spoke tediuosuly on this topic. Hinkley pretty much blew him off with his own talks and usage anyway.

[Hagoth]

Actually, we should be named prophetists, because we worship our prophets.

Or Templars.

[Hagoth]

This has been his gospel hobby since the April 1990 conferencewhen he spoke tediuosuly on this topic. Hinkley pretty much blew him off with his own talks and usage anyway.

Yes, in the following conference Hinkley specifically referenced Nelson's talk and more or less laughed it off. Must have stung.

[Not Buying It]

President Nelson threw his predecessors under the bus. If we need this revelation in 2018, what the hell were all the other prophets doing for the past 188 years? Weren’t they getting this revelation too?

[moksha]

First of all, I have this quote by Joseph Smith elsewhere here on the site but would like to reiterate it here.

"One of the grand fundamental principles of Mormonism is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may."

There is a possibility this quote might become correlated into "One of the grand fundamental principles of COJCOLDSism is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may."

[Palerider]

First of all, I have this quote by Joseph Smith elsewhere here on the site but would like to reiterate it here.

"One of the grand fundamental principles of Mormonism is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may."

There is a possibility this quote might become correlated into "One of the grand fundamental principles of COJCOLDSism is to receive truth, let it come from whence it may."

I saw your pronunciation guide. Love it!!

[wtfluff]

This has been his gospel hobby since the April 1990 conferencewhen he spoke tediuosuly on this topic. Hinkley pretty much blew him off with his own talks and usage anyway.

Yes, in the following conference Hinkley specifically referenced Nelson's talk and more or less laughed it off. Must have stung.

Yup. If this re-branding effort were really as important as cRusty makes it out to be, he would have been lobbying the Q15 for at least the past 28 years to listen to the so-called deity that they supposedly worship to whisper to them of it's importance.

Instead, he just waited for his predecessors to die, so he could be come the profit of the re-branding of The Corporation of the President of the COJ-COLDS.

It really is the most important issue facing our society today. (Yes, that was sarcasm.)

[AdmiralHoldo]

In other news, President Nelson lifted his leg and literally 'marked his territory' all over the red velvet prophetic throne. "Take that, Gordo and Tommy," he was reported to say.

[Red Ryder]

Remember how we all feared the day Boyd K. Packer would become the prophet?

Nelson is filling the space just fine.

[Dravin]

The name of Christ's church should be the Church of Jesus Christ. But I have to disagree with his contention that because a church is "named" the church of Jesus Christ, therefore it must be his church. The two concepts aren't necessarily connected at all.

You can easily smash that idea with a quick Google of "Church of Christ" it is a very common name and if you do accept thinking that the name is some sort of proof it means Mormonisms claims of being the Church of Christ is shattered. To be fair that 'false' churches are named that doesn't necessarily mean the 'true' church won't be called that but it means the name is rather pointless as far as evidence goes, the farthest you can take it is you can rule out false churches because they don't call themselves "Church of Christ", it doesn't appreciatively narrow the field much and certainly doesn't point some unquestionable finger of veracity at Mormonism. So at best all of Russ' insistence on the name gets you is ETCOJCOLDS can't be rule out based solely on the name.

What's funny is as you ratchet up the rhetoric about how it is wrong you also increasingly undermine Mormonism up to this point. It's a bit like declaring, "I've always been a great husband, and to keep people from thinking otherwise I'm going to stop beating my wife."